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Ryker’s hand found Leslie’s, and he gave it a gentle squeeze. She squeezed back with barely checked strength, and he tugged her closer to him, pressing their hands snugly against his thigh as they walked side-by-side. No matter how her parents reacted, she would be okay, and Ryker would be with her.

“Hey, you two. Come check this out.”

They crossed the room and stood over Dad’s puzzle table, where a two-thousand-piece puzzle lay half-completed. When finished, it would depict a scene that could have come straightfrom Harmony Ridge’s downtown fifty years ago, complete with a single traffic light and old brick shopfronts. The single car parked on the street, a red pickup truck with rounded fenders and giant round headlights, was the biggest giveaway of the historical setting. The wardrobes of the few pedestrians crossing the street was another clue.

Hey, maybe she should create a diorama series—same place, different decades.

Was she so dreading the coming conversation, her brain tried to distract her with art? Well, art would have to wait.

“Not that we have anything dire going on at three in the morning,” Dad said, “but we might as well get to your very important conversation. Your mom’s been trying all night to guess what it is.”

Mom settled into one of the stuffed chairs and tugged a throw blanket around her shoulders. “Should I tell you my top three guesses?”

“No,” Leslie said. “I mean, I’d rather just tell you, if that’s okay.”

Mom’s smile faded. “Of course, honey.” She glanced from Leslie to Ryker and back again. “Is something wrong?”

“I don’t think so. But I’m not sure. I need to ask you…a few questions.”

“Come and sit.”

Leslie kept hold of Ryker’s hand as she sat on the love seat, and he sank down beside her. He offered his neat folder to her, and she took it but set it on her lap without opening it. She didn’t need his notes. She didn’t need hers either. She had every piece of their investigation memorized.

“Leslie?” Dad said. He stood up from his puzzle table and moved to the other stuffed chair.

Now they all faced one another, Dad and Mom from one side of the den and Leslie and Ryker from the other side. It was thelast thing she wanted, to face down her parents like the opposing army in a battle for family secrets. But she didn’t know how else to do this, and she shouldn’thaveto do this, because they should have told her the truth years ago.

“I’ve been wondering about our family,” she said. “Our history, my history. Where I came from and how we got here—as vampires, I mean. Why we’re living apart from other vampires.”

Mom went statue-still. Dad gave a slow blink, and his pale-blue eyes shifted to charcoal gray. Beside her, Ryker stiffened. Leslie wanted to run out of the room, to take the words back altogether, to restore to this house the harmony that had greeted her and Ryker only minutes ago. Ryker wrapped one arm around her, and his defense fortified her enough to keep going.

To her dad she said, “Do you know I asked Mom about this, and she wouldn’t tell me?”

Dad nodded but said nothing.

“Okay, so I looked into it myself. That is, Ryker and I looked into it. I wouldn’t have been able to find much on my own.”

Dad began shaking his head before she finished, and his eyes remained flat and gray. “Our past is a family matter, Leslie. If we’re going to discuss it, then it needs to stay with the three of us.”

A few months ago, she would have surrendered then and there, asked Ryker to honor her dad’s wishes, squashed the frustration and hurt and never brought it up again. But she knew so much now that she hadn’t known a few months ago—about vampires, about herself, about the man she loved and about her parents.

“No,” she said, and her parents’ faces tightened in surprise and displeasure. “Ryker is going to be part of this family, Dad. He’s my boyfriend, and soon he’s going to be not only my spouse but also…my eternal.”

“Oh…” Mom’s voice was resonant, her full self unmuted by her surprise. “Congratulations, both of you.”

“This isn’t how I wanted to tell you.” Leslie glanced to Ryker. “Sorry to ruin the big reveal.”

Ryker shrugged. A smile tugged his mouth, but it didn’t last while Dad continued to frown at him.

“Stop glaring at him,” Leslie said, and her parents flinched again with surprise. “And stop acting like I’m a mouse who just came out of her hole for the first time in her life. Didn’t y’all just a month ago encourage me to take on my boss, to go after the things I want? Well, I want this. I want to know the truth.”

“You found enough on your own,” Mom said. “Whatever you found, why can’t that be enough?”

“Because stories matter, Mom. Our story matters.”

After a moment that tightened and stretched itself out, Dad sat back in his chair and nodded. “All right, Les. Show us.”

It was time. She knew all the way to her bones, though the conflict in the room threatened to squeeze her heart dry. She slid her notes from Ryker’s organized folder into her lap. She looked from Dad to Mom, back and forth, as she told them everything…and hoped they would understand.