He looked so surprised I had figured it out that I felt insulted. "Do you think I'm stupid or something, Thomas? Did you honestly think I wouldn't put two and two together, eventually? I mean, if I hadn't figured it out last night, I would have this morning. How's your arm? Wasn't it broken a few hours ago?"

He hung his head and sighed. "I was going to tell you."

"When?" I demanded. "I'm sick of being kept out of it! I feel like for everything you tell me there's always another secret! Just because I didn't know about magic doesn't mean I'm an idiot!"

"I know that. I... I just... Look, give me five minutes. Then we'll talk, I promise." Before I could answer, Thomas flung open the door and was gone.

Everyone else was still staring at me. I was saved when the theme from Jaws started playing. Charlie groaned.

"It's your mother. Again."

Dani winced. "Oh God, tell her I'm not here."

"I'm not answering."

"She'll keep calling if you don't."

Charlie glared at him. "I can't have a conversation with her without hearing about the latest property for sale in Boston. I'm starting to think she moonlights as a real estate agent."

"So... tell her that my hatred for Massachusetts sports teams outweighs my love for you, and I refuse to move there."

"She'll just find a different state where it’s legal," Charlie said, rolling his eyes.

"Oh. I was hoping that she'd keel over after my previous statement, and we wouldn't have to worry about it."

The phone started to ring again. This time, Charlie pulled it out of his pocket, answered it, and wordlessly tossed it to Dani.

Dani looked mortified for a moment. Then he silently cursed and held up the phone. "Hi, Ma! I'm actually right in the middle of—" I could hear a steady stream of talking on the other end. Dani pinched the bridge of his nose and started speaking rapidly in Greek.

After a couple of minutes, TS came over and sat next to me. "Jen, listen," he said softly. "Tom was going to tell you. He was actually thinking about doing it today. Try not to be too upset with him, alright?"

Then, Thomas was back and still didn't look too happy. He set a bag of croissants on the desk. "Dig in. We'll talk when you're done eating okay, Jennifer?"

I wanted to argue, but I was hungry. Mariana, TS, and I all grabbed some food. Nobody but Dani, who was still on the phone and not looking happy about it, spoke. I ate quickly and stood as soon as I was finished.

"Okay. Where can we talk?"

"My room, I suppose," Thomas said.

"Let's go."

He reluctantly led me to the door. "We'll be right back."

"Be careful," TS said.

Thomas and I hurried in silence down to his room. We got there without incident and sat down on the two beds, facing each other. He didn't seem to be in any hurry to start.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

He shrugged. "Thought it was for the best, I guess." He leaned back until he rested against the wall and sighed. I was about to ask for a better response, when he started talking. "You're not the first person I've seen find out about magics. And some people don't handle it like you have. Some people..." Thomas shook his head. "They freak. Knowing you like I do now, I realize that we could have told you everything, everything, that night in Panama, and you would have been just fine. But I've seen people who... get a little crazy. So, I thought it was for the best. I figured we'd let you go slowly. Not lay too much on you at once." He smiled. "I'm sorry. You're a lot tougher than I thought. You can handle it."

"I see," I said. I wondered if I would have freaked out hearing everything at once and decided that an abbreviated version had probably been a good thing. I wouldn't have gone crazy, but I probably would have been a bit overwhelmed. I felt a bit overwhelmed sometimes, anyway.

"And then... Well, vampires aren't exactly popular." I could just hear a slightly bitter note in his voice. "To be honest, this wasn't just for your benefit. I rarely mention it. If magics can't tell on their own, then I won't go out of my way to tell them."

"Is there a way to tell?" That would be handy.

"It depends on what you are. A werewolf, for example, can smell it. As can another vampire. I'm afraid that the only way you'd be able to tell is... well, after you've seen the fangs. And then, it's probably too late."

"That's the only way to tell?"

He nodded.

"So, when people can tell, they give you a hard time just for being a vampire?"

"Not many people are stupid enough to give a vampire a hard time," he said with a half-hearted laugh. "But most don't go out of their way to make life easier, either."

"Just because you're a vampire?"

He smiled grimly. "That's reason enough."

"That's hardly fair." No wonder he hadn't told me. It would have been horrible enough to just lose his parents and familiar. To be turned into a vampire and have people judge for you it on top of that must have been just awful.

"I find life rarely is." Thomas sighed. "I'm sorry. That came out pessimistic. It's... just not always easy. Anyway, I'm sorry I didn't say anything sooner... And then after the biter showed up, I wasn't sure when to tell you."

I nodded. "I understand. You could have told me, though; I would've felt safer knowing you could fight him."

Thomas sighed. "Don't feel too safe. Everything that happened last night was my fault."

"I don't see how."

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"I should have staked him, and I couldn't do it."

He said that before, and Charlie said he didn't blame Thomas. I thought about why he'd blame himself for a moment and figured it out. "That's hardly your fault. You can't help if you hesitated. I'm sure it's hard to stake another vampire."

"That's not it. When I was turned I... I lost everything. I would happily stake every other vampire in the world if it meant I could spare just one kid the pain of what I went through."

"I'm sorry." I wasn't sure what else to say.

He smiled sadly. "Don't be. It took a few years to get used to, but I'll admit there are perks to being a vampire."

"How long has it been since you were turned?" It couldn't have been that long ago.

"About forty years."

My jaw dropped, and I stared at him, trying to figure out if he was joking or not.

He grinned sheepishly. "Oh... Yeah... I guess nobody's mentioned that yet."

Forty years? I'd been trying not to think about vampire books, but that thought brought one particular fact to mind. "You're not immortal, are you?" I gasped.

His grin widened. "Yeah."

My jaw dropped. "Y-you..."

"If it makes you feel better, I'm only sixty-two."

I opened my mouth and closed it again. I just stared at him. Sixty-two. He didn't look a day older than me. He was dressed like a normal college student, in jeans and a band tee. My eyes locked onto his shirt; a faded Rolling Stones shirt to be exact. "Is that vintage?" I managed to whisper.

He looked down at his shirt and laughed. "I guess. It wasn't when I bought it, if that's what you mean."

Oh my god. No wonder he'd left that part out initially. It was a bit hard to accept. Actually, he hadn't brought his age up. I had.

"Were you planning on telling me that?"

"Of course. Actually... while we're on the subject—"

"I'm really getting sick of these secrets!"

"I know. I'm sorry. I really am. It's... a lot to think about. I promise, though. The fact that I'm a vampire was the last thing we were deliberately keeping from you. From now on, anything you ask, I'll answer. But, before you—"

Finally. It seemed like ever since I'd seen Dani fall overboard, it had been one secret after another. Wait, they still hadn't told me what was wrong with TS! "And what about TS?"

He looked surprised. "Ah, you've noticed that?" I could just see a flicker of worry. He knew exactly what I was talking about!

I glared. "What's wrong with him?"

"What? Nothing is wrong with him." He sounded infuriatingly honest. But I knew that he had a few decades to practice lying.

"Come on, Thomas! You said you were going to be honest."

"I am!"

"Then tell me why TS is sick. Is it a magical disease?"

He frowned in confusion. "He isn't sick."

I was just mad he was still lying. "Remember when I said I'm not stupid? He's sick almost every night, after sunset. Not only that, but he's always perfectly fine the next morning. Plus, he was fine last night during the new moon when he was human! Are you seriously going to sit there and tell me he isn't sick?"

Thomas hung his head and looked ashamed. "That's... blood loss."

My brain screeched to a halt. Blood loss? I looked at Thomas in horror, as I realized it. "From... Y-you drink his blood?" Thomas nodded. I couldn't help but inch farther back on the bed away from him. He was a good vampire! He wasn't supposed to drink blood! "Why?" I blurted.

"I don't have a choice." He sighed heavily. "I'd die."

"So, you have to drink blood."

He nodded.

"Do you only drink from TS?"

"Just on the ship. I've made arrangements for when we're in port." He studied me for a moment and then sighed. "You don't have to worry... I won't feed from you."

"I'm not worried," I said. I was a little freaked out now that I knew he drank blood. And even though I had insisted that I wasn't an idiot, I felt dumb for assuming that a vampire wouldn't. But, compared to the other vampire, a single person didn't seem like much of a meal. "How much blood do you need?"

Thomas shrugged. "More than I'm getting."

Now I felt a bit worried. "Are you hungry?"

He hesitated. "A little." He glanced at me and quickly added, "But it's no big deal. I'm not going to suddenly start biting people or anything."

We were quiet for a moment. I felt bad that I had been scared. It was still Thomas. I had all night to think about the fact he was a vampire. It seemed a bit hypocritical of me to say it wasn't fair of people to judge him for being a vampire, if I did the same thing. When my brain finally started working again, it struck me as odd that TS was the only one he drank from.

"Why don't you drink from anyone else on the ship?"

"It's illegal to feed without permission."

"I know. I meant, like Dani and Charlie. Wouldn't they let you?"

He sighed. "I'm sure they would. But they aren't human. Their blood is no good to me."

"TS isn't human either."

"He's human during the day. That's why you noticed he's sick at night. I feed right before sunset. He's still human, but starts rapidly recovering as soon as the sun goes down."

The slightly cryptic conversation from earlier came back to me. "That's what Mariana offered, isn't it? You're going to start drink—I mean feeding from her."

He nodded.

"And the phone call you had to make?"

For a moment I wasn't sure if he was going to answer. "I had to apply for a permit," he finally said. I waited expectantly for him to continue. "To feed without permission." He sighed heavily. "I never have. Not ever. I'm... really not happy about it."

"Then why do it?"

"I have to."

"Because you're not getting enough blood?"

There was another long silence. Thomas chewed absently on his fingernails, and I had a slightly crazy urge to ask to see his fangs. Before I could ask, he answered my previous question. "Because of last night." With another depressed sigh, he continued, "Blood is not just blood. There are different types. Not just A or B, but different ages, genders, diets, and so on. Feeding from just one person for days at a time isn't good enough, even if I was getting enough. I'm... not as strong as I should be. That's why I couldn't stake him last night. If I had been feeding properly, I would have staked him with no problem. Char probably would never have gone overboard, and Danio wouldn't have been hurt. We wouldn't be in this mess."

So, that was why he blamed himself. "It's hardly your fault."

He shook his head. "It is. I knew going into this that I was going to get weaker. It wouldn't have been a problem if this biter hadn't turned up. As soon as we found out, I should have started feeding. I didn't."

I wasn't sure what to say. I took a moment to mull it all over. "Can you ever get as much blood as you need? You made it sound like most people don't even like vampires. How can you even find enough people to give you permission?"

"There are a few around. Not many, but there are some."

"Is it enough variety?"

He nodded. "A lot of the blood I consume back home is from blood drives, so there's a lot of variety."

"Wait, wait, wait. You can drink blood without biting people?"

"Yes." He answered my next question before I asked it. "I drink bagged as often as possible. But once in a while it has to be... well, fresh. About a third of it actually."

"Oh." Then I had another idea. "But if you can drink it from bags, can't you just bring a bunch on the ship? Then, you'd be getting enough, right?"

He smiled grimly. "If only. It starts to go bad as soon as it leaves the body. There's maybe... three hours or so before it's useless. It would be bad long before I needed it." He sighed and stood. "We should probably get back. Was there anything else you wanted to know?"

"I don't think so. I've got a lot to think about now."

He eyed me nervously. "You okay?"

"Yeah... just... overwhelmed?" I said with a nervous giggle.

Thomas smiled. "I'll try not to throw any more curveballs your way."

"Thanks."

We were halfway back to Dani and Mariana's room, when I thought of Laurie. "Thomas? Can we check on my roommate?"

"Sure," he said with a cautious glance behind us.

Laurie, thankfully, was awake and watching TV. "Hey," she called hoarsely.

"How are you feeling?" I asked.

"Blah," she said. "Stay back. I think it's that bug."

"I'm sure it is."

She looked at Thomas and then grinned at me. "Is that why you haven't been sleeping here?"

I was about to deny it when Thomas put his arm around me. "You don't mind not sharing with a roommate all the time, right?" he asked Laurie with a grin.

Laurie smirked. "Not at all, she's all yours."

"We should get going," I said. Thomas’ arm was disturbingly comfortable around my shoulders. "Feel better."

"Yeah, I will. Be good."

The second we were out of the room, Thomas removed his arm. "What was that?" I demanded.

"A very good excuse. You can't exactly say you're sharing a room with Mr. and Mrs. Pelagos, now can you?"

"I guess not." We walked to Dani and Mariana's room, and I felt a chill as I remembered the frantic dash the night before. "What are we going to do?"

He put his arm around my shoulders again. "You aren't going to do a thing. You are just going to enjoy your cruise as best as you can. We are going to protect you, okay?"

I nodded.

"I mean it," he said softly. "I won't let anything happen to you."