All Wounds Read Online Free PDF Page A

saw her hair being moved aside. She felt him tilt her chin so she could see the huge mark on the right side of her neck she hated so much. It was a dark, tea-colored stain that covered half her neck, shaped like a funny asterisk.
    Ever since she’d started school, kids had teased her without mercy about her birthmark, and Rebecca tried to cover it as much as possible. Everyone still made fun of it, except Robin. Robin only teased her for keeping it hidden with her hair. Robin thought it was cool—almost like a tattoo of an eight-pointed star.
    “Be proud of it! Show it off! You have this great piece of body art you didn’t even have to pay for, that no one will yell at you for getting! How cool is that?” Robin always said in that over-enthusiastic way that made her such a great friend. Rebecca didn’t mind it when Robin mentioned her birthmark. Robin never made her feel horrible about it. Robin never made her feel different, or that there was something wrong with her.
    That didn’t make her feel any better about that horrid thing on her neck.
    It looked like someone drew a little t on her neck, then changed their mind and drew an X over it. Rebecca was going to see about having it removed as soon as she was out on her own and had the money.
    She felt Syd’s fingers touch her neck and she glanced at it in the mirror, scowling at her reflection. Her brow furrowed as she realized that she could see the pulse that beat below the skin there.
    She looked up at him, confused. Rebecca could see two small white points poorly hidden behind a suppressed smile.
    Were those fangs ?
    “If you’re really a vampire, shouldn’t I be staking you through the heart or something?” Rebecca asked with a bravado she didn’t feel. “I mean, you know...like in Buffy ?”
    A soft laugh escaped Syd as he released her.
    His laughter almost annoyed her. People laughed at her all the time and it always made her feel stupid and hurt. She didn’t need yet another gorgeous guy making fun of her—certainly not when he was the one who had shown up at her house totally uninvited. Yet somehow Syd’s laughter didn’t hurt like it did when the kids at school did it. His was...Rebecca didn’t have a word for it, other than “warm.” Gentle, maybe. Not meant to hurt.
    He was amused by her, not trying to make her feel stupid.
    “Do you really think you could?” He smiled so that his fangs could be seen. Rebecca gasped and took a step back at the sight of them. “Tell me, Acolyte—ever kill a spider?”
    Rebecca nodded, wide-eyed. How did he know about—?
    “It hurts, doesn’t it, just a little bit?” Syd continued.

    Rebecca nodded again, biting her bottom lip. She always tried to catch them instead, and take them outside because it did hurt. Physically. Not just because she felt sorry for them when she accidentally killed one, which was probably dumb, but it didn’t stop her feeling it.
    “Or when you want to hurt someone, like today in detention, when you wanted to slap—”
    “Shhh! Please!” Rebecca glanced over at her grandmother, but Nana was focused on Ryan and hadn’t seemed to notice her talking to Syd.
    “Did Ryan tell you about detention?” she whispered to the boy. Well, he wasn’t really a “boy,” was he, if he was a...a...
    Syd smiled again and gave that soft laugh that both annoyed and captivated Rebecca. “‘Vampire,’” he said. “You can say it. I’m not as sensitive about the term as some.”
    “Sydney,” Nana called suddenly. “I can’t slow it. It’s too late. He’s turning.”
    Sydney instantly crossed to the bed where Ryan lay and knelt beside it. He took Ryan’s hand as the bed shook. Ryan seemed to be having some kind of seizure, and looked all but dead to Rebecca.
    “It’s all right, buddy,” Syd soothed. “I’ve got you the best Healer here, and we’re going to take care of you. Don’t fight it. I know, it’s earlier than we planned, but take it in stride. Come on...”
    Rebecca