In the Company of Vampires(7)

Geoff rolled her eyes. “Heard that. Have the T-shirt. My last girlfriend, she makes Carmen look like Miss Free and Easy. I finally had to get a restraining order against her because she started stalking me. It was really creepy. I don’t blame you for leaving Brad when you did, because seventeen can be such a wacky time, but are you sure you don’t want to see him? I mean, you’re all grown up now. Maybe things will be different.”

“No. Nothing will be different.” I’d still be his Beloved. We’d still be bound together because of that odd quirk of fate, and not because we wanted to be together.

“Well, good luck to you. I’d be scared stiff to move in with my dad. He’s so rigid. He still thinks I’m twelve.”

I grimaced. “My father isn’t much different, but it’ll only be for a couple of weeks until I get a place of my own. My mother isn’t going to be happy, though. She thinks my dad is the devil incarnate, and she really can’t stand her replacement.”

“Yeah, my mother hates the current Mrs. Widden, too. I just wish Dad would get past his trophy wife stage and settle down to one.”

“Well, there’s nothing my mother can do to stop me. Except maybe a spell or two,” I added under my breath.

“Except what?”

“Nothing.” I scooted back on the bed, mentally counting down the days. Two weeks and I’d be done with the big Web site launch project that I’d been working on for the last three months, and I could leave Oregon and step into a new life.

Why did that thought seem so bleak?

“Doesn’t it just figure,” Geoff said with an exaggerated sigh, pulling out her phone when it indicated she had another message. “I finally find a normal roommate, and you’re dumping me.”

“I’m sorry about leaving you in the lurch.”

She waved away my apology, tucking the phone into her pocket. “It’s your life, and you have a right to live it the way you want. Damn, she’s having another hissy. So much for relaxing. I’d better go see what bee is up Queen Carmen’s butt this time. See ya.”

“Later,” I said, mentally rehearsing the conversation I was going to have with my mother. A sudden itchiness had me twitching slightly. Maybe I should tell her now, rather than wait until I was in California. “It’s not like it’s going to be one simple conversation,” I murmured as I put Ben’s picture back into the drawer. “I might as well start my martyrdom sooner than later.”

I reached for my cell phone, remembering after a few seconds that it was lost with the backpack. “Bullfrogs! I’ll just have to wait until Geoff gets back.”

I used the time to trot downstairs to check if my backpack had been turned in to the bookstore (it hadn’t), finally using their phone to call the police and report it stolen. I suffered through a lecture about leaving valuables out in the open, then headed back up the stairs to the apartment, wondering how my life had suddenly become so chaotic.

“Goddess!”

I stared openmouthed at the man who turned from the small ancient refrigerator that squatted next to the TV, a chicken drumstick in his hand. He was tall, had shoulder-length bleached blond hair, and blue eyes that had seen more history than I could possibly imagine. “Eirik? Eirik Redblood?”

“Goddess Fran! We are so happy to see you again! You have grown bigger!” A second man popped out of the tiny bathroom, wiping his hands on his linen tunic. He was bigger than the first, large and imposing, with a long brown beard that was split down the middle and braided.

“Isleif? What—?”

“She is pleased to see us,” a voice said behind me. I spun around and stared with continued stupor at the third man. He, too, was tall and muscular, but his hair was walnut, and he had a short goatee and mustache that gave him a roguish look. “Finnvid.”

“Aye, she is pleased,” Eirik the Viking ghost said, frowning as Finnvid captured my hand and pressed his all-too-real lips to my knuckles. “Do not slobber on the goddess, Finnvid. It is unseemly.”

“Sorry.” Finnvid’s brown eyes twinkled at me with an expression I remembered well.

“What are you guys doing here?” I asked, trying frantically to wrap my mind around the fact that three Viking ghosts—my three Viking ghosts—were standing here in my apartment. “Aren’t you supposed to be in Valhalla? Didn’t Gunn and her Valkyries take you there? I distinctly remember her taking you away.”

“We have returned,” Isleif said simply.

“Freya has sent us to you to beg your help,” Eirik said, waving the piece of chicken at me.