Dead Perfect

“Shannah?” He closed the short distance between them, his steps tentative, his expression guarded. Did he expect her to run away, screaming? “Does this change anything between us?”

“No.”

His relief was palpable.

“But I still don’t think I can do it. To drink a stranger’s blood, to have to do it every night…” She shook her head. “No.”

“In the beginning I had misgivings, as well, but all the things that you think are so important now soon become irrelevant, just as those things you view as repugnant now soon become second nature.”

“I don’t know…what of my family? My friends? Will they all become irrelevant, too?”

“No, Shannah. I was speaking of more mundane things.”

“I just don’t know.” She looked up at him, her eyes filled with doubts and a shadow of fear that he had seen there far too often of late. Fear of death.

“You needn’t decide now.”

But she couldn’t wait too long. Her time was running out. He knew it, and so did she.

Shannah turned away from the answering machine. There were four messages from her doctor.

She should have called him, she thought. She had intended to when they were in New York but she had been feeling so good and having such a wonderful time she had put it off, and then there had been the plane crash, and she had forgotten all about it. She knew she should go see him, but she didn’t want to hear what he had to say. She knew she was getting worse; he would know it, too, and she didn’t want to spend whatever time she had left in the hospital with doctors and nurses poking and prodding and smiling their bright, false smiles as they assured her everything would be all right.

She called her parents and spent an hour on the phone, assuring them time and again that she was fine.

When she hung up, she sat at Ronan’s desk and wrote letters of good-bye to her mom and dad, telling them that she loved them and that Ronan had taken good care of her. She wrote a letter to Judy, telling her how much she had appreciated her friendship through the years, assuring her that Ronan had made her last days easy to bear.

When she was done, she sealed the letters and put them in her dresser drawer, underneath her nightgowns.

Going downstairs, she went into the kitchen. She was standing in front of the refrigerator, trying to decide what to fix for dinner, when she heard a knock at the front door.

She peeked out the window, groaned softly when she saw Carl Overstreet and Jim Hewitt standing on the porch. What did they want now?

She darted back before they could see her, then stood there wondering if she should open the door or let them think she wasn’t home.

One of them knocked on the door, loudly, and then rang the doorbell again.

Shannah held her breath, waiting for them to go away.

She heard shuffling footsteps and muffled voices, the scraping sound of metal against metal, and suddenly the door swung open.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Shannah exclaimed, more angry than afraid. “Get the hell out of here!”

“I told you she was home,” Hewitt said dryly.

“Yeah, yeah,” Overstreet muttered. “Get on with it.”

“How did you get in here?” Shannah demanded.

“There are ways,” Hewitt said, slipping something into his pocket.

Shannah grimaced. How they had gotten in didn’t matter. They were here now. And they had to leave before Ronan arrived.

“So,” Overstreet said, “did you find out where he sleeps?”

“No.” As if she would ever tell them.

The reporter’s eyes narrowed ominously. “This would be a lot easier on everybody if you’d just cooperate with us.”

“Knock it off, Overstreet,” Hewitt said sharply.

“We’re wasting our time,” the reporter said, his eyes darting around the room. “She lives with the guy. She must know where he sleeps.”

Shannah fisted her hands on her hips and lifted her chin defiantly. “Well, I don’t.”

“Did you ask him if he was a vampire?” Hewitt asked.

“Of course.”

“What did he say?” Both men leaned forward expectantly.

“Do you mean before or after he stopped laughing?”

“She’s lying,” Overstreet said. “He’s here. All we have to do is find him.”

Hewitt nodded. “I’m sorry about this, Miss Black,” he said.

Shannah thought he meant breaking into the house until he pulled a pair of handcuffs out of his coat pocket. Before she could protest, he pulled her toward the staircase and handcuffed her left wrist to the banister.

“What are you doing?” she cried, tugging on the cuff. “Let me go this instant!”

“Just sit tight, sister,” Overstreet said.

Shannah stared at Hewitt. “I’ll have you arrested for this!”

“I doubt it.”

Furious tears filled her eyes as she watched the two men split up to search the house. She tugged on the handcuff again. What if one of the men found Ronan while he slept, she thought frantically. But surely they wouldn’t find his hiding place. She never would have found it save for the blood bond they shared. Hewitt and Overstreet had no such bond. But Hewitt was a vampire hunter. He would know where to look and what to look for.

Leaning against the banister, she tracked their movements through the house by listening to their footsteps and the sounds of doors being opened and closed. Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to relax. As long as they were upstairs, there was nothing to worry about.

The two men searched for what must have been an hour before they returned to where they had left her.

“I told you he wasn’t here,” she said icily. “Now will you let me go?”

Overstreet glanced at the window. “It’ll be dark soon. Let’s get out of here while we can.”

Hewitt nodded. “I think you’re right.”

He removed the cuff from Shannah’s wrist. She rubbed it, then let out a shriek when Hewitt grabbed her arm and pulled her toward the front door.

“Let me go!”

“I think you’d better come with us,” Hewitt said, hauling her along behind him. “You’re not safe here.”

“You’re the ones who won’t be safe if you don’t let me go!”

“Uh, just where are we going?” Overstreet asked, hurrying outside after the two of them.

“I’m not sure,” Hewitt said. “We need a place with a powerful threshold.” He frowned as he opened his car door and pushed Shannah into the passenger seat. He grabbed hold of her ankle when she lunged toward the driver’s side door.