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His tone sounded strange, but Katie couldn’t tell what he was talking about. Or to who.
She went into the bathroom and quickly washed her hands in the sink, then wiped them on a dubiously clean towel hanging on a rack by the shower.
She stepped back into the hallway to hear Cort say something about the parrot always trying to peck his balls. The bird was darned annoying and did like to peck, but she didn’t think it had attempted that particular area before. It sounded to her like he just wanted to get off the phone.
He sounded strange. Maybe a little upset, or disappointed. She wasn’t really sure. Who had he been talking to?
Just as she started toward the kitchen, she heard the apartment door open.
“Yo.” She heard Drake’s gravelly voice.
“Hey.” Cort sounded distracted.
She hurried back to Cort’s bedroom door, not wanting to be caught in just her panties and a tee. But she left the door open partway and listened.
“I have good news for you, my man,” Drake said. Or at least that’s what Katie thought he said. His words were a little slurred and thick like he had cotton in his mouth.
“Oh yeah, what’s that?” Cort still sounded like he was only half listening.
“That priest—” Drake said in a leading way as if he expected Cort to respond.
Cort obviously didn’t.
“You know, that one from the bathtub,” Drake prompted.
“Yes, I know who you are talking about. It’s not like I know many damned priests.”
Wow, Cort sounded downright testy.
“Well, excusth me,” Drake slurred. “Well, it turns out, he’s a—”
“A stripper,” Cort finished for him. “Yeah, I know. I just got off the phone with Wyatt.”
“Oh,” Drake said, clearly disappointed that he hadn’t gotten to share the news first. “Well, shit, man, you don’t exactly sound as pleased as I thought you would.”
Cort didn’t answer for a second, then he said, “No, it’s definitely a good thing. I mean, married. That would have been totally crazy.”
“Totally crazy,” Drake agreed, his tone decisive even through the slurring. But Katie wasn’t concerned with Drake’s feelings about her and Cort’s marriage. She only cared about how Cort felt.
“I didn’t think it could be real,” Drake said. “Marriage is not your thing, my man. We all know that.”
“No,” Cort agreed. “I’m not about that. Not at all.”
Katie’s stomach sank—no, more than sank. She actually felt sick to her stomach. Here she’d been thinking about the fact that she loved him, had loved him for some time, and needed him to show her how to adapt to her new life. Or death. Or whatever.
Damn, she could feel tears welling up in her eyes. She was a vampire, for crap’s sake, didn’t that mean she shouldn’t be able to cry or something?
She sure as heck didn’t want Cort to find her all blotchy and red-eyed. She turned and hurried to find her jeans and flip-flops.
She threw them on then paused at the door. She also didn’t want to greet Drake looking all tousled, smelling like sex, which she knew firsthand he would smell with no problem, and bleary eyes. She’d suffered enough embarrassment for one day, but she had to get out of here.
She crept back to the door and listened again. The two men’s voices still emanated from the kitchen, which meant she couldn’t leave yet, since the apartment door was off from the room where they were.
She looked around her, glancing at the window. That was a no-go, since the jump from the window had to be more than twenty feet down. But she walked over to look anyway.
Easing up the window, she winced and glanced over her shoulder as the noise from Bourbon Street filled Cort’s room. Had they noticed? She didn’t hear anything, so she stuck her head out the window, trying to judge how far away the ground was. Could she make that jump?
Oh hell no.
But wait, she was a vampire now. She might be able to make it. She looked back down at the dirty, cracked pavement below.
Nah, she’d wait to find out about that ability. Not to mention, even as rowdy and drunk as the partiers on Bourbon Street were, they’d definitely notice a woman jumping out of a building.
She debated other possibilities. She could turn into a bat, couldn’t she? That was a potential option. But how did she go about it?
Try focusing, she told herself, visualizing herself as a small black creature with large ears, beady black eyes, and flapping wings.
That was kind of disturbing, actually. Maybe she would be a cuter bat, more like a Disney movie sort of bat. She liked that image better.
She refocused, imagining her new bat self as well as adding a little of the Peter Pan version of how to take flight—happy thoughts, minus the pixie dust, of course. She scrunched up her face, squeezing her eyes closed, and began to talk quietly to herself.
“Warm puppies, strawberry smoothies, rainstorms, warm breezes, pedicures, hot fudge sundaes, good music, laughing, riding a bike without hands, Christmas morning . . . believe, believe.”
After a moment, she opened one eye, then the other, and looked down at herself.
Nothing. No wings or ears, cute or otherwise. Nothing had changed, except several tourists had stopped on the sidewalk below to peer up at her. She backed away from the open window, realizing she probably did look rather crazy.
Okay, so the window was definitely not an escape option.
She tiptoed back to the door, just in time to hear footfalls coming down the hall. She slipped behind the door, hoping they passed.
They did.
“You still got the bird, huh?” Drake said.
“Yeah. No one would take that damned thing even if you paid them.”
Katie had to agree with that.
Drake chuckled.
“The new tooth looks good,” Cort said, their voices becoming more muffled as they walked into the living room.
“Thankth, man. Although thith Novocain stuff sthuck.”
Well that explained Drake’s sudden and strange lisp.
“What happened to Katie, anyway?” Drake asked.
“She’s resting,” Cort said, and Katie noticed he didn’t add that she was resting in his room. Was he ashamed of what they’d done as well as being relieved that he wasn’t saddled with her as a wife, for even a brief time?
Well, that was fine. Right now, she just needed to get out of here and think. She listened. They were definitely in the living room. Now was the time to make her break.
She slowly pushed open the door, glad the hinges didn’t creak. She poked her head out and looked toward the living room, praying neither man was in a place where they could see her.
