by Amy Boyles
“Coffee isn’t going to help, you know,” Vordrid said. “It’s only going to make your nerves worse by cranking up your blood pressure.”
I glanced up at an open shelf that held a row of half-chipped dishes because I was a klutz, and the Magic 8 Ball.
“You’re right; let me make this better,” I said. I opened the fridge and squirted some of the bottled chocolate syrup into the mug. I glanced around for some whipped cream, didn’t see any, and made a mental note to pick some up.
Vordrid quivered, rocking back and forth. The dishes rattled. “Something bad must’ve happened today. Did something bad happen? You and Gabby are normally gone until the afternoon.”
I didn’t answer. I stared at my imitation granite counter.
The ball floated up into the air and landed on the glass stove top. “Something bad happened. I can smell it.”
I gripped the cup of steaming coffee and sighed, sinking my head down past my shoulder blades. “Janitor Jehoshaphat was found dead today.”
“Hmmm. His first name isn’t Jumping, is it?”
“No, it was Justin and that’s not funny.”
Vordrid shook with laughter. “I think it is.” Once he realized I wasn’t going to join him, he stopped. “What’s so strange about him dead? People die every day, Andie. It’s called the circle of life. I can sing the Elton John song for you; I’ve got it memorized.”
“No thanks. I thought…”
“Yes?”
I spread my fingers over my forehead and squeezed as if that would sharpen the memory. “I thought I saw two puncture marks on his throat. Givens was too close, so I couldn’t see if they were real or not.”
Vordrid stopped shaking.
“Not too funny anymore, is it?”
“Is it like last time?” he said. “Because if it’s like last time, you’re going to need reinforcements.”
“It’s not like last time. Normal’s never had vampires, and I haven’t heard of a sighting since Dex.”
“So there’s a possible bad vamp on the loose.”
“Not that any of them are good. But it’s highly unlikely it’s a vampire. Probably just some Halloween makeup.” I gritted my teeth. “I wish I’d been able to get close enough to see.”
“I’ve heard of good vampires,” Vordrid said.
“I haven’t.”
Vordrid rocked back and forth. “Who was that man on the front steps this morning?”
I frowned. “You sure ask a lot of questions.”
“I’m just curious. Nothing wrong with curiosity.”
“It killed the cat.”
“I can’t be killed.”
“I’ve noticed,” I said. I waved the question away. “It was nobody.”
“I can tell by your tone that it was somebody. You’re worried, aren’t you?”
I slurped down the rest of the mocha and slid off the chair. I rinsed the cup and left it on the counter in case I needed some later. Like, ten more cups.
“I’m not worried,” I said.
I tapped my finger on the counter. The gold wedding band I wore clinked on the Formica.
“Dexter would say that it was your duty to get involved,” Vordrid said in a voice that sounded a bit too superior for my taste.
“Dex is dead,” I said. “I’ve got Gabby to take care of. She’s my responsibility. I can’t keep her safe if I’m out looking for vampires. Besides, I’m sure it’s not a real vamp.” I rubbed at the worry lines forming on my forehead. “My daughter doesn’t know anything about that life. I want to keep it that way as long as possible.”
“Might I remind you that she sees me,” Vordrid said sullenly.
“That’s okay while she’s little, but in a couple of years, V., you’ll have to go.”
Vordrid paused. He didn’t like talking about becoming someone else’s mentor, even though I hadn’t used his talents in ages.
“You know, there might be an answer in The Witch’s Handbook.”
I raised a hand. “I’m not looking in the handbook. We’re not going there.”
Vordrid sighed. I rolled my eyes. He could be so pushy. Truth was, he was bored here, living a normal life. He wanted action and adventure, excitement and intrigue.
I just wanted a nap.
Vordrid rattled. “Then where are we going?”
I clicked my teeth in thought. It took about half a second for me to come up with, “I’m going upstairs to make a phone call.”
Selma answered on the first ring. “Heard you’ve got some craziness going on down South,” she said in that velvety voice of hers.
“What? You mean the comet?”
“Yeah. It’s all over the news. Made a sizable crater.”
You could say that. Of course, the news wasn’t saying anything about the supposed human form that Vordrid had spotted.
“Selma,” I said.
“Yes?” she cooed. “I imagine this isn’t a social call, Andie. We haven’t talked since that night.”
A shiver raced down my spine. “Right. I know.”
“How’s the baby?”
“She good. Great. Growing like a weed. I can barely keep up with her.”
“She looks so much like Dex. I’ve seen the pics on social media.”
Sadness washed over me. I couldn’t go there. Just couldn’t. “Yeah. Thanks. She does. Listen, Sel, I was calling to see if anything strange has happened there.”
I could nearly hear her eyebrow arch in question. “What do you mean?”
“Have you seen anything weird? Any sightings?”
I heard her earring jangle over the speaker. “Nothing other than your everyday peaceful werewolves and fairies. We’ve got a community up here. Run-of-the-mill stuff.”
I raked my fingers through my hair. “So nothing?”
“Andie,” she said in a motherly tone. “We have a few good vamps up here, but they signed the treaty. They don’t make new vampires unless it’s approved, and they don’t kill humans. Things are different now. It’s not like it was when the supernatural tribunal used us as hunters. None of the teams have been out on jobs for a couple of years. You’d know that if you hadn’t abandoned us.”
“I didn’t abandon anyone,” I snipped. “I needed time to process. With Dex gone, my team was destroyed.”
It had gotten everyone’s panties in a wad when I pulled away from the other hunters. Well, what did they expect? My husband had been killed on a job, and shortly after, I discovered I was pregnant. My priorities changed overnight.
“Anyway. You’ve got good vamps?”
“Hard to believe, right?” she said.
“Yeah. I’ve never met a good one. Sure you can trust them?”
“So far so good.” She paused. “But no, I haven’t heard of anyone seeing a bad vamp.”
That was a relief. So Justin had probably just been dressing up for Halloween. Made perfect sense. It hadn’t been puncture wounds, only makeup.
Then why was my stomach still knotted?
“Why all the questions, Andie?”
I sighed. “This morning a man approached me with an old ad—an old hunter ad. Where the heck could he have gotten that?”
“No clue. But listen, I don’t even know how to reach half the teams. You’re the only one I’m friends with on Facebook.”
I tugged on one of my diamond stud earrings. A gift from Dex. Goodness knew I couldn’t afford them on my current salary. “I’m sure it’s nothing. I just wanted to touch base with you.”
“Anytime. Call whenever you need to, and keep the pics of the baby coming. I love seeing her.”
“Thanks, Selma. I appreciate it.”
I thumbed the phone off and exhaled a shot of air.
I went back downstairs and found Vordrid watching Gabby in the living room. Watching was the operative word since he didn’t do things like change diapers.
“The child hasn’t set any fires, so I consider this a victory,” he said.
“Me too.”
&n
bsp; I tapped my foot impatiently.
“Something bothering you, Andie?”
“Yes. The air feels different, charged somehow.”
“It’s the comet,” Vordrid said.
“Not that again.”
“It’s true. I was able to take a sample last night from the crash site.”
I glared at him. “You didn’t tell me that.”
“You didn’t ask.”
I scoffed. “That’s not even a good answer. Like, seriously. That should be something you offer up right at the beginning. ‘By the way, Andie. The comet was in the form of a human princess from the planet Zog. Also, I took a sample from the specimen.’ See? That’s how it works.”
Vordrid laughed. “You’re so amusing. There isn’t a planet Zog.”
“There could be. Anyway. What’s going on with the sample?”
“It wasn’t ready a few minutes ago, but might be now.”
“Okay, great. Let’s read it. Where is it?”
“In my lab.”
“So the guest bathroom.”
Vordrid sniffed. “Yes.”
I entered the guest bathroom that Vordrid liked to refer to as his lab. It was a regular bathroom, decorated beach style. Among the seashells and pictures of flip-flops sat a row of tubes.
“I was running the very last test on the matter I found.”
I leaned on the door frame and crossed my arms over my chest.
“Very interesting,” Vordrid mused.
“What is it?”
“The last test tube had two colors it could have turned. One was pink, the other blue. If it turned one color, that meant the substance was earthen, made here. But if it turned the other, then that meant the substance was foreign.”
I quirked a brow. “You mean alien?”
“That’s exactly right. You know, you should have been a scientist. You can definitely extrapolate ideas from missing sentences.”
“I don’t need to hang around places where the word ‘extrapolate’ is being used. So what’d you find?”
“This test tube turned pink.”
“Okay.”
“That’s very interesting.”
I rolled my eyes. “Vordrid, you’re trying to be dramatic. Can you please just tell me what it means?”
“Of course. The pink color means the substance came from outside this planet.”
“Well, that’s kind of a no-brainer. It was a comet.”
“But what’s interesting are the other tests I ran today.”
I heard a shuffling behind me. “Mommy go potty.”
I tickled Gabby’s head of curls. “No, Mommy doesn’t need to go potty. Vordrid is telling Mommy a long-winded story because he only has me and you to talk to.”
“Mommy not go potty.”
“Right.”
“I resent that,” Vordrid said. “I’m not completely lonely. Dot was here yesterday.”
“Good point.” I pivoted Gabby back in the direction of the living room and said, “Can we just cut to the chase?”
“Yes. This is what I’ve discovered. The first is that the matter is organic, as I said. Meaning whatever fell from the sky was living.”
“The other thing?”
Vordrid shook a little bit. This was going to be good. At least, to Vordrid. “In the matter I found trails of dust.”
I spit out the bit of lip I was chewing. “What sort of dust?”
“Stardust, Andie. Whatever landed was made of a living star.”
I glanced at the rack of different colored liquids in the test tubes. “I don’t understand.”
Vordrid bounced on the counter. “The star wasn’t just a star—it was an angel who fell from heaven.”
FOUR
“If it comes down to trusting your gut or your heart, you’d better trust your gut because that’s where your food goes.”
—The Witch’s Handbook
* * *
“What?” I poked a finger in my ear, trying to scrape out any wax that could be clogging my hearing.
Vordrid made a sound similar to throat clearing. “I’ve only seen a sample like this once before, and it came from an angel.”
I backed up toward the door. “So you’re saying an angel fell from heaven and that’s what created the comet?”
“Exactly.”
I smirked. “Where’s Dot when you need her? She’d love this.”
Vordrid was silent.
“Vordrid?”
“I haven’t been able to reach your great-aunt.”
“Good,” I said as I left the bathroom. “Keep it that way. I tell you one thing—unless an angel shows up on my doorstep, I’m not worrying about it.”
The next morning officially started Fall Break. Teachers had to show up to finish paperwork, and I’d originally planned on taking Gabby with me, but at the last moment I changed my mind.
Vordrid sailed up. “You can’t protect Gabby if she’s not with you.”
I rolled my eyes. “Weird stuff’s going on. I’ll feel better with her here.”
“Because you’re afraid there’s a vampire.”
I covered Gabby’s ears. “Ix-nay on the ampire-vay.”
“What?”
“Never mind. Vordrid, if you mention one more thing about vampires, I’m going to flush you down the toilet.”
“I’ll stop it up.”
“I’ll find a huge, disgusting toilet at Walmart and use that one.”
Needless to say, that silenced him.
The doorbell rang.
“Mommy, who is it?” Gabby said.
“I was wondering the same thing,” Vordrid replied.
“It’s the babysitter.”
Vordrid gasped. “You hired a stranger to watch your daughter? This is highly inappropriate. If you need someone to oversee Gabby, I can do that.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’ve yet to see you change one diaper.”
“That doesn’t mean I can’t.”
I opened the door to a redhead who looked about eighteen. She gave me a warm smile that reached her eyes. Classic good looks in an Ann Margaret sort of way etched her face—upturned nose, high cheekbones, the works. Basically the girl had natural glamour.
“Mrs. Taylor?” she said in a baby voice that took me by surprise.
“Yes, that’s me. You must be Charlotte.”
A brisk wind whipped over the porch. I stepped out of its path.
“I am.” She extended her hand. Her fingers were cold.
“Come inside,” I said. “Get warmed up. It’s a chilly morning for October.”
Charlotte nodded. “Yep, sure is.” She walked inside and peeled off her jacket. “The agency said you’d need me until about two.”
“I should be back a little before then.”
Gabby came up and clutched the back of my leg.
Charlotte leaned over. “Hey, little girl. We’re going to play today. You want to do that?”
Gabby glanced up at me, her golden eyes full of hesitation.
“It’s okay, sweetheart. You’ll have fun.”
Gabby scrunched up her face. Charlotte said, “I can make that face, too. See?”
My little girl laughed at the babysitter’s expression.
A wave of reassurance washed over me. “Looks like you two are gonna get along great. Let me show you everything you need to know.”
Charlotte mussed Gabby’s hair as she walked past her. Ten minutes later I was in the 4Runner headed toward school.
I fluffed my bangs while talking to myself. “Okay, let’s go see what we can find out about our janitor.”
I wanted to see if my makeup theory had been correct. That Justin had been dressed up for Halloween, which I was 99.9 percent sure was right.
Because I really didn’t want to have to deal with the other 0.1 percent chance that I was wrong. I was retired, and I didn’t want magic in my life.
Period. End of story.
I sneaked into school a few minutes early, avoiding Givens’s
office so that I wouldn’t be stopped, and headed down a set of concrete steps to the basement. I wound around a dark hallway until I reached an open door. The scent of bleach trickled up my nose. I covered my face. Ugh. Who could stand to be around that all day?
A figure stood in the back, facing the wall. He stretched up on his toes. “Just one more push. Ugh. There you are.”
He stepped back, fisted his hands on his hips and smiled. “Perfect.”
My gaze washed over the dimly lit room. Pictures covered every last square inch of wall. Hand drawings of pentagrams, goat’s heads, black cloaks, fangs, exactly the sort of weird stuff you find in a janitor’s room.
If the janitor worshipped Satan.
When the man stepped back after securing the last picture, I padded into the room quietly. I rose on my tiptoes and saw the last photo was Bela Lugosi, the original cinema vampire himself.
“Givens doesn’t know you have this, does she?”
The man jumped three feet in the air and whirled around. My breath hitched in my throat when I saw him. Slicked-back oily black hair accentuated bloodred lips, black eyeliner and white skin.
Like, bleached white, like this dude wanted to be a vampire.
I mean, do you think all the pics on the wall were a hint or something?
“You scared me,” he said.
“Sorry. I came downstairs to find some cleanser. I’m disinfecting my classroom. But seriously. I don’t think Givens would be crazy about all this art.”
“Yeah, well, she doesn’t come down here much.” He slid a hand over his hair. “I’ll find you some cleaner.”
“Don’t worry about it.” I reached out an enthusiastic hand for a shake. “I’m Andie. I haven’t seen you around before. It’s just horrible about Justin,” I said. “He was a great kid.”
“Yeah, dude. I’m Stevie Cartman,” the new janitor said. “I normally hang out on the other side of the day.”
At thirty-two I guess I wasn’t cool enough to know that phrase. “Yeah, dude, not familiar with that one,” I said.
“Oh, dude, that’s okay. It means I work after hours and stuff. But now that Justin died, well, uh, I guess I’ll be taking over days.”
“Oh, that other side of the day,” I said, trying to sound way cooler than I was. Let’s face it, I was one minivan away from losing every cool point I had—which were few and far between to begin with if you asked Vordrid.
