Chapter 3

Nadine was alone in her room. Then there was a knock at the door. "Come in."

Ryan walked in.

Nadine sighed. "What do you want?"

"That's not really a nice way to talk to your husband."

Nadine ran over to the door and shut it. "We haven't told anyone, remember? And after this morning, I don't intend to anytime soon."

"Relax. So we eloped during a mission and didn't tell anyone." Nadine gave him a look. "Alright, maybe that is a little…"

"Insensitive? Inappropriate? Unfocused?"

"Yes, yes, and yes."

"So…all of the above."

"Look, I think that we shouldn't keep them out of the loop."

"And how do you think they'd take it if we told them that Kelly wasn't the only one keeping secrets?"

Meanwhile…

"Maybe they'll understand," Sarah suggested.

"Yeah, right!" Benny said, pacing around her room, "You saw how the intervention with Kelly went."

"Look, she made a bad choice. She felt bad. She made it right in her eyes. So what if we took it a little hard because she didn't tell us immediately?"

"Yeah, and they're gonna take it the same way with us because we didn't tell them immediately that the two of us eloped during a mission."

"Hey, you're the one that proposed without…actually proposing."

Also meanwhile…

"Well, I didn't think it'd get this bad," Robert told Lucy, dropping onto his bed.

"Oh, please, it's not like we eloped during a mission and didn't tell anyone," Lucy said, sitting down next to him.

"I know, but we…you know. And we didn't…you know."

"It was one night! It's not like they're gonna hold it against us forever!"

Meanwhile again…

"They're probably going to hold it against us forever you know," Brenda told Jack as he sat down on his bed.

"True, but hey! It was fun while it lasted!"

"Jack, one kiss does not count as a relationship." Jack glared at her. "OK, maybe it does, but still!"

Again meanwhile…

"I still think that if we told them that Kelly wasn't the only one having a secret relationship," Madelyn ranted to Michael as she looked out the window of her room, "that they'd be totally against us."

"Yeah, right!" Michael said, coming over to her, "When we took you back in after Austin switched, we knew that something was bound to happen. I thought there was something going on with the two of us from the start." He then considered that. "And I never told them. Oh, boy, I never told anyone but you! They really are going to hold it against us forever!"

Madelyn kissed him, making him shut up.

"OK, never mind then."

Madelyn sighed. "I never thought that a Protector hiding her Quests for four years would result in such mania."

"Hey, at least Tiara didn't get to you and Kelly. And as long as we can protect you, nothing bad is going to happen from now on."

Like I said, meanwhile…

"Something bad is going to happen," Austin said. He kissed Kelly again.

Kelly pushed him off. "Yeah, right. I think I would've seen it instead of dreaming about you." She pulled him back in.

Austin pulled away. "You were dreaming about me?"

"Beside the point." Kelly pulled him back in…again.

Do I really need to clarify again?…

"It's beside the point, Tech!" Sophie scolded her husband as they walked towards the building Austin and Kelly were in.

"What is?"

Sophie and Tech both jumped and whirled around to see Duck standing there. "What're you doing?" The two coyotes looked at each other.

"OK, that's creepy."

"What's creepy is that you neglected to mention the fact that you were tagging along," Tech said. He started walking down the street again with Sophie following.

Duck started going after them. "Wend and Danni were talking about magic again, and I felt out of the loop, so I decided to come see what Kelly and wolf boy were up to." He pushed his way past Kelly's parents and walked into the building. "Sometimes I wonder—WHOA!"

Kelly and Austin noticed Duck and fell off the bed. Luckily, they fell off the other side. Kelly quickly pulled herself back under the covers and Austin pulled himself back up.

"What are you doing here?" Kelly demanded.

"Well, we were going to come see how wolf boy was doing after three years in hell, but it looks like he's just fine!" Duck stormed over. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Uh…testing to see if half-Vamps can lose their soul?"

"Oh, it's bad enough that we've seen Austin's demon-y side, now you wanna get a glimpse of yours?"

Austin looked at Kelly. "You didn't tell them?"

Kelly looked back and forth between her boyfriend and uncle. "Well…I told Dad!"

"Oh, great," Sophie said, "What'd you tell Tech now that you neglected to mention to us?"

Kelly zapped herself and got out of the bed in her usual clothes. She zapped Austin to the same effect. "I tweaked the spell that brought him back. He's half-Vampire like me now. That's what I meant by him being better!"

Duck looked back and forth between the two. "Oh."

Before Kelly could come up with a comeback…

(Hannah Montana's "Best of Both Worlds" plays)

"Oh, what now?!" Kelly took out her cell phone and walked over to the other side of the room. "What is it, guys?"

"Kelly! Problem!"

"OK, OK, Sarah! Relax! I'll be down there right away." She hung up. "I gotta go."

"That sounded urgent." Austin went over to her. "And yes, I heard it from over there."

"Yeah, do you think by 'problem' she meant something involving Vampires?" Duck asked, coming over, too, "And yes, I heard it from over there, too!"

"I don't know, let's go find out." Kelly walked out and Austin and Duck followed.

Before Sophie could follow, Tech pulled her to the side. "Is there something you want to talk to me about?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you sounded a little…upset when you asked her about what she'd told me. And I was being nice, I think 'upset' is an understatement."

Sophie sighed. "I just feel like I'm missing out on my daughter's life. She's telling you everything! And Sarah and Ryan and Michael have all seemed a little…off lately and I don't know what's wrong."

"I noticed that, too. Look, Kelly and I have a bond that can't be broken. That's it. And then the whole group got her all upset again and she had to rant to me and I apparently gave her an idea that she just had to test."

"You told her to…" Sophie shuddered. "…Austin again?"

"Well…that's not exactly what I said."

"Let's just go see what's up with the team right now."

"Oh, it's probably nothing."

An hour later…

"This is serious," Madelyn told the gang as soon as they'd collected at HQ.

"Vampire?" asked Kelly.

Madelyn shook her head. "My senses warned me that something was going on…again. And I don't like the feeling. That tells me it's not anything as minor as one simple Vampire or even a nest."

"So we know something's up," Benny said, "and it's not something that we can turn to dust by poking it in the heart with a pointy wooden stick."

Brenda sighed. "Well, whatever it is, we can handle it. We've been through a lot together. And as long as Kelly and Austin are out in the open…we don't have any more secrets between us."

Sarah nodded. "Yep."

"Uh-huh," Ryan said.

"Great," Lucy added.

"No problem whatsoever," Michael pointed out.