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“Randa, come back.” Kahn ordered. “It’s not fair to be mad at me when I’m right.”

She scoffed and kept walking, weirdly grateful that Kahn had returned to being his normal difficult self. Being pissed at him felt a lot safer than their brief moment of closeness.

Chapter Eight

From that instant, too, she melted in quietly amongst us, and was no longer a foreign element.

Though always an object of peculiar interest, a riddle, and a theme of frequent discussion.

Nathaniel Hawthorne

By the next evening, Randa was ready with her battle plan.

“Before we go to the singles mixer, I’ve prepared a list of things to do and to not do around human women.”

The Light Phases had spent the day investigating whatever it was they needed to investigate, patrolling around the house like Saxon might spring out of the microwave, and reducing her backyard birdhouse to dust with concentrated Light energy. (They claimed “dangerous, rabid creatures” were infesting it. It was a squirrel, which luckily escaped disintegration.) They also ate a lot of prepackaged human snacks. Oreos were a particular favorite.

No new flower bouquets had arrived, which was a huge relief. This was the second night in a row with zero sign of her stalker. The Light Phases must have been doing something right. …Impossible as it seemed.

Randa had been issued a laptop by the police station, because she worked from home on Saturdays and Mondays. In between transcribing files for her job, she’d devoted the afternoon to creating an informative slideshow. Sullivan wouldn’t mind the extracurricular computer use. Especially if it kept the Light Phases from wrecking the town.

“It’s important that you act as though you belong tonight.” She told her unruly charges with all the gravity of a general preparing for war. “We can’t risk any mistakes, so pay close attention.”

The Light Phases were crowded onto her living room furniture, staring at her with various degrees of excitement and apprehension. They all seemed more invested in their bride hunt today. Randa suspected that Kahn told them she intended to keep her word. She’d promised to find them Matches and she would. ...Or kill them trying.

Mannus and Daven were all but bouncing on the sofa cushions, ready to hit the town like twin tornadoes.

Julius had borrowed a pad of legal paper from her desk and was poised to take notes.

Rye was fiddling with a knife, no doubt longing for something to stab and eat raw.

Kahn was staring at her, with a strange expression on his face. His new haircut was spectacular. Andre had earned every cent of his eye-watering tip. The golden strands fell around Kahn’s face and shoulders in carefully controlled disarray. Before, he’d looked like a barbarian. Now, he looked like a barbarian with incredible cheekbones and a trust fund.

Worse, for the last twenty-four hours, he’d been markedly less hostile. Even after their argument at the salon, he stayed respectful and considerate. Not in a fake way. Like this was the real Kahn, previously hidden beneath all the mistrust. Like now he was showing her who he actually was at his core.

And this version of him called to her.

That realization panicked Randa. His attention was even more unnerving than his antipathy. The strength of his dark gaze made her antsy in some way she couldn’t quite explain, so she was ignoring him completely. Her therapist would call it avoidance. Randa just called it smart.

“Okay.” She finished hooking the computer up to the TV, pleased to have a visual aid for her battle plan. The Light Phases needed all the help they could get. “Let’s begin with some ‘don’ts.’”

She clicked the spacebar on the computer, advancing to the first PowerPoint slide she’d prepared. “Rules” was written at the top in red, and there was a picture of a stop sign behind the bullet points.

Randa gestured to “don’t” number one, which she’d typed out in bold font. “Do not kill anyone tonight.”

Julius wrote that down.

“What if someone attacks us with a sword?” Daven wanted to know. “Then can we kill them?”

There was still a long way to go before these guys could effortlessly blend into Mayport Beach’s singles scene.

Randa sighed. “No, Daven. We’re just going to a bar. What are the odds that you’d be attacked by swords in a bar?”

“Fifty-fifty.” Mannus gave a seesawing hand gesture. “I mean, if we go by our history, anyhow. Half the time we just get into fistfights.”

Rye grunted in agreement. “I like it better when it’s swords.”

“No swords. No fighting, at all.”