Prom Nights From Hell Page 0,12

plunge the hand-carved piece of ash deep into the place where his heart would have been.

If he'd had one.

"Ted," Lila says, in a syrupy voice, as her boyfriend lies across the contoured plastic bench with his head in her lap.

"Yes?" Ted asks, looking up at her adoringly.

"No," Lila says. "That's what I'm getting for my tattoo next time I'm in Cancún. Across the small of my back. The word Ted. So from now on, everyone will know I belong to you."

"Oh, honey," Ted says. And pulls her head down so he can stick his tongue in her mouth.

"Oh my God," I say, looking away.

"I know." Adam's returned from throwing a glow-in-the-dark twelve-pound bowling ball down the disco-lit lane. "I almost liked her better when she was under Drake's spell. But I guess it works out better this way. Ted'll hurt a lot less than Sebastian. That was a strike, by the way. In case you missed it." He slides onto the bench beside me and looks down at the scoring sheet in the glow of the lamp just above my head. "Well, what do you know? I'm winning."

"Don't get cocky," I say. Although I have to admit, he has a lot to brag about. Not just winning at Night Strike bowling, either.

"Just tell me," I say as he reaches up and finally pulls off his bow tie. Even in the weird disco lights of Bowlmor Lanes-the bowling alley where we'd retreated for our post-prom activities, a mere nine-dollar cab ride from the Waldorf-Adam still looks obscenely handsome. "Where'd you get the holy water?"

"You gave a bunch of it to Ted," Adam says, looking down at me in some surprise. "Remember?"

"But how'd you get the idea to put it in the water gun?" I demand. I'm still reeling from the evening's earlier activities. Midnight bowling is fun and all. But nothing can really compare with slaying a two-hundred-year-old vampire at the prom.

Too bad he'd fizzled into ash out in the garden, where no one but Adam and I could see it. We'd have been voted prom king and queen for sure, instead of Lila and Ted, who are both still wearing their crowns... although they've tilted a little rakishly, due to all the kissing.

"I don't know, Mare," Adam says, filling in his own score. "It just seemed like a good idea at the time."

Mare. No one has ever called me Mare before.

"But how did you know?" I ask. "I mean, that Drake had-well, whatever? I mean, how could you tell that I wasn't faking it? To lull him into a false sense of security?"

"You mean besides the fact that he was about to bite you on the neck?" Adam raises a single dark brow. "And that you weren't doing a damned thing to stop him? Yeah, I had a pretty good idea of what was going on."

"I'd have snapped out of it," I assure him, with a confidence I most definitely do not feel, "as soon as I felt his teeth."

"No," Adam says. Now he's grinning down at me, his face illuminated by the light from the scoring desk's single lamp. The rest of the bowling alley is in darkness, except for the balls and pins, which glow with an eerie fluorescence. "You wouldn't have. Admit it, Mary. You needed me back there."

His face is so close to mine-closer than Sebastian Drake's ever got.

Only instead of feeling as if I could dive into his gaze, I feel as if I'm about to melt under it. My heartbeat staggers.

"Yeah," I say, unable to keep my gaze from drifting toward his lips. "I guess I kinda did."

"We make a good team," Adam says. His own gaze, I can't help noticing, isn't straying far from my mouth, either. "Wouldn't you say? I mean, especially in light of the coming apocalyptic event? When Drake's dad finds out what we did tonight?"

I can't help gasping a little at that.

"That's right," I cry. "Oh, Adam! He's not just going to come after me. He's going to come after you, too!"

"You know," Adam says. And now his gaze has drifted from my mouth, and downward. "I really do like that dress. It goes great with bowling shoes."

"Adam," I say. "This is serious! Dracula could be getting ready to descend upon Manhattan at any moment, and we're wasting time bowling! We've got to start getting ready! We need to prepare a counterattack. We need to-"

"Mary," Adam says. "Dracula can wait."

"But-"

"Mary," Adam says. "Shut up." And I do. Because I'm