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“bloodsucking monsters” and “filthy bastards” rang in my skull, and my cheeks burned as I stomped back to Big Bertha. I swore that if I found blood on her, I was going to go back to River Oaks, pack up, and move to Tibet.
I had one of those out-of-body automatic driving experiences, where I put the keys in the ignition, and the next thing I knew, I was turning Big Bertha around the corner to Gabriel’s road. I pulled into his driveway, climbed the stairs, and stared at the house. My hand froze in midair as I started to knock on his door.
This was nothing new. I’d been to Gabriel’s house before. Of course, I’d behaved like a screaming harridan when I was there before…and here I was, coming to his door with problems again.
I chewed my lip and considered running back to my car. Then again, Gabriel was always going on about his responsibility in leading me through my vampire growing pains. Oh, let’s be honest, I was there to get a few sympathy kisses and maybe an elder-vampire platitude or two. Something like “It’s always darkest before the dawn…and we never really see that, so why worry?”
Before I could knock, the door swung open, and Gabriel was there.
“Jane!” Gabriel exclaimed with a grin that faltered at the sight of my expression. “What’s wrong?”
I tilted my head and have him a long, appraising look. “I know this is a long shot, but did you ever read a book called Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day?”
“No, but the title does lend itself to inference.” Gabriel nodded.
“Well, whatever you’re inferring, add cigarette smoke and desperation.”
“That explains the smell,” he said, sniffing my hair. “Where have you been?”
“Working.”
“You found a job? That’s—”
“As a telemarketer.”
He made the “ouch” face. “Oh.”
“For a company that sold, among other sleazy and dubious products, a vitamin tonic they claimed would reverse vampirism.”
Gabriel scoffed. “Well, that’s ridiculous. No one’s ever been able to accomplish that.”
“Not the point.”
“Sorry.”
“I agreed to sell this crap. Well, actually, I agreed to try to ensnare innocent families into booking appointments in questionable locations with complete strangers wielding cameras. But I was just terrible at it, because the customers could apparently smell my fear through the phone and just hung up on me, or they told me to drop dead, and we both know that horse is already out of the barn. It was hell, OK? I took a job in the stinkiest pit of minimum-wage hell.”
Gabriel gave me a blank look. “Why didn’t you ask more questions about the job before you took it?”
“I was just tired of not working. I wanted a job. Any job. Anything to make me feel useful and productive…and not doomed to move back in with my parents.”
“Jane, if it’s a question of money, I could—”
I touched a finger to his lips. “Don’t. Don’t make an offer that will change our relationship. I appreciate the thought, but I’m not comfortable when you blur that daddy/boyfriend line.”
“The offer, which you wouldn’t let me make, still stands.”
“Thank you. Anyway, when I could not lure people into these said appointments, my new boss told me all about the other stuff I could sell, including this antivampire snake oil. And then she told me that vampires are filthy, vicious creatures who are going to overthrow the human government in some bloody coup we’ve been planning for years.”
“I take it she didn’t know you were a vampire?” he said as I shook my head.
“Not only was I subjected to the general abuse that telemarketers receive—and, I now realize, deserve just the tiniest bit—
but I got treated to my very first hate speech.”
“Oh, you’ll hear much worse over the years,” he said, wrapping an arm around my shoulders and pressing me to his side. “I once had a drunk in a tavern tell me a delightful joke about two vampires, a priest, and a—”
“I don’t need to hear it,” I assured him. “Also, I’m pretty sure this is one of those stories that ends in ‘and then I ate him.’”
