Echo is speechless on the other end of the line.
“Echo?”
“Right. Um. Are yousure?”
“Am I sure there is no more blood for you? Yes, Echo. I’m sure.”
“But where is Paul?”
“I don’t actually know. In the ground, probably.”
“The ground.”
“Yep. Are we good?”
“Last time he went to ground he stayed away for two years. Is that what we can expect?”
“Probably.”
“O… K.” She pauses. Like she’s picking and choosing her words very carefully. “But who’s in charge here? I mean, we’ve never been left alone before. We always had Lucia.”
“Josep, I presume.”
“I’m sorry?”
“Jo-sep.”
“Who the hell is Josep?”
“The vampire who lives under the house. Good luck with that, by the way. I’ve gotta go. Bye.”
I hang up the phone, smiling, feeling a bit satisfied, actually. It’s not nice to confuse her. I mean, she probably is feeling the effects of no blood. I’ve never been a halfbreed, obviously, so I can’t be sure. But even if it’s just psychological, it’s an addiction at this point.
I would not want to be her, that’s for sure.
They’re probably gonna go crazy out there in the mountains. But whatever. They’re Josep’s problem now, not mine. I grab my jacket and step outside.
It’s only then, when I’m standing on the porch with the cold air swirling around me, that I realize I was way too warm.
It’s back. It’s been thirty minutes—maybe forty-five—and the hunger is back.
I take a seat in a short-back rocking chair that I made forty years back, and I settle in to wait for Syrsee. Telling myself, over and over again as I close my eyes and breathe deeply, that I will not attack her when she gets here.
