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He slipped an arm around her, expecting her to pull away, but to his surprise, she sagged against him, the laughter dying on her lips.
“It’s okay,” he murmured to her.
“No, I really don’t think it is,” she murmured back.
“What the hell is Bob doing?” Wyatt said, ducking out of the way just as the bat swooped toward him. The bat made a sharp turn and dove toward Wyatt again. “Saxon, call your stupid friend off me.”
“He’s probably still drunk,” Saxon said.
“I don’t care,” Wyatt said. “He’s going to get caught in my hair.”
“Bob, stop it,” Saxon cried at the circling bat.
Katie laughed again.
All of a sudden the flapping sound grew louder, and something red flapped into the room, joining Bob in his frantic race around the ceiling.
“What now?” Wyatt asked, peering out from under his arms, which he had folded protectively over his long hair. “What the hell is that?”
“Wait, this one is a what and not a who?” Katie asked, staring up at the flying blurs.
A what and not a who. Why did Cort suddenly feel like he’d been dropped into a Dr. Seuss book? At least that would explain why nothing was making sense this evening.
Even though he knew it was probably a lost cause to try and understand this new turn of events, Cort squinted to make out what had just joined the bat.
And as expected, his deduction only added to the confusion of the evening. “I think, I think that’s a . . . parrot.”
As soon as he said the word parrot, the bird flew down from the ceiling and landed on Cort’s shoulder, the shoulder of the arm that was around Katie. Katie screamed and jerked away. The parrot lifted its crest and cawed in shrill response.
“Crazy train . . . crazy train,” the bird squawked in a weird falsetto voice.
Katie squealed again, then fell back into her hysterical laughter. Yeah, this was all going very, very strangely.
“Rad, dude, a talking parrot.” Saxon nodded, approaching the bird.
The bird eyed him with skeptical, beady, black eyes. “Jenny, I’ve got your number,” it said, then cawed loudly and ruffled its feathers.
“I don’t think that bird likes me,” Saxon said, looking wounded again. He ran a hand through his tangle of surfer-blonde hair.
“What happened to your forehead?”
Saxon frowned, touching the place where Cort stared.
“What is it?” the mussed blonde asked, looking around at all of them, panic clear in his eyes. “What is it?”
Wyatt leaned in to inspect the large pinkish mark. “It looks like a burn. In the shape of a cross.”
“A burn? From a cross?” Saxon hurried off to the bathroom to inspect.
“Okay, this is officially crazy,” Wyatt said, watching Saxon leave. “Cross burns. Parrots. Fledgling vampires. Craziness. Oh, and let’s not forget idiots trapped in bat form.”
Wyatt looked up at Bob the bat, if that was actually who the bat was. It no longer flitted around the room, but now hung from the dusty chandelier in the center of the living room ceiling. But it did shriek loudly at Wyatt’s comment.
The bird cawed again, nearly deafening Cort.
“I think it’s safe to say that none of us have a clue what happened last night,” Drake stated.
“Except I’m definitely a vampire,” Katie said slowly, and Cort noticed she was no longer staring at the parrot, but rather her hand. “And apparently I might be married as well.”
She lifted her left hand to display a gold wedding band. A gold wedding band that had “Hers” etched onto it. The rest of the guys, including Cort, reluctantly looked down at their own hands. Oddly he wasn’t terribly surprised when he saw that he, too, had a golden band glinting on his left hand.
And, of course, etched in the band was the word “His.”
“Are we married?” Katie asked, her voice pitchy again, hysteria creeping back. This time, the same sensation was creeping up on him, too.
Married. Damn, he’d never even managed to ask this woman out on a date. They couldn’t possibly be married. This was crazy.
“That probably means you crossed her over, too,” Wyatt pointed out.
“No, it doesn’t,” Cort said automatically, even though he wasn’t sure. “And I’m sure I didn’t marry her either.”
He was even less sure of that, what with the matching rings and all.
“I didn’t marry you,” he repeated to Katie as if saying it again would somehow make it true.
Katie rightfully didn’t look convinced, and for just a moment, Cort could have sworn an emotion akin to hurt flashed in her dark blue eyes, but he couldn’t be certain.
“Damn, I feel rough. I need some blood,” Drake said, but before he could leave the room, Saxon returned, blocking his exit.
“It is a cross burn. That’s really messed up.”
“Just chalk it up to one crazy-ass night,” Drake said, moving around him. “At least you have all your teeth.”
“I have a permanent scar, dude,” Saxon said, distressed, lifting his bangs. “You know wounds from religious relics take forever to heal.”
Drake shrugged and left the room.
Drake was never long on sympathy.
“It doesn’t look that bad,” Katie said, the hysteria somehow gone and replaced by genuine empathy.
Amazing. She’d just discovered she was undead, and she was still being her kind, generous self.
“Thanks, man,” Saxon said, smiling appreciatively.
Well, at least his troubles seemed soothed. Too bad all their problems weren’t so easily dismissed.
“But we should probably try to figure out what happened,” Saxon said. “You know, retrace our steps or something. But first maybe we need to assimilate what we do know.”
Cort raised an eyebrow. Who’d have guessed that the out-there surfer dude would be the one trying to act the voice of reason. Maybe the burn had seared some sense into him. And despite his typically odd choice of wording, Saxon was right. They needed to try and piece together what they knew. Maybe that would jog their memories.
“Okay,” Cort said. “The last thing I remember was being on the riverboat. We took a break and headed to the bar for a drink.”
“That’s the last thing I remember, too,” Drake said as he strode back into the room, with a wineglass filled with blood. “I remember toasting Johnny with Raven.”
