Kiss of Death

“What?” He fixed those dead, dark eyes on her.

“Wow, not a New Kids on the Block fan, either. I’m shocked. Okay, I’m thinking not Marilyn Manson, then.... Jessica Simpson? Or...” Eve’s voice faded out, because Michael’s hand had closed over her arm. She looked over at him, and he shook his head. “Right. Shutting up now. Sorry.”

“What do you want?” Michael asked the men.

“Your little freak vampire girlfriend needs to learn how to keep her mouth shut.”

“Who you calling little?” Eve demanded.

Shane sighed. “Wrong on so many levels. Eve. Shut up.”

She glared at him but made a little key-and-lock motion at her lips, folded her arms, and sat back.

Michael had locked gazes with the third man, the angry one, and they were staring it out. It went on for a while, and then Michael said, “Why don’t you just let me and my friends have our ice cream, and then we’ll get back in our car and leave? We don’t want a problem.”

“Oh, you don’t, you whiny little bitch?” The angry man shoved the other two aside and slapped his palms flat against the table to loom over Claire and her friends. “Why’d you come in here, then?”

Eve said, in a very small voice, “Ice cream?”

“Told you to shut the hell up.” And he tried to hit her with a backhanded smack.

Tried because Michael leaned forward in a flare of motion, and had hold of the man’s wrist in a flicker of time so fast Claire didn’t even see it. Neither did the angry man, who looked just kind of confused by being unable to move his hand, then put it all together and looked at Michael.

“Don’t,” Michael said. It was soft, and it was a warning, through and through. “You try to hurt her again and I’ll pull your arm off.”

He wasn’t kidding, but the problem was, none of them was kidding. While he was holding the angry one, the guy in the orange cap reached in his pocket, flicked open a big, shiny knife, and grabbed Eve by the hair. She squeaked, raised her chin, and tried to kick him. He was good at avoiding her. It looked as if he’d had practice. “Let Berle go,” Orange Cap said. “Or I’ll do a hell of a lot worse than slap this one. I can get me real creative.”

Shane was cursing softly under his breath, and Claire knew why; he was stuck in the corner, she was in front of him, and there was no way he could be effective in helping Michael out from that angle. He had to just sit there—something he wasn’t very good at doing. Claire stayed very still, too, but she looked Orange Cap in the eyes and said, “Sir?” She said it respectfully, as her mom had taught her. “Sir, please don’t hurt my friend. She didn’t mean anything.”

“We don’t like smart-mouthed freaks around here,” he said. “We got our ways.”

“Yes sir. We understand now. We were just trying to have a little fun. We won’t be any trouble, I promise. Please let my friend go.” She kept her tone calm, sweet, reasonable—all the things she’d learned to do when Myrnin was ru

Orange Cap blinked, and she thought he was seeing her for the first time. “You need better friends, little girl,” he said. “Shouldn’t be ru

“We’re going,” Claire said instantly, and grabbed Shane’s hand. Michael let go of the angry guy, Berle, who snatched his arm back and rubbed at his wrist as if it hurt. It probably did. Claire could see white marks where Michael had held him. That was restraint, for Michael; he probably could have broken the bone without much effort. “Sir?” She spoke again to Orange Cap, treating him like the man in charge, and he nodded and clapped his friends on the shoulders.

They all stepped back.

Claire slipped out of the booth and squeezed by the men, practically dragging Shane with her. Eve and Michael followed. They walked away from the table, into the store, and Claire pushed open the door and led them all outside, into the harsh white light near the gas pumps and the car.

She looked back at the store. The three men, the people working the restaurant, and practically everyone else were looking out the windows at them.

Claire turned on Eve first. “Are you crazy?” she demanded. “Just couldn’t shut up, could you? And you!” She pointed at Michael. “You’re not in Morganville anymore, Michael. Back there you were a big dog. Out here, you’re what we were back there. Vulnerable. So you need to stop thinking that people owe you respect just because you’re a vampire.”

He looked stu

“It was,” she said, interrupting him. “You acted like a vamp, Michael. Like any vamp getting back-talked by a human. You could have gotten us hurt. You could have gotten Eve killed!”

Michael looked at Shane, who lifted his shoulders in a tiny, apologetic shrug. “She’s not wrong, bro.”

“That’s not what it was,” Michael insisted. “I was just trying to—look, Eve started it.”

“Hey! That thump you heard was me under the bus, there! ”

Shane shrugged again. “And now Michael’s not wrong. Hey, I like this game. I don’t have to be the wrong one for once in my life.”

“Shut up, Shane,” Eve snapped. “What about you, Miss Oh, sir, please let my friends go; I’m such a delicate little flower? What a crock of shit, Claire!”

“Oh, so now you’re mad because I got you out of it?” Claire felt her cheeks flaming, and she was literally shaking now with anger and distress. “You started it, Eve! I was just trying to keep you from getting killed! Sorry you didn’t like how I pulled that off!”

“You just—can’t you stand up for yourself?”

“Hey,” Shane said softly, and touched Eve’s arm. She whirled toward him, fists clenched, but Shane held up both hands in clear surrender. “She stood up for you. Might want to consider that before you go calling Claire a coward. She’s never been that.”

“Oh, sure, you take her side!”

“It’s not a side,” Shane said. “And if it is, you ought to be on it, too.”

Michael had been watching, calming down (or at least shutting down), and now he reached out and put his hands on Eve’s shoulders. She tensed, then relaxed, closed her eyes, and blew out an impatient breath. “Right,” she said. “You’re going to tell me I can’t be upset about nearly getting my face cut off.”

“No,” Michael said. “But don’t take it out on Claire. It’s not her fault.”

“It’s mine.”

“Well...” He sighed. “Kind of mine, too. Share?”

Eve turned to face him. “I like my blame. I keep it close like a warm, furry blanket.”

“Let go,” he said, and kissed her lightly. “You’re taking my side of the blame blanket.”

“Fine. You can have half.” Eve was calmer now, and relaxed into Michael’s embrace. “Damn. That was stupid, wasn’t it? We nearly got killed over ice cream.”

“Another thing I don’t want on my tombstone,” Shane said.

“You have others?” Claire asked.

He held up one finger. “I thought it wasn’t loaded,” Shane said. Second finger. “Hand me a match so I can check the gas tank.” Third finger. “Killed over ice cream. Basically, any death that requires me to be stupid first.”

Michael shook his head. “So what’s on your good list?”

“Oh, you know. Hero stuff that gets me rerun on CNN. Like, I died saving a busload of supermodels.” Claire smacked his arm. “Ow! Saving them! What did you think I meant?”

“So,” Claire said, taking the high ground, “what now? I mean, I guess ice cream is kind of off the table, unless you’re okay with random violence as a topping.”

“Got to be something else in town,” Michael said. “Unless you just want to sit here and take up a gas pump until Oliver gets his act together.”

“He told us to wait here.”