Drop Dead Gorgeous Read online

  And then she raised her head. Her mouth opened wide. Her eyes glowed like green fire.

  “I can’t hold back any longer.”

  That’s what I think she said. I felt close to her and far away at the same time. No way to catch my balance. I stared into the bright mist, waiting for her lips again.

  “I can’t hold back any longer.”

  I didn’t get her lips. I got her teeth. I saw them pull up, long white teeth. She gripped me by the shoulders and pressed me against the wall.

  She lowered her head, eyes glowing, mouth open hungrily.

  Was I imagining it? Her face began to change. Her cheeks appeared to sag. Her whole face appeared to melt, her eyes sinking deep into their sockets.

  Nooooo. I am hallucinating. This is crazy. This isn’t happening.

  Then I felt her teeth . . . felt them slide against my neck . . . tickling . . . tickling . . . just before she plunged them into my throat.

  48

  Morgan Narrates

  My whole body trembled at the thought of this sweet meal. My skin tingled as if electricity coursed over me. The animal hunger I felt would soon give way to a feeling of warm ecstasy as I fed on Zane.

  I teased him, tickling the skin on his throat with my teeth. My saliva ran onto his neck. Yes, I was drooling. Liam’s mother had been filling but oh so unsatisfying.

  And now . . . I prepared my feast. Held him carefully in place. Fogged his brain so that he would willingly sacrifice, willingly give of himself, give me life!

  “Hey, Morgan—here you are!”

  The voice startled me so badly, I uttered a shriek.

  I jerked my head back, pulled my teeth from Zane’s throat. I hadn’t even punctured the skin.

  Struggling to regain my composure, I kept my back turned until my face returned to normal. Then I saw Delia stride into the room. She dangled car keys in one hand. “Your door was open,” she said, “so I—”

  She stopped and her mouth dropped open when she saw my embrace of Zane. “Oh. Sorry. Did I interrupt?”

  “Uh . . . no,” I said, taking a step back, removing my hands from his chest. “I was giving Zane a shoulder massage. He’s totally tense.”

  “Who isn’t?” Delia replied, crossing the room to us. “How’s it going, Zane?”

  Zane blinked his eyes a few times. He flashed Delia a smile. I could see the confusion on his face. He was completely dazed. I knew he didn’t remember a thing.

  Delia waved her car keys. “I’m just on my way to school. To help Julie and the others finish decorating the gym for the alumni carnival. I thought maybe you’d like to come pitch in.”

  “Yeah. Sure. Of course, I do,” I said.

  I realized I was holding my stomach. The gnawing feeling inside me was so intense. Could she and Zane hear my stomach growl?

  I was so close, I thought. So close.

  Then Delia ruined my meal.

  Well, now I have reason to pay you back, Delia dear. I never noticed what a pretty throat you have.

  Well, I had many surprises planned for the alumni party. And now, I’d definitely have one for Delia.

  49

  Julie Narrates

  “Has anybody seen Delia?” I asked. “She promised to come and help with the posters.”

  “I think she stopped to pick up Morgan,” Amber answered. She was on a tall ladder against the gym wall, tacking up the Beavis and Butt-Head poster.

  I had about twenty helpers now, one day before the party, and the gym was looking like a nineties time warp. The long wall was nearly covered in posters and big color photos of all the shows and stars our nineties’ alumni watched.

  We had Saved by the Bell and Fresh Prince and Ren & Stimpy and Full House posters. Caleb Farr, whose father worked at an ad agency in New York City during the nineties, gave us life-sized cutouts of the Power Rangers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

  My favorite poster showed a great action scene from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I love that show. I watch the old episodes all the time on Netflix.

  Amber finished tacking up the Beavis and Butt-Head poster. She climbed down the ladder and stepped up beside me to admire the poster gallery. She had beads of sweat glistening on her forehead. We had all been working really hard.

  “My parents watched a show called Rugrats,” she said. “I don’t think it was about rats. They said it was huge. Everyone watched it.”

  “I couldn’t find a Rugrats poster,” I said. “But I think we did pretty well.”

  “Who is working on the music mix?” Amber asked.

  “You know. Frankie Gerard. Mr. Tech. He told me he’s doing a two-hour jam. Mostly disco stuff.”

  “Cool,” Amber said. “My cousin is seriously into nineties disco. Like the songs they play at basketball games during time-outs? ‘Pump Up the Jam’ . . . ‘Whoomp! (There It Is).’” I love that one.

  “We have to test the sound system,” I said. “Make sure we can get it loud enough.” I sighed. “There’s still a lot to do.”

  A loud crash made me jump.

  I turned to see that the helium tank had fallen over. Some kids were hoisting it back up. We needed the helium to blow up the balloons. Something else that was on my list.

  “Can I have everyone’s attention?” a voice boomed.

  Calvin Imhoff, the so-called vampire hunter, strode into the gym. The doors closed loudly behind him. He had a bandage around the top of his head, dark glasses over his eyes. Even at a distance, I could see that his face was red and swollen.

  He wore a black suit, white shirt open at the neck. He walked steadily to the center of the gym, eyes straight forward, not glancing at our poster-covered walls. He waved both arms, summoning everyone to gather around him.

  Kids muttered and questioned each other. A lot of them had never seen Imhoff before and had no idea who he was. Amber and I hesitated, exchanging glances. What is he doing here? Why is he interrupting our work? Should we call the police?

  It took Imhoff a while to get everyone quiet. He stood stiffly, facing everyone, hands jammed into his pants pockets. The high ceiling lights reflected off his sunglasses, filling the glass with silver so we couldn’t see his eyes.

  “For those of you who haven’t met me, I’m Calvin Imhoff. I hunt vampires,” he started. He held up his badge.

  “I saw a badge like that on eBay,” a boy shouted from the back of the crowd of kids. “Did you get a whistle, too?”

  A few kids laughed.

  Imhoff’s whole body stiffened. He bit his bottom lip. “I don’t think we want to make jokes when there’s a killer on the loose,” he said.

  “I don’t think you want to be in here,” I told him. “I’m calling an administrator.”

  “All of your lives are at risk!” he shouted.

  Silence now. The only sound was the loud hum of the air-conditioning vents at the top of the gym. A poster hadn’t been tacked up right and made a flapping sound on the wall behind us.

  “I want you to all be safe for your alumni carnival,” Imhoff continued. He scratched at the bottom of his bandage. “Some of my colleagues will be on duty. I want to assure you that we will take precautions and will be alert to any problem that might arise.”

  I narrowed my eyes at Imhoff. Liam still thought he was the killer. But the police let him go. That had to mean they had somehow ruled him out. That it wasn’t him.

  My mind whirred with questions. I thought about Winks. It was hard not to think about Winks.

  “You mean, you think the killer may come to the carnival?” I asked.

  Imhoff scratched at his bandage. “I’m just saying that we will be ready.” He shook his head bitterly. “I’ve failed so far. When I came to Linden, my assignment was to keep everyone safe. I’ve failed.”

  He stood silent for a long moment. He pulled off his sunglasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. His silvery eyes gazed down the line of kids.

  “I knew who it was, and I couldn’t do anything about it,” he said. He
twirled the sunglasses tensely in his hand. “I knew who it was. The vampire. That’s the specialty of my fellow workers, you know. We know who they are.”

  I saw some kids shift uneasily. I heard some mumbles, and a few kids rolled their eyes.

  I didn’t blame them. Imhoff seemed to be talking to himself, not to us. And what he was saying was strange. I couldn’t figure out why he was telling us all this.

  “Sure, we try to keep it quiet. Isn’t there enough bad news? Enough problems to panic over?” he continued.

  He didn’t notice that people were getting restless, eager to get back to their decorating chores and preparations.

  Imhoff’s eyes darted from side to side. He slid the sunglasses back over them. “I knew who it was when I came here,” he repeated. “I tried to warn off that boy Winkleman. I tried to scare him away from her.”

  He shook his head. He definitely was talking to himself now. He was looking down, shaking his head, rubbing the bandage over his hair. “I failed. I tried to scare him. I was too late. I knew her. I knew who the vampire was.”

  His voice was strained now. His chest was heaving with each breath.

  “I knew . . . I knew her . . . I knew . . . But I couldn’t . . .”

  His knees appeared to fold. He started to fall. A whistling sound escaped his mouth, like air seeping out of a balloon.

  Startled, I rushed forward and grabbed his arm to help him stay on his feet. “Are you okay?” I asked.

  He nodded. “Yes. Okay. I’m okay.”

  “Who is the vampire?” someone shouted.

  “You know who it is? Tell us!”

  Imhoff leaned heavily on me. I could see he was falling. He couldn’t support himself.

  “Who is it?” Another voice from the crowd.

  “I’ll . . . tell . . . you . . . ,” Imhoff said, his voice weak, failing. “It’s . . .”

  A hush fell over the gym. Imhoff dropped to his knees. “It’s the girl who calls herself Morgan Marks.”

  Then he passed out.

  I tried to hold him up, but he toppled forward, hitting his head on the gym floor. He didn’t move.

  “Somebody call 911!” I cried.

  “Morgan Marks?” Liam appeared from the crowd of kids. Had he been there all along?

  “Morgan Marks?” he repeated. “If she’s a vampire, I’m a Hobbit!”

  Some kids laughed.

  A guy named Kerry Smithson tapped knuckles with Liam. “If she’s a vampire, I’m a Wookiee!”

  “Morgan Marks? He’s seriously nuts.”

  “If she’s a vampire, I’m the Tooth Fairy!”

  “This dude was out of his head,” a boy named Carlos Fuentes said. “Like he was dazed or something. He was totally in la-la land. He didn’t know what he was saying.”

  “It’s my bad,” Liam said. “I slammed his head twice with a skillet.”

  “Shut up! Shut up! Stop talking, everyone!” Amber cried. “Don’t you see? He’s unconscious. Did anyone call for help?”

  “The ambulance is on the way,” Kerry Smithson said, holding up his iPhone.

  I heard a banging at the gym doors. “That must be the medics,” I said.

  The doors swung open and Delia came walking in, a smile on her face. “Hi, guys. Sorry I’m late,” she called. “But look who I brought with me to help out.”

  I couldn’t help myself. I let out a sharp cry as Morgan Marks followed her into the gym.

  50

  Julie Continues

  No one said a word. We all watched the two girls make their way across the gym. On the floor, Imhoff let out a groan. One of his legs twitched, but he didn’t open his eyes.

  “What happened?” Delia cried, spotting his crumpled body. “Who is that?” She started to run toward him. Morgan followed, blinking, her face twisted in confusion.

  “It’s the vampire hunter,” Liam said, stepping forward to greet them. “I think it’s his head injury. The one I gave him. He just . . . collapsed.”

  I watched Morgan and thought about Imhoff’s accusation. She raised both hands to her face as she gazed down at his unmoving body. “Is he . . . breathing?”

  Before anyone could answer, two green-uniformed medics came bursting into the gym, carrying a bag of equipment. We all stepped out of their way as they trotted up to us. One of them knelt beside Imhoff and reached for his wrist to check his pulse.

  “What happened here?” the other medic asked.

  “He fainted,” I said. “As you can see, he has a head injury.”

  “He was in the hospital,” Amber added. “Maybe he came out too soon.”

  It didn’t take them long to get Imhoff onto a stretcher. He raised his head and gazed around as they started to carry him away. One of the medics put a hand on his chest and made him lie back down.

  As soon as they were out of sight, everyone started talking at once. I kept my eyes on Morgan, thinking about what Imhoff had said. Even with her hair tied back loosely, some of it falling over her face, and no makeup at all, and in ragged jeans and a baggy T-shirt, she looked beautiful. She didn’t look like a vampire.

  But what does a vampire look like?

  I felt a chill at the back of my neck. What if Imhoff wasn’t out of his head? What if he wasn’t just talking crazy because of his injury?

  I’d heard rumors that Winks had been drained of his blood. And some people said that the same thing had happened to Liam’s mother.

  A real vampire in Linden? It didn’t seem possible. And it definitely didn’t seem possible that Morgan Marks could be the vampire. For one thing, she was too light, too thin. How could she drink that much blood?

  Crazy thoughts. I shut my eyes and tried to get my head together. We still had a lot of work to prepare for the party.

  I opened my eyes when Delia grabbed my wrist. “Julie, what was he doing here?” she demanded.

  “He came to warn us,” Liam spoke up before I could. He answered Delia’s question but his eyes were on Morgan. “He said the killer is still out there somewhere. He said he’d keep us safe.”

  “But then he fainted to the floor,” I added.

  “Horrible,” Morgan murmured. She still had her hands covering her cheeks. “How horrible. Everyone must have freaked.”

  “It was kind of frightening,” I said. I was dying to tell Morgan that Imhoff had accused her. But I just couldn’t say the words.

  To my surprise, Liam said them for me. “Imhoff was muttering to himself. He kept repeating things,” he told her. “It was crazy. He said that you are the vampire. He said he came to Linden to protect us from you, and he failed.”

  Liam watched Morgan to see how she would react. So did I. So did everyone.

  Her hands slid from her cheeks. Her mouth dropped open in surprise, and I could see her thinking hard, her green eyes on Liam.

  “Of course, I’m a vampire,” she said. “Look at my fangs.” She opened her mouth and clicked her teeth a few times. She laughed. “Don’t I look like a vampire?”

  “Not exactly,” Liam said.

  She smiled at him. “Thanks. I guess that’s a compliment.”

  Kids shifted uncomfortably. A few muttered to each other, keeping their voices low.

  Morgan turned to me. “Julie knows I’m a vampire. Right, Julie? You work in the office with your mother. You saw my old school records. You know I went to Transylvania Middle School.”

  Some kids laughed.

  Morgan was getting her point across. The idea of her being a vampire was a total joke.

  But then I remembered something. “Morgan, actually, we don’t have your school records. They never came. Your file is totally empty. So . . . maybe you did go to Transylvania Middle School.”

  She grinned at me. “Maybe I did.”

  Amber tugged down the sleeves of her white sweatshirt. She cleared her throat. Her eyes were on Morgan. “We all feel weird and frightened and tense,” she said, “because of the horrible murders. But we have to try to have a normal life a
nd just keep on. You know. Keep on keeping on.”

  She took a breath. She didn’t usually speak up in a crowd. I could see it made her nervous. “And we can’t start accusing people we know of being vampires. That’s just crazy.”

  “She’s right,” Delia chimed in. “We can’t accuse one another. We don’t know anything about that Imhoff guy. He may be a total nutjob. If he came here to protect us, why didn’t he save Winks’s life? Why didn’t he save anyone’s life?”

  “Yes, he’s a nutjob,” Liam said. “Did anyone check up on him? Did the police check? Did they just let him go free?”

  Again, voices rang out. Everyone had an opinion about Imhoff.

  He had to be crazy. Just take one look at Morgan. She’s beautiful. And normal. And funny.

  But then another chill tightened the back of my neck as I remembered the letter from her old school. The letter that said she had died five years ago.

  I froze watching her, listening to everyone putting Imhoff down, talking about his crazy speech to us. Out of his head. He’s out of his head.

  I froze watching Morgan and remembered snapping the photos of her in my mother’s office with my phone. The photos that turned out to be blank, a blur. No school records. No photos. And that letter that said she had died. The letter she explained as a mix-up.

  I had to get everyone back to work. I didn’t have time for these thoughts. I didn’t have time . . .

  But what if? What if?

  What if Imhoff was telling the truth?

  Would someone else die because we didn’t believe him?

  51

  Julie Continues

  It rained the day of the alumni carnival, and I stood at our living room window, staring into the glare of the gray and glumly watching the big raindrops splash over our front yard.

  I felt Mom’s hands on my shoulders. “You can’t control the weather, Julie,” she said softly. “You’ve controlled everything else wonderfully. You’ve done a great job for this party.”

  “There’s been so much bad news,” I said. “I just want something to be nice. And normal.”