Stolen

BURNED

We'd elected to eat at an Italian restaurant. Bad choice. Though it was nearly eight, the place was crowded. This part of Vermont didn't offer much in the way of fine dining, so it seemed as if everyone within a fifty-mile radius who didn't like hamburgers was here. There was no hope of getting a table for seven, so we agreed to split up. When the server found us a table for six and a table for two, Cassandra offered to take the small table. At first, I thought she wanted to eat alone, which wouldn't have surprised me, but instead she invited me to join her. I wasn't the only one shocked by that. Paige stared at me as if trying to figure out what could possibly possess Cassandra to pick me as her dining companion. I think she'd have been less surprised if Cassandra invited me to be dinner instead. Even Kenneth blinked, which seemed a sure sign that a dinner invitation from Cassandra was not a common event. I'll admit, I was flattered. Cassandra didn't seem the type who'd need, much less want, company.

Cassandra and I sat apart from the others, out on the patio. I wondered whether she'd eat dinner. She ordered chicken parmigiana and white wine. While she drank the wine, she only had a few bites of the chicken, then shifted the food around on her plate to make it look as if she'd eaten more. Maybe she was eating later. I really didn't want to think about that. Culinary squeamishness may seem absurd coming from someone who chows down on raw rabbit, but there was a difference between what appealed to me as a wolf and what appealed to me as a human. As good as freshly killed deer tasted after a hunt, I didn't like to think about it while eating seafood linguine.

"You're curious," Cassandra said after our meals arrived. "But you don't ask questions. Odd for a journalist."

How much had Ruth and Paige told everyone else about me?

"Depends on the type of journalist," I said. "I do politics and social issues. Strictly public-life stuff. Very little dirt-digging of a personal nature."

"So you avoid personal questions. Probably because you don't want anyone asking them back. If you're curious, you can ask. I don't mind."

"Okay," I said… and asked nothing.

After a few minutes of silence, I decided I really should ask something. Not just anything, but the big question. After all, it was staring me in the face, from Cassandra's barely touched dinner.

I gestured at her plate. "So, I guess you're not big on chicken."

"Solids in general. I can eat a few bites, but more gives me a nasty case of indigestion."

She waited, face expressionless, but a smile shimmering in her eyes.

"There's no sense asking, is there?" I said, sipping my wine. "Asking if vampires-you know-would be like asking if werewolves change into wolves. It's the hallmark of the species."

"Actually, in my case, you'd be mistaken. I know, I know, you read so many stories. But they're just not true. I most emphatically do not sleep in a coffin." She paused, then arched her eyebrows. "Oh, isn't that what you meant?"

"I meant, obviously you drink-" I gestured at my wineglass.

"Burgundy? I prefer white. Yes, I can drink wine. Thank heaven for small mercies. It's only solids that give me trouble. Let me help you out, Elena. I believe the word you're looking for is 'blood.'"

"That's it. Slipped my mind."

She laughed, a throaty laugh that startled the server coming out the patio door. We ordered refills on our wine, then waited until he'd left.

"So what is it these days?" I said. "Home deliveries from the blood bank?"

"Afraid not."

"A special deal with the butcher?"

"The FDA would likely disapprove. Sadly, we're stuck getting our meals the old-fashioned way."

"Ah."

"Ah, indeed," she said with another laugh. "Yes, I drink it straight from the source. Some rules, though. No children. No one under thirty. Makes it more sporting."

"Did I mention I'm twenty-eight?"

"That's not what I heard." She grinned. "No need to worry. Common courtesy dictates that we never drain the lifeblood of anyone to whom we've been formally introduced."

She cut a few bits of chicken and moved them around on her plate. "To be honest, I've tried animal blood and blood banks. They don't work. Living that way is like subsisting on bread and water. We exist, but barely. Some still do it. I'm too selfish. If I'm alive, I want to be completely alive. The only apology I can make is that I try to choose those who welcome death, the old, the sick, the suicidal. I'm deluding myself, of course. I can tell that a man wants to die, but I have no way of knowing if he's about to climb a twenty-story building or is temporarily depressed over a broken affair. Life would be so much simpler if we lost our souls when we were reborn, if we forfeited the ability to feel, to know right from wrong. But I suppose that's why they call it a curse. We still know."

"But you don't have a choice."

"Oh, there's always a choice. Self-annihilation. Some do it. Most consider it, but the will to survive is ultimately too strong. If it means the choice between their death and mine, altruism be damned. The motto of the truly strong. Or the incredibly selfish."

We were quiet a moment, then she said, "I take it werewolves aren't cannibals, then?"

"You mean eating humans, not other werewolves, which strictly speaking, would be cannibalism."

"You don't consider yourselves human?"

"To varying degrees. Myself, I still think half-human, half-wolf. Cla-Others don't. They consider werewolves a separate species. I'm not avoiding the question. Pack wolves are forbidden to eat humans. We wouldn't anyway. It doesn't make sense. Eating humans wouldn't serve any other purpose than to sate a hunger that can as easily be satisfied with a deer."

"It's that easy then?"

"I wish. Unfortunately, there's not just the hunger. There's the hunting instinct, and I'll admit, humans satisfy that far better than any animal."

Cassandra's eyes glittered. "The Most Dangerous Game."

The thought struck me then, how odd it was to be discussing this with another woman. I shook it off and continued, "Trouble is, it's hard to hunt without killing. It's possible, but dangerous, risking the chance you won't be able to stop yourself before the kill. Non-Pack werewolves hunt, kill, and eat people. The temptation is too great, and most aren't interested in controlling their impulses."

The server came out then to get our dessert order. I was about to pass, as I usually did when dining with other women, then realized it didn't matter. Cassandra wouldn't care if I ate three pieces of cake. So I ordered tiramisu and a coffee. Cassandra seconded the coffee. As the server turned to leave, Cassandra reached out and grabbed his wrist.

"Decaf actually," she said.

As she spoke, she kept her hand on his wrist, thumb outstretched across his pulse. The server was young and Latin-handsome, big dark eyes and smooth olive skin. Did he notice she held his arm too long? Not a chance. As she called him back and changed her order, she kept her eyes on his like he was the most fascinating thing in the room. And he stared back like a mouse entranced by a cobra. If she'd asked him to step into the back alley with her, he'd have tripped over his feet to obey. When she finally released his arm, he blinked, then something like disappointment crossed his face. He promised to hurry with the coffees and returned to the dining room.

"Sometimes I almost can't resist," Cassandra said after he'd gone. "Even when I'm not hungry. The intoxication of power. A nasty but unbreakable addiction, don't you think?"

"It's… tempting."

Cassandra laughed. "You don't have to pretend with me, Elena. Power is a glorious thing, especially for women. I spent forty-six years as a human woman in seventeenth-century Europe. I'd have killed for a chance at power." Her lips curved in a wicked grin. "But I guess I did, didn't I? The choices one makes." She leaned back and studied me, then smiled again. "I think you and I will get along quite well, A rare treat for me, meeting a huntress who isn't another self-absorbed vampire."

Our coffees and my dessert arrived then. I asked Cassandra what it was like to live as long as she had, and she regaled me with stories for the rest of the meal.

After dinner, Adam repeated Paige's offer to join them on the way back to the Legion Hall. Again, I was about to decline, but this time Jeremy overheard and insisted I go along, probably hoping the two youngest delegates would talk more freely without their elders around. In an aside, he promised to follow us in the Explorer.

Unlike Jeremy, Adam hadn't found parking in the small lot behind the restaurant, so the three of us left the others and headed up a side street. Ahead, on the other side of the road, I saw the old Jeep from the Legion Hall parking lot, the one with the California plates.

"Yours?" I asked Adam.

"Unfortunately."

"That's some drive."

"A long drive. In a Jeep, a very, very long drive. I think I shook loose two fillings this time. Getting above the speed limit is nearly impossible. And passing? Forget it. It'd be easier driving over slow traffic. Next time, I'm saving my pennies so I can fly out."

"You say that every time," Paige said. "Robert would buy you a plane ticket any day, but you always refuse. You love driving that piece of crap."

"The blush is wearing off the romance. One more-Shit! "

I looked up to see a massive Yukon backing into the spot in front of Adam's Jeep. The gap was barely big enough to fit a compact. The behemoth SUV kept reversing until it was mere inches from the Jeep's front bumper. Another car was parked less than a foot from the Jeep's rear end.

"Hey!" Adam called as he jogged toward the Yukon. "Hold on!"

A forty-something woman in the passenger seat turned and fixed Adam with an expressionless stare.

"I'm stuck in behind you," he said, flashing a wide grin. "Could you just pull forward a second? I'll get her out of there and you'll have lots of room."

The passenger window was down, but the woman didn't answer. She looked over at the driver's seat. No words were exchanged. The driver's door opened and a man in a golf shirt got out. His wife did the same.

"Hey!" Adam called. "Did you hear me? You boxed me in. If you can pull forward, I'll be out of there in a flash."

The man clicked his remote. The alarm chirped. His wife fell in step beside him and they headed for the restaurant.

"Assholes," Paige muttered. "Own a fifty-thousand-dollar gas-guzzler and you own the whole damned road."

"I'll talk to them," I said. "Maybe he'll listen to a woman."

"Don't." She grabbed my arm. "We'll catch up with the others and come back for the Jeep later."

"I'm only going to talk to them."

She glanced at Adam, who was starting after the couple. "It's not you I'm worried about."

The man turned now, lip curling as he threw some insult at Adam.

"What did you say?" Adam yelled back.

"Oh, shit," Paige murmured.

The man turned his back on Adam.

"What did you say?" Adam shouted.

As Adam advanced on the man, I made a split-second decision to interfere. We were trying to lie low and couldn't afford to call attention to ourselves with a brawl that might involve the police. Adam should have known this, but I guess even the most easygoing young men can be subject to surges of testosterone.

As I turned to go after Adam, Paige grabbed my arm.

"Hold on," she said. "You don't-"

I shook her off and started running, ignoring her trailing footsteps and warning shouts. As I drew closer to Adam, I smelled fire. Not smoke or burning wood or sulfur, but the subtler odor of fire itself. Ignoring it, I grabbed Adam's wrist and whirled him around.

"Forget it," I said as he turned. "Jeremy can drive us-"

Adam faced me now, and I knew where the smell of fire came from. His eyes glowed crimson. The whites were luminescent red, sparking absolute, bottomless rage.

"Get your hands off me," he rumbled.

There was no trace of Adam's voice in the words, no sign of him in his face. Heat emanated from his body in waves. It was like standing too close to a bonfire. Sweat sprang from my pores. I turned my face from the heat, still holding his wrist. He grabbed me, each hand gripping a forearm. Something sizzled. I heard that first, had a second to wonder what it was, then blinding pain seared through my arms. He let go and I stumbled backward. Red welts leaped up on either forearm.

Paige grabbed me from behind, steadying me. I shoved her away and turned back to Adam. He was striding toward a vacant alley.

"He's okay," Paige said. "He'll get it under control now."

The Explorer rounded the corner. I waved my arms for Jeremy to stop and yanked open the passenger door before the SUV hit a full stop. As I jumped in, Jeremy's gaze went to my burned arms and his mouth tightened, but he said nothing. He waited until I was inside, then hit the accelerator.