Page 45 of Eat, Slay, Love

Leo finally leaves the Rah! Attack! stance, but his body is still tense. “She’s a demon,” he says, but it’s spoken with little conviction.

“She’s a kid,” I fire back.

They watch her for another few seconds as she pushes one of her friends playfully and nearly trips over her own boots. “So she looks like a regular kid,” Leo says, slightly strangled. “That doesn’t mean she’s not feeding on souls when no one is around to see.”

Amara peels away from the group, heading towards the subway, while her friends continue their way towards us.

I scrub my face with my hands. “What will it take to get you to believe me?”

He swallows. “I want to track her and make sure.”

“I see we’re pushing that ‘appropriate’ line further and further away,” Gabriel remarks.

By this point, we’ve lost visual on her, but her group approaches: two identical twins and another girl.

“Hey,” I say, because I have apparently forgotten all of my social cues. “Where does your friend Amara live?” I blurt out, and immediately regret it.

At my periphery, I see Gabriel jamming two fingers into his eyelids.

One of the twins stares at me in stunned silence. Her gaze flicks from my face to my brothers, then back again as the full picture settles into place.

And then, she—well. The only accurate word for what happens next is that she detonates.

“What is this, Filipino Black Panther?” she hisses, waving at our skintight, full-body leather. “Why are a bunch of grown-ass adults in matching catsuits asking where a teenage girl lives?”

We all wince.

She steps forward, growing at least seven inches taller in sheer fury. “Are you fucking insane? Do you hear yourselves? ‘Hi, children, where does your minor girlfriend reside?’ What’s next, you want her social security number too?”

Leo opens his mouth.

She rounds on him before he gets anything out. “No, actually. Don’t speak, Temu T’Challa.”

Gabriel coughs into his fist.

She pivots. “Is this some kind of weird cosplay cult? Because if so, I promise you, the city already has enough.”

Leo mutters, “We’re not a cult.”

She gasps theatrically. “Oh good, that clears it up completely. Just three leather-clad adults stalking a high schooler for wholesome reasons.”

I attempt damage control. “It’s not like that⁠—”

“Oh, is it not like that?” she fires back. “Because from where I’m standing, it’s giving true crime podcast.”

“It’s giving ‘last seen near the mall,’” her friend growls.

“It’s giving felony,” the other twin says with a solemn nod.

The scary twin folds her arms and looks us up and down with devastating precision. “Here’s a thought,” she says coolly. “Maybe don’t roll up in coordinated pleather and start fishing for addresses. What kind of deranged Scooby-Doo villain behavior is this?”

Gabriel makes a strangled sound that might be laughter.

She steps closer, chin lifted. “I think it would be wonderful if you fucked right off.” She gives us one final withering look. “And maybe unpack why you thought this was a normal question.” Then she turns on her heel and storms away, her twin and her friend gliding after her.

We watch as she knocks into some kid who looks too big for his body. “Watch it, you illiterate gorilla,” she snarls at him.

The kid shakes his head and mutters something that sounds like “worst fuckin’ nightmare” under his breath.