Awake at Dawn

Chapter Twenty-two

  That afternoon, Kylie decided to skip the picnic dinner at the swimming hole. First, she didn't have a bathing suit that would fit; second, she really wanted to make a few calls to see if she could locate any Brightens who might know something about her real dad. And third, well, she hoped the ghost would drop by again. Something about the way she'd shown up when Kylie had been talking to her mom felt odd.

  Kylie knew she couldn't start fixating on trying to guess who the ghost was talking about being in danger. But deep down, the fixating had bit. Could the ghost be talking about her mom? Could her mom be in danger?

  Worried that it might be true, Kylie had called her mom. Twice. But her phone was turned off. Probably because she was in mid-flight.

  Kylie sat down at the computer desk, telling herself everything was fine, and pulled out the printed list of phone numbers. Her cell rang. Hoping it was her mom, she took the call without checking the caller ID.

  "Mom?" Kylie asked.

  "Not Mom. It's Sara. "

  "Oh, hi," Kylie said, trying to figure out which one of the multitude of emotions about Sara she should let control the conversation. There was the hurt she felt that Sara-whom she'd considered her best friend for years-hadn't returned any of her calls in almost a month. There was the concern she felt knowing that Sara was . . . going through something. And then there was the melancholy she felt because she knew her friendship with Sara would never be the same again.

  When the silence seemed awkward, Kylie jumped in. "My mom said she saw you in the grocery store the other day. "

  "Yeah, she did. She's looking good, too. I like her new look and hairstyle.

  She said you talked her into getting a makeover. "

  "Did she do it?" Kylie asked. "She hasn't told me she did it. "

  "Oh, I hope I didn't ruin her surprise. "

  "Nah, I appreciate the warning. Does she look good? Or dumb?"

  "Good. She looks . . . younger, I guess. You know, kind of like she might be about to start dating. "

  "Dating?" Kylie knew this was a possibility, she'd even suggested it, but for some reason now the idea hit her stomach like a bad piece of chicken. "Did she say that or are you just guessing?"

  "No, she didn't say it. She just looked, you know, like a woman who wanted to be noticed by a man. Tighter jeans and a fitted top that showed off her girls. I almost didn't recognize her. "

  Was Sara saying her mom was dressing like a ho? That wasn't the makeover Kylie had suggested. Realizing the conversation had gone quiet again, Kylie started talking to fill the silence. "Mom said you looked. . . "

  Kylie had almost lied and said good, but at the last minute decided not to do it. ". . . thinner. Are you on some new diet again?"

  Sara was the first to try every new diet endorsed by Hollywood: low carbs, no carbs, all fruit on Tuesday, all brown rice on Wednesday, the crazier the better.

  Not that she ever stayed on any of them.

  "Not really," Sara said. "I think it's the birth control pills. I heard they'd cause me to gain weight, but they seem to be doing the opposite with me. "

  Sara was on the pill? It struck Kylie again how much things had changed between them. The old Sara would have certainly told Kylie something as big as getting on the pill.

  But then, Kylie hadn't exactly been in a sharing mood with Sara lately, either. Of course, trying to explain to a normal about being a still unidentified supernatural was a little-well, a lot-more difficult than discussing birth control pills.

  "Did your mom agree to you taking them?" Kylie asked, knowing Sara's mom was a bit of a religious fanatic and constantly preached against premarital sex.

  "Are you kidding? She'd die if she found out. I went to the clinic and I faked her signature. "

  Kylie had heard about some other girls doing the same thing to get around the Texas law that required a parent's signature before dispensing the pills.

  Another long pause followed.

  "So, who are you dating?" Kylie asked.

  "A couple of different guys. " Sara sounded purposely vague. Kylie couldn't help but wonder if Sara was having sex with the couple of different guys, too. Once upon a time, she might have asked.

  "So," Sara said. "You're still coming home in a couple of weeks, aren't you? Camp from hell is almost over? No more being a boner, huh?"

  Annoyance chomped down on Kylie's stomach. Obviously, Trey had told Sara about the whole boner reference, because Kylie couldn't remember mentioning it.

  "Actually, I'm only coming home for the weekend. And I really like it here. " Kylie didn't tell her about the whole boarding school possibility just because she didn't want to go into it. But she sent up a silent prayer that her mom agreed to it. The thought of going back to her old school and not having the old Sara at her side was just too much.

  "Really, you like it? You hated it at first. Camp Freaky, isn't that what you called it?" Sara sounded shocked.

  That was before I actually realized I was a freak, too. Well, not a freak, but not all human, either. "I guess things change. " Kylie meant her relationship with her one-time best friend, as well as her feeling about the camp.

  "Yeah, I guess so. " Another pause. "Well, text me when you get in town and hopefully we can meet up. "

  She wasn't even going to get a definite "Yes, I'll see you" from Sara. That hurt like a paper cut to the lip. Pushing away the feeling, she answered, "Yeah, I'll do that. " But she wasn't so sure she would. Seeing Sara might just be too weird to deal with right now.

  "Okay, my mom is calling me to help with the dishes," Sara said.

  Kylie couldn't hear anyone calling in the background. Not that she wasn't eager to end the call as well. This had been hard. Really hard. "Okay, bye," Kylie said. Have a good life. Nice knowing you.

  As soon as Kylie hung up, the phone rang again. This time, she looked at the caller's phone number.

  Derek?

  He didn't normally call her. "What's up?" she asked with a touch of worry.

  A ghostly cold invaded the room as she waited for Derek to speak. A wave of dizziness had Kylie grabbing the computer desk. She had experienced this enough to know that it meant a vision was about to occur.

  Or was occurring, she corrected when she saw the casket sitting where the kitchen table had been seconds earlier. The woman in the casket was the ghost. A few people moved around the casket with tears in their eyes.

  "Kylie?" Derek's voice came on the line.

  "Yeah. " She stared at the casket and the people and wondered what she was supposed to learn from this vision. That was why they happened, right? The ghost was trying to tell Kylie something. But what? "I'm scared, Mama. " From the back, Kylie saw the little girl reach up and take her mom's hand.

  "It's just Grandma. " The couple walked up to the casket.

  "Kylie, are you there?" Derek's voice sounded upset . . . or something. She recalled her concern about Derek calling her. It was so out of character for him.

  "Yeah. I'm here. Is everything okay?" Kylie asked, and her concentration on Derek made the vision fade like an old photograph. It lost its color and went into black and white mode as if dating the scene as something that happened a long time ago. Then the vision grew weaker, almost transparent. "Don't go," she said.

  "Go where?" Derek asked.

  "Not you," she said, but it was too late, only a vague outline remained of the scene. The woman holding the little girl's hand turned around. Kylie got only glimpse of her face, but something about her looked familiar.

  Shaking her head, and remembering Derek was still on the phone, she asked, "Is everything okay?"

  "No," he said. "It's not okay. "

  "What's wrong?" she asked.

  "You're not here. "

  She rolled her eyes. "I thought
you were serious. "

  "I am. I've been looking forward to this afternoon all day, thinking you'd be here. "

  "But I wanted-"

  "Please," he said. "I. . . " His voice lowered. "I haven't ever seen you in a bathing suit. "

  "And you still wouldn't. I've grown out of my bikini top, remember?"

  "Don't remind me," he said with a tease in his voice.

  "You're terrible," she reprimanded, but she wasn't all serious. She liked the fact that he was attracted to her.

  "Just put on a pair of shorts and a T-shirt and come down. "

  Kylie bit down on her lip. She looked at the computer screen, which displayed the list of the Dallas Brightens she hadn't called yet. Della and Miranda had been helping, but so far nothing.

  "Please," Derek said.

  His plea echoed in his voice and she felt herself giving in. On top of just wanting to make Derek happy, she remembered that she could read everyone's brain patterns and realized seeing everyone all together would be fun. She could compare one brain pattern to another.

  "You had a rough day," Derek said. "You deserve some fun in the sun. "

  I've had a rough few months. "I'll be there in a few minutes. "

  "Really?" he asked, almost shocked that she'd given in. Didn't he know how much he meant to her?

  "Really," she said, and smiled. The smile warmed Kylie inside and out. The memory of how he'd stood up for her even to her dad played in her mind. And that's when she knew that the next time Derek asked her to go out with him, she'd say yes.

  It took her fifteen minutes to decide which pair of shorts and T-shirt to wear. She wanted to look good. Extra good. Maybe she and Derek could sneak off together and . . . and hopefully he would ask her to go out with him. Heck, maybe she might even ask him.

  When she realized how much time had passed, she tore out the door. The shortest route to the swimming hole was through the woods, so she took it. The speed with which she moved shocked even her. Her footeye coordination of where to step and how to miss the trees flabbergasted her.

  While speed and agility had never been something she longed for, she found herself feeling a sense of pride at her new talents. If only she knew from what species these new talents stemmed.

  She was over halfway to the swimming hole when she felt it. Felt that sensation of being followed. The hair on the back of her neck stood up. And wouldn't you know that's when she recalled Burnett's warning about staying on the paths and out of the woods.

  Listening, hoping to hear something other than the sound of feet pounding against the earth, she felt better when the normal sounds of the woods filled her ears. Whatever presence loomed close by wasn't so ominous that birds and insects stopped their songs.

  Not that she should stake her life on the wisdom of the birds and insects.

  The feeling hit stronger . . . someone was here. What should she do? Logic said for her to keep going; turning back would only put her farther away from the help of the others if trouble struck. Her mind went to the girls who'd been killed in town and amazingly, she found herself running even faster.

  The clearing in the woods appeared in less than a minute. The bright sun hit her eyes and she could hear the other campers laughing and splashing in the water. When nothing attacked her, when no evil presence appeared wearing a bloody shirt and tried to yank her back into the woods, she wondered if this feeling of being watched wasn't all in her head. Could she be that paranoid?

  She stopped in the clearing beside a tree and tried to catch her breath, feeling completely winded from her run. She almost had her breathing back to normal when she saw Derek coming toward her. He wore only a pair of swim trunks. His chest was bare and wet like the other night in the shower. The trunks were regular boy trunks, a little loose on him, even hung a little low on the waist, but they were wet so they molded against his form. Since she knew what he looked like without them, she found herself feeling breathless again.

  "Hey," he said, and when his gaze fell to her mouth, she could tell he wanted to kiss her. He looked around and saw that they had an audience.

  So instead of kissing, he reached out and took her hand. "Come on, the water feels great. "

  It did feel great. And for the next hour, Kylie played water volleyball, splashed around, studied everyone's brain pattern, and completely forgot about the problems pressing on her shoulders. The only downside was watching Perry watch Miranda. She looked really good in her bathing suit and Kylie wasn't the only one who noticed, either. The guys were all stealing glances, even Derek, and then Perry would cut them glances, and not the friendly kind of glances either. His eyes would turn jet black, reminding Kylie of some kind of serpent.

  Nevertheless, between the water and the laughter, Kylie hadn't had so much fun in . . . well, forever.

  Then all the fun came to a jarring halt when she spotted Holiday running out of the woods in a panic and heading straight for the lake. Her expression grew tighter with each hurried step. What was wrong? Holiday's gaze found Kylie's and suddenly she knew that whatever was wrong involved her.

  Kylie started moving out of the water, but her toes sank into the mud at the lake's bottom the closer she got to shore. All the stresses in her life lined up like dominos in her mind, and she wondered which one this new problem involved.

  Selynn appeared behind Holiday and her gaze shot to Kylie, as well. This wasn't going to be good.

  Kylie met Holiday at the edge of the water and purposely ignored Selynn. "What's wrong?"

  "We have a problem. " Holiday's gaze shot back to the water and she waved someone else in. Kylie turned and saw Derek swimming in to join them.

  "What is it?" Kylie asked again, still ignoring Selynn, who had moved in.

  "You're coming with us," the werewolf spouted out. Her hand clamped down on Kylie's wrist. "Now. "