Born at Midnight (Shadow Falls #1)(74)

Miranda's eyes grew round as if she just remembered something. "Is it true that Lucas got your name this morning?"

"Yeah," Kylie admitted.

"Oh, shit." Del a pushed Kylie into a kitchen chair. "Start talking. What happened?"

Miranda dropped into a chair. "Yeah, spil it."

Kylie did spil it. It al rol ed off her tongue so fast she couldn't stop it. And not just about the kiss. She told them about Lucas living next to her, about her cat. She told them about the amazing kiss and about the whole mess with Derek and Trey-including her mixed-up feelings for Derek after he'd moved on without giving her so much as a second glance. When Kylie final y shut up, Del a and Miranda sat there, their eyes wide and their mouths hung open in disbelief.

"Damn," Del a said.

Miranda leaned back in her chair and sighed. "I wanna be kissed like that. I'm so ready to be swept off my feet."

"That's easy," Del a said. "Why don't you go find Perry and lay one on him?"

Miranda shook her head. "Please, if the guy doesn't have the bal s to even tel me he likes me, he's not going to have the bal s to kiss me."

"Then put a spel on him to make him grow a pair," Del a said.

They al laughed. And then Kylie's phone began to ring. She glanced at the cal er ID and saw her dad's number on the screen. Her laughter faded into a frown. And then, just because she didn't want to let anything ruin the mood, she reached down and turned off the ringer and then slipped the phone back in her pocket.

* * *

The next day and a half flew by. It helped that there were no more bouts of drama-no surprise visits from Trey, no confrontations with Fredericka, not even any arguments between Miranda and Del a. They had donated blood and it felt right. And then night fel .

Kylie woke up in a cold sweat. She sat up in her bed, knowing the ghost was here. Then Kylie realized she wasn't in her bed. She wasn't even at camp.

Her heart raced as she tried to make sense of her surroundings. She knew she wasn't in Texas anymore. Not even in the United States, for that matter. It felt ... foreign and yet somehow familiar, like images she'd seen in the Gulf War movies her mom loved. Kylie stood outside of a smal house on a plot of land devoid of trees and grass. It was hot. Not Texas hot, more dry desert heat. The sun had set and the time seemed caught between light and dark. The smel of burning rubber and wood, of devastation, fil ed her nose. Plus there was noise. So much noise. It was as if someone suddenly turned up the volume because the noise around her was deafening-there were screams and loud pops-bombs echoing off in the distance. Gunshots. Someone was yel ing for her to fol ow them. "It's not our problem," the male voice screamed. What's not my ... She heard the wailing-a woman, Kylie realized. A woman screaming for help, screaming in pain. Fear climbed up Kylie's spine and she knew whatever was happening to the woman was terrible. And unjust. Kylie didn't want to be a part of it. Didn't want to see it, didn't want to know about it. Too ugly. Not my problem.

What was not her problem? Confusion fil ed her mind.

It's a dream. Just a dream. Wake up. Wake up. She tried to remember how Dr. Day had taught her to stop the dreams, but she couldn't. She closed her eyes real y tight and opened them, hoping she'd be back at her cabin.

She wasn't. Somehow she'd moved closer to the house and to the screams. The woman was in the house. Someone hurt her. Who? Why? What did it al mean? Why was Kylie here? Why was she stuck in a war movie? Or was it a movie? No, a dream. Her mind tried to compute the questions. No time, a voice deep inside her demanded, only time to feel, to understand. Why did she need to understand?

Her questions faded and she felt completely present in the dream again, in the havoc, in the ugliness of war. She felt an enormous guilt for not wanting to be involved with the woman. If she ran, if she ran right now, she knew she could catch up with the others and get away. Choices ran through her head. She could live if she left now. But could she live knowing she'd al owed this to happen to the woman?

No. She couldn't. She glanced down at an assault rifle in her hand. Just like the ones from the war movies. She had to stop whoever was hurting that poor woman.

Kylie kicked in the door and aimed her gun at the man hunched over the woman. "Stop it!" Kylie screamed, but it wasn't her voice making the demand. It was a man's voice.

Kylie froze for a second, then she saw that the man had a knife. She saw the woman, her clothes ripped, and blood covering her face and hands, as she scrambled away from her assailant.

The man swung around to face Kylie. He rushed forward, his bloody knife held high. Her finger on the trigger tightened. She saw him fal and felt no remorse for shooting him. He was evil, she knew it.

A young boy came running in the front door. His dark hair and eyes seemed haunted and older than his years. "No!" he screamed when he saw the bleeding woman huddled against the wal . He fixed his eyes on Kylie.

He started yel ing something in a language Kylie didn't understand. He pul ed a gun from his pants pocket and aimed it. Aimed it right at Kylie. Pop. Pop. Pop. She heard the shots. She didn't feel them, but she knew she'd been shot-she also knew when she fel to the floor she was dying.

Suddenly, she stood in the corner of the room looking at the boy and the woman. Her gaze shot to the body lying in a heap, the body she'd just left