"Why don't you try it before you knock it?"
Selena laughed. "One day, little sister, you're going to have to accept the other half of your blood."
Amanda disregarded her words as her thoughts turned back to her ex-fiance. She'd really thought Cliff was the one for her. A nice, quiet, average-looking data entry clerk, he had been just her cup of tea.
Until he had met her family.
Ugh! For the last six months, she had put off introducing him to them, knowing what would happen. But he had insisted and last night she had finally caved.
Closing her eyes, Amanda winced at the memory of her twin sister, Tabitha, meeting him at the door all decked out in the Goth clothes she used for stalking the undead. The outfit came complete with a crossbow Tabitha just had to show him, and her entire collection of throwing stars. "This one is special. It can cleave the head off a vampire at three hundred yards."
If that wasn't bad enough, her mother and three of her older sisters had been conjuring a protection spell for Tabitha in the kitchen.
But the absolute worst had come when Cliff had mistakenly drunk from Tabitha's cup, which had been filled with her strength potion of curdled milk, Tabasco sauce, egg yolks, and tea leaves.
He had heaved for an hour.
Afterward, Cliff had driven her home. "I can't marry a woman with a family like that," he'd said as she handed her engagement ring back to him. "Good God, what if we had kids? Can you imagine what would happen if some of that rubbed off?"
Leaning her head back, Amanda could still kill her family for the embarrassment. Was it too much for them to be normal for one dinner?
Why, oh why, couldn't she have been born to a regular family where no one believed in ghosts, goblins, demons, and witches?
Come to think of it, two of them still believed in Santa Claus!
How could her wonderfully normal father stand all their nonsense? He definitely deserved to be sainted for his patience.
"Hey, guys!"
Amanda opened her eyes to see Tabitha approaching. Well now, isn't this just peachy keen? What would happen next? Would a bus run her over?
This day just gets better and better.
She loved her identical twin, but not at this moment. At this moment, she wished very vile things on Tabitha's head. Painful nasty things.
As usual, Tabitha was dressed all in black. Black leather pants, turtleneck, and long black leather coat. Her thick, wavy dark auburn hair was pulled into a long ponytail, and her pale blue eyes glowed. Tabitha's cheeks were flushed and she had a chipper step.
Oh no, she was on a hunt!
Amanda sighed. How on earth could they have come from the same single egg?
Tabitha reached into her coat pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper, then placed it on the table in front of Selena. "I need your expertise. It's Greek, isn't it?"
Without answering the question, Selena set her cards aside, and looked the paper over. She frowned. "Where did you get this?"
"It was on a vampire we dusted last night. What does it say?"
" " The Dark-Hunter is close. Desiderius must prepare.' "
Tabitha put her hands in her pockets as she considered the words. "Any idea what that means?"
Selena shrugged as she handed the paper back to Tabitha. "I've never heard of either this Dark-Hunter or Desiderius."
"Eric said 'Dark-Hunter' was a code name for one of us. What do you think?" Tabitha asked.
Amanda had heard enough. Ye gods, how she hated it when they began with the whole vampire-demon-occult garbage. Why couldn't they grow up and live in the regular world?
"Look," Amanda said, rising. "I'll catch you two later."