It's the fangs that give it away--translate that for Chad, please." I waited while he did so, his hands jerky with anger or something related to it.
Chad relaxed against me.
Stefan continued signing, and said, almost defiantly, "I'm no one's hero, Mercy." I turned my face until I was looking directly at Chad.
"Do you think that means I won't get to see him in spandex?" Chad mouthed the last word with a puzzled look.
Stefan sighed.
He touched Chad's shoulder, and when the boy looked up, he finger-spelled spandex slowly.
Chad made a yuck face.
"Hey," I told them, "watching good-looking men run around in tight- fitting costumes is high on my list of things I'd like to do before I die." Stefan gave in and laughed.
"It won't be me," he told me.
"So what do we do next, Haunt Huntress?" "That's a pretty lame superhero name," I told him.
"Scooby-Doo is already taken," he said with dignity.
"Anything else sounds lame in comparison." "Seriously," I said, "I think we'd better go find his parents." Who hopefully were sleeping peacefully despite Chad's cry and doors banging into walls, not to mention all the talking we'd been doing.
Now that I thought of it, it was a bad sign they weren't out here fussing.
"We? You want me to come, too?" Stefan raised an eyebrow.
I wasn't going to tell Chad to lie to his parents.
And if something had happened to Amber and her husband, I wanted Stefan with me.
Their room was on the opposite side of the house from Chad's and mine, their door was thick--and they didn't have nifty hearing like Stefan and I did.
Maybe they were sleeping.
I clutched my walking stick.
"Yeah.
Come with us, Stefan.
But, Chad?" I made sure he could see my face.
"You don't want to tell your folks Stefan is a vampire, okay? For the same reasons I told you before.
Vampires don't like people knowing about them." Chad stiffened and glanced at Stefan and away.
"Hey.
No, not Stefan," I said.
"He doesn't mind.
But others will." And his father probably wouldn't believe him about that either--and maybe he'd tell Blackwood about it.
Blackwood, I was pretty sure, wouldn't be happy if Chad knew about vampires.
So we trekked to Amber's room and opened the door.