wound itself through the dark wrought-iron trestle. A black coffin lay underneath with a lit candelabra and two pewter goblets. I only needed Alexander.
And then I saw him: a dark-haired figure with his back toward me in the distance just behind one of the sides of the trestle. He must have been making the final touches for our ceremony. I raced over to him. I took a deep breath. This was the moment I'd waited for all my life.
When I reached Alexander, he turned around.
I gasped in horror. Green eyes were staring back at me. It couldn't be. Not tonight. Not this night.
Trevor Mitchell was as gothed up as I was. His normally model-blond hair was newly dyed jet black and was gelled up and spiky. Several silver-studded earrings flashed from his earlobes. His fingernails were painted black. And he wore a menacing grin.
He leaned on the trestle as if he owned the cemetery. "It's what you've always wanted, Monster Girl." I was stunned. First of all, I was expecting Alexander. And second, not in my wildest imagination was I ever expecting to see Trevor Mitchell dressed this way.
Trevor was hot and seductive. Part of the attraction I had felt for him before had been that we were opposites. However, with him staring back at me while dressed like a gorgeous goth, it was hard for me to take my eyes off him.
But as attractive as he was, he wasn't the reason I was here.
"What are you doing here?" I asked. "Where is Alexander?"
"That isn't important now."
"You need to leave. Like now," I urged.
"I'm right where I need to be," he said.
"How did you know about this?" I asked.
"I have my sources."
I paused. Who could have told him? Becky, but she wasn't even here yet. Sebastian? Did he have loose lips after all? "You don't even know what this is about," I challenged him.
"I do," he said confidently. "It's about becoming a vampire."
"What?" I was even more shocked. And slightly frightened that Trevor knew why I was here.
He grinned down at me. "It's why Jagger took you up on the altar - and Luna did with Sebastian. It's about bonding with another for eternity. On sacred ground.
And this place is sacred enough for a hundred humans to turn into vampires."
I was even more taken aback by his knowledge of the evening. "Who told you that?" I asked.
"I told you, I have my resources. Or, rather, vampires."
"Scarlet?" I wondered. She wasn't likely to tell. Or was she? "But she didn't even know about tonight."
"Look what I've done for you." He rolled up his black sleeve. It was a tattoo of a raven.
"It's permanent," he said. "And I'm hoping we'll be, too."
I stared at his tattoo. What was Trevor doing? And what was he suggesting?
"What are you doing here?" I yelled. "Trying to ruin my night?"
"No," he said. "Trying to make it last forever."
"I don't know what you're talking about!" I shouted. "You aren't even a vampire!" Then his fangs flashed in the full moonlight.
I gasped again and stepped back. "No ... this can't be! You can't be."
I was living a nightmare. Trevor Mitchell, my nemesis, a vampire? And we were standing together on sacred ground.
I picked up my dress and inched back. "Who turned you?" I asked, breathless.
"That doesn't matter now. It's time to be talking about us. You and me. And eternity."
"There is no you and me!" I stepped back again, but he drew closer.
"I think there is." He took my arm and pulled me in to him and laid a riveting kiss on me. I was shocked and, for a moment, lost in the embrace. I felt like I had more than a year ago when he kissed me on the lawn of the Mansion on Halloween and several times before. He knew how to kiss and make a girl feel happy against his lips, but it was hard to see into his soul - if he had one. Tonight I felt something even deeper. I really felt in his lips that there was something more to his feelings than trying to seduce the goth girl. I felt that he loved me.
I wanted him to leave. I had assumed the Maxwells might have disrupted our evening, but I'd forgotten about the bigger threat - Trevor Mitchell. Though he was attractive and we had a lifelonghadleave. I connection, I was angry and sad for him that he was spoiling my big night. On my end, I was kissing the Monster