"You don't speak ASL?" I looked over my shoulder--not incidentally letting Chad see my lips.
"Me either.
It was one of those things I always meant to learn." "Indeed." I'd amused him, it seems.
He sat down in the armchair and gestured to Amber to take the other.
"She's dead," I told him.
"You broke her." He went very still.
"She serves me still." "Does she? Looks more like a puppet.
I bet she's more work and trouble dead than she was alive." Poor Amber.
But I couldn't let him see my grief.
Focus on this room and survival.
"So why do you keep her around when she's broken?" Without allowing him time to answer, I bowed my head and said a quiet prayer over the food ...
and asked for help and wisdom while I was at it.
I didn't get an answer, but I had the feeling someone might be listening--and I hoped it wasn't just the ghost.
THE VAMPIRE WAS STARING AT ME WHEN I FINISHED.
"Bad manners, I know," I said, taking a slice of bread and buttering it.
It smelled good, so I put it down on the plate in front of Chad with a thumbs-up sign.
"But Chad can't pray out loud for the rest of us.
Amber is dead, and Corban ..." I tilted my head to look at Chad's father, who hadn't moved since I'd come into the room except for the gentle rise and fall of his chest.
"Corban's not in any shape to pray, and you're a vampire.
God's not going to listen to anything you have to say." I took a second slice of bread and buttered it.
Unexpectedly, the vampire threw back his head and laughed, his fangs sharp and ...
pointy.
I tried not to think of them in my neck.
It wasn't nearly as creepy as Amber laughing right along with him.
A cold hand touched the back of my neck and was gone--but not before someone whispered, "Careful," in my ear.
I hated it when ghosts snuck up on me.
Chad grabbed my knee, his eyes widening.
Had he seen the ghost? I shook my head at him while Blackwood wiped his dry eyes with his napkin.
"You have always been something of a scamp, haven't you?" Blackwood said.
"Tell me, did Tag ever discover who it was that stole all of his shoelaces?" His words slipped inside me like a knife, and I did my best not to react.