The Next Generation

  Mom made a disgusted noise and slapped her hand over Julian’s eyes, even though he hadn’t been looking. Dad tugged on Mom’s other hand, signaling that it was time to move on. Then Starla was harshly jerked out of view, and Jacen stepped into her place. He was shirtless, just wearing lounge pants. My eyes widened this time. He looked good, too. I felt an emotion similar to what Julian had gone through earlier—attraction mixed with disgust. Pulling Mom’s hand from his eyes, Julian tossed a smirk my way; his amusement flooded into me.

  “Sorry about that,” Jacen murmured, running a hand through his shaggy, blond hair.

  Starla popped up beside him, muttering, “Knock it off, Jace!” but he held her back with one toned arm, firmly keeping her from going back on display.

  Shaking his head, Dad murmured, “We’ll let you…get back to your evening.”

  He started leading us away when Jacen said, “Hey, sorry Starla was late again today with the kids. I told her to leave earlier, but she…dawdled.”

  Pausing, Dad looked up at Jacen. “She was late?” He looked back at Julian and me. “Is that why it’s been taking you guys so long to get home from school?” I shrugged and nodded. Dad could feel our locations shifting from place to place. He must have assumed we were the slow pokes. But Starla being late was typical. From the window I heard her mutter, “Tattletale,” to Jacen.

  Smiling, I said to Dad, “You could let us get a car of our own? Then you wouldn’t have to worry about it.”

  Dad frowned at me, then said, “I’ll call you tomorrow, Starla. So we can discuss this when you’re not busy.”

  Jacen and Starla disappeared as the four of us continued our walk. While we couldn’t see them anymore, we could still hear them—there was a lot of giggling going on. Mom and Dad picked up the pace a bit.

  At the halfway point along our circular route, we came across a long moving van parked in the driveway of a modest, one-level townhouse. Julian and I stepped into the street to walk around it. Dad paused and looked for the homeowners. I knew the look on Dad’s face and wanted to groan, but didn’t. Dad was going to offer to help, and if the new owners took him up on it, we’d all be expected to help too…and then we’d be here for the next several hours. I was all for lending a hand, but I’d already mapped out my evening, and it included cranking out my English paper and talking to Arianna for an hour before bed, not lugging around various boxes of other people’s junk.

  “Hello?” Dad asked. Mom snuggled into his side as she stopped with him.

  The back of the moving van was wide open, and a person came out from behind some large boxes and jumped down onto the street with Julian and me. I audibly gasped, and not because I was surprised. Everyone in my family looked at me, and I felt my cheeks flame red-hot. I couldn’t help it. A boy—no, a man—was standing on the road beside me, and he was the most incredibly good-looking man I’d ever seen. Well, who I wasn’t related to anyway.

  Oddly, he sort of looked like the men in my family, but that was probably because his hair was jet-black. His eyes were a dark, piercing brown, though, the kind of eyes that trapped you and never let you go. A part of me wanted to be trapped by them.

  Running a hand along an attractive amount of light stubble on his jaw, he looked us over. My heartbeat skyrocketed when his eyes passed over mine. Maybe it was my imagination, but they seemed to linger on me a moment before moving to my parents.

  The gorgeous man’s gaze settled on Dad. “Yeah?” His confused expression was adorable.

  Dad gestured to the truck. “I see you’re moving in. Can we lend you a hand?”

  He paused as he thought about Dad’s offer. I couldn’t tell how old he was. He seemed younger than my dad appeared, but older than me. I fervently hoped that he wasn’t so much older than me that he found my age undesirable. I chewed on my lip while he answered Dad’s question. “That would be great, thank you.”

  I inwardly did a happy dance over the fact that we’d be staying here for the next several hours. And, fortunately for me, there were enough street lamps nearby that my parents’ glowing eyes wouldn’t be a factor once the sun fully set; no one would notice the faint phosphorescence that was a dead-giveaway of our race. It was meant to subdue prey, and was only really visible in pitch-blackness. It was a side effect of vampirism that my brother and I didn’t share, thankfully.

  The boy looked back at me, and I tried to give him a calm, grown-up smile, so he wouldn’t think I was just a giddy, sixteen-year-old girl. My heart was still unnaturally fast though, and knowing that every member of my family could hear it only tripled my embarrassment; I knew that Julian found my struggle to rein in my hormones hilarious. But I didn’t care, because tall, dark, and handsome smiled back at me…and it was amazing.

  Just when it seemed that he was about to speak directly to me, the front door of his new home opened. We all twisted to look as an older version of the boy stepped out of the house. His hair and jaw line were speckled with gray, and he was clearly related to the boy who was accelerating my heart. With similar dark and piercing eyes, the older man gave us a onceover. “Something going on, son?”

  “Hey, Dad, these guys were just passing by. Offered to help.”

  The older man stepped to the back of the truck and leaned against it. Mom and Dad moved closer to Julian and me as the boy’s father appraised us all. Mom lifted a hand to indicate the truck when she reached my side. “We’d love to lend a hand. We’re pretty strong.”

  I bit my lip to hide my grin. Yeah, we were definitely strong. The older man gave us a polite smile, then walked over to clasp his son on the shoulder. “Thank you for the kind offer, but I think we can handle it. We’re pretty strong too.”

  The man’s son smiled and looked right at me. My heart was pounding in my ears as butterflies danced in my stomach. Wow, he was attractive. The man watched his son closely for a second, then added, “Besides, taking care of one’s own mess is good for the soul. Builds character.”

  The boy looked over at his dad and frowned, but didn’t say anything. My father cleared his throat, then started herding our group around the truck and back onto the sidewalk. “Well, I certainly understand that,” he said. Dad nodded back at the men as we started walking away. “Good luck, and welcome to the neighborhood. Maybe we’ll see you around?”

  The older man nodded, his hand still clasping his son’s shoulder; he was still staring at his dad, frowning. My disappointment that we were leaving was so great that my feet felt encased in cement. With each plodding step I took away from the good-looking stranger, my spirit sank. Julian poked me in the ribs, but I ignored him and his never-ending amusement. If I had to tolerate his over-the-moon feelings for Raquel, then he could put up with my impromptu passion for the neighbor.

  Just as we reached the corner that would take the dark-haired boy from my sight, I turned my head to get one last look at him. Surprisingly, he was watching me leave. Even more surprisingly, he had a small smile on his lips. I wasn’t sure if the smile was specifically for me, or if he’d just been touched by my family’s offer, but my body didn’t care. My heart thudded against my ribcage, and I couldn’t slow it down. And I didn’t want to. The surging pulse invigorated me in a way I hadn’t ever felt before. I felt…alive. Wholly and truly alive.

  As I reluctantly pulled my gaze from the hot boy down the block, I met eyes with Dad. Frowning at me, he murmured, “Maybe we should find a new route for our walk. Shake things up a bit.”

  I rolled my eyes at him. No way, Dad. This route is just fine.

  The attractive neighbor stayed in my head for the rest of the night. Thinking about him made lying about my family a little easier, and I finished writing my English paper by imagining that I was having a conversation with him, telling him the things that I could tell him, none of which was the truth. If I told him the truth, he would be moved out by morning.

  I almost told Arianna all about him when she called me later that night. I didn’t though. It wasn’t that I didn’t want
to tell her—I was actually dying to describe him to her in graphic detail—but it wasn’t something that I wanted to talk about around my super-hearing family, and since my parents’ room was the only “quiet” room in the house, any conversation about the super-cute neighbor would have been very public.

  As I crawled into bed, I did my best to ignore the memory of those dark, piercing eyes. Between yawns, I heard my brother sleepily mutter, “Night, Nick.”

  Thinking about his eventful day, I firmly pushed those beautiful eyes into the recesses of my memory. Feeling Julian’s contentment as he settled into bed, I murmured back, “Night, Julie.”

  Dad’s voice drifted down the hall to us as he stepped into his room, where Mom was already climbing into bed. “Good night, kids.”

  Mom echoed Dad’s sentiment, then giggled and whispered, “Close the door, Mr. Adams. Your secretary would like a word with you in private.”

  Dad chuckled and then, mercifully, the door closed. Julian groaned from his room. “God, they’re so embarrassing.”

  “Yeah,” I sighed. As I closed my eyes, the darkness of the night wrapped itself around me, comforting me. Within the blackness, a pair of even darker irises grew inside my mind’s eye; they seared my soul.

  I AWOKE THE next morning feeling groggy. The deepest, most restful part of sleep had been elusive, hiding from me just when I’d been about to find it. I’d tossed and turned for hours, drifting in the fog of being half-awake and mostly asleep. If I’d gotten into the coffee habit like some of my friends, I’m sure I would have woken up yearning for a cup. As it was, all I really wanted was a glass of cold water, and maybe some cucumbers for the bags under my eyes.

  Mom and Julian were still in their rooms, but Dad was downstairs so I shuffled down to see him. He was in the living room, watching the sun rise when I entered. He looked contemplative, so I stopped to watch him. Not looking back at me, he quietly said, “Good morning, Nika.”

  Stepping up beside him, I peered up into his face. His light eyes were flicking over the beauty of the morning, absorbing it. “Morning, Dad. You okay?”

  With a peaceful smile on his face, he looked down at me. “Of course.” Slinging his arm over my shoulders, he tilted his head. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  I examined his face for a moment, then shrugged. “I don’t know, you just seemed…thoughtful.”

  He smiled wider and raised a perfectly arched brow. “Thoughtful doesn’t always mean there’s a problem.” I twisted my lip at him, and he chuckled. Returning his gaze to the window glowing gold with early morning light, he sighed. “I was just thinking about Great-Gran…and all of the other purebloods…they don’t get to enjoy moments like this.” When his eyes returned to mine, they were soft with sympathy. “Sometimes it’s easy to forget just how good we have it…all the benefits, few of the setbacks. I just like to take a minute now and again to appreciate the things that can so easily be taken for granted.”

  “Like sunrises?” I asked.

  Dad kissed my head, squeezing me tighter. “Like sunrises.”

  I wrapped my arms around Dad’s waist and watched the colors of the world blossom into life with him. Everything was crystal clear to my eyes; I could even pinpoint the microscopic flaws in the glass. I preferred it like that, though. There was beauty in imperfection, it was all in how you looked at it.

  After a quiet moment, Dad asked, “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, just tired. Didn’t sleep well.”

  I yawned after my statement, and Dad chuckled. “Thinking about that boy down the street?”

  Pulling back, I cringed as I looked up at him. “Dad…”

  He held up his hands and shook his head. “I know, I know…you don’t want to talk about it.” He paused, then added, “But…if you ever did…”

  Smiling, I leaned up to kiss his cheek. “I know…you’re here for me.”

  I felt Mom’s presence entering the room, and Dad and I twisted to look at her. Her long, brown hair was up in a high ponytail, and she was dressed in casual knit pants and a yoga top. Although her body didn’t need it, Mom still liked to work out on occasion. That familiar look of peace washed over her as she approached her husband, her sire. “Sorry, am I interrupting a bonding moment?”

  Dad dropped his arm from me to reach out for her. “Yes, but that’s all right. I enjoy your interruptions.”

  Mom leaned up and gave him a soft kiss. “Since it’s early, I thought I’d get in a quick class before we headed out to the ranch.” While Dad kept his features schooled as he nodded at her, his eyes roved over her figure. I turned my head to give them a little more privacy. The sound of another light kiss filled the air, and Mom let out a low giggle. I rolled my eyes, not even daring to look at the two love birds.

  Just as I was about to remind them that I was standing right beside them, Mom tapped my shoulder. “Want to come with me, Nika?”

  I glanced between the two of them, then shrugged. “Sure…why not.” Besides the fact that Mom’s yoga class was great exercise—it made my arms shake, and considering my strength, that was saying something—maybe we would drive past the neighbor’s house…and maybe he’d gotten up bright and early to continue unpacking the truck…and maybe he’d smile at me again.

  I HEARD MOM and Nika leave, felt Dad loitering around downstairs, but it was way too early to get up so I drifted back to sleep. When I woke up again, Mom and Nika were coming through the front door, laughing and complaining that their legs were going to be sore for the next three days.

  Stretching and yawning, I decided to go join the living…and the dead.

  When I got there, Nika was sitting at the kitchen table, a third of the way through her cereal. There was an odd sort of excitement inside her, a feeling that had been there ever since she’d spotted that guy moving in down the road. It was a little shocking, but my sister was finally developing a crush. While it made me happy that I would no longer be the only one of us having embarrassing feelings that made me curse our bond, I wasn’t looking forward to my sister’s mood turning all ooey-gooey, lovey-dovey.

  Well, if I knew my sister—and I did—the crush wouldn’t last long. Nika was pretty sharp, and even if she did have a romantic buried deep inside her, she was more practical than passionate. She wouldn’t let herself fall for a guy who wasn’t exactly right for her. My sister had always had this ability to see the truth of a situation and adjust her feelings accordingly. Unlike me, she would never pine for someone who wasn’t available.

  My mood sank some as I sat beside Nika. Sensing the emotional shift, she lifted her eyebrow in question. Ignoring her curiosity, I forcefully shook Raquel out of my thoughts, and said good morning to everyone. Mom promptly placed a bowl of food in front of me, then ruffled my hair like I was still three-years-old. Smiling at her, I murmured, “Thanks,” and dug in.

  Leaning against the counter, Mom returned to her conversation with Dad, something technical about the herd at the ranch. Tuning them out, I glanced at Nika. Her warm brown eyes were locked on Mom and Dad, intently listening to the conversation about ringworm and foot rot. As I looked back at our parents, I realized another reason why Nika’s blossoming feelings were surprising. Nika wanted what Mom and Dad had—that intense, loving, unshakable connection that sometimes embarrassed the crap out of me. Nika wanted it so much that she tended to put every guy she saw on a set of scales—Dad on one end, the aforementioned schmuck on the other. Predictably, every teenager she’d ever come across had failed her internal test.

  Sometimes I feared that they always would, that Nika would be alone forever because no one would ever be able to reach the pedestal she’d put Dad on. But then I remembered we were young. Mom and Dad had found each other late in life—God, they’d been just a few years shy of thirty!—so there was hope for Nika. And me too, if I could ever stop wanting to be with Raquel.

  An hour later, we were on the road to our typical weekend destination—Adams Ranch. It was a spot that my sister and I still loved g
oing to, even after all these years, even with our parents. While most kids our age were trying to avoid their family, we enjoyed being with ours. And the ranch was special, a place where we could be ourselves, unafraid of who might be watching. True, there were some ranch hands about, so we always had to be aware of them, but for the most part, they stayed clear of the main house.

  Peter Alton, a guy who seemed more ancient than Gabriel, led the crew and kept the hired hands in line. He’d been with our family since before Nika and I were born. Dad said he’d married him and Mom, and had been around since Dad was young. While no one in the family spoke of it, we all knew that Peter knew our secret. He had to. He’d been around us for decades, and there was no way he could have missed the fact that only Grandpa Jack seemed to age. But Peter was loyal to our family, and we trusted him with our lives. Literally.

  The ranch wasn’t too far away from the heart of the city, but it felt like stepping into another universe. Dad entered a code near the gate, and the massive iron doors began to creak open. The family name was spelled out in large, ornate iron letters along the top of the gate. The middle A was split in half as the doors pulled inward—AD on one side, MS on the other.

  I always felt a sense of obligation when I drove through those letters. Nika’s name would change when she got married, and as the youngest man in the family, it was up to me to carry on the name. Not that my supernaturally long-lived Dad was going anywhere, but the weight of that responsibility was still on me. I’d confessed that to Dad once, and he’d told me not to worry about it. He’d said the family name had changed several times since Halina had started the ranch, back when she’d been human. In fact, Dad’s first name was a tribute to one of those past surnames—Teren was Imogen’s last name.