And now he was gone. And I had a funny idea, no matter how I tried to shake it, that he wasn’t going to come sauntering back into the room and throwing around ironic one-liners.

So you go find him, just like he said. Right?

Except I didn’t have a clue where to begin looking. My thinker was pretty busted.

The bathtub was a big cast-iron thing, and the shower looked older than I was. There was a brandnew plastic shower curtain on a ring bolted to the wall. The water ran rusty-red into the scrubbed

white bowl of the sink for a few minutes when I turned it on, then cleared and warmed up.

I tried not to think about it.

I found I was crying silently. I didn’t look in the mirror above the sink. There was a cabinet built into the wall with fresh white towels that smelled of fabric softener. I muffled the sobs in one of them

while the shower ran, then got in and washed my aching self free of the sweat and the snot and the

tears and the stickiness of fear, not to mention the stink of rotting vampire blood. There was shampoo. Conditioner. Soap in a waxed paper wrapping with French stuff written on the outside. Someone had remembered a toothbrush and the Crest from my room.

It was like being in a hotel room again. Only this time Dad wasn’t outside the door, watching TV

while he loaded clips or cleaning his guns or looking through his contacts list. No, outside the door

there was a listening silence, as if Christophe knew I was crying.

And I hated it.

Jealousy

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

There was a tiny table near the hall door, and when I finally stalked out of the bathroom with a

handful of damp towels balled up around my underwear, I found out what it was used for. There

was a tray on it, with a paper coffee cup. A covered dish, polished silver so it shone. A stack of buttered wheat toast, visibly steaming, and a small bowl of strawberries and blueberries. A little silver

thing of cream.

All in all, it looked like the regular Schola breakfast. Down in the caf you don’t get the silver. But

everything else, sure, spare no expense and feed the kids good. Even if they aren’t kids.

“I wasn’t sure what you’d want.” Christophe picked up the paper latte cup. He was back to the faint

mockery. The shotgun was nowhere in sight. “Leontus insisted about this, though.”

It was a banana latte. I took it from him gingerly, not touching his fingers. I guess some things are

reliable. “I, um. Yeah. Thanks. Christophe—”

“I don’t blame you.” Quietly. “You’ve been shuttled from one place to another like a chess piece. A