His smile broadened, turning unmistakably fond as he regarded her.
“We’ll need help.” The logistics were arranging themselves in her brain, forming an orderly to-do list. It was surely missing a few elements, but at least it gave them a place to start. “Every resident of the Containment Zone we can get.”
The curve of his lips abruptly flattened into a thin line, and his grip on her hand tightened. But after a long pause, he inclined his head in agreement. “I suppose we will. Unfortunately.”
He looked grumpy as hells at the prospect.
“Sorry. I know you’re not exactly a group project enthusiast. Or an other-sentient-beings-in-your-vicinity enthusiast.” She tipped her head in thought. “Mostly, you seem to like sex and impractical, testicle-entrapping underwear.” After another moment of consideration, she concluded, “That’s about it.”
“I likeyou.” The admission sounded aggrieved.
“I’m very likable.” She grinned at him, pleased. “But we need more help than just me, and I’m not sure where to start looking for volunteers. Should we go back to the mall and talk to Doug and his merry band of counterfeiters?”
His shoulders rose and fell on a silent sigh. “I doubt they want to announce their presence to a crowd of neighbors. We can ask, but I think we should start elsewhere.”
“Where?” She had no other ideas, sadly enough. Max wasn’t the only resident of Cloverleaf Drive who needed to get out more.
“Riley mentioned living beside a witch. One powerful enough to scry.” His jaw worked. “I may know who that witch is. If I’m correct, she’s headed various community advocacy and safety initiatives. She’d know most of her neighbors and their capabilities, and her wife is a strong telepath.”
“So between the two of them, they’d make recruiting a zombie-killing team much easier.” Which was great news, for all his evident crankiness. Still, she couldn’t help but wonder…“How in the world do you know her? Your time on SERC?”
Edie was pretty sure he hadn’t been hitting any neighborhood block parties in recent years. Mostly because there hadn’t been any, but also because he’d rather stake himself than socialize.
“Something like that.” A vein in his temple pulsed. “To be clear, I don’t know her. I knowofher. And I hope she knows absolutely nothing about me.”
Because he prized his privacy? Because she objected to vampires for some reason?
Given his apparent bad mood and the urgency of their mission, those questions would have to wait.
“Oooooh-kay,” she said slowly. “But it’s all right to ask for her help?”
“We don’t have a choice.” His brusque response was the closing of a conversational door. “As soon as I grab a few blood packs from my house, we’ll head her way.”
Edie frowned, confused. “We don’t have her address.”
“If we return to the spot on the roadside where we met Riley, I should be able to follow her scent, as she suggested earlier. Hopefully straight back to her home.” Seeming to shake off hisearlier grouchiness, he raised a smug brow at her. “My tracking ability is just one of my many areas of sensory superiority.”
“I see.” She scratched the tip of her nose with her middle finger. “So, basically, you’re like one of those sniffer dogs. Floppy ears. Wiggling butt as you waddle along.”
His gasp of feigned outrage was a thing of beauty.
“How dare you?” Straightening in his seat, he lifted his chin high andharrumphed dramatically. “I do not waddle. Istride. Manfully, with the grace of a sexy gazelle.”
She tipped her head. “You find gazelles sexy?”
“Perhaps I do.” The lofty outrage in his expression fractured a tad, and his mouth twitched. “You, a non-vampire, could not even begin to understand the intricacies of my agile brain and my complex desires.”
“If those intricacies include humping a gazelle, I’m okay with not understanding.”
He laughed, the remaining tension in his expression falling away.
“You win.” His face lit with mirth as he dropped his Pretentious Asshole Vamp shtick and planted a kiss on her cheek. “Buckle up, my Edie. Let’s go.”
As she clicked her belt into place, she grinned back at him. “No…one—”
“Absolutely not.”
“—fucks like Gaston—”
