Always the Vampire

“Sam did kill the outside alarm.”


“I noticed that. Otherwise Mr. Lister would be out here with a shotgun.”

Hugh Lister was our over-the-jasmine-hedge next-door neighbor. He didn’t seem to like us in general, but when the outdoor siren had whooped, Lister had charged through the hedge, swearing the September afternoon blue.

My system wasn’t even supposed to have an outside siren.

“So where are Sam and Saber now?”

Neil shrugged. “Sam adjusted the volume inside our place, then he and Saber made a run to the hardware store.”

“Wait. Your place?” I whipped my head to glance across the lawn where Maggie’s home fronted the property. “Why are you running the alarm to the big house?”

“Remember the sniper? Shooting at you from the oak tree out front? Waking up the neighborhood?”

I recalled too well being shot at while Jo-Jo the Jester gave me a flying lesson in the shadows of our shared yard.

“Point taken. Is the noise window-shattering loud at your place, too?”

“No, but we don’t have to wake the dead.”

I narrowed my eyes. “I’m underdead, Neil, and I’m going to do something evil to you one of these days.”

“Right, Fresca,” he said with a cuff on my arm.

Yes, Neil calls me Fresca. Having a soft-drink nickname is better than being called Cesspool, which is what Neil used to call me. At least Fresca rhymes with Cesca, short for my real name. My usually darling Deke Saber has another name for me. Which reminded me . . .

“Neil, will you please, please, please tell Saber to disconnect the siren when he gets back? And leave it off until Sam’s ready to do a final test.”

“Will do. Oh, and remember that when your alarm is set, so is ours. Having it on in the daytime is no problem. We’re gone most of the time anyway, but turn that thing off if you’ll be coming and going late at night.”

“You got it.”

He gestured at the binder in my arms. “You off to help Maggie with the wedding mail?”

“And to go over plans for the bachelorette weekend. Do you have the valet parking under control? And the music? You remembered a Victorian wedding should feature classical music, right?”

“Stop nagging. I’ve got it covered. Oh, but I think Maggie’s having second thoughts about those poofy things for the bridesmaid dresses.”

“Poofy things?” I gulped. “The bustles?”

He smirked as he trotted away.

Hell’s freaking wedding bells.

Sure I owed Maggie more than I could ever repay. If not for Maggie buying and restoring the house she and Neil now shared, I’d still be buried in the long-forgotten half basement underneath this very property. Maggie had unearthed me, taken me under her wing, and was now including me in the biggest day of her life.

But if her big day included big bustles on the bridesmaid gowns? No, I’d just have to change her mind again.

I sped across the lawn to Maggie’s back door, calling to her as I passed through the mudroom and into the kitchen.

“I’m in here,” Maggie yelled back. “Walk softly, or you’ll topple my piles.”

She looked up as I entered, and we shared a grin. We’d both dressed for the September heat, me wearing aqua shorts and a tank top with my hair in a frizzy ponytail, Maggie wearing green shorts and a white T-shirt. With the humidity high enough to drain a body faster than a starving vamp, thank goodness for arctic-level air-conditioning.

Maggie’s grin turned rueful as she gestured at the dining table littered with stacks of replies, lists, and the bulging wedding-planner binder that matched mine. The few cards resting in the cardboard Regrets box didn’t cover the bottom of it. The piles in the Accepts box were ten inches high, and more haphazard stacks of unopened envelopes rested at Maggie’s fingertips.

I carefully pulled out the chair on her right to prevent a paper slide.

“You think I can cram ten more tables and a hundred more chairs in the backyard?” she asked on a sigh.

“You have that many yeses for the reception? What happened to only half of the people you invited accepting?”

She snorted. “Obviously I underestimated.”

“Maggie, you’re an interior design guru, and Neil’s a state anthropologist. With all the contacts between you, I’m not surprised at the responses. Don’t worry; we’ll deal,” I added, patting her hand. “The rental guy is holding double of everything for us, and we’ll order more food when we meet with the caterer again tomorrow.”

Maggie turned her hand to grip mine. “What if we don’t have enough food? What do I do then?”

“First, you’ll have plenty of food. The caterer swears people eat less when the service is buffet style.”