Page 37 of Blood and Bonbons

“Hey, I get it. After what happened to your grandparents, freaking out is normal,” I said, trying to be the calm one. “If you don’t want us to involve your parents yet, then we won’t. We’ll give Miles another day or two to show up on his own. We’ll also focus on the leads you have and our vampire issue. Miles seemed more worked up about the vampire than whatever big thing he was working on.”

“You’re right,” she said, giving me a grateful smile. “Since we’ve done what we can about the vampire situation for tonight, let’s focus on our Miles leads.”

She slapped a hunk of cheese from the fridge onto a plate, pulled out a box of crackers, and handed it all to me, along with a knife. “Take this to Mom’s study. I’ll run our bags upstairs.”

I listened to her footsteps fade away into the house as I sliced the cheese and went to settle into her mom’s leather thinking chair. What were the odds Vena would let me sleep if I closed my eyes right now? I was tempted to find out. Feet hurting from a busy shift, I kicked off my shoes and settled in.

“I was right!” I heard Vena yell from above.

I didn’t bother yelling back. If it was important, she’d find me.

Closing my eyes, I waited.

“Ev,” she said when she entered.

I dutifully opened my eyes and watched her bee-line to her mom’s computer. She turned it on while waving an empty bag of chips at me.

“Mileswashere. This was in his room. He always eats the good stuff first when he comes here.”

“It could be from the last time he visited,” I said even though I doubted it. Their mom ran a tight ship. Garbage cans were emptied, and cupboards were stocked with non-perishables every time they went on a research expedition.

“You know as well as I do this chip bag means that Miles was here recently. But was it before or after he received the picture of the book?”

She stuffed the bag into the garbage by the desk and faced her mom’s computer. “Now the question is…did he find anything here?”

“What do you want me to do?” I asked, fighting the urge to close my eyes again.

“See if you can find any books that might look like the one in the picture. I doubt it’s here, but we should look to be sure.”

I peeled myself out of the chair and started with the shelves in the study. Every room in the manor had rows of books except the bathrooms and the kitchen. It could take the rest of the night to weed through them all.

“Vena, what if I look through the shelves in here tonight and leave the rest for the morning? We both need sleep.”

Vena made a halfhearted noise, which I took as an agreement, but I wasn’t too sure either. Since my feet ached, I scooted the chair close to the shelf and sat down to search the lowest row first.

Before I finished scanning the shelf, my phone buzzed in my pocket. When I pulled it out, the paper-towel-wrapped sun charm came with it. The small bundle landed quietly on the floor. I scrambled to pick it up, accidentally unraveling the paper towel. I palmed the stone and looked at Vena like a kid getting caught licking the frosting off the cake.

She didn’t look away from the computer even for a second.

Exhaling in relief, I tucked the sun charm into my cleavage so there weren’t any more mishaps and looked at the message on my phone.

Shepard: You were supposed to check in. Are you safe at home?

Crap. I forgot to text Shepard.

Me: Yes. I’m safe. Sorry, I forgot. Long day.

Pocketing my phone, I rubbed my eyes to get them to focus and resumed my search. I’d only meant to lean back in the chair for a moment to rest my eyes. Instead, they stayed closed.

I wasn’t sure how much time had passed when Vena shook my arm.

“Huh? What?” Groggily, I blinked up at her serious face.

“I found the book.”

I sat forward and scrubbed my face with my hands, trying to spark my brain up to Vena-speed.

“Where is it?” I asked.

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