“Right,” Damon scoffed.
“What if humans wander in and want to order a hamburger or something?”
“We compel them to leave and try their luck elsewhere.”
“Do the bottles have blood in them?”
“No. Most do not. Why?” he said. “Are you thirsty?”
“Are you?” she retorted.
“Are you asking me if the smell of blood in the embalming room aroused my appetite?”
Her stomach turned. “There was blood in there? I didn’t know that.”
“It’s an embalming room. You know what they do in there.”
“Not the specifics, and I don’t want to know. I didn’t smell any blood.”
“Vamps have an increased sense of smell.”
“Bully for you.”
“I can smell your fear,” he said.
She was sure he was making that up. “What does it smell like?” Wait, she had remembered to put on deodorant this morning, hadn’t she? She’d been in such a rush to get dressed, she wasn’t sure. “Never mind.”
“What are you afraid of, little witch?”
“Demons in funeral homes,” she said. “And spiders. I don’t like spiders.” Damn, she shouldn’t have told him that. “I was just kidding about the spiders.” She wasn’t but she didn’t want him to know that.
She also didn’t want him knowing the strong desire she felt for him. She was afraid of the way he could get to her with just one look. And then there was that extraordinary kiss—not to mention his hands on her breast. That caress was burned into her memory.
Damon was clearly a master in the art of seduction. He’d had over a century to perfect his moves. She’d had fewer than forty-eight hours to perfect her defenses against him, and there were moments when the walls she’d built were about to come tumbling down.
Even now, Damon was looking at her as if he wanted to lift her onto the bar, peel off her yoga pants and underwear, and have his wicked way with her.
She tried to turn her thoughts away from that vividly sizzling fantasy but it stubbornly stayed in her mind.
Thankfully, she was prevented from doing anything she’d regret by the arrival of a young man wearing broken glasses taped together. Definitely a nerd. Also a vampire? Yep, judging by the way Damon greeted him. So vampires came in all shapes and sizes and personalities. From Pat the hippie who’d actually fought for the English Crown to Tanya whose boyfriend turned her in the 1950s to Damon the darkly sexy vampire who fought for the Union.
“This is Neville,” Damon told her.
The nerdy vampire shyly nodded at her.
Was he afraid of her because she was a witch?
Wait, it was coming back to her now. This Neville was the guy who’d hacked her laptop. She wished she was a meaner witch and could do something equally egregious to him. But the poor vamp was probably just following orders. Damon’s orders.
He and Damon conversed in such quiet tones that she couldn’t hear them. At first she was aggravated, but upon further reflection she wondered if she really wanted to hear what they had to say if it had anything to do with embalming rooms and blood.
When Damon finally returned to her side, she said, “Did he have anything new to add to Silas’s story?”
“Nothing we didn’t already know. Let’s go.”
“I need to stop at the Heavenly Cupcakes shop before we go home.” It was her home, not Damon’s. She wondered where he lived but didn’t want to give him the satisfaction of asking.
“Is another Latin saying drawing you there?” Damon asked.
“No, it’s the devil’s food cupcake.”
“For Guy the demon?”
“No, for me.”
Zoe entered Daniella’s shop for the first time and was impressed by the decor. A Raphael-like angel smiled down on them from the HEAVENLY CUPCAKES sign inside the store. Several other framed prints of angels hung on the pink walls. But Zoe’s main attention was focused on the glass case displaying a wonderful assortment of cupcakes. Neon-colored chalk listed their individual descriptions on the glass. They all sounded divine. Black Forest. Chocolate peppermint. Amaretto. Red velvet.
The young woman behind the counter had dark blond hair with streaks of attention-grabbing hot pink throughout. “Hi, I’m Xandra. Welcome to Heavenly Cupcakes. Happy St. Patrick’s Day. We’re all out of our Irish cream cupcakes and the mini mints but we have lots of other choices. Have you decided what you’d like?”
Zoe nodded. She’d like for the past thirty-some hours to disappear. She’d like to go back to pre-demon times. She’d like to focus on her lovely soaps and lotions instead of saving the world. But since none of that was going to happen, she needed chocolate.
“I’ll have the devil’s food,” she told Xandra.
“Is that to go or to eat here?” Xandra asked.
“Eat here,” she said.
“To go,” Damon said.
One look at his expression told her that he wasn’t about to change his mind. “Fine. To go then.”
Xandra packaged the cupcake in a special box that prevented it from sliding around.
Zoe belatedly realized she didn’t have her wallet with her since Damon had whisked her away from home at top vamp speed.
Turning to Damon, she said, “Thank you for paying for my cupcake.” Her look warned him that if he refused to pay, there would be hell to pay.
The corner of his wicked mouth lifted in the fleeting hint of a sardonic smile. “You’re welcome.”
As Zoe stepped back outside, she realized it was the first time she’d been away from their rental house since she’d first met Damon … yesterday? She stopped in her tracks. How could that be? She felt as if she’d known him for much longer than that.
She walked past Pat’s Tats. Now that she knew Pat was a vampire who had been turned while imprisoned in the Tower of London for crimes against Cromwell, she wondered how many of the other businesses along the street were run by vampires.
She already knew that Tanya’s Tanning Salon was one of them. But what about the Happy Times Emergency Dental Clinic?
“Dental care is important for vamps,” Damon said, shining his pearly whites at her. “Doc Boomer is a real pro.”
“A pro vampire?” she whispered, looking around the street nervously to make sure she wasn’t overheard. The sidewalk was empty.
Damon nodded. “He got his nickname from his booming voice and his overwhelming physical appearance. But enough about the doc. If you’re done sightseeing, we need to get back to your house.”
“I should have gotten a cupcake for Gram,” Zoe said, pivoting to return to Heavenly Cupcakes, apparently the only human-owned business on the block. Well, the only hybrid-owned business, she corrected herself.
Damon turned her back. “I had Xandra add another devil’s food cupcake for your grandmother.”
His consideration surprised her. “That was nice of you. Thank you.”
The short walk to her rental house seemed longer with Damon beside her. She could see where super vamp speed might come in handy from time to time. Not that she wanted him scooping her up in his arms again that way.
Doing that took away her power. Well, not her power, but her choice. Apparently her protection spell did not guard her from being whisked off by a vampire on a mission. Not that she was about to point that out to him. Who knew where he might take her next?
Maybe he could only whisk her away within a certain distance from home. Like a few blocks. She’d have to check with Gram when she got home.
