Wicked Hungry

Enrique and Jonathan are still looking at me.

“What did Anger Girl want?” Jonathan asks.

“Shut up, Jonathan,” Enrique says.

“Sorry,” Jonathan says. “She spooks me.”

“She found this stockpile of External Cleanse,” I say. “She was going to destroy them, and then she hung up. She said someone was coming. I think she’s with other vampires. ‘Sisters’ she called them, and she’s an only child.”

“Hold on,” Jonathan says. “Now we have vampires, too? Like in the plural? In Lansfeld? I haven’t seen any except Karen, and I never saw anything making me think she was a vampire.”

“Don’t you know how fast vampires are?” I ask. “You think they’re going to let you see them if they don’t want to?”

“Yeah, dude, but still,” he says. “You’d think we’d notice, wouldn’t we?”

“They’re incredibly fast, practically invisible, and they have no smell.” No smell unless they touch you, and then all you smell is roses. “How are we going to notice them?” I continue.

“You’d see their victims,” Jonathan says. “They eat. They get hungry. They mark their prey. They bite.”

“Maybe they aren’t biting,” I say. “Yet.”

Just nibbling and touching. Marking their prey. Playing with their food.

“Morgaine is one,” Enrique says.

“Well, that makes two,” Jonathan says. “But I’m having trouble imagining Karen hanging out with Morgaine.”

I shake my head. “Morgaine is married to a werewolf. She wouldn’t harm us.”

“Wouldn?

??t harm you, maybe,” Enrique says. “But I’m a jaguar.”

I shrug. “All I know is Karen’s put herself in danger. We’ve got to help her.”

“Dude,” Jonathan says. “We don’t even know where she is. And we’re trapped in here until we come up with a plan. Let’s get something to eat and you can try to call her.”

“He’s right,” Enrique says. “Let’s all shut up and eat some tamales. Nothing makes me hungrier than changing.”

“But—”

“Come on,” Enrique says, and pulls me out of the room.

We enter the kitchen. Andres is sitting at the counter, putting some salsa on one of the tamales.

“Hombre,” he says. “What were you all doing? Esme was so excited, she didn’t make any sense.”

“Nothing,” Enrique says. “We were changing.”

“Changing?” asks Andres.

“Yeah, to figure out about going out,” Enrique says.

“You know,” Andres says, “talking about going out, I almost forgot I wanted to show you all something.”

“What?” Enrique says. “Can’t it wait? We’re kind of in a hurry.”

“Kind of hungry, too,” Jonathan adds.