Big Vamp on Campus (Half-Moon Hollow Series Book 7) by Molly Harper Page B

roared to life, lights blinking and buzzers blaring like something from a carnival ride.
    Jamie stopped, looking back over his shoulder. “What the—?”
    My eyes went wide. The machines stilled, all except for dryer number six.
    “A ghost?” He panted, looking around the room.
    I shook my head. “I don’t see one. I don’t feel anything. Well, I mean, I felt something . But I think . . . maybe . . . I think maybe I did that.”
    Jamie laughed. “What?”
    “I think maybe I made that happen. I could feel the energy pulling through me, all around me, and then the dryers started.”
    “But you always said you didn’t have a gift,” he said, still holding fast to me.
    “I’ve never shown any signs,” I said. “Some vampires don’t get a talent at all, you know? And I was capable in so many other ways that it didn’t seem to matter.”
    Jamie snorted, kissing my neck.
    Could it be that after all these years, I’d finally developed my vampiric gift? I didn’t like to admit it, but I had always been the slightest bit ashamed that I’d never developed a talent after I’d been turned. Hell, even Jane had a powerful talent, which she used to her advantage. If mine had something to do with electricity, it definitely made sense that I hadn’t immediately developed the gift. After all, I’d lived without electric power for the first three hundred years of my life. If manipulation of electrical energy was meant to be my gift, I would have needed to wait for technology to catch up.
    The question was, why had my talent waited to show itself until now? Maybe that anxiety I’d felt fading had blocked off my abilities?
    I’d always been hungry for power, after all. It sort of made sense that I could manipulate it now. I grinned at him as he said,“Well, I think we’re just going to have to repeat the experiment to be sure.”

5
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    Involvement in campus activities is the best way for vampires to feel connected to their new community. Some areas to avoid: blood drives, sunrise yoga clubs, bake sales, and bird-watching societies. Not because there’s anything dangerous to vampires in bird-watching, but because other students will make fun of them.
    —Big Vamp on Campus: Strategies to Successfully Integrate the Undead into Postsecondary Education
    T he party was in full swing. I had transformed the main lounge on the second sublevel into a club that any vampire would . . . well, not be completely embarrassed to walk into. Huge (rented) leather lounges flanked a dance floor, providing enough room for everyone involved to camp out and pretend they weren’t watching everybody else. The walls had been temporarily papered over in black, giving the professionally choreographed light show somewhere to reflect. While black lights turned our clothes, smiles, and drinks a neon rainbow of colors, accent lights threw abstract blue shapes against the walls.
    The DJ, a willowy blonde imported from Iceland, kept the music at a low, constant throb, fast enough to dance to but not so loud as to prevent conversation. Jamie, delightful goof that he was, hovered over her shoulder, staring at her playlist as if he could willsomeFlo Rida songs onto her laptop. The caterers were serving a respectable array of imported donor bloods. Nothing synthetic, nothing blended. Living students sipped meticulously crafted “mocktails,” because Tina had insisted that I wasn’t allowed to serve alcohol in a campus building.
    And, as predicted, the girls flocked to the fruit bouquets and spent much of the evening wrapping their lips around melon balls in a provocative fashion.
    “You did all this with the budget we gave you?” Tina asked me, her eyes wide behind her thick glasses.
    “Some services were donated,” I admitted. I rolled my ankles, one after the other, still adjusting to the new high-heeled sandals I’d bought online. I’d gone “coed casual,” on the advice of Keagan and Meagan—dark skinny jeans and black