The foggy morning light drifted through Juliet’s curtains and brought her into a state of consciousness. She batted her eyelashes and brought the room into focus. Her room was empty because there was no long-limbed gentleman asleep at her desk or dark-haired rogue in bed with her. 

Seth was gone.  

Juliet sighed.  

She couldn’t remember a thing after their second kiss and that had been somewhere between four and five in the morning. Had he left right after that? From what she could tell, he hadn’t done a thing to her, but merely covered her with a blanket and walked out. Well, there was something else she wanted to check. She felt the contours of her throat, but the skin was unbroken.  

She flopped back down on her bed.

What should she do now? After their conversation the night before, Juliet was left to choose what to believe: either that Seth was an ordinary guy who was pretending to be some dark, demonic thing just to please her, or that he actually was some dark, demonic thing.  

When Juliet thought of the first theory, Rylan’s red eyes popped into her head. She could guess how he would answer her dilemma. “I’m an everyday guy and I’m wearing red contacts. Remember? The simplest solution is usually the correct one. And Seth? Yeah, he’s a normal guy, too. Don’t be so dumb that you believe the ridiculous stories he tells you.”

Since when had Rylan become the voice in her head? Was he supposed to be the devil or the angel sitting on her shoulder?

Juliet considered the second theory, that Seth was really something dark—cursed. Three pieces of evidence supported this theory: the three bite marks in a neat line down the vein in his throat, his fangs, and the fact that he said himself that he scared off vampires because he was scarier than they were.

If she’d had enough of these games, she needed to crack down on what Seth really was. Reminding herself that it was completely okay if he was an ordinary guy, she picked up her cell phone and gave the Occult’s Addict president a call.

“Hello,” Fiona answered her phone briskly.

“Hi Fiona, this is Juliet.”

“Hey, how’s it going? Lucky you called after ten, if you’d called ten minutes earlier, I wouldn’t have answered. What can I do for you this morning?”

“I was just wondering what information our club has gathered on Seth. Could you share it with me?”

Fiona yawned. “Sure, babe, but I think you’re in a much better position to share information with us, since you’re so close to him and everything.”

Juliet hesitated. “I already told Rylan a bunch of stuff. Didn’t he pass it on?”

“That little puke,” Fiona fumed. “No, he didn’t. Stop telling him things. He’s been so despicably jealous since that night you left the greenhouse with Seth. I can hardly stand to be around him anymore. Just come to Halo or me when you have something interesting to spill. It’ll be more fun to tell us anyway.”

Juliet suddenly remembered her conversation with Elise from down the hall about Seth. That girl didn’t want to hear about it, but these people did. Juliet’s heart sang.  

“You bet,” she said cheerfully, and she explained how she had blacked out when he kissed her.

“You are so lucky,” Fiona said when she was finished. “Seth’s piping hot, but it’s not just his face. The man looks totally tortured while somehow managing to look sophisticated and... I don’t know... he seems like he’s got a layer of impatience simmering under the surface.” She sighed. “I hope you have a good time with him. I wish I’d studied him a little more closely myself because I had no idea he had such a honey-dappled way of talking or such a razor-sharp wit.”

“Yeah, he’s a little vicious, huh?”

“Gorgeous, but vicious,” she agreed. “It’s a good thing Rylan didn’t try to spar with him. There would have been bloodshed.”

Juliet smiled. At least someone understood her fascination. “So, what do you know about him?” she asked.

“We weren’t that far into our investigation when you showed up, and I just thought you’d take it over. So, I have his address and Rylan’s pictures of him and that’s all.”

“His address? That’s more than I have. I haven’t been over to his place yet.”

“All right, here it is.”  

Juliet wrote it down. “Wow, I’m glad you had it so handy,” Juliet commented. “Do you usually keep this kind of information so handy?”

“Ah,” Fiona said, sounding nonchalant. “No. I have a folder next to my bed and that’s where I keep all my occult stuff. I gotta go, but please tell me how it goes. If he sucks your blood, I want to be the first to know. Later.”

With that, Fiona hung up. Juliet didn’t even get a chance to say good-bye before the line went dead.

“That was a little weird,” Juliet muttered as she dropped her phone on her duvet. It wasn’t that Fiona’s friendliness was completely unexpected, but Juliet found her end of the conversation awkward. She expected to have to wait for Fiona to give her Seth’s address. Why in the world did she have it at her fingertips?  

Juliet shrugged. She should just be happy with the result, which meant she could spend her entire Saturday hunting Seth down and figuring him out.

She looked at his address more carefully. His apartment complex wasn’t in her part of the city; rather, it was across the river in an area she had never been. However, the numbers made it seem like it wasn’t that far away. Too far to walk, she decided as she shoved herself to her feet. She needed to take her time getting ready, just in case she ‘accidentally’ ran into the object of her pursuit.