“That’s something I’m learning from Leslie,” Ryker said from the front.
“What?” Hannah said, then laughed at herself while Claire laughed along and repeated his words.
“Tai?” Leslie said from the front. “You didn’t answer the question.”
“New to me too,” came his unmistakable voice from the back.
Of all the facets of Tai that made Claire grit her teeth, his voice was near the top of the list—though notatthe top, obviously. Tai’s voice was a warm baritone that must curl the toes of every woman who didn’t have reason to steer clear of him. It was smoke and honey. It was infuriating.
And now she couldn’t shut it out.
“You were saying,” came the bothersome baritone.
“Right, anyway,” Nova said, “I’m working on an article forVampire Todaythat’s probably going to be controversial, because I want to sort of call out that tradition of self-protectionism and explore where we could go as a society if we’d all work harder to get past it.”
Trust Nova to introduce social issues to a morning hike in nature. Claire shook her head but had to smile. They’d met online thanks to a firecracker of an article by Nova. They’d kept chatting thanks to their shared passion for justice, though they acted on that passion in different ways.
Very different ways.
“You don’t find that idealistic?” Tai said.
“Oh, it probably is.” Nova laughed. “Ask anyone here, and they’ll tell you I’m a stubborn idealist.”
He laughed along, and yes, his laugh was one of the other things near the top of the Tai’s Flaws list. Deep, rich, disarming.
“I can admire that,” he said, “but how far have you dug into the history? Apex to apex, I mean.”
“I’ve read a lot of books.”
“Written by vampires?”
“And by humans.”
A pause fell behind Claire, and she kept herself from pivoting to give away her curiosity. The others were listening too, given how all other random chatting had ceased while Tai and Nova talked.
“Well?” Nova said. “Out of thoughts?”
Now his laugh came so quietly, Hannah and Jake wouldn’t hear it even if the waterfall suddenly went dry. “I think your research is missing an entire voice if you haven’t read any wolves.”
“I don’t disagree, but try to find a sociology book written by a wolf—especially one that’s more than five years old.”
“Fair point, but I hope you’ll find a way to include them. They typically live at least a full century, which means a lot of their elders alive today saw some terrible things. Their self-protectiveness makes a lot of sense.”
“You sound like you know them.”
“A few, yeah.”
Claire was fairly certain Tai knew almost everybody. If he had a superpower, this was it: his ability to convince people he truly, deeply saw them. He’d done it to her, after all. Had her believing she’d found a true friend. She tried to turn her focus from the discussion behind her to the beauty in front of her.
Hiking at human speed, reaching the base of the waterfall took about twenty minutes. Everybody began stripping off clothes and shoes to reveal their swimsuits beneath. Claire stripped down to her blue-and-burgundy floral one-piece and waded out into the clear, icy water.
“It’s too cold!” Nova shrieked. “Too cold for vampires!”
It was vastly less comfortable than the heated public pool near Claire’s condo, but she waded in farther. Across the basin, a slim black-haired form leaped from the ground onto a high boulder that jutted over the water. A portion of the waterfall constantly splashed the rock, and now it splashed him too—until he sprang off the boulder and made a slicing, shallow dive that shot him from one side of the basin to the other. The water was clear enough that he was easy to watch under the surface in his bright-blue shorts.
Hannah and Jake cheered and clapped.
“That was so cool,” Hannah said.
