Wicked Love - Michelle Dare Page 0,49

you the whole time. Even if you want to keep your eyes closed.”

Damn this boy was way too cute and chivalrous. How the heck was I supposed to say no to that?

“Lead the way,” I replied.

9

Judson

Maybe vampires really do have more fun?

This was complete insanity. I was supposed to be grilling this chick for information on the asshole who killed Audrey. Instead, I was going on dates with her. What was happening here?

I needed information, and for that, I would have to tell her that I knew what she was. Would she lose her shit and kill me? Try to bite me? Or just not care? I wasn’t sure, but what I did know was that it had to be done very carefully. I had to be prepared. She had refused to take a swig of the holy water-laced vodka I’d had in the flask, so that was out. I had watched and read everything I could get my hands on regarding vampires, and the jury was still out on whether or not holy water could hurt them or not. Some of the lore said it only worked on demons. Others, like with Dracula, holy water burned like fire. I just didn’t know, and while I didn’t want to hurt Daniela, I knew if it did burn her, she’d heal quickly. My plan was to “accidentally” splash some on her skin before letting her drink it. But she’d refused my offer—probably because vamps couldn’t get drunk. That much I knew. I watched her drink three bloody marys without even a hint of any tipsiness.

With her cool hand in mine, I led her across the dirt parking lot and bought us two tickets to the haunted maze that led to the house of horrors.

“Are you ready?” I asked her.

She glanced once again at the entrance to the maze, then back to me. “Yeah, I guess.”

Was this big, bad, fierce vampire girl really scared of a little theatrics? I mean… yeah, haunted houses had definitely upped their game in the past few years, that I wouldn’t deny. I had read about one recently in Tennessee that made you sign a waiver before going in because people were passing out, vomiting, and having heart attacks and shit. Some of the actors were physically harming people. This wasn’t like that. My buddy Adam told me it was pretty adrenaline-fueled, but nothing like being actually harmed.

I held Daniela’s hand tightly as we started through the maze. Tall, closely cropped shrubs reaching about twelve feet high surrounded us as we slowly walked around several turns. There were signs marked “exit” with arrows showing us which way to go, but around each corner, we both held our breath. After the third turn, a guy looking like some sort of zombie farmer holding a shovel jumped out in front of us. His messy, dirty hair and crazed eyes instantly brought me back to the night of Audrey’s attack and I yelled out a curse. Realizing my weakness, I swore under my breath and stepped back.

Daniela looked up at me with a puzzling look, then back to the crazed farmer. “You all right?”

I didn’t take my eyes off the actor, who was telling us to get off his farm and out of his maze or he’d take our heads off with the shovel.

“Yeah, fine,” I muttered, then pushed the vampire girl behind me. “Move,” I said to the actor.

“Get off my farm, now!” he snarled, something black dribbling from his mouth as he swung the shovel.

As I went to push past him, he slunk back into the shrubbery, laughing maniacally and threatening to get us next time.

Resisting an eyeroll, I chuckled and led Daniela through the maze. A few more similar “monsters” popped up to scare us, but we laughed it off.

A long, dirt road led us to a big, rundown-looking farmhouse and we went to the front door where it instructed us to ring the bell. We pulled a long cord attached to the ceiling and a deep, booming bell chimed. Frankenstein answered the door and told us in a gravelly voice to make our way up the staircase directly ahead of us.

The stairs creaked in very cliché fashion, and once we reached the top, a witch slowly made her way out of the wall and cackled. She threw some glittery smoke type stuff at us and told us we were cursed. We ignored her and kept walking down a long hallway. A few more surprises—one of a