Dead End Dating - Dead And Dateless Part 15

Okay, now I'd sprouted a halo and angel wings. "Are you insane? How in the world is he supposed to spend forever with a human?" Before I could point out what was obvious to everyone except for my mother (who would sooner drive a stake into her own heart than do the unthinkable and make a vampire) she added, "I need another drink." She downed a long swig.

I stepped forward (to smack her, of course) and found myself patting her back and mumbling, "It'll be all right."

Crazy, right? But I'd been freaked out myself when I'd seen Jack with Mandy. I could only imagine how my mom felt what with him being the fruit of her womb (my mother's words, not mine).

She took several more drinks before setting the bottle on the counter and straightening her shoulders. "I'm ready," she said. "The sooner we get in there, the sooner we can send Mandy back to the city and talk some sense into Jack."

"Sounds like a plan."

I followed my mother into the living room and braced myself for my father's reaction when she announced, "Lil forgot your b.a.l.l.s."

Followed by the inevitable, "Lil, we'd like you to meet..." where she introduced me to this week's fix-up. Aka the latest prime specimen of born male vampness wealthy and fertile enough to be her future son-in-law and the sire of her grandchildren.

"Lil's here," she said. "Rob's if." She clapped her hands. "Come on, vampires. Let's get this show on the road!"

Wait a second.

I glanced around. My father. Max. Rob. Jack. Dr. Mandy. Mom. My father. Max. Rob. Jack. Dr. Mandy... Holy s.h.i.+t.

"Are you okay?" Jack asked as he came up next to me.

"I love you, bro." I planted a big, wet one on his cheek. "I really love you." I headed for the back veranda before I broke down and wept with grat.i.tude.

No awkward fix-up. No Mom on my back, pointing out my flaws, berating me for not doing the expected thing and squeezing out a grandchild for her like so-and-so's daughter. No dad giving me the "eye" and wondering if I'm a lesbian. Not that I have anything against same-s.e.x relations.h.i.+ps, but I wouldn't want people thinking I'm a Sephora girl when I do all my shopping at MAC. Same principle.

The point? This moment... What can I say? It was my fondest dream come true (okay, so maybe it wasn't the fondest, but it ranked right up there with finding my eternity mate and rolling around naked on the beach with Ty). We're talking heaven.

Not that I did much talking or thinking about the big H. I rarely gave any thought to the "What happens next?" concept. After all, I'm immortal.

But every once in a great while when I did imagine the "What if I were human-not that I want to be-but what if I were?"

thing, when I did, H-E-A-V-E-N always consisted of an accepting, supportive family that didn't think of me as the black sheep.

Black is so not my color.

Chapter Seventeen.

The next few moments pa.s.sed in a frantic blur as my mother herded everyone outside, toward the veranda steps.

Rob got the usual head start and raced down the steps, across the lawn, and into the trees. The it person takes the lead and whoever catches him first and gets close enough to blow the whistle around his neck wins.

My father had his usual stopwatch, but before the hand could tick off a full minute, my mom gave the "Go" signal to the rest of us.

My mother and Max took off after Rob. My father was slow on the start, but once he realized what was happening, he hit the forest at warp speed, an enraged look on his face, a compet.i.tive gleam in his eyes.

I lagged behind as usual, ready to circle back around just as soon as everyone was out of sight. Mandy was slowing Jack down, however, and so the three of us practically crawled toward the cl.u.s.ter of trees that loomed just beyond the lawn.

Eventually my bro and his sweetie came to a dead stop for a long, lingering kiss (totally cute or what?), and I took advantage of the distraction. I cut to the right and headed for my usual spot-the pool house.

I'd barely settled into a lounge chair to go over my Alpha Meet Market list when I heard the shrill sound of the whistle that signaled the end of the hunt. I glanced at the clock on the portable fridge.

Three minutes?

Not that I was complaining. I was just surprised.

Previous Top NextEven more when my mother emerged from the woods a few minutes later dragging a startled Rob by the whistle wrapped around his neck.

"You have to be kidding me," Max said as she hauled him up the veranda steps. "She hasn't won the hunt in, like, two hundred years."

Not since the time she'd beaten my father and he'd pouted for three decades. While she always partic.i.p.ated, she usually held back and let someone else walk away with the coveted Moe's vacation days.

Usually.

Then again, she was desperate to speed things along and get Jack away from Mandy.

Obviously, mothers didn't just lift cars to save their children. They also tackled other vampires (even the fruit of their womb) and beat the s.h.i.+t out of them when necessary.

"You didn't have to hit me." Rob followed her as she led him past us and into the house.

"Stop being such a bebe," she snapped and tugged him even faster.

Inside, he collapsed on the sofa in the living room and leaned his head back against the cus.h.i.+ons. His left eye was black and swollen and he looked as if he'd just tangled with a pack of werewolves rather than his own maman.

My mother shrugged and walked over to the bar to pour him a gla.s.s of blood. "It's a hunt, dear. One must do what is necessary to capture one's prey."

"You kicked me, too." He touched his thigh and his face went visibly pale.

"Only once." She handed him the gla.s.s and studied him for a nanosecond. "You're fine."

"I hurt like h.e.l.l and it wasn't just once. It was two and a half times."

"How do you kick someone a half time?" Max asked.

"She tried to kick, but I ducked and rolled and so she barely grazed me," Rob explained.

"That was ducking and rolling? It looked more like crying and begging to me." My mother shrugged. "I had to subdue you and prevent you from running."

"The chase is half the fun." My father sank into an armchair, a gla.s.s of his favorite AB-negative in his hand and a sullen look on his face. "But you killed that, Jacqueline. As usual."

"Oh, hush. I've let you have your fun for two centuries. On top of that, I say nothing when you and Viola go at it every other week when it's time to trim those blasted hedges."

"Those are my hedges and I can trim them when and if I d.a.m.n well feel like it. Of course, I won't have to once the weed killer really sets in."

I opened my mouth to tell him about Viola and the pee fest, but then thought better of it. I mean, really, who was I to interrupt when they were so totally engrossed in a conversation with each other? No need to distract them.

"The man at the nursery said it should take a few weeks and then bam, no more azalea bushes." His mouth crooked in a devilish smile."See?" my mother told him. "You're having fun. You always have fun. The least you can do is lose gracefully this one time."

My father's expression faded back to sullen. "I did not lose. You can't lose if you don't get the chance to even try. I would have beat you hands down if you hadn't broken the rule about no contact in the first ten minutes."

"Since when is there a rule about no contact in the first ten minutes?"

Since my father had made it up.

"There's always been a ten minute rule," Dad went on. "Why do you think the hunt always takes so long?"

"Because our children have become victims of modern civilization and we aren't as fast as we used to be."

"For your information, I'm as fast and as vicious as I ever was." He bared his fangs and flashed my mother a See this? look. "My guard was down tonight because I didn't expect you to break the rules. If I had known, I would have put my best foot forward a h.e.l.l of a lot sooner, I'll tell you that much. A h.e.l.l of a lot sooner."

"Certainly, dear." My mom retreated into her usual appeasing self-when it came to my father, that is. I guess after six hundred years of commitment, it's easier to just go with the flow sometimes. "It's my fault. It won't happen again."

"I thought you were spectacular," Mandy chimed in. "You won one for us girls." She waved a hand in the air. "Way to go, Jackie!"

While Jacqueline Marchette considered herself many things-devoted mother, supportive wife, heartless b.i.t.c.h (at least when it came to fighting for a parking s.p.a.ce at the monthly meeting of the Connecticut Huntress Club)-a "girl" wasn't one of them. And no one ever-ever-called her Jackie. Her gaze grew dangerously dark.

"Why, thank you, dear," she said with tight lips. "What an interesting way to phrase something." She shoved a drink in my hand and turned to fill another gla.s.s. Her knuckles were white on the bottle and I waited for the explosion of crimson.

Surprisingly, she managed to hold her temper and play the proper hostess. She pa.s.sed out gla.s.s after gla.s.s as quickly as possible-blood for us vamps and a watermelon martini for Mandy.

We'd just settled onto the sofa to enjoy our refreshments when my mother plucked the gla.s.s out of my hand.

"But I wasn't-" I started, but she cut me off.

"Would you look at the time?" She reached for the next gla.s.s... Pluck. "We'd better wrap this up." Pluck. Pluck. "I have a huntress club meeting in less than fifteen minutes."

"But you met last week," Rob protested, staring longingly after the drink she carted away from him.

"We're meeting again this week." She set the gla.s.ses down and recorked the bottle.

"But you only meet once a month." Rob wasn't giving up. I didn't blame him. I could feel the pain radiating from him. He needed sustenance.

"It's an emergency," she told him.

"It's a social club."

"It's a social emergency." She cut him a glare. "Marge Ellen Weisenbocker's daughter is getting engaged. To a werewolf. Marge is beside herself." She stared pointedly at Jack, who gazed adoringly at Mandy. "She knows that a mixed commitment can never work.""I wouldn't say never." Did I just say that? "Francis and Melissa are making things work." Oh, no, that was me. I clamped my lips shut. I was not saying another word. My mother had already s.h.i.+fted her full attention from Jack to yours truly. "It's not easy, but it is possible. He hasn't bitten and made her yet, but they've already decided they're perfect for each other. I'm sure the rest is inevitable."

"Time to go," she ground out. "Now." Her gaze lingered on me. "I'll speak with you later, Lilliana."

Black, here I come.

She herded everyone toward the front door. Just as Jack was about to escort Mandy out onto the front step, my mother clamped a hand around his arm. "Dear, I need you to drive me over."

"I'll drive you over," my father said, coming up behind her.

"I need Jack." She tugged my brother away from Mandy. "He can drive me in the Hummer. He loves the Hummer," she told Mandy. "Don't you, dear?"

"I guess-"

"Jacqueline," my father cut off Jack's response, "I may not be as young as I used to be, but I'm perfectly capable of driving you over to your meeting in a timely manner."

"I'm sure you are, dear," her gaze drilled into Dad, "but I would really like Jack to drive me. I never get the chance to spend any time with him. We need to talk more. To connect."

The moment my mother said the last word, understanding lit my father's expression. FYI-in addition to never winning, my mother never used the word connect. Not when it came to emotional stuff.

"Oh, right." Dad did his best imitation of a fanged bobblehead. "Jack should drive you." He clapped my brother on the back.

"He handles the Hummer like a real champ. Don't you, son?"

"Well, I-"

"Your friend," my mother cut in, referring to a startled Mandy, "can catch a ride back to the city with Lil."

I opened my mouth to point out the fact that I was wanted for a felony.

Playing escort to my brother's latest squeeze and making myself even more visible by crawling into the back of a cab might not be the smartest thing to do.

I snapped it back shut. Hey, why ruin a good thing?

"I've already called," my mother added. "There's a car waiting."

"Thanks, Mom." I grabbed Mandy's arm, hauled her outside and down the front walk. "Later."

Chapter Eighteen.

Previous Top Next"They like me," Mandy declared once we'd climbed into the cab and given the driver our destination. "They really like me."

"How many watermelon martinis did you have?"

"Just one. Well, a quarter of one. Your mother sort of rushed us out of there. Not that I don't understand. I totally do. She's a busy woman and extremely conscientious." She smiled. "That's two for me."

"What are you talking about?"