"Are you ok?" Carmine asked when she saw Conner in English next period. She would have asked him earlier, but she'd spent the rest of lunch with Zev.

After Zev fell in the middle of the cafeteria, Carmine had rushed over to help him. She didn't see why Conner was suddenly so mad at her, but she had more important things to worry about. She pulled Zev up to his feet and practically dragged him out the door. He hadn't made it to the bathroom – he'd barely even made it to the trash cans outside of the cafeteria. After that, she'd helped him over to the wall a few feet away. They sat down against it, Zev leaning his head back against the bricks while he waited to see if he'd feel better.

"What happened?" Carmine asked.

Zev just shrugged. He was looking pretty pale, and his eyes were closed tight.

"Should I call someone?" she asked. She'd never seen him look so sick before.

He just shook his head.

"So what should I do?"

"Just... give me a minute." he told her finally. "See if... fresh air helps... If not... then call someone."

"Who would I call?" Carmine asked. His parents? She just hoped he had his phone with him instead of in his backpack. Mentally, she went over what she was supposed to say. What could she actually tell them?

"Mr. Lowell." Zev said, cutting into her thoughts before she had too much time to worry about it.

"Mr. Lowell? Why?" Carmine lowered her voice to barely a whisper. "Is it a... werewolf thing?"

"Shhhh." he told her. He actually opened his eyes, looking around to make sure no one heard her before answering. "I don't know. But if it is, I don't want to go to the nurse."

Carmine nodded. Suddenly, she was kind of jealous he had someone he could turn to for help at school. But before she had time to get too caught up in it, he looked back over at her.

"Help me up – I'm going to be sick."

Carmine waited with him for the rest of the period. After about fifteen minutes, she'd decided enough was enough. She'd been about to call Mr. Lowell after all, but he stopped her. He just needed to sit here a minute or two, he said. She didn't argue – especially since he wasn't actually throwing up anymore. But by the time he stopped feeling dizzy enough to walk to class on his own, there were only a few minutes left before lunch was over.

Zev might not have been entirely sure what had happened, but Carmine was pretty sure Conner had a theory, especially with the way he'd been glaring at her before she left. And now that she was sitting next to him in class, she was going to find out just what that theory was.

"So what happened?" Carmine asked, since Conner hadn't responded to her last question yet.

Conner didn't even look up from his stupid book. Instead, he turned his shoulders away from her just slightly.

"Really? You're not talking to me?"

Conner turned a page, but continued ignoring her.

Carmine glanced at the front of the room. Mr. Glasco hadn't come in yet, so she hopped over the edge of her desk and stood right next to Conner. She grabbed his book out from in front of him; if he was going to ignore her, he was going to have to stare down at nothing like an idiot.

"Fine. What?" Conner snapped, finally looking up at her.

"Just tell me what happened. And why you're so mad at me."

"Because. I told you that thing about the mistletoe barely even a week ago. And suddenly everyone's sick at lunch?"

"Well, not–" Carmine started. But Conner cut her off.

"Yeah – not everybody. Just us. That's how I know what it was." Conner snapped.

He glared menacingly at her, and Carmine could barely believe it; she'd only seen him look like that once – right before he ran at Adam last year. And that was only after Adam had tricked them twice and set Conner up to be potentially killed. Carmine found herself wondering if he felt like she'd tricked him into something like that herself. But whatever it was, she did not want to mess with him if he was going to be looking at her like that. Slowly, Carmine set his book back down on his desk.

"I'll leave you alone." she told him quietly. "But just so you know, I didn't do anything to you." She walked around to her desk and got out her own book.

Class started, and Carmine spent the entire time staring down at her book. She tried to pay attention to Mr. Glasco, but she couldn't get over how mad Conner looked. She would have been seriously insulted by it if she hadn't seen how sick Zev had been. If he and Luke had gotten even half as sick, she could understand why Conner'd be upset.

Carmine actually felt pretty guilty over that whole thing. Was it really mistletoe that did that? She never would have thought it'd be so drastic. But then, she guessed it'd have to be if it was going to get that kind of reputation. If Rudi wasn't busy torturing Mia, Carmine would have almost felt bad for her.

The bell rang, and Carmine threw her book in her bag. She stood up, not even glancing in Conner's direction; she figured it wouldn't be a good idea to antagonize him. Besides, she had to be in P.E. in three minutes, and it was all the way on the other side of the building. She was just about to leave when Conner stopped her.

"Carmine." he called to her.

Carmine stopped, but she didn't turn around. Did she really want to hear what he had to say? Maybe it would be better if she just waited a day or two, let him calm down first. She wasn't really in the mood to be yelled at any more anyway.

"Carmine, please?" he asked.

"What?" she said, finally turning around.

"I'm sorry." he said. He didn't look quite as apologetic as she would have liked to see, but at least he wasn't furious with her anymore. "It's just that... well, when I told you that stuff, I didn't think it'd be used against me."

"I didn't do anything." Carmine said for what felt like the hundredth time. "I never had any mistletoe!"

"Shhhh." he told her, looking around.

"Sorry." She hadn't meant to yell; she was just so frustrated.

"I believe you." Conner said. "But then, who did? I mean, as soon as you left, we started feeling better."

"Yeah, so did Zev. And I was with him the whole time." Carmine told him.

Conner stared at her for a minute, thinking. Suddenly, his eyes went wide.

"Mia." he said quietly.

"Really?"

Carmine thought about that. It was true she'd told Mia what she'd learned from him. And then Mia had rushed out of the cafeteria after she and Zev had left. Was that what Conner was referring to? He looked at Carmine carefully.

"Why would she do that?" he asked.

"I'm pretty sure it wasn't on purpose." Carmine told him.

"Yeah, I get that. But why did she need it at all? I mean, the stuff's banned at school."

"...Rudi." Carmine said finally.

Maybe she should have told him earlier, but it wasn't like he'd really given her a chance. And she knew if she'd mentioned it to him before she'd gotten the information, he never would have told her anything.

"Did Rudi say something to Mia? Is she making her worry about Zev? But... why would she even listen to Rudi in the first place?" Conner looked baffled. But that was nothing compared to how Carmine felt.

"What are you talking about?" she asked.

"When you said Rudi..." Conner started. He had the guilty look of someone who'd just said something he probably shouldn't have. "...What exactly did you mean?"

"Rudi's been stalking Mia." Carmine told him.

"She has? I thought she stopped that." Conner looked shocked by the idea – as if that hadn't even registered as a potential problem with him.

"Apparently not." Carmine said. But she didn't want to worry about that just yet. "So, what were you thinking? That Rudi was telling Mia to stay away from Zev?"

"Uh... yeah, kinda."

"Why?"

"It's just a rumor that's been going around the neighborhood." Conner shrugged, like that could ever really be the end of it. Did he not know Carmine by now?

"No way." Carmine told him. "After the way you just yelled at me, I want to know. It's the least you can do."

He looked at her apologetically for a second before giving a reluctant nod.

"It's just that a lot of people at home are asking me if Luke's scared of Zev." Conner told her.

"What? Why?" Carmine asked.

The three of them had been best friends for as long as she could remember – since some time in elementary school. And Zev had already shown them that he was more than willing to risk his life to help Luke. So what would Luke possibly have to be afraid of?

"Well, because we keep going off by ourselves and Luke always seems to come back hurt. Zev too, but not as bad. And people are getting suspicious."

"What – they think he's hurting Luke?" Carmine could hardly believe it.

"Well, we can't exactly tell them what we've been doing." Conner pointed out. "So we sneak out in the middle of the night, come back injured, and have no believable excuse. So yeah – they're starting to think the worst."

"So what are you going to do?" Carmine asked. She suddenly felt guilty; it had never occurred to her that they might have problems at home because they helped out Carmine and her friends.

"We're just going to have to try not to let it happen again." Conner told her.

"Don't worry." Carmine told him. "Except for the Rudi thing, nothing's going on. So we should finally be ok for once."

"Promise?" Conner asked, sounding skeptical.

"Promise." Carmine told him.