The accompanying picture showed a black kitten with a splash of white across its chest, three white feet, and a white spot on one ear. Its yellow eyes stared inquisitively. It stood as if posing in the middle of Philippa’s blue kitchen rug.
Claire tried to type a reply, something happy, but she had always sucked at faking.
Hey, I’m actually not okay right now, could I talk to you?
Her phone rang immediately.
“Claire, what’s wrong?”
“I…” Out of nowhere, tears threatened.
“Claire?”
Philippa couldn’t sense her distress over the phone, but she was still intuitive, and she knew Claire cried about once a year. She gulped them all down. No point being on the phone if she couldn’t talk.
“Tai and I broke up.”
“Oh, Claire, no. When?”
“A few hours ago.”
“What happened, honey? No, stop. This isn’t a phone conversation. I’m coming over, and I’m bringing Nova, and if Leslie’s not in Tennessee, I’m bringing her too.”
Her friends would arrive in less than half an hour, so Claire sprang into necessary action. She cleansed all vestiges of Verena from her face and changed into purple yoga pants and a pink graphic tee with a rearing horse on the chest. Again she nearly cried, remembering their perfect date at Warbler Ranch. Then she put on the shirt anyway. There was nothing to be done about the wound below her neck. Any makeup that might cover it would be just as noticeable to vampire eyes as the injury itself.
Tonight she’d have to tell them everything.
She’d barely finished changing when the women arrived. Leslie was in town after all. Philippa brought a cat carrier in with her, which she set down in the middle of Claire’s living room.
Meanwhile Nova wrapped Claire in a fierce hug. “Claire, I’m telling you right now, if that man hurt you again, I’m going to commit some vandalism or something.”
“He didn’t mean to,” Claire said.
“Not good enough. He’s out of chances.”
But then Claire stepped back from her hug, and Nova’s eyes grew wide. She all but shrieked her next words as she pointed at Claire’s injury. “Did he dothat?!”
As one, her three friends began hissing. Claire held up her hands. “No, no, he didn’t. I promise.”
“Then you’d better tell us who did, so we can take them out instead,” Leslie said.
“Y’all calm down. I’ll tell you, but you’ve got to calm down and listen.”
None of them took a chair or a seat on the couch. Instead they sat on the floor in a square around the cat carrier.
“Would you mind if I open the door for her?” Philippa said. “She might stay inside, but this way she can choose.”
“Fine by me,” Claire said, and Philippa opened the carrier door.
Then they were all staring at Claire, waiting for the story. She drew a long breath in and let it out. It hadn’t felt so hard when she’d stared at herself in the mirror and acknowledged this conversation was long overdue.
“Okay,” she said. “So.”
They all waited. Nova cocked one eyebrow at her, probably beginning to suspect what she was about to reveal. Leslie laced her fingers in her lap. Philippa simply watched Claire, no doubt reading all sorts of things she might not want revealed yet. But Philippa had never been anything other than trustworthy when it came to Claire’s deepest feelings. She hadn’t known Leslie long, yet she trusted her just as much.
“Every other Saturday night, I disguise myself as human and go to a human club and wait for a guy to show interest in me. I feign intoxication, just to see if he’ll try anything forceful. If he does, I subdue him, call the police, and leave.”
Nova didn’t feign surprise, instead sat quietly and let the other two recover from the frozen shock that fell over them. Philippa would notice that any second now.
