Monsters Are Forever

8. An Unexpected Alliance

It had been exactly one week since Mia had gone out with her friends, and she really did feel better after that. Of course, who wouldn't? She'd bitten two separate people that night. And both of them looked pretty pale by the time Mia was finally feeling ok.

Of course, Anna had been incredibly worried. She knew just how bad it was when they waited like that. But as horrible as Mia felt when Anna looked at her like that, it was even worse coming from Carmine.

Carmine had only been doing this for about a year. Actually, Mia had been the one who'd turned Carmine in the first place. She hadn't really wanted to, but Anna had flatly refused to do it. And it was the only plan they could come up with to save Carmine's life. Both of them had been pretty concerned with how Carmine would handle it, but she ended up being remarkably good at it. Actually, when Mia had finally calmed down after their attack last week and realized that Carmine had basically done everything herself, Mia had been pretty impressed – especially since Mia hadn't exactly been helping to put anyone at ease. But even realizing that Carmine almost seemed to have a kind of natural skill for this didn't make it any less embarrassing to have Carmine feeling bad for her.

That's why Mia had assured her friends that she really would be fine after that. And once she finally had enough blood to think straight, she was sure she'd be able to come up with a plan on her own.

Of course, that was seven days ago, and it hadn't really worked out the way she'd planned. Rudi had picked up right where she'd left off, starting the very next night. Now Mia was getting ready to face her friends at lunch after another week without blood. She put her book back in her backpack carefully, getting all her things together as slowly as she possibly could. And after this, she planned on making a trip to her locker, just to waste a few extra minutes.

Normally, she would have rushed to get out of class, but she really didn't want to face her friends at the moment – she needed to compose herself first. It was kind of embarrassing to be tracked at night the way she had been. Mia had always thought of herself as being a good enough hunter that she could lose anyone who would try to sneak up on her. Ever since she'd been suspected of being some kind of demon back in her hometown, she'd been extra careful, and she hadn't had any problems until now. But suddenly, she was starting to wonder if she was slipping.

Of course, Anna and Carmine already knew about Rudi tracking her, but Mia hadn't actually told her boyfriend, Zev. And she made her friends promise not to tell Luke or Conner either. She really didn't want to admit to any of them that she couldn't take care of her own problems. And she was getting really tired of constantly asking Zev and his friends for help anyway. Ever since she'd found out what they were, it seemed like they'd been involved in every problem the girls had. Mia knew the first time they'd helped had been her idea, but still – she liked to think she could deal with some things on her own; she hadn't thought it'd be the start of a trend.

And of course, Mia wasn't exactly anxious to admit she was having a problem with a werewolf to any of the boys – especially Zev. She knew he was a little sensitive about the idea that any of them would ever hurt someone. And even though Rudi didn't necessarily know that what she was doing was hurting anybody, Zev would. And Mia really liked him; she didn't want to make him uncomfortable if she could help it. She figured it would be best to just ignore it, especially around him. And the best way to help with that would be to make her lunches just a little bit shorter.

As the next class started filing in, Mia realized she must have been sitting there longer than she'd thought. The bell signaling the beginning of class sounded, and she hadn't even gotten out of her seat yet. At least that meant she really would be late to lunch.

As she started making her way down the hall towards her locker, she stopped suddenly. Rudi was standing there, talking to someone. Mia panicked for a second, wondering if she was being stalked here at school too. But the thought only lasted a minute. Rudi was obviously deep in conversation, and she hadn't seen Mia yet. Actually, Rudi kind of looked like she didn't want to be seen by anyone herself at the moment.