Your Coffin or Mine? (5 page)

“How’s that?”

“Because Inga is really a five-hundred-pound Japanese guy with a pot belly and bunions. But you don’t know this because he’s got all of these great pics posted and so you fall into a deep, meaningful back and forth exchange, only to have your heart broken into a thousand pieces when you find out the truth. Then you’re scarred for life, afraid to trust anyone. You turn into a hermit, invest in a couple dozen cats. They find you one day, facedown in the kitty litter. Dead. Alone.”

He eyed me for a long moment. “Does that story usually work?”

“Usually. Sometimes I tell it with dogs instead of cats. Or even Chia Pets. But you didn’t really look like the gardening type.”

He grinned and shook his head. “Call me if you hear from him again, okay?”

I nodded. Not that I was going to sit around waiting on Ty and worrying. I didn’t do worry very well. Rather, I was going to be proactive. I would send out a message to him every hour on the hour, and the rest of the time I would spend working.

I had bills to pay, after all, and as ominous as things seemed (Ty was missing and there was still the little issue of me being followed), I’d still had an extremely productive evening. I’d met John-the-insurance-fraud-investigator, who obviously needed some serious help in the soul mate department. I’d also passed out a ton of cards and even gotten several in return.

Love was definitely in the air.

Unfortunately, love wasn’t the only thing. The realization hit me, along with the smell, when I left Ty’s building and started down the street toward the corner. My nostrils flared and the foul scent grew stronger with each step and—Ugh.

I glanced down at the brown mess squishing out from beneath the toe of my snakeskin Prada. I twisted and started scraping my shoe on the concrete to clean the mess. I’d just about gotten everything off when I heard the faint sound.

The
meow
echoed through my head and my first instinct was to run the other way.

I know cats are cute and snuggly, but I’m just not into them. Most vampires aren’t, and the ones who are keep them around from pure necessity. Like my great uncle Pierre who still lives a zillion kilometers from civilization (aka the nearest shopping mecca) in the remote French countryside. While he has a huge staff of servants to help him out with the need to feed, sometimes he gets tired of the same old, same old. He likes a little variety, and since the nearest village is home to a pack of were-wolves, he turns to whatever’s handy, i.e., his cat. I
know.
Talk about a flossing nightmare. But to each his own.

The sound kept blaring in my head as I neared the corner. Louder. More desperate.

Meow.

It wasn’t like I cared. No cats. That was my motto. Not only because of the hair issue, but because I was determined not to wind up facedown in the kitty litter.

At the same time, it
was
my civic duty to ensure that the streets of New York City remained free of piles of stray-cat poop. Talk about a fast way to kill a pair of killer shoes.

My Pradas, the poor things, would never be the same.

I took a few more steps before turning down a narrow alley that wound down the side of the building and around the back. My vision cut through the darkness, skating this way and that as I searched for the source. I caught a whiff of damp fur and more poop. The sound grew louder.

I bypassed garbage cans and a Dumpster and there it was. The Prada killer in the flesh.

Not that there was much flesh on it. It looked like a full-grown cat, yet it was so scrawny and malnourished that it couldn’t have weighed more than the small bag of MAC necessities I kept in my purse. The black fur was matted. Big, bright green eyes glittered back at me and my chest hitched.

I stiffened against the feeling and put on my best you-are-so-busted look. “You owe me six hundred bucks,” I told the cat. “Since you can’t possibly pay me back, I’m calling the animal shelter. They’ll pick you up and the streets will once again be safe for designer shoes.”

He blinked and shivered.

“Don’t look at me like that. I
am
calling the animal shelter.”

Another blink and more shivering.

“You can’t just stay here, pooping and starving. The animal shelter will feed you and find you a home.”
And put you out of your misery if no one wants you.
The thought struck and guilt spiraled through me.

Wait a second. I don’t even like cats. Never have. Never will. They shed and they shit and I don’t even want to think what they taste like.

Meow
.

“You’re not coming home with me.” Excuse me? Back the Ferrari up. I was not—repeat NOT—thinking about taking this shoe destroyer home with me.

Was I?

My brain did a quick scrambling before the right answer popped up.

No. Definitely not. Sure, they allowed pets in my building, but we’re talking the cute, fuzzy kind. Not an over-the-hill, shriveled-up excuse for a feline.

To my left, I saw a rat big enough to saddle and mount scurry under a stack of cardboard boxes.

“There you go,” I told the cat. “You can feast on Mickey and I’m off the hook.”

Unless Mickey decided to feast on Killer, here. The rat was certainly big enough for a knock-down, drag-out. And who knew? It might win and then I wouldn’t just be guilty of animal neglect. I’d be a murderer.

Like I know the word vampire is synonymous with the big M for the most part, but I’m not really as bloodthirsty as most of my brethren. No, really. It’s true. My dirty little secret.

Which wouldn’t be so secret if I snatched up Killer, took him home, and gave him a bath and a saucer of milk. And cuddled up with him on the couch.

He meowed and did more of the I’m-alone-and-I’m-scared-and-you-are-so-wonderful-for-saving-me blinking.

“It won’t work. You wouldn’t last five seconds at my place. Trust me. I’m ruthless.”

Yeah, right,
the cat seemed to say.

“Really, I am. You don’t want to make me mad.” I flashed him a little fang for show, which would have sent most animals running the other way. But the cat simply sat there. Looking at me. Begging me. “I don’t like cuddling.”

Whadayaknow? Neither do I. Cuddling is for kittens. I’m old. Temperamental. Grouchy.

“And I don’t like a lot of noise during the day when I’m trying to sleep.”

As weak as I am, I can barely hold up my head much less make a lot of racket.

“And keep your hair to yourself because I’m NOT vacuuming up after you.” If there was one thing I hated more than cats and pushy Visa collectors, it was vacuuming. Don’t do it. Don’t like it. Not happening. End of story.

Sheesh, I’m nearly bald as it is. How much shedding could I actually do?

“And don’t even think about peeing on any of my rugs.”

I’m old, not incontinent.

“Or clawing at the furniture. I don’t actually have a lot of furniture—I only recently moved out of my parents’ place—but what I do have, I cherish.”

I can barely clean myself, much less scratch. I’m weak. Starving.

“And,” I added as I stepped forward and scooped up the poor, pathetic thing, “if we’re going to be roommates, you can’t do any pooping on the floor. It’s the litter box or, I swear, I’m shipping you to my uncle Paul.”

Six

B
y the time I walked into Dead End Dating a half hour later (after a stop at the nearby grocery for a carton of milk), it was after ten o’clock and Evie had already left.

That or she’d grown a zillion zits, a bad haircut, a size twelve foot, and a penis.

I stopped and eyed the young man sitting at her desk. “Hello?”

“Yo.” He looked to be about nineteen or twenty. Human. He had dark hair that curled down around his ears and stuck out every which way, a piercing in his right eyebrow, and a pair of wire-rimmed glasses with black electrical tape wrapped around the nose-piece. He had a headset hooked in his ears. An iPod blasted Disturbed.

“I’m Lil.”

He didn’t so much as glance up, his gaze fixed on Evie’s computer terminal. A small set of tools lay open on the desk. “Cool.”

I motioned around me to the small outer office. “I own this tribute to fabulous decorating skill.”

“Phat.”

“Do you have a name?”

Die Slut
had been tattooed on the back of his left hand and
Kill the Whore
on his right. His fingernails, painted with black nail polish, flew over the keyboard of Evie’s computer. A display of numbers and letters scrolled across the screen. “Word.”

O-kay. “That, um, wasn’t a comment. See question mark on the end.”

“Word.”

“No, really, could you tell me your name?” If he looked up, I could see for myself, but his attention stayed riveted on the computer.

“
Word,
” he said, pulling off the earphones. He still didn’t look at me as he shifted his attention to the tool set. He retrieved a tiny screwdriver and reached for a small box that I recognized as a Flash drive. “That’s my name. It blows, doesn’t it?” He started unscrewing the front panel of the drive. “I was named after some old guy that I can’t even remember. My great uncle something or other. I dunno. Never met him.” He set the screwdriver aside and reached for another that was even smaller.

I set the scrawny cat down on his wobbly legs. He wrapped himself around my ankles and stayed put. One paw rested on the toe of my shoe and my chest hitched. While he was a pain in the ass, he
was
sort of cute, in a scrawny, half-starved way. And he obviously had superb taste.

I shifted my attention from the skinny cat to the skinny young man. “What’s your last name?”

“Dalton.”

“Ah, so you’re related to Evie.” Evie was my loyal assistant. She could handle five phone lines, an extra large latte, a temperamental computer, and a tube of MAC’s Morning Sunrise all at the same time, and without breaking a sweat. If Evie hadn’t been human, I would have sworn we were Siamese twins separated at birth. The girl definitely had it going on in a major way.

“She’s my third cousin. I keep hoping she’ll go out with me since we’re so far removed, but she says the idea creeps her out.”

I had a hunch it was Word himself who creeped her out, but I kept this thought to myself.

“A rip, isn’t it?” he went on. “What with her being so fine and me being such a genius, we could make one hot match.”

“Or an interesting episode of Dr. Phil.”

He turned back to the drive. “You’re funny. You’re pretty hot, too.”

I already knew that, but what I really wanted to know was how he knew it since he hadn’t so much as glanced my way.

Look at me.
I sent out the silent thought, but he didn’t glance up.
Hell-o? Look. At. Me.

His head wobbled.
Atta boy.
He slid a look my way.
Come on, you can do it.
Our eyes connected.
Bingo!

Word Dalton. Nineteen and three quarters. He liked listening to music—particularly the undeniably nonPC “Die Slut” and “Kill the Whore.” He liked chugging beer and playing his PSP and chugging beer and working on computers and chugging beer. He wasn’t technically a virgin, but he was close. For reasons completely unknown to him, of course, on account of
he
thought he was a pretty hot guy and he aimed to please, which was why he’d gotten his penis pierced—

Ugh. I soooo didn’t need
that
visual.

“You want to go out sometime?” He shifted his attention back to his work, grabbed a cord, and plugged the flash drive into the main computer as he waited for my answer.

“Let me guess. Chug some beer and maybe catch a Die Slut show?”

He stared at me with the same awe men used when I vamped them. “You like Die Slut?”

Not in this eternity. I smiled. “Doesn’t everybody?”

“Rad.” He grinned. “So you wanna go?”

Uh, no. I was a vampire. He was food. I should rip his throat out or something equally vicious.

I contemplated the murderous thought for a nanosecond before a shudder ripped through me.

Oh, all right. I’ll admit it. I’m only batting two out of three when it comes to Super Vamp must-haves. I stared at his hopeful expression, his desperate eyes. Just like the cat.

Not that I was taking him home, mind you. One stray was one too many. But I couldn’t squash his hopes and dreams just like that.

I smiled. “Obviously, I would love to, if I didn’t already have a boyfriend.” Well, I
did.
Ash had referred to me as the closest thing to Tag’s girlfriend, which would make him the closest thing to my boyfriend. Sort of. “But if a date is what you’re interested in, you’re certainly in the right place.”

“I don’t pay for dates.”

I didn’t have to be a mind-reading ultra vamp to know
that
was a load of bull. “So what are you doing?”

“Installing a flash drive. After that, I’ll be upgrading and then you’re good to go.”

“Thanks.”

“Don’t thank me until you’ve seen the bill. I take all major credit cards and cash. Or we can talk alternative payment solutions.”