Page 25
If I can keep him out of my bed by sacrificing my food budget for the week, so be it. “Knock yourself out, Mr. Whiskers.”
“Vincent,” he reminds me.
Right.
However, before he turns away from the door, I realize there’s something I really want to know. Like everything else in this messed-up dream or simulation or whatever, you’d think I’d know the answer, but I don’t, and I feel like I won’t be able to go to sleep and put an end to this if I don’t get him to tell me this one thing.
“Vincent?”
I know he offered to do it before, but it’s a toss-up if he was flirting with me or fucking with me when he said he would purr. Probably both, I decided, but the moment I say his name… his human name… he totally purrs deep in his chest as he murmurs mine in return.
I swallow the sudden lump in my throat. “Tell me something.”
The purr quiets just enough to be noticeable. “If I can.”
He has to know what I’m about to ask, and I don’t disappoint.
“How did you get cursed in the first place? If you want me to believe that any of this is real… if you want me to act like you’re real… tell me the truth. What did you do?”
For a moment, he doesn’t say anything. It’s like he’s debating whether or not he should, and I’m beginning to think that it’s a real doozy of some kind of supernatural crime when he mutters, “I stole a spell.”
Okay. Stealing is bad. “What kind of spell?”
His cheeks turn pink. “It was a love spell. It was supposed to help me find my fated mate. The witches wouldn’t share the spell with a warlock and I did what I had to do to find her.” There’s that crooked grin. “To find you.”
Well, that would’ve been quite a feat if, like he said, this happened in 1987… and I wasn’t even born yet.
Still. I don’t see why someone—witch or not—should’ve punished him for as long as they did if the crime was just looking for his one true love. And maybe I am really a romantic at heart, because I kind of think it’s sweet that Vincent was so determined to find his one true love that he stole a spell to do it, and ended up as Mr. Whiskers.
Then I remember that he thinks this supposed ‘mate’ is me and… yeah.
Even so, I find myself saying: “That’s it?”
He nods. “That’s it.”
“So you’ve been a cat for forty years”—forty freaking years!—“because you were looking for a wife?”
“Only vampires have brides. We have mates. Warlocks are like shifters in that way, but if you bond yourself to me, I’ll make you my wife, pumpkin. I understand that’s a human thing, too, and I…” His voice drops. “I think I like the idea of being Mr. Kate Bellamy.”
“You know, most of the time, when a woman gets married, the tradition is for her to take her husband’s name. If I lost my mind and married you, I’d probably be Mrs. Vincent whatever-your-last-name is.”
“Morrow,” he supplies, completely glossing past the ‘if I lost my mind’ quip. “And that makes no sense. I mean, I’m happy to share my name with you. I remember that’s how mortals did it when I was still human. But if you did that, how would anyone know that I belong to you?” His eyes light up. Once again, there’s a hint of green that belongs to Mr. Whiskers. “Shifters mark their mates. I’m not a shifter, but I got bored one Halloween and got a tattoo.” Again, his fingers trail over the marks on his right bicep. “You want a tattoo, Kate?”
Honestly? I just want to wake up tomorrow and decide this has been one hell of a Halloween movie semi-marathon-induced nightmare.
SIX
HAPPY HALLOWEEN
Um.
It isn’t.
It can’t be, and the reason for that is simple: five hours later, after I tossed and turned and finally, finally fell asleep, when my alarm goes off and I wake up with a groan, it takes about two seconds for me to realize that I… I’m not alone.
Let me just say, it’s been a long time since I woke up in bed with another person. Mr. Whiskers doesn’t count. From the moment the vet gave me the all clear, telling me that the oversized stray didn’t have a single flea on him—though he gave him a preventative med, just in case—or any diseases, there has been no such thing as personal space when it comes to me and my cat.
If I’m on the couch, Mr. Whiskers is on the couch. If I’m in bed, Mr. Whiskers is in bed. If I go to the bathroom, Mr. Whiskers will sit outside the door, howling like I’m a cruel mistress who has abandoned him forever until I hop off the pot and open it for him again.
