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“That answer, by its very nature, makes you a Colin Farrell girl.” I snickered.
“I’m just saying what you’re both think—” Andrea let out a shriek and dropped her half-melted tub of ice cream on my floor.
At least it wasn’t vomit.
“What?” I squinted at her whitened face in the flickering light of the TV.
“There’s somebody out there!” she cried. “I saw them! They were looking in the window.”
“Who was it?”
“I don’t know!” she cried. “It was all blurry.”
“I can’t imagine why,” I drawled, looking pointedly at the two empty wine bottles at her feet.
“Jane, I’m serious, there was someone standing there, watching us through the window!” Andrea insisted.
I shook my head. “But I haven’t picked up on anything.”
I looked to Jolene, who shrugged. “I usually have to be pretty focused to sense something watching me.”
Jolene and I went to the window and saw nothing reflected back at us but darkened woods.
“Hit pause. I’ll go check it out.” I sighed.
“What if it’s Gabriel? Or what if it’s some townie lookin’ to mess with a vamp?” Jolene asked. “And you’re wearin’ your bathrobe.”
“Either way, I get to hit something, so yay. They’re probably gone by now, anyway.” I shrugged. Andrea did not look convinced. “Fine.”
I shrugged out of my robe, reached into the hall closet, and pulled out a Louisville Slugger, which had been sharpened to a wicked point.
“Why do you have that giant phallic symbol in your hall closet?” Andrea asked, pointing to my bat.
“I’m a woman living alone in the country. Vampire or not, I feel the need to take some precautions. Why do you think I keep that pair of muddy men’s boots out on the porch?”
“I thought it was a tacky decoration,” Andrea said, shrugging.
“I’m comin’, too,” Jolene said, rolling her shoulders in a way I knew meant she was preparing to wolf out.
“You’re not going anywhere, pregnant lady. You just stay here and keep your belly covered. Besides, someone has to keep Lushy here company. Lock the door behind me. Call Dick if things get weird.”
“When aren’t they weird?” Andrea grumbled as I walked out the front door. I crept around the house, bat on shoulder, to the den window. There was a fresh smear of scent on the air, a cold, angry presence. Someone had been standing outside my window, watching as we gorged ourselves and watched silly movies. Someone had intruded on what was supposed to be my sanctuary.
That just pissed me off.
The scent was emotional, unfamiliar, dark and red and desperate. I followed it to the tree line and, against my better judgment, walked into the dense grove of oaks that surrounded my house. Night is rarely quiet in Kentucky, especially in the hazy weeks of late summer. Mosquitoes buzzed near my head but apparently knew better than to try to graze on my undead skin. Bullfrogs croaked their love songs from the slow-moving creek that flowed into the long-abandoned pastures. Growth had given way to ripening and rot, a wet, sad smell that rose up to meet me with every step, covering the trail of the intruder.
I moved quickly through the trees, cringing with every acorn that crackled beneath my feet. A draft of icy, frigid air seemed to snake around my ankles, rising to twine around my body and squeeze at my chest. I froze, turning toward a bank of poplar trees on my left, the source of the strange sensation. I couldn’t see anything, anyone, even with my clear, inhuman vision. I closed my eyes and tried to search for the mind of whoever was out there. It was like scratching my fingers at a slick marble wall, cold, hard, and impossible to get a grip. Even with my limited psychic practice, I could tell that the clammy blast of air clinging to my skin wasn’t coming from whoever might be out there. It felt like an internal alarm, an organic warning even stronger than a sense of dread or foreboding. My body was trying to tell me that something bad was coming.
I took an instinctual step back toward the house, where I could lock several doors against this sense of impending doom. Instead, I locked my legs against the impulse to run. The time for running was over. Time to be proactive, I told myself.
Mustering up all the bravado I could, I yelled, “Hey! I know you’re out here. I don’t care who you are. I don’t care why you’re here. If you have something to say to me, you don’t skulk outside my window like a peeping Tom, understand? You come to my door and approach me like a grown-up evil being.”
I waited another few beats, but the only presence I felt was the frogs, their tiny hearts fluttering in the dark. “I thought so. Stay away from my house, you freaking coward!”
I turned on my heel, stepped into a mud slick, and went flying, landing on my back with a thud and whacking my head against a stump.
Through the lacy green canopy of leaves, the stars twinkled, mocking me.
