Fangs for the Memories by Molly Harper Page A

embarrassment.
    Even Jamie had a major, and he was only nineteen years old. He was already a hit in the sports medicine department and was on track to serve as an assistant trainer for the baseball team in the spring. He was limited to assisting with indoor weight training and night games due to our sunlight aversion, but he still had a job. It was embarrassing, at my age, to be considered directionless. I was lost. And I was never lost. Jamie was so at ease here, surrounded by people close to his own age and making friends left and right. This was the life he should have started just a few years before, but while being able to eat solid foods and go out during the day without self-immolating. Maybe my punishment for contributing to his loss of that life was my own difficulty in settling into a similar contentment.
    I supposed the problem was that while he was choosing what he wanted to be when he grew up, I’d already lived several lifetimes. I’d learned so much already, it was difficult to find a new subject that interested me. And Jamie was so young. He’d seen so little of the world. No matter what Jane said, I didn’t want to keep him from it—quite the opposite. I just wanted to be there with him when he saw it.
    â€œUh, Ophelia’s undeclared for right now,” Jamie said, squeezing me against his side.
    â€œWell, you’ll figure it out,” Ben assured me.
    â€œAnd how is . . . Gigi?” I asked, trying to keep the growl from my voice.
    The sparkly smile disappeared from his button face. “Oh, uh, we haven’t really talked much since this summer. We broke up, you know, and she’s been real busy adjusting to being a vampire. I mean, we parted as friends and all, but you know how it is when you say you’re going to stay friends—you never really stay friends.”
    I had no idea what he was talking about. No paramour I’d parted with had ever asked me to remain friends. Mostly, they asked to remain attached to all of their limbs. But given her tendency to enthrall every man with whom she came into contact, it didn’t surprise me that Gigi had left Ben a morose shell of the man-puppy he used to be.
    â€œBen was seeing some girl he met interning at Microsoft,” Jamie added in his helpful tone. “But she dropped him like a silver cross when she went back for her senior year. She saw an old boyfriend and they got back together. She says it’s ‘like they’d never split up.’ ”
    Ben said dryly, “Thanks for bringing that back up, buddy. It’s not embarrassing at all.”
    Jamie grinned. At times like this I had to remind myself that the awkwardness that stemmed from Jamie’s obtuse nature was genuine. Convenient and amusing, but genuine.
    I would have to think of some more appropriate woman to distract Ben. It would keep Jamie from being his undead wingman and it would irritate Gigi when she saw her ex wandering around campus with attractive arm candy. Sure, Gigi had moved on with one of my more reliable operatives, Nikolai Dragomirov, but that didn’t mean she would enjoy seeing her ex canoodling with a beautiful vampire.
    I added “connect Ben with a trustworthy vampiress” to my mental to-do list. Also “copy Jamie’s schedule from his iPhone to mine” so I could try to find more time with him. He’d been so busy with classes and his friends and a lot of other things, I hadn’t seen him much since the semester started. Fortunately, he was pretty careless with phone security.
    But for right now, I had bodywash to avenge.
    â€œWell, it was lovely to see you again, Ben. Please don’t be such a stranger.” I paused and gave Jamie a kiss. “Enjoy your workout. I’m going to go have a conversation with my roommate.”
    â€œBe nice,” Jamie told me.
    â€œI will be the very picture of civility, all smiles and sweetness,” I promised