Dead Vampires Don't Date (6 page)

No, that label fell to me.

I'd had the brief realization of being the probable only suspect this morning. After that it had been all too easy to conveniently forget all about it.

I do realize that my ostrich routine isn't exactly healthy. Or wise. And if I live long enough, I'll consider therapy. Maybe.

My only excuse is this entire morbid episode had me totally rattled. If I didn't get with it my excuses would get me killed.

"What would you do?" I asked bluntly.

"Lie, and start sharpening my stakes," she smiled. A tiny drop of red stained her left fang.

A good plan, simple and to the point. As an added bonus I'd already unwittingly put part of it into action. I would just continue to swear up and down that the prince had never, ever shown up for his interview to anyone who cared to ask.

Most of the businesses on my block close at five. It's a quiet area. I couldn't recall seeing anyone when the prince had left. Chances were good that there were no witnesses.

Even if the prince had called someone on his way to the interview, I planned to lie my ass off and the prince was dead, so there wasn't anyone to say otherwise.

Tomorrow I'd stop at Lowes and pick up some wooden stakes. Yesterday's paper listed an advertisement for flowerbed fencing. I'd noticed because my Aunt has several flowerbeds in her front yard and I knew she would love the short white picket fencing. In fact, I thought the newspaper coupon was still on my counter.

All I had to do was keep a section for myself, separate the little stakes into an office pile, a car pile and one for my apartment. Plus a couple extra to keep on my person at all times. I knew Morgan had an extra knife harness that I could borrow.

Perfect. I didn't feel quite so blonde anymore. I now had a plan and it included thirty percent off.

7.
Dangerous Demons.

Half an hour later my neck began to tingle. I didn't need the quickening of my heartbeat to tell me who had just arrived.

I didn't like it that we already had some connection. Not one bit. Happy dancing hormones aside, that demon spelled trouble in a big way. I just didn't know which way.

Morgan glanced at me, eyed the pulse in my neck and then swiveled around. I did my best imitation of a Stonehenge boulder.

"You haven't even moved," she pointed out.

I shrugged. What could I say? Hormones are hell. No rhyme or reason and they will get you into trouble time and time again.

Mine had just gathered to plot against me.

"May I join you?"

Oh Sweet Spirits. I nearly came right then and there. This close, his voice vibrated through his chest, across the table and rumbled its way down into my belly. Dark and so deep I could have used grappling hooks to pull myself up.

I froze, just stiffened from head to toe in my chair as if someone had put a spell on me.

This went beyond trouble and into the realm of Seriously Screwed. My reaction was out of proportion. The demon continued to focus his attention on me and not Morgan – the short, slightly rotund one, not the drop dead gorgeous one. Something was off.

Morgan eyed the two of us. She curled her long white fingers around the stem of her wineglass and settled back in her chair, obviously prepared to enjoy the show.

A long silence ensued.

I did my utmost best to remember to breath. Morgan took a long drink. The demon pulled out the chair next to me.

He somehow managed to brush my thigh with his as he sat down. I gulped. Little tiny flames erupted from that spot.

Startled, I looked down. No, just imaginary ones. You can never be certain with a demon. They all come from somewhere in Hell.

"I'm Ash."

And I should leave. Get up and walk right out. Not a single look over my shoulder. I
knew
this. If I'd had my broom with me, its bristles would be dancing about so strongly did my intuition stir.

This demon equals trouble.

I didn't need the rest of the equation.

My butt remained firmly planted in my chair. I wondered if it was that same impulse that caused humans to slow down or even come to a complete stop at the scene of a gruesome accident.

I had no desire to see my body bloody, yet I could not move.

I took a deep breath. The subtle hint of smoke combined with a musky woodsy scent flooded my nose. For a moment, I was nine again, sitting around the campfire with my mother and my aunt telling witch stories and breathing in the woods.

I blinked rapidly against the sudden sting in my eyes. Had he done it deliberately? No. Demons can be casually cruel, but they can't read memories.

He simply smelled a little like love to me.

Shit.

"I'm Morgan."

Apparently the introductions were still going on while I continued with my personal crisis.

Morgan raised her brows at me. I gave the tiniest shake back. Did she honestly expect me to communicate right now?

"The silent one is Kate." Morgan toasted me with her glass.

I didn't have time to think of a mild curse for her, the chair next to me squeaked in protest as the demon shifted closer. My heart thudded like a rabbit evading a wolf.

"Hello Kate." His tone told me the words - as innocuous as they were - were meant for my ears alone. No one else existed.

The chair groaned again. Thick, deliciously rippling arms settled onto the small table. His elbow deliberately touched mine.

I have never in my life considered my elbow to be an erogenous zone. Right now, it had its own series of mini orgasms.

"Would you like to dance?"

I searched frantically for my voice. It might be lost in a surge of rampaging hormones, but I knew it was still there. I had to find it before he took mute for yes.

If he took me in his arms and pressed his body against mine . . . I'm almost ashamed to say I whimpered.

An honest-to-witchiness whimper.

Had it been that long since I'd last had a date?

The music shifted. A slower ballad started up.

I cursed the band. I cursed my own inability to resist him and I let him lead me out onto that tiny dance floor.

His heat wrapped around me before his arms did. Hot, almost pulsing with flames, he settled his hands on my lower back and tugged until a whisper couldn't intrude between our bodies.

He wore another black leather vest. No shirt. Firm male skin and soft leather engulfed me.

It was worse than I thought.

I wanted to melt into him. Into his warmth. Into his scent. Into his big, hard body.

I am a smart witch. In that moment of touching, I have no idea where she went. I was surrounded by sensation. Dazed.

One of his large hands stroked up my back to press gently. My breasts touched his chest. I shuddered. He pushed again, my upper half plastered against him, torso to torso. Soft to hard.

I've always been rather busty. The extra pounds that I've accumulated in the past few years have not discriminated in their placement on my body so now my breasts are more than a handful for even the largest hands.

I had despaired of the extra weight. Now, I couldn't imagine a more perfect fit for my body than his.

He shifted us side to side in a slow rhythmic motion that probably qualified as dancing to the casual observer. To me it was seduction, pure and simple.

Something tugged on my hair. "It's so soft." There was both astonishment and something else in his voice as he ran his hand over my curls.

From what I knew of the demon realm, it consisted mostly of barren rocky wastelands, interspersed with steam vents, rivers of lava and volcanoes.

Female demons have spikes not hair, sharp claws and lots of muscles. I could see where my hair – and my body – would be a novelty to him.

It was the undercurrent of resentment, almost anger, that puzzled me. Thankfully, it also pulled me out of my stupor.

I leaned back. His hands tightened before they eased. I looked up. He angled his head down and our gazes met.

My breath caught. Again. I've seen big cats of prey that had eyes less threatening than his. Danger and death lurked and stalked deep inside.

Call me crazy and blonde – or both – but I didn't feel threatened. Instead I had this almost compulsive urge to soothe him.

Like a starving lion that's been cornered at the end of a ravine, I wanted to stroke him and comfort him. Which meant I had definitely lost my mind.

The last thing this massive demon needed was protection. So, why did I feel like snatching up my wand and jumping in front of him?

I grabbed hold of my magic and sent it out. Nothing. No one worked magic of any kind around us. This was not a spell or a curse.

This was between us.

And although I didn't sense any magic around us or motivating him, that in no way meant he didn't have an agenda of some sort.

I'm not vain and I'm not ignorant of my appeal to certain members of the opposite sex either, but big, sculpted demons straight out of my fantasies did not pick the chubby witch, especially when the red-haired bombshell was anywhere in the vicinity.

Despite all the crazy lust on my end, it came down to what he really wanted from me. He felt desire, possibly a little more for me. I could see that. It wasn't all good though.

I sucked in my inner hussy and pushed against his shoulders. He narrowed his eyes. His grip tightened.

Damn, but I love a determined demon.

"No."

I wanted to whimper one more time. I wanted to shake his mile wide shoulders and demand the truth. I really wanted to see if my fantasy had any bit of reality to it.

"No." This time I said it more to myself.

Something very dark flashed through his eyes. I gathered the words for a protection spell and held them on the tip of my tongue.

He let go so quickly I stumbled. Before I could do more than wobble, he had my shoulders in his grasp once more. He steadied me, eased away, hands ready in case I even flinched.

I held it together this time.

One large, very warm hand stroked the side of my cheek.

"No." He nodded as he said it. Despite knowing that something more, something I in no way understood, was going on, my stomach clenched.

"This time." He turned and left.

I tottered around the rest of the dancers to slide into a boneless puddle in my seat.

"Short." Morgan said.

Very. Extremely short dance and yet entirely too long.

"Your pulse is racing throughout your body."

Knew and felt that one too, thank you very much.

"You do remember that you're cursed, right?"

Like a neon Vegas billboard. I'd never resented it so much as I did right at this moment. Even if he didn't have some underlying nefarious desire in mind, a relationship would never, ever, in-a-million-years work between us. I was both cursed and mortal.

I took a long drink from my bottle.

Dark amber eyes flashed through my head. They taunted me. I swallowed hard. As I began to take another sip, it occurred to me that I still did not know exactly what he looked like. I fell into his gaze each time and drowned to the point of not even caring about anything else.

Damn scary.

So why did his last words keep echoing in my mind? An acceptance of my refusal and also a promise for something more. Or would that be a threat?

8. Home Improvement Shopping Or How To Find A Stake In Aisle Five.

The automatic doors hissed open as I walked into Lowes. According to my coupon, I should be able to find the twenty-four inch white picket fencing in both the outdoor garden area and aisle five.

Twenty-four inches would provide the perfect height to showcase my Aunt's flowerbeds. It was a little long to be strapped to my body as a stake.

So I'd added a small saw to my shopping list.

I am in no way what-so-ever handy around my apartment, but I did feel confident enough to chop off a few ends of narrow stakes. Especially if it meant saving my own life.

I am all for that.

I turned left to head towards the correct aisle. I passed house numbers and outdoor lighting.

Hmmm . . . I turned down that aisle. A couple of outdoor solar lights angled around the fencing would look really cute.

Country. Cheap. Too flat. That burnished nickel color was almost the
exact
shade of grey as his horns.

I stopped, walked over to the edge of the metal display shelves and thunked my head. I'd been doing it all morning.

The demon whom-I-refused-to-call-by-name continued to pop into my head at the most inopportune moments. As in constantly.

He wouldn't leave me alone.

I'd turned him down. He'd sort of accepted that. My mind, on the other hand, blatantly continued on its path of we still had something going on.

After another series of X-rated dreams and his every-five-minute appearance in my mind, I'd resorted to head banging.

Now I needed Ibuprofen. My healing spells were redundant at this point.

I gritted my teeth, picked up four discreet spotlights and stomped over to the next aisle.

I spotted the white bundles about halfway down. Right next to the hoses.
Thick and heavy
like a certain part of a certain demon's anatomy would be
. . . horrified I ran down the aisle, snatched up three bundles and bolted to the checkout counter. I set my purchases on the counter and yanked open my purse.

"Doing some gardening today?" The cheerful brunette slid the solar lights in front of the bar code reader. It blipped happily.

I hummed a non-committal reply. My mind was rebelling and I didn't trust the response. Gardening and protection, who knew it all came so nicely bundled?

"These are really the best." She rang up one of the bundles. "They're so nice and stiff."

"What?!" I looked side to side. Had the demon been in the store today?

"They're hard and stiff." She had the gall to give
me
a skeptical look. "The soft, flexible ones are worthless."

Well, I had certainly always thought so, but somehow this did not seem to be the most appropriate conversation to be having with the checkout clerk at Lowes.

"You're right. Why bother with the soft ones?" I looked at her more closely. Wow. And I thought the HC could be deceptive. She looked like someone's grandmother.

I leaned a little closer. "I didn't know there are
flexible
ones."

She nodded. "Sure there are, honey. You must have missed them. They're next to the hard ones." She slid the last bundle over the scanner.

"But don't bother. They're not worth it."

I planned to take her word for it.

"That'll be one hundred eleven and eighteen."

I handed her my coupon, which brought me to just over seventy-seven dollars. I love coupons.

I thanked her, picked up my goods and high-tailed it out to my car. I opened the passenger door.

"Let me see what ya got."

I had only one appointment that afternoon. I figured I'd lock Al in my office during the interview. We could go for a walk afterwards.

I set the bags on the seat and opened the one with the stakes. Al stuck his little head inside and sniffed for several seconds.

"Nice and thick."

"What?!"

"They've got some meat on them." Al titled his head at me. "You okay, Doll? You're breathing kinda funny." He stiffened from head to tail. "Anybody mess with you in there?"

I refocused on the fencing. Right. Nice, thick
stakes
.

That adult store was at the end of my block. I would simply stop in there after work. I looked at Al. On another day.

"I'm fine, Al." I shut the door and walked around my bright yellow Mini-Cooper. Totally inappropriate for winters in Idaho, I still loved my car.

"I told ya to bring me in with you," Al continued as I got in and started the car.

"They don't allow unleashed dogs in Lowes, Al." He refused to believe me.

"Trust me, Doll. They ain't gonna mess with me." He stuck his head in the bag again. "Yeah, these should work just fine. Make sure you keep at least five on you at all times." I'd shared my plan with Al.

He hadn't let up on the dead body problem and I can't resist his bulging brown eyes. And let me add that
no one
can lecture you like a Chihuahua can.

"I've got Morgan's knife harness on already."

"Good." He grunted. "I should only need two."

Bless his tiny, hit man channeling head. I reached over and rubbed him behind the ears. He snuffled and leaned into my hand.

He could always use them as chew toys if nothing else.

****

"
Do you play any sports?"

"I'm good enough to be semi pro in tennis." Ken stretched his legs out in front of him. Actually, I think his name was Steve, but unwrap the plastic and there's no difference between the man and the doll.

Gelled and styled sandy blonde hair topped his perfect head. His eyes were the blue you see only on the most clear of days. A dimple winked periodically from the corner of his mouth.

After that it got progressively worse. Or better, depending upon your idea of attractive. Mine ran towards big and scarred with just a hint of woodsy smoke.

I had a hunch Barbie would like Ken, even without her predecessor and plastic mobile match. The link on that cuff had been his clothes. He'd walked in for his interview and I'd thrown my Charm spell right out the window.

The man wore pink.

Pepto-Bismol golf shirt, tan chinos and –
shudder
– salmon tennis shoes.

I did work a truth spell. Twice. It came back heterosexual both times. I considered running it a third time.

"And it says here that you own a tanning business?"

His white teeth beamed from his utterly even, tanned face. "I do indeed." He reached into his shirt pocket, lifted a card and slid it across my desk. "Forty percent off your first visit."

He winked. I maintained my smile. Barely.

"Thank you." I pushed the card over to the corner of my desk. My trashcan waited underneath.

I wouldn't last six point two seconds with this guy, let alone years. I reminded myself that this was not about me. I reminded myself that everyone has different tastes. I reminded myself that clubbing clients over the head with a trashcan was not good for business.

But the image certainly made me smile.

Smarmy and pretentious make my skin damn near crawl. A whole colony of ants had relocated to my upper dermal layer.

Still, it was not my call. Ken met at least three out of the five of Barbie's date criteria. As a bonus, he even matched.

However, I liked Barbie. I admired her pickiness in her dates. If you're going to spend a significant portion of your life with someone, you
should
be picky.

I even admired her wardrobe. Intimidated might be the more accurate word, but damn, that girl knew how to accessorize
.

I'd keep Ken in mind. Sad as it may be, I simply didn't have enough clients to throw him into a reject pile – or under a bus.

He really irked me.

On the positive side, I still had one more client to interview. I studied Ken's over-whitened smile. Anything had to be better than this.

We spoke for several more minutes. I asked a few more pertinent questions. He offered me fifty percent off and another wink.

I shuddered to think of what went on in his tanning salon.

Finally I wrapped things up, told him I'd call to set up a date and escorted him to my front door.

He left without saying thank you.