From Dead to Worse

There was some regular Saturday night traffic. The line of vehicles parked against the curb stretched for a very long way down the street, so all traffic was moving slowly. I’d illegally parked with the driver’s side against the curb, not usually a big deal in our little town.
    I bent to unlock my car door, and I heard a noise behind me. In a single movement, I palmed my keys and clenched my fist, wheeled, and hit as hard as I could. The keys gave my fist quite a core, and the man behind me staggered across the sidewalk to land on his butt on the slope of the lawn.
    “I mean you no harm,” said Jonathan.
    It isn’t easy to look dignified and nonthreatening when you have blood running from one corner of your mouth and you’re sitting on your ass, but the Asian vampire managed it.
    “You surprised me,” I said, which was a gross understatement.
    “I can see that,” he said, and got easily to his feet. He brought out a handkerchief and patted his mouth.
    I wasn’t going to apologize. People who sneak up on me when I’m alone at night, well, they deserve what they get. But I reconsidered. Vampires move quietly. “I’m sorry I assumed the worst,” I said, which was sort of a compromise. “I should have identified you.”
    “No, it would have been too late by then,” Jonathan said. “A woman alone must defend herself.”
    “I appreciate your understanding,” I said carefully. I glanced behind him, tried not to register anything on my face. Since I hear so many startling things from people’s brains, I’m used to doing that. I looked directly at Jonathan. “Did you . . . Why were you here?”
    “I’m passing through Louisiana, and I came to the wedding as a guest of Hamilton Tharp,” he said. “I’m staying in Area Five, with the permission of Eric Northman.”
    I had no idea who Hamilton Tharp was—presumably some buddy of the Bellefleurs’. But I knew Eric Northman quite well. (In fact, at one time I’d known him from his head to his toes, and all points in between.) Eric was the sheriff of Area Five, a large chunk of northern Louisiana. We were tied together in a complex way, which most days I resented like hell.
    “Actually, what I was asking you was—why did you approach me just now?” I waited, keys still clutched in my hand. I’d go for his eyes, I decided. Even vampires are vulnerable there.
    “I was curious,” Jonathan said finally. His hands were folded in front of him. I was developing a strong dislike for the vamp.
    “Why?”
    “I heard a little at Fangtasia about the blond woman Eric values so highly. Eric has such a hard nose that it didn’t seem likely any human woman could interest him.”
    “So how’d you know I was going to be here, at this wedding, tonight?”
    His eyes flickered. He hadn’t expected me to persist in questioning. He had expected to be able to calm me, maybe at this moment was trying to coerce me with his glamour. But that just didn’t work on me.
    “The young woman who works for Eric, his child Pam, mentioned it,” he said.
    Liar, liar, pants on fire, I thought. I hadn’t talked to Pam in a couple of weeks, and our last conversation hadn’t been girlish chatter about my social and work schedule. She’d been recovering from the wounds she’d sustained in Rhodes. Her recovery, and Eric’s, and the queen’s, had been the sole topic of our conversation.
    “Of course,” I said. “Well, good evening. I need to be leaving.” I unlocked the door and carefully slid inside, trying to keep my eyes fixed on Jonathan so I’d be ready for a sudden move. He stood as still as a statue, inclining his head to me after I started the car and pulled off. At the next stop sign, I buckled my seat belt. I hadn’t wanted to pin myself down while he was so close. I locked the car doors, and I looked all around me. No vampires in sight. I thought, That was really, really weird. In fact, I should probably call Eric and relate the incident to him.
    You know what the weirdest part was? The withered man with the long blond hair had been standing in the shadows behind the vampire the whole time. Our eyes had even met once. His beautiful face had been quite unreadable. But I’d known he didn’t want me to acknowledge his presence. I hadn’t read his mind—I couldn’t—but I’d known this nonetheless.
    And weirdest of all, Jonathan hadn’t known he was there. Given the acute sense of smell that all vampires possessed, Jonathan’s ignorance was simply