He crossed Main Street just up from the courthouse and his confidence began to grow. So much so, in fact, that he barely flinched when he turned the corner from Elm Street onto Walnut and found six of them coming toward him.

They were mostly older men, in their late fifties to early sixties, and wore faces that Del had seen only in passing in the drugstore or the town square. There was a girl there too, about Bart’s age. Of the lot of them, it was she who spoke. “Aren’t you coming to the hill?” Her eyes, like all the others he’d seen, were deep and empty and threatened to draw him in unless he averted his own gaze.

“The hill?”

There was genuine surprise in her dead face. “Of course. Haven’t you heard him calling us? He’s there,” she motioned to the north, where the land swelled up and an old house he knew only as the Shady Rest stood. “He needs us. Come.” She took his arm.

Del was panicky. What if she felt his warmth through the coat sleeve? He quickly pulled away. “Uh . . . I’m still hungry. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

She stared at him and made an odd face. Del finally realized it was meant to be a smile. “You’re a real pig,” she said, reaching out to run a cold finger along his lip and dab at the artificial blood. She tasted it. The boy’s breath caught. She rolled her tongue about, considering, and then grimaced. “No wonder you’re still hungry. But hurry. You don’t want to keep him waiting.” The lot of them stepped around him and continued along Walnut Street, heading north.

“One last thing,” Del blurted after them, even before he realized he was saying it. “What about the Miller woman? Was she taken to the hill?” Oh, Lord, now you’ve done it, they’ll figure you out and then your ass is grass . . .

They looked at him in a dull, unreadable manner for a long time, and he did not dare to even breathe. Then the girl simply replied, “Yes,” and they resumed their trek to the hill.

Del stood there alone in the middle of the sidewalk and felt a shiver of dread wrack his small frame. Danner had his mother—it was his worst nightmare. And they would be surrounded by other vampires. What could he do alone?

Dammit, Stiles, where are you when I need you!

The night air split with the echoes of a gunshot that came rolling up the street. It awakened the boy, shook him from his fearful paralysis. A gunshot—that meant someone was fighting back. Someone was still alive! His mind raced as he ran south on Walnut, straining his ears to sort through the fading echoes, his eyes to make out the names on the mailboxes as he went. It could be anyone, he rationalized. Anyone who had held out that long. But on this street . . .