“You really consider me your best friend?” he blubbered. “I have never had a best friend in all my three hundred years. I’ve tried, but I just…” He broke down and let her rip.
“Yes, you’re my best friend, you idiot. Stop crying. Now.” Snark I could deal with. Tears? Not so much.
“Oh my god, I just feel so happy,” he gushed. “And I want you to know if you change your mind about the boyfriend thing just wink at me four times and I’ll stick my tongue down your throat.”
“Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind.”
“Anything for my best friend. Ohhh Essie, are there any gay bars in Hung?”
This was going to be a wonderful trip.
***
One way in to Hung Island, Georgia. One way out. The bridge was long and the ocean was beautiful. Sun glistened off the water and sparkled like diamonds. Dwayne was quiet for the first time in fifteen hours. As we pulled into town, my gut clenched and I started to sweat. This was stupid—so very stupid. The nostalgic pull of this place was huge and I felt sucked back in immediately.
“Holy Hell,” Dwayne whispered. “It’s beautiful here. How did you leave this place?”
He was right. It was beautiful. It had the small town feel mixed up with the ocean and land full of wild grasses and rolling hills. How did I leave?
“I left because I hate it here,” I lied. “We’ll do the job, castrate the alpha with a butter knife and get out. You got it?”
“Whatever you say, best friend. Whatever you say.” He grinned.
“I’m gonna drop you off at my Grandma Bobby Sue’s. She doesn’t exactly know we’re coming so you have to be on your best behavior.”
“Will you be?”
“Will I be what?” God, Vamps were tiresome.
“On your best behavior.”
“Absolutely not. We’re here.”
I stopped my crappy car in front of a charming old Craftsman. Flowers covered every inch of the yard. It was a literal explosion of riotous color and I loved it. Granny hated grass—found the color offensive. It was the home I grew up in. Granny BS, as everyone loved to call her, had raised me after my parents died in a horrific car accident when I was four. I barely remembered my parents, but Granny had told me beautiful bedtime stories about them my entire childhood.
“OMG, this place is so cute I could scream.” Dwayne squealed and jumped out of the car into the blazing sunlight. All the stories about Vamps burning to ash or sparkling like diamonds in the sun were myth. The only thing that could kill Weres and Vamps were silver bullets, decapitation, fire and a silver stake in the heart.
Grabbing Dwayne by the neck of his muscle shirt, I stopped him before he went tearing into the house. “Granny is old school. She thinks Vamps are…you know.”
“Blood sucking leeches who should be eliminated?” Dwayne grinned from ear to ear. He loved a challenge. Crap.
“I wouldn’t go that far, but she’s old and set in her geezer ways. So if you have to, steer clear.”
“I’ll have her eating kibble out of my manicured lily white hand in no time at…holy shit!” Dwayne screamed and ducked as a blur of Granny BS came flying out of the house and tackled my ass in a bed of posies.
“Mother humper.” I grunted and struggled as I tried to shove all ninety-five pounds of pissed off Grandma Werewolf away from me.
“Gimme that stomach,” she hissed as she yanked up my shirt. Thank the Lord I was wearing a bra. Dwayne stood in mute shock and just watched me get my butt handed to me by my tiny granny, who even at eighty was the spitting image of a miniature Sophia Loren in her younger years.
“Get off of me, you crazy old bag,” I ground out and tried to nail her with a solid left. She ducked and backslapped my head.
“I said no tattoos and no piercings till you’re fifty,” she yelled. “Where is it?”
“Oh my GOD,” I screeched as I trapped her head with my legs in a scissors hold. “You need meds.”
“Tried ‘em. They didn’t work,” she grumbled as she escaped from my hold. She grabbed me from behind as I tried to make a run for my car and ripped out my bellybutton ring.
“Ahhhhhhgrhupcraaap, that hurt, you nasty old bat from Hell.” I screamed and looked down at the bloody hole that used to be really cute and sparkly. “That was a one carat diamond, you ancient witch.”
Both of her eyebrows shot up and I swear to god they touched her hairline.
“Okay, fine,” I muttered. “It was cubic zirconia, but it was NOT cheap.”
“Hookers have belly rings,” she snapped.
“No, hookers have pimps. Normal people have belly rings, or at least they used to,” I shot back as I examined the wound that was already closing up.