Free At First Bite by Ruth Ames

leads.
    I shrink backward in my chair, terror gripping my throat. There’s no way this is a coincidence. Every detail is too similar to Mr. Bernal’s attack.
I was right,
I think as I stand up in a panic.
Marc was sick, and he attacked again.
It makes sense that he’d hunt someone on the beach, since that’s clearly a place he hangs out.
    Somehow I feel responsible, as if I should have done something to prevent this. As if I need to do something now.
    I glance wildly around my room. I could text Arabella, but it’s unlikely she’d get back to me. I could call the police, but then I’d run the risk of everyone discovering
I’m
a vampire. I could look in the Handbook, but I don’t even know where I put it — a lot of stuff got misplaced last night in the shuffle of moving in my furniture. I could — I could — I close my eyes, overwhelmed. Then, in the next instant, there’s nothing I
can
do.
    Because I’m transforming into a bat.
    I know I shouldn’t have panicked. But it’s too late. My teeth have already lengthened into sharp fangs, and my body is shrinking upward as my armsbecome wings. I feel my eyes burn red and my claws take shape. I’m morphing much faster than I ever have before. Within seconds, the mirror on my wall shows a bat in my bedroom.
    At least, I console myself, I’m alone. I’m not in school, or with friends, and there’s no one I have to hide from….
    “Ashlee?”
    Except for my mother.
    I hear her coming down the hall and can smell her expensive moisturizing cream.
    “Ashlee, I hope you’re not still sleeping,” she says in a singsong. “It’s almost noon, and I was thinking we could go shopping on Rodeo Drive!”
    I flash to an image of my mom, impeccably dressed and groomed, walking into Chanel with a bat perched on her shoulder. I almost want to laugh.
    I hear Mom’s hand on the doorknob. I’m reminded of my last night in New York, when Arabella narrowly escaped by flying out my window….
    I glance at the still-open doors to my terrace. I take a breath, flap my wings, and propel myself outside, into the cool air. I hear Mom entering my now-empty room. “She must have gone to the beach,” she murmurs to herself. “I hope she wore sunscreen.”
    I do fly toward the beach, since it’s straight ahead. Although it’s not sunny, there are a few people dotting the sand. It’s bizarre — and a teeny bit cool — to see them beneath me: little colorful figures lying out on towels. Then I see a group of police officers and realize I’m in danger. The surfer said he was attacked by a “dark, winged thing.” If someone happens to glance up at the sky, they’ll see just that. They’ll see me.
    I can’t linger here. And I can’t go home either, since Mom could still be in my room. I hover for a moment, thinking, and then it hits me: In homeroom yesterday, Gordon said he and Marc were meeting at the Apple Store at noon. I’m not far from the Third Street Promenade. If I head over there, I can check to see if Marc is healthy-looking again — and maybe I can pick up some other clues, too.
    Suddenly, for the first time ever, I’m glad that I’m in bat form. It will give me the chance to move quickly and spy on Marc, as long as he doesn’t look up.
    I make an abrupt turn, and my stomach does a weird swooping thing, kind of like the time I rode the roller coaster at Coney Island with Eve. But I keep flying ahead. I’ve never been in bat form outside during the daytime, and it feels sort of nice to have thewind in my face. Yes, I’m worried that any minute I’ll shift back and fall out of the sky. But behind my fear is a sense of freedom and wonder. I’m as tall as the palm trees!
    The Third Street Promenade is crowded with shoppers. My gaze scans over parents, toddlers, elderly couples … and then lands on a boy about my age, with curly dark hair. He’s really here, wearing his S.M.A. BEARS shirt and making his way toward the Apple Store.
    Marc, the Dark One.
    He does