Page 61 of Fang Fatale

You'd also be wrong.

"Go inside," I say, pushing open the heavy, iron-banded door. "The alarm spell will fry your scalp if you're not quick."

She doesn't hesitate, disappearing into the black maw of the foyer, her footfalls soft as nocturnes.

I linger outside long enough to make sure my "cousins" understand the seriousness of this shift.

"Three shifts," I tell them. "Nobody comes up this drive unless they want to leave in several smaller, less symmetrical pieces."

It's overkill, but it makes me feel like I'm doing something, which is about as close as I get to sleep.

Inside, the house is frigid and close, every surface layered in the scent-memory of unlit fires and preservation magics. I find Birdie in the kitchen, arms wrapped around herself, staring at the broken clock on the wall as though it's a puzzle she can solve if she looks hard enough.

"This used to be a rectory," I say, which isn't true, but sounds better than grief-permeated mausoleum with Wi-Fi. "You hungry?"

"I could eat," she says, even though I'd bet my fangs she isn't. Birdie's not a big talker, but I've spent enough time watching her survive to know that sometimes she says yes simply to see what happens. I take it as a challenge. I also take it as an excuse to avoid discussing the past three hours until at least two of us have something warm in our hands.

There's nothing in the fridge but condiments and blood packs, so I settle for dry soup mix from the pantry, stirring it into a battered steel pot on the stovetop. I offer Birdie a can of ginger ale, which she accepts after studying the label for a full ten seconds as though the nutritional information is written in hieroglyphics.

I want to ask what she's thinking.

I already know.

She's wondering how long before every trace of her is found and swept away by Leland's clean-up crew... and whether I'm actually trustworthy or just another hired collector waiting in the wings.

I don't blame her.

In another life...

I might have been.

She sits at the tiny round kitchen table, knees together, hands wrapped around the can like it's a holy relic. The way she studies the room, I can tell she's cataloguing every exit and most of the potential blunt-force weapons. The tension makes me want to say something witty, but all my best material abandoned me somewhere between the car chase and the moment she uncorked her old wounds in Dandy's living room.

"So," she says after a full minute of parallel silence, "besides guarding me, what exactly do vampires do in the off-season? I feel like there's a whole after-hours culture I'm missing out on."

I pour the soup into two mugs, resisting the urge to make a blood joke.

"Mostly we binge prestige television and offer snide commentary on the neighbors. Some of us take up crosswords. Others dote on houseplants. There was a time when Trent tried knitting, but he kept making accidental nooses."

Birdie almost smiles, and the sight makes my lungs do something unfamiliar and borderline unpleasant.

She sips the soup—which is, predictably, terrible—and raises an eyebrow.

"You could've at least lied and told me it was peasant stew passed down from your Transylvanian grandmother."

I shrug.

"She was a terrible cook and an even worse liar."

A beat.

"I'm just carrying on the tradition."

Rain has grown heavier, smearing the world outside into a Monet painting of blue and black. Birdie watches it for a long moment, and in the silence I think about the things I'd like to say, the things I'd like not to want, and all the reasons I've failed at both.

I wonder if she knows how rare it is for me to bring someone here.

How this place is less a fortress...