We were all sitting around the dining-room table—Vlad, glowering at Sergio; Sergio, oblivious, enjoying his fourth piece of Veggie Madness on a gluten-free crust; Nina, working a bag of AB negative and typing away on my Mac; and Will and I trading uneasy glances between a half-decimated all-meat, extra-cheese pizza.
I wiped my grease-soaked fingers on my napkin and pushed away from the table. “Okay! So, are we going to talk about the elephant in the room?”
Nina raised her eyebrows. “Sophie, you may have put on a few pounds, but I wouldn’t call you an elephant.”
“I think she is talking about him.” Vlad’s dark eyes went to Sergio, who popped his last bit of pizza in his mouth and wiped his hands on a napkin. Sergio’s back stiffened, and his eyes held Vlad’s.
“What about me?”
“I thought you said there wasn’t an issue between vampires and werewolves?” Will asked.
“Hey, before you guys start comparing incisors, and before I completely kick Nina’s ass for calling me an elephant—”
Nina held up a single finger without looking up from my laptop. “I called you
“I’m talking about the fact that Sergio was shot with silver bullets. Kale was plowed over in an intersection. Bettina was hammered in the streets. Someone tried to drive a stake through my heart. What else needs to happen for you to believe that someone is out there? We’re seriously being Van Helsinged, and no one is paying attention.”
“Who has it in for demons?” Will asked.
I huffed. “Who doesn’t?”
Will’s eyebrows went up and Nina sighed. “There is always someone hunting vampires. Buffy wasn’t exactly an original idea.”
“There’s always been people after us,” Sergio said.
“Yeah. They’re called dogcatchers!” Vlad snorted.
“Guys!” I shouted.
Nina finally looked up from the laptop, clicking it closed. “Okay, if someone is out for demon blood, what are we supposed to do about it?”
“Um, maybe find out who wants you dead and why. If this guy knew that Sergio was a werewolf , and that silver bullets would
“Then he’s probably got a pretty decent foothold in the Underworld,” Will finished.
“Right. Because most people just pretty much assume the whole werewolf-silver-bullet thing is legend,” I said.
Vlad blew out an exhausted sigh. “Still more trouble in Gotham.”
“We were shot at.” I thought yelling and stamping my foot with each word would get the weight of the issue across, but Vlad just straightened his ascot to Thurston Howell-perfect—quite a feat since the man had no reflection to check—and looked at me.
“I’m really sorry about your incident, Sophie, but I fail to recognize how this affects me. Or”—his eyes cut to Nina—“us.”
Nina frowned. “Are you sure it wasn’t gangbangers? Maybe they picked up the bullets by mistake.” She crossed her arms in front of her chest and narrowed her coal black eyes. “Bastard gangbangers. We could do the city a real service if the UDA would just lift their ban and let us eat them.”
Vlad wrinkled his nose. “Ew. I don’t like gangbangers. They’re usually so thin and stringy.”
“It wasn’t gangbangers.” I dug in my pocket and picked out the one shell casing I had nicked from Will’s stash. “This bullet isn’t something you inadvertently pick up at Walmart.”
Vlad examined the shell casing and gave it a small sniff.
“Anything?” I asked.
He narrowed his eyes. “I’m not a dog.” Then, “Do you keep Skittles in that pocket, too?”
Nina leapt off the couch and snatched the casing from Vlad’s fingers. “A silver bullet. How odd. Maybe one of my characters gets shot with a silver bullet!”
Sergio leaned over, flashed a big grin. “You’re a writer?”
“Novelist, actually,” Nina said, oozing pride. “I’ll read you something later.”
“Hello!” I sprang up from the couch. “My clients go missing, a banshee is bashed up with the message about eradicating ‘her kind,’ and now someone shoots at me and Will with
No one seemed to register the amount of shock and awe that my proclamation required, and I huffed. “Hello? Guys? There is a serial killer out there and you’re what he’s looking for.”
Nina bit her lip. “I don’t know, Sophie. Demon hunters can’t exist. Have you read Harley’s book?”
I was sputtering. “Wh-what? Harley’s book? Nina, Harley’s stupid book says
“Like what?”
“Like you think I’m completely Looney Tunes for suggesting that we might be in danger.”
Sergio leaned over to Will. “What book is this?”
Vlad patted my shoulder in an effort to placate me. “It’s not that we think you’re Looney Tunes, but look at the facts. Someone shot at you and Will with silver bullets—silver bullets that only kill werewolves.”
I held up a single finger. “And can make a hell of a dent in your everyday average human.”
“You’re not everyday,” Will put in.
“Or average,” Nina chimed in.
“But I’m still human, and I was still shot at. And, Nina, I swear to God, if you say that being mistaken for a werewolf is proof positive I need to wax in the winter, I will drive a stake through your heart myself.”
Nina crossed her arms in front of her chest and jutted out a hip. “You said it, not me.”
“You guys, this is serious. Can’t you see?”
I looked into the unconcerned faces surrounding me: Nina, surreptitiously eyeing my winter-hairy legs; Vlad, dark eyes cutting from the clock to the front door; Sergio, intently flipping through the promotional copy of Harley’s book, which Will handed him.
This was going to be harder than I thought.
I looked around, feeling my eyes widen while my stomach dropped. “What if this is another fallen angel?”
Nina blinked at me. “If it were, don’t you think they’d toss out the middle man and kill you directly? I mean, no offense.”
“I don’t know.” I looked at Will. “Maybe they’re playing—trying to get me nervous or something?”
Will rubbed his chin. “There has been no information on any fallen angels coming into town. As for them playing with you? Nina is kind of right. Fallen angels don’t play. If they’re after you, it’s pretty direct.”
“And frankly,” Vlad stated, eyes glued to his screen,
“everything that has happened so far has been pretty coincidental. Kale got hit by a car—a hundred cars run through that intersection every day. It was bound to happen.”
I put my hands on my hips. “And Bettina and Mrs. Henderson and the centaur and me getting staked?”
“Muggings, break-ins—they happen. The economy is tanking, breathers get desperate. Unfortunately, both of those can end in murder.”
I tried to shoot a questioning glance at Will, but he was fully immersed in the last piece of pizza. I cleared my throat; and when he looked up, he opened his mouth, looking as though he was about to agree with Vlad. I pinned him with a glare and he snapped his mouth shut.
“The guy said he was going to eradicate her kind, Vlad. Do you really think that was just your average thug?”
Vlad shrugged. “I got mugged in New Orleans by a guy who told me he was mugging for Christ. It takes all kinds.”
