Meredith was on her feet and so was Matt, fists clenched.

"Make it stop! Make it stop!" Vickie cried wildly.

But it didn't stop. Matt and Meredith looked around as new objects joined the dance. Everything

movable was shaking, jittering, swaying . It was as if the room were caught in an earthquake. "Stop!Stop!" shrieked Vickie, her hands over her ears. Directly above the house thunder exploded. Bonnie jumped violently as she saw the zigzag of lightning shoot across the sky. Instinctively she grabbed for something to hang on to. As the lightning bolt flared a poster on Vickie's wall tore diagonally as if slashed by a phantom knife. Bonnie choked back a scream and clutched tighter.

Then, as quickly as if someone had flicked a power switch off, all the noise stopped.

Vickie's room was still. The fringe on the bedside lamp swayed slightly. The poster had curled up in two irregular pieces, top and bottom. Slowly, Vickie lowered her hands from her ears.

Matt and Meredith looked around rather shakily.

Bonnie shut her eyes and murmured something like a prayer. It wasn't until she opened them again that

she realized what she had been hanging on to. It was the supple coolness of a leather jacket. It was Damon's arm. He hadn't moved away from her, though. He didn't move now. He was leaning forward slightly, eyes narrowed, watching the room intently. "Look at the mirror," he said.

Everyone did, and Bonnie drew in her breath, fingers clenching again. She hadn't seen it, but it must have happened while everything in the room was going berserk.

On the gla.s.s surface of the bamboo mirror two words were scrawled in Vickie's hot coral lipstick.

Goodnight, Sweetheart.

"Oh, G.o.d," Bonnie whispered.

Stefan turned from the mirror to Vickie. There was something different about him, Bonnie thought-he was holding himself relaxed but poised, like a soldier who's just gotten confirmation of a battle. It was as if he'd accepted a personal challenge of some kind.

He took something out of his back pocket and unfolded it, revealing sprigs of a plant with long green leaves and tiny lilac flowers.

"This is vervain , fresh vervain ," he said quietly, his voice even and intense. "I picked it outsideFlorence ; it's blooming there now." He took Vickie's hand and pressed the packet into it. "I want you to hold on to this and keep it. Put some in every room of the house, and hide pieces somewhere in your parents' clothes if you can, so they'll have it near them. As long as you have this with you, he can't take over your mind. He can scare you, Vickie, but he can't make you do anything, like open a window or door for him. And listen, Vickie, because this is important."

Vickie was shivering, her face crumpled. Stefan took both her hands and made her look at him, speaking slowly and distinctly.

"If I'm right, Vickie,he can't get in unless you let him . So talk to your parents. Tell them it's important that they don't ask any stranger inside the house. In fact, I can have Damon put that suggestion in their mind right now." He glanced at Damon, who shrugged slightly and nodded, looking as if his attention was somewhere else. Self-consciously, Bonnie removed her hand from his jacket.

Vickie's head was bent over the vervain .

"He'll get in somehow," she said softly, with terrible certainty.

"No. Vickie, listen to me. From now on, we're going to watch your house; we're going to be waiting for him."

"It doesn'tmatter ," Vickie said. "You can't stop him." She began to laugh and cry at the same time.

"We're going to try," Stefan said. He looked at Meredith and Matt, who nodded. "Right. From this moment on, you will never be alone. There will always be one or more of us outside watching you."

Vickie just shook her bent head. Meredith gave her arm a squeeze and stood as Stefan tilted his head toward the window.

When she and Matt joined him there, Stefan spoke to all of them in a low voice. "I don't want to leave her unguarded, but I can't stay myself right now. There's something I have to do, and I need one of the girls with me. On the other hand, I don't want to leave either Bonnie or Meredith alone here." He turned to Matt. "Matt, will you..."

"I'll stay," said Damon.

Everyone looked at him, startled.

"Well, it's the logical solution, isn't it?" Damon seemed amused. "After all, what do you expect one of them to do against him anyway?"

"They can call for me. I can monitor their thoughts that far," Stefan said, not giving one inch.

"Well," Damon said whimsically, "I can call for you too, little brother, if I get into trouble. I'm getting bored with this investigation of yours anyway. I might as well stay here as anywhere."

"Vickie needs to be protected, not abused," Stefan said.

Damon's smile was charming. "Her?" He nodded toward the girl who sat on the bed, rocking over the vervain . From disheveled hair to bare feet, Vickie was not a pretty picture. "Take my word for it, brother, I can do better than that." For just an instant Bonnie thought those dark eyes flicked sideways toward her. "You're always saying how you'd like to trust me, anyway," Damon added. "Here's your chance to prove it."

Stefan looked as if he wanted to trust, as if he were tempted. He also looked suspicious. Damon said nothing, merely smiled in that taunting, enigmatic way. Practically asking to bemistrusted , Bonnie thought.

The two brothers stood looking at each other while the silence and the tension stretched out between them. Just then Bonnie could see the family resemblance in their faces, one serious and intense, the other bland and faintly mocking, but both inhumanly beautiful.

Stefan let his breath out slowly. "All right," he said quietly at last. Bonnie and Matt and Meredith were all staring at him, but he didn't seem to notice. He spoke to Damon as if they were the only two people there. "You stay here, outside the house where you won't be seen. I'll come back and take over when I'm finished with what I'm doing."

Meredith's eyebrows were in her hair, but she made no comment. Neither did Matt. Bonnie tried to quell her own feelings of unease. Stefan must know what he's doing, she told herself. Anyway, he'dbetter .

"Don't take too long," Damon said dismissively.

And that was how they left it, with Damon blending in with the darkness in the shadow of the black walnut trees in Vickie's backyard and Vickie herself in her room, rocking endlessly.

In the car, Meredith said, "Where next?"

"I need to test a theory," said Stefan briefly.

"That the killer is a vampire?" Matt said from the back, where he sat with Bonnie.

Stefan glanced at him sharply. "Yes."

"That's why you told Vickie not to invite anyone in," Meredith added, not to be outdone in the reasoning department. Vampires, Bonnie remembered, couldn't enter a place where humans lived and slept unless

they were invited. "And that's why you asked if the man was wearing a blue stone." "An amulet against daylight," Stefan said, spreading his right hand. On the third finger there was a silverring set with lapis lazuli. "Without one of these, direct exposure to the sun kills us. If the murdereris avampire, he keeps a stone like this somewhere on him." As if by instinct, Stefan reached up to brieflytouch something under his T-shirt. After a moment Bonnie realized what it must be.

Elena's ring.Stefan had given it to her in the first place, and after she died he'd taken it to wear on a chain around his neck. So that part of her would be with him always, he'd said.

When Bonnie looked at Matt beside her, she saw his eyes were closed.

"So how can we tell if he's a vampire?" Meredith asked.

"There's only one way I can think of, and it isn't very pleasant. But it's got to be done."

Bonnie'sheart sank. If Stefan thought it wasn't very pleasant, she was sure she was going to find it even less so. "What is it?" she said unenthusiastically.

"I need to get a look at Sue's body."

There was dead silence. Even Meredith, normally so unflappable, looked appalled. Matt turned away,leaning his forehead against the window gla.s.s. "You've got to be kidding," Bonnie said. "I wish I were." "But-for G.o.d's sake, Stefan. Wecan't . They won't let us. I mean, what are we going to say? 'Excuse me while I examine this corpse for holes'?" "Bonnie, stop it," Meredith said. "I can't help it," Bonnie snapped back shakily. "It's anawful idea. And besides, the police already checked her body. There wasn't a mark on it except the cuts she got in the fall." "The police don't know what to look for," Stefan said. His voice was steely. Hearing it brought something home to Bonnie, something she tended to forget. Stefan was one ofthem . One of the hunters.

He'd seen dead people before. He might even have killed some. He drinksblood , she thought, and shuddered. "Well?" said Stefan. "Are you still with me?" Bonnie tried to make herself small in the backseat. Meredith's hands were tight on the steering wheel. It was Matt who spoke, turning back from the window. "We don't have a choice, do we?" he said tiredly. "There's a viewing of the body from seven to ten at the funeral home," Meredith added, her voice low.

"We'll have to wait until after the viewing, then. After they close the funeral home, when we can be alone with her," said Stefan.

"This is the most gruesome thing I've ever had to do," Bonnie whispered wretchedly. The funeral chapel was dark and cold. Stefan had sprung the locks on the outside door with a thin piece of flexible metal. The viewing room was thickly carpeted, its walls covered with somber oak panels. It would have been a depressing place even with the lights on. In the dark it seemed close and suffocating and crowded with grotesque shapes. It looked as if someone might be crouching behind each of the many standing flower arrangements.

"I don't want tobe here," Bonnie moaned. "Let's just get it over with, okay?" Matt said through his teeth. When he snapped the flashlight on, Bonnie looked anywhere but where it was pointing. She didn't want to see the coffin, shedidn't . She stared at the flowers, at a heart made of pink roses. Outside, thundergrumbled like a sleeping animal.

"Let me get this open-here," Stefan was saying. In spite of her resolve not to, Bonnie looked.

The casket was white, lined with pale pink satin. Sue's blond hair shone against it like the hair of a sleeping princess in a fairy tale. But Sue didn't look as if she were sleeping. She was too pale, too still.

Like a waxwork.

Bonnie crept closer, her eyes fixed on Sue's face. That's why it's so cold in here, she told herself staunchly. To keep the wax from melting. It helped a little. Stefan reached down to touch Sue's high-necked pink blouse. He undid the top b.u.t.ton. "For G.o.d'ssake ," Bonnie whispered, outraged. "What do you think we're here for?" Stefan hissed back. But his fingers paused on the second b.u.t.ton. Bonnie watched a minute and then made her decision. "Get out of the way," she said, and when Stefan didn't move immediately, she gave him a shove. Meredith drew up close to her and they formed a phalanx between Sue and the boys. Their eyes met with understanding. If they had to actually remove the blouse, the guys were going out.

Bonnie undid the small b.u.t.tons while Meredith held the light. Sue's skin felt as waxy as it looked, cool against her fingertips. Awkwardly, she folded the blouse back to reveal a lacy white slip. Then she made herself push Sue's shining gold hair off the pale neck. The hair was stiff with spray.

"No holes," she said, looking at Sue's throat. She was proud that her voice was almost steady. "No," said Stefan oddly. "But there's something else. Look at this." Gently, he reached around Bonnie to point out a cut, pale and bloodless as the skin around it, but visible as a faint line running from collarbone to breast. Over the heart. Stefan's long finger traced the air above it and Bonnie stiffened, ready to smack the hand away if he touched.

"What is it?" asked Meredith, puzzled.

"A mystery," Stefan said. His voice was still odd. "If I saw a mark like that on a vampire, it would mean the vampire was giving blood to a human. That's how it's done. Human teeth can't pierce our skin, so we cut ourselves if we want to share blood. But Sue wasn't a vampire."

"She certainly wasn't!" said Bonnie. She tried to fight off the image her mind wanted to show her, of

Elena bending to a cut like that on Stefan's chest and sucking, drinking...

She shuddered and realized her eyes were shut. "Is there anything else you need to see?" she said, opening them.

"No. That's all."

Bonnie did up the b.u.t.tons. She rearranged Sue's hair. Then, while Meredith and Stefan eased the lid of

the casket back down, she walked quickly out of the viewing room and to the outside door. She stood there, arms wrapped around herself .

A hand touched her elbow lightly. It was Matt.

"You're tougher than you look," he said.

"Yes, well..." She tried to shrug. And then suddenly she was crying, crying hard. Matt put his arms

around her.

"I know," he said. Just that. Not "Don't cry" or "Take it easy" or "Everything's going to be all right." Just "I know." His voice was as desolate as she felt. "They've got hair spray in her hair," she sobbed. "Suenever used hair spray. It's awful." Somehow, just then, this seemed the worst thing of all. He simply held her. After a while Bonnie got her breath. She found she was holding on to Matt almost painfully tightly and loosened her arms. "I got your shirt all wet," she said apologetically, sniffling. "It doesn't matter." Something in his voice made her step back and look at him. He looked the way he had in the high school parking lot. So lost, so... hopeless. "Matt, what is it?" she whispered. "Please." "I told you already," he said. He was looking away into some immeasurable distance. "Sue's lying in there dead, and she shouldn't be. You said it yourself, Bonnie. What kind of world is it that lets a thing like that happen ? That lets a girl like Sue get murdered for kicks, or kids inAfghanistan starve, or baby seals get skinned alive? If that's what the world is like, what does anything matter? It's all over anyway." He paused and seemed to come back to himself. "Do you understand what I'm talking about?"

"I'm not so sure." Bonnie didn't even think she wanted to. It was too scary. But she was overwhelmed by an urge to comfort him, to wipe that lost look from his eyes. "Matt, I-"

"We're finished," Stefan said from behind them. As Matt looked toward the voice the lost look seemed to intensify. "Sometimes I think we'reallfinished," Matt said, moving away from Bonnie, but he didn't explain what he meant by that. "Let's go."

Seven

Stefan approached the corner house reluctantly, almost afraid of what he might find. He half expected that Damon would have abandoned his post by now. He'd probably been an idiot to rely on Damon in the first place. But when he reached the backyard, there was a shimmer of motion among the black walnut trees. His eyes, sharper than a human's because they were adapted for hunting, made out the darker shadow leaning against a trunk.

"You took your time getting back."

"I had to see the others home safe. And I had to eat."

"Animal blood," Damon said contemptuously, eyes fixed on a tiny round stain on Stefan's T-shirt.