She squinted at me long and hard. “You mean I’m a—”
“Yes, you’re a vampire. I turned you. You couldn’t stay in LA. It wouldn’t be safe.”
She gave me a does-not-compute look and held her hands out, as if expecting them to look different. “I look the same. I feel…the same.”
“Don’t worry. It’ll be fine,” I said. Then I stooped to give Cat a scratch through the door of her carrier and whispered, “We’re home!”
Heaven looked from the house to me. “You’re out of your damn mind, Tiffenie.”
Hefting up the carrier, I said “Let’s check it out. Shall we?” like a professional tour guide.
Heaven took a deep breath and shut her eyes to calm down. “I need a woosah.” She walked ahead of me toward the house, leaving me to struggle with the bulky cat carrier and slippery footing.
Fallen leaves had piled on the stairs along with a dusting of snow and ice. I said, “It’s beautiful, isn’t it? The snow is so…white.”
Heaven was looking at the ground like she’d landed on Mars. “We’re in Vermont. Everything is pretty damn white, Tiffenie.”
“We can bring in the luggage tomorrow,” I called after her, as if that was her concern. “Some of my creams might freeze, but it’s probably okay.”
Hopefully the house had a TV hooked up, because the conversation wasn’t flowing.
There was a double front door made of carved wood. From experienceI’d say it was old.
“So,” Heaven said as I fiddled with the lock, “just to get this straight, you killed meandkidnapped me.”
“Sure, if you want to look at it that way.”
I pushed open the door to our new home and said, “Immortality is a lot. Just focus on the new home. It’s going to be—” Before I could saybeautiful, a light fixture fell from the wall and crashed on the floor, scaring a raccoon that had been hiding in the shadows.
I flipped a light switch but nothing happened. No electricity—that wasn’t great. I didn’t need heat, but I could definitely use a TV and a few lights. “I guess we can watch a show on our phones tonight, but we’ll have to charge them in the car.”
Cat slunk out of the carrier with her belly low to the ground, unsure of her surroundings.
Heaven scanned the room with wide eyes, looking as if she couldn’t process anything. “Ohmygod.” At the wordGodshe winced. I’d have to explain that to her later when she was more capable of absorbing the details of vampirehood.
“I need a minute,” she said, walking around in horrified silence, more like a FEMA employee assessing a disaster than a woman walking into her new home.
Using my phone flashlight, I gave myself a tour of the living room. What I saw would’ve taken my breath away if I still breathed. Vaulted ceilings with a chandelier, a grand fireplace, a sweeping staircase. There were so many HGTV must-haves, but they were all covered in a thick layer of dust. The plaster was missing in spots, revealing the structure of the wall behind.
“Once we get it cleaned up and turn the lights on, it’ll be better. It’s not that bad.”
She held up a hand like she couldn’t even talk about it.
“And don’t worry, you only need to quarantine for maybe a month. Could be less. However long it takes to get your bloodlust under control.”
Heaven turned to stare. “Stay insidethisplace. For amonth.Nuh-uh.”
I patted her arm. “It’ll be over before you know it. Let’s check out the house.”
The main themes of the décor were the Bible and the 1980s. Framed, embroidered Bible quotes graced almost every wall. Antique dolls populated the mantel over the living room fireplace and almost every bookshelf. Several large portraits of Jesus hung in places of honor in the living room and dining room. Even a non-vampire would sizzle and smoke if they had single thought that wasn’t holy.
Aunt Mildred must not have done a thing to the house in forty years. She definitely hadn’t operated it as a business for a while. Based on personal experience, I’d say this was the result of at least twenty-five years of deferred maintenance, maybe longer.
Upstairs, the bedrooms were filled with teal carpeting and mauve bedspreads. Every room had big poofy floral curtains that matched the bedspread. A few years ago, it would have been habitable. Tonight, though, the wind was howling through the house as if to tell us we weren’t welcome. In one room, the snow had even piled up inside of the windows facing the road. Clearly, the carpets and fabric all needed to be replaced thanks to water damage.
It was a poorly preserved ’80s time capsule.
In what I suspected was Aunt Mildred’s room, my skin sizzled and began to burn and smoke from the high concentration of religious paraphernalia. “This is just not going to work for us,” I said, taking several Bible verses from the wall and piling them up. Burning vampires with crucifixes wasn’t a myth. Anything holy would do it.
