“A lot of these records are decades out of date,” Dad reasoned. “The more recent years are in the computer.”

“He broke into that, too, I think,” I said, remembering the day I’d found Lucas sneaking out of Mrs. Bethany’s carriage house office.

Mrs. Bethany whirled on me, her temper clearly at the breaking point. “You saw that Lucas Ross was breaking rules, yet you never warned anyone in authority. You let a member of Black Cross run rampant at Evernight for months on end, Miss Olivier. Don’t think I’ll forget this.”

Whenever she spoke to me like that, I usually cringed. This time, I shot back, “You’re the one who admitted him in the first place!”

After that, nobody said anything for a second. I’d spoken only to defend myself, but I realized that Mrs. Bethany had screwed up—really, seriously screwed up—and her attempt to pin the blame on me had just failed.

Instead of strangling me, Mrs. Bethany stiffly turned back to searching the room. “Open every box. Look in every closet and in the rafters. I want to know everything Mr. Ross kept up here.”

Memories of Lucas and I together nearly overwhelmed me, but I concentrated on one moment in particular. When we’d first come into this room, Lucas had immediately taken a seat atop the long trunk against the nearby wall. I’d thought he just wanted to sit down, but maybe he’d done that for a different reason: to keep me from opening it.

Balthazar followed my eyes. He didn’t say anything out loud, but he raised one eyebrow, questioning. I nodded, and he went to the trunk and opened its lid. I couldn’t see what was inside, but my mother gasped and Professor Iwerebon swore beneath his breath. “What is it?” I asked.

Mrs. Bethany stepped closer and peered down into the trunk. Her face remained imperiously cool as she bent her knees and picked up a skull.

I screamed, then immediately felt stupid for doing so. “That’s got to be really old. I mean, look at it.”

“When we die, our bodies decompose rather rapidly, Miss Olivier.” Mrs. Bethany kept turning the skull that way and this. “To be precise, they decompose to the stage they should have reached since the time of human death. Though the flesh is gone, a few scraps of skin remain—which suggests this skull belonged to a vampire who died decades ago, perhaps even a century.”

“Erich,” Balthazar said suddenly. “He said once that he died in World War I. Lucas and Erich always had it in for each other. If Lucas lured him up here, and Erich had no idea that he was dealing with a Black Cross hunter, then it would’ve been no contest.”

“Not if Lucas had one of these.” My father had opened another box nearby, from which he lifted a huge knife—no, a machete. “This thing could make quick work of any of us.”

Balthazar gave a low whistle as he looked at the blade. “Those two used to fight, but Erich always got the better of Lucas. Either Lucas threw the fights on purpose, or he knew if he showed what he could really do, we might have caught on.”

I protested, “I thought Erich ran away.” Surely that had to be the truth. Lucas and Erich had fought, but Lucas couldn’t have killed him.

“We all thought that, but we were all wrong.” Mrs. Bethany let Erich’s skull drop unceremoniously back into the trunk. “Keep searching.”

The others did as she said. Trembling, I stepped closer to the trunk to look inside. There lay a jumble of bones, a dusty Evernight uniform, and, in the corner, a tan hoop. With a jolt I realized it was Raquel’s leather bracelet, the one that had been missing. Lucas wouldn’t have stolen it. No, Erich had taken it, and he’d had it on him when he died.

When Lucas killed him.

“Bianca? Honey?” My mother came to my side. She wore jeans and boots; normally she refused to dress in what she still thought of as men’s clothes, but to catch Lucas, she’d made an exception. “You should go to our apartment. You don’t need to see any more of this.”

“Go to the apartment and do what? Read a nice book? Listen to records? I don’t think so.”

“We should be able to track him despite the rain. You will never tell anyone else at this school what transpires here tonight.” Mrs. Bethany glared at me over Iwerebon’s shoulder.

Slowly I shut the lid of the trunk. “I’m coming, too.”

“Bianca?” Mom shook her head. “You don’t have to do this.”

“Yes, I do.”

“Don’t.” Balthazar stepped closer to me. “You’ve never done anything like this, and Black Cross—they’re good. Deadly. Lucas might be young, but he knows what he’s doing. That much is obvious.”

“What Balthazar is too polite to say is that it’s dangerous.” Dad looked furious. His nose was red and swollen—probably broken. Even vampire injuries take a while to heal. “Lucas Ross could hurt you, even kill you.”

I shivered, but I stood my ground. “He could kill any of you. You’re still going.”

“We’re going to take care of everything,” Balthazar insisted. “The worst part of all of this is what he did to you, Bianca. Your parents won’t let Lucas get away with it, and neither will I.”

Mrs. Bethany raised one eyebrow. Obviously she didn’t consider my broken heart the “worst part of all this,” and I expected her to shoot me down as usual. Instead she said, “She may join us.”

My mother stared at her. “She’s only a child!”