Wolf at the Door - By MaryJanice Davidson Page 0,27

prisoner on death row.

Not a vampire.

A dead man.

He was so startled he tripped on the curb and fell, flailing, to the sidewalk. He caught himself by the hands, but not quite fast enough.

What a stupid way to meet my first-ever zombie, he thought, clutching his skinned knees and trying not to groan with humiliation and pain.

Twenty

The zombie was pretty helpful.

“That looks like it stings,” it told him. It had hurried (sort of) through the gate and helped him up off the sidewalk. Edward braced himself for utter revulsion, but the zombie’s grip was surprisingly free of grossness. It was cool, but firm. Nothing squished. Nothing oozed onto his own hand.

He was able to get a good look at the zombie and, now that his shock was receding, was almost disappointed. The zombie was cool to the touch, yes, but not gross; it wasn’t teeming with maggots and wasn’t shuffling toward him moaning, “Braaaaaaains.”

Kind of a letdown, really.

Welcome to my life, zombie. Things are never as cool as they are in the movies.

“I’m a doctor,” the zombie was telling him, just when he thought things couldn’t get any weirder. Oh, of course. A doctor zombie made perfect sense. Yep.

It continued in a voice that sounded helpful, if a little hoarse. From disuse? From slowly rotting vocal cords? “My name’s Marc. D’you want to come in the house? I could get that cleaned up for yo—”

“No!” God, no. Never. He was no match for vampires and zombies and, if the rumors were true, ghosts. No match. “It’s fine, it’s just a scrape, I—I—” He forced himself to take a breath. “Are you all right? You look . . .” Dead. Defeated. Dead. And also, dead. “. . . pale,” he finished.

“Oh. Well.” It shrugged one shoulder. “I’ve been sick.”

I’ll bet you have. For a moment, Edward was afraid he was going to giggle. If he did, he wouldn’t stop. He wouldn’t stop until somebody hit him a few times with a brick. And that would be bad.

And he still couldn’t get over how a real-life zombie was nothing, nothing at all like the movies. It didn’t stink, and it wasn’t dressed in rotting rags. It had no visible marks or injuries. Maybe he died of a drug overdose? He sure didn’t get smashed by a car or fall off some scaffolding. Its eyes were clear, not clouded with death, though the corneas weren’t as bluish as they could have been.

No, what gave the zombie away—

Marc, the zombie’s name is Marc.

—was how it could stand so still. The lack of animation in body and facial expression, the way it stood there like its batteries had run out (which I guess they had) was just unsettling enough to raise his hackles.

Here came the big question: what was a zombie doing here at all?

Then he remembered the pregnant woman and felt the chill that came from knowing something awful and realizing there wasn’t much to be done to prevent the awful thing from happening.

Boo.

He had to call Boo. Now.

“Sorry to trouble you. I gotta get going. I’m late,” he said, and then turned on his heel and began to sprint.

“Be careful,” Marc-the-zombie called after him, which put the final surreal touch on the conversation.

If anyone had told me hanging around Summit Avenue in Minnesota would be way more exciting than vamp hunting in Boston with Boo, I would have suggested they up their meds.

Twenty-one

Rachael stopped by her apartment pro tem on the way to the queen’s mansion. She did so partly because she wanted to make sure Edward hadn’t left any messages for her, and partly because she was becoming quite fond of her den. Apartment. All right: den.

Well within walking distance of the queen’s hideout, her apartment was part of the basement of a small Victorian, a two-story house with five bedrooms, nearly as many bathrooms, and a turret (a turret!). There was no yard to speak of, but Rachael was used to that from her years in the Boston area. Besides, there was a turret. (A turret!) It looked like they were smuggling princesses up there.

She parked her rental car in . . . no. She parked the rental car in the alley behind her apartment. No. The apartment. Dammit, this was a temporary living situation, so: The rental car. The apartment.

Anyway. She parked in the alley behind the apartment, circled around to the front, and bounded up the steps. The porch floor was painted sky blue, and various sherbet-colored chairs from the