Circus of the Damned (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter 3)

"What's wrong?" he said.

"I'm not very good at small talk," I said.

"You were doing fine."

No, I wasn't, but I wasn't sure how to explain it to him. I didn't like talking about myself to strangers. Especially strangers with ties to Jean-Claude.

"What do you want from me?" I said.

"I'm just passing the time."

"No, you weren't." His shoulder-length hair had fallen around his face. He was taller, thicker, but the outline was familiar. He looked like Phillip in the shadowed dark. Phillip was the only other human being I'd ever seen with the monsters.

Phillip sagged in the chains. Blood poured in a bright red flood down his chest. It splattered onto the floor, like rain. Torchlight glittered on the wet bone of his spine. Someone had ripped his throat out.

I staggered against the wall as if someone had hit me. I couldn't get enough air. Someone kept whispering, "Oh, God, oh, God," over and over, and it was me. I walked down the steps with my back pressed against the wall. I couldn't take my eyes from him. Couldn't look away. Couldn't breathe. Couldn't cry.

The torchlight reflected in his eyes, giving the illusion of movement. A scream built in my gut and spilled out my throat. "Phillip!"

Something cold slithered up my spine. I was sitting in my car with the ghost of guilty conscience. It hadn't been my fault that Phillip died. I certainly didn't kill him, but... but I still felt guilty. Someone should have saved him, and since I was the last one with a chance to do it, it should have been me. Guilt is a many splendored thing.

"What do you want from me, Richard?" I asked.

"I don't want anything," he said.

"Lies are ugly things, Richard."

"What makes you think I'm lying?"

"Finely honed instinct," I said.

"Has it really been that long since a man tried to make polite small talk with you?"

I started to look at him, and decided not to. It had been that long. "The last person who flirted with me was murdered. It makes a girl a little cautious."

He was quiet for a minute. "Fair enough, but I still want to know more about you."

"Why?"

"Why not?"

He had me there. "How do I know Jean-Claude didn't tell you to make friends?"

"Why would he do that?"

I shrugged.

"Okay, let's start over. Pretend we met at the health club."

"Health club?" I said.

He smiled. "Health club. I thought you looked great in your swimsuit."

"Sweats," I said.

He nodded. "You looked cute in your sweats."

"I liked looking great better."

"If I get to imagine you in a swimsuit, you can look great; sweats only get cute."

"Fair enough."

"We made pleasant small talk and I asked you out."

I had to look at him. "Are you asking me out?"

"Yes, I am."

I shook my head and turned back to the road. "I don't think that's a good idea."

"Why not?" he asked.

"I told you."

"Just because one person got killed on you doesn't mean everyone will."

I gripped the steering wheel tight enough to make my hands hurt. "I was eight when my mother died. My father remarried when I was ten." I shook my head. "People go away and they don't come back."

"Sounds scary." His voice was soft and low.

I didn't know what had made me say that. I didn't usually talk about my mother to strangers, or anybody else for that matter. "Scary," I said softly. "You could say that."

"If you never let anyone get close to you, you don't get hurt, is that it?"

"There are also a lot of very jerky men in the twenty-one-to-thirty age group," I said.

He grinned. "I'll give you that. Nice-looking, intelligent, independent women are not exactly plentiful either."

"Stop with the compliments, or you'll have me blushing."

"You don't strike me as someone who blushes easily."