Heart Right Through Verdugo

Up until she turned 15, Emma's life was ordinary. Living in Los Angeles, she had a few friends, and loved learning history. She had a fascination with magic growing up, but after elementary, she moved on from the foolish idea, learning the hard way that magic isn't real and that it's only a lie Hollywood had fed her. But her whole perspective shifted again after the passing of her grandpa.

She discovered that he had kept a secret from his whole family-that he once was a warlock. He had given up that life when he moved to L.A. in the 1970s, but Emma and her cousin Carolina are determined to learn every trick in the spell book he left behind.

Fast forward to a year later, Emma's life takes a new turn. During junior year, a mysterious new student from San Bernardino catches her eye. He's mysterious, intriguing, and mostly keeps to himself, but why? It's what she wonders every day when they cross paths. Who in Glendale would want to be so secretive, anyway? Bobby Staten-that's who.

Due to Bobby's classic leather jacket and dark aesthetic, Emma and her friends constantly joke that maybe he's a vampire and that's the secret he's hiding. It's no longer funny when a series of gruesome killings occur at Verdugo High, described by local officers as a bloody mark found on the necks of the victims. Strangely, this same pattern had appeared earlier in spring at a San Bernardino High School. Coincidence? Rebecca, Emma's other cousin, thinks not.

Rebecca quickly suspects a connection and begins investigating Bobby's past and persona. As Emma befriends him, she struggles to believe that someone like Bobby could be capable of crimes so vicious. Rebecca reminds her that one of the only ways to permanently kill a vampire is with a stake through the heart-in much more poetic terms, heart right through Verdugo.