Blood Crave 2 by Jennifer Knight

Lucas and Derek had spent the first night fixing it so that it was lightless. Lucas even went to some expensive home security store and bought a high-tech-lock thingy that only he and I had the keys to. It locked from the inside too, so Derek could get out if need be, and also lock himself in when I left him. It was safe. Derek was safe.
    But, boy I wished he could see this sun with me.
    It had been such a perfect vacation thus far. I hadn’t realized how much I’d been missing my mom until I saw her face, bright with awe, as we greeted each other. She was totally stunned when I showed up at her door at eleven o’clock at night, with a pale Derek on one side, and a tall devastatingly sexy—okay, and somewhat scary—boy on my other side. She was wild with happiness once she got over the shock, but I could tell she was thrown by Derek’s new look. We told her that he was getting over the flu, since we couldn’t use the leukemia spiel. She’d obviously call Derek’s parents to send her condolences, and they didn’t know about this yet.
    Surprisingly, my mom really liked Lucas. My mom’s a lawyer, and she’s one of those overly opinionated people that’s sometimes hard to get along with, but she and Lucas seemed to have the same views on pretty much everything. They spent hours griping over politics and global warming and other stuff that put me to sleep.
    I was glad that my mom liked Lucas so much. She was kind of my moral compass when it came to life and if she approved, I approved.
    The deal was officially sealed.
    Lucas jogged toward me from the surf, the sun glancing off his damp, caramel skin in the most enticing way. The girls lying next to me, Nicole and Alexis, suddenly stopped talking. I looked over and had to smother a laugh. They were staring at Lucas with their mouths hanging open. Yeah, he was cute when he was happy.
    Lucas crashed in the sand next to me, spinning the Frisbee on his finger.
    “Wanna play?” he asked.
    I smiled. “Careful, I think your tail is wagging.”
    Lucas flicked the Frisbee at my stomach, and I grimaced, acting injured.
    “Play for just five minutes,” Lucas wheedled.
    “Fine, but don’t laugh at me when I trip over myself.”
    His smile widened. “Never.” He tugged me up and ran down the beach, holding his arms over his head for me to throw.
    I threw it and he returned the thing with lightning speed. I fell over in the water trying to catch it and Lucas laughed at me. He laughed at me big time. Not that I cared much. I was just enjoying having fun with him instead of trying to evade death. I think he liked it too.

    N ew Year’s Eve was the following day, and Lucas and I decided to do something special together since we’d had little time to ourselves lately.
    It wasn’t the warmest, but I took Lucas surfing anyway. He admitted to trying it once, a couple decades ago, but gave up quickly because salt water didn’t gel with him. Apparently, it tasted too much like blood for his liking.
    “You’re not supposed to drink it,” I said. “Don’t be a grump. Just roll with it.”
    He turned out being better at it than I had ever been. Which was expected. And annoying. He actually ended up helping me improve, something he teased me about to no end. After we were spent, we ate lunch on the pier and fed the pelicans our scraps as we talked about school and what classes we wanted to take this semester.
    Later Lucas took me to a club where they throw glowing paint on the crowd, and we spent the night dancing. I expected Lucas to refuse to dance with me—he didn’t seem the dancing type. More the brood-in-a-corner type—but he’d astounded me by refusing to actually stop . At twenty seconds to midnight, I was panting and exhausted, but Lucas had never looked more alive. Or happy. As the music blared and the countdown began, he pulled me close, pressing his hips against mine.
    I heard his rough voice in my ear, sending my heart flying.
    “Three . . . two . . . one . .