Fangtabulous (6 page)

“I bet they use off-site backup for their records, then. I would,” Brent offered.

“But those things are like Fort Knox. We’ll never get in.”

“Then we have to get that laptop. Tomorrow, when everyone’s in the theater watching the Gothic Magic Show. Eric’s a genius hacker; he ought to be able to find a back door into the system. Gina, you think you can get Ulric to help with distraction so that no one notices when Eric goes for the computer?”

Everybody looked at me. Again.

“Piece of cake.”

By the time we were certain the security guard had gone, dawn was too close for comfort. The Old Jail would have to wait until tomorrow night. We raced the sun back to Danvers, and made it with just moments to spare.

6

T
he Gothic Magic Show didn’t start until midnight, after the Haunts in History tours ended, so the first order of business the next night was keeping our cover. I was in the midst of getting costumed for my first tour when Ulric pulled aside the dressing room curtain and poked his head in.

“Damn, I was hoping to catch you in some form of
dishabille
.”

“Dish-what?”

“Undressed.”

I looked for something to throw at him, but I didn’t really think lobbing my panties would have the desired effect.

“Sorry to disappoint,” I answered dryly.

Luckily, I was more or less dressed, except for the oh-so-sexy bonnet.

“Oh, you don’t,” he answered, a gleam in his eye that despite
Bobby
and
taken
gave me a little jolt of excitement.

I stepped out of the dressing room, and Ulric moved—barely—to let me pass.

“When I told Kari I wanted to talk to you, I didn’t mean BC,” I said.

“BC?”

“Before clothes.”

He laughed and looked at me like he was wishing for a superpower of his own, like X-ray vision.

I sighed. Ulric was a force of nature. Or nature’s evil twin, anyway. There was no point in trying to convince him he’d done anything wrong. He’d never buy it.

“Tonight at the Gothic Magic Show, we need your help,” I told him.

“Go on.”

“Can you arrange it so everybody is distracted, focused on you?”

“For how long?”

I thought about it. “For as long as it takes.”

“Why?”

“That’s on a need-to-know basis.”

Ulric didn’t roll his eyes. In fact, their intensity continued to bore into me. I licked my lips and nearly nicked my tongue on my fangs, which had extended and locked into place at his nearness. It had been days since I’d fed—not since we’d hit the road in our flight from the Feds. It didn’t help that I
knew
the taste of Ulric’s blood … a flavor like heat and spice, adrenaline and youth. Liquid life. I nearly moaned just at the thought of it.

Bobby stepped out of his dressing room, swinging his cape around his shoulders and catching Ulric in the face with it. Ulric flinched back and the spell was broken.

“Did I interrupt something?” Bobby asked, staring at Ulric for an answer. I somehow didn’t think the cape had been an accident.

“Yes,” Ulric said, at the same time I answered, “No.”

Exasperated, I huffed, hands on both my hips now. “No,” I repeated.

Ulric looked from me to Bobby and back. “I’ll help on one condition.”

“What?” I asked, dreading the answer.

“A date.”

Bobby answered for me. “Nevermind, we’ll handle it ourselves.”

“Oh, I’m sure you will,” Ulric responded.

“Okay,
seriously
? Down boys. Ulric,
I’m taken
. Bobby, dial it back before you come down with testosterone poisoning.”

They both stared at me, then Ulric’s lips quirked up in amusement. “It was worth a shot. Sure, I’ll help.”

Bobby didn’t look so sure the help was worth letting Ulric off without a punch in the nose, but that wasn’t really his style. In the end, he smiled back.

“Thanks,” he said.

“I’m not doing it for you,” Ulric answered.

“I never thought you were.”

Men.
Can’t live with them, can’t stake ’em.

As the three of us walked together toward the front of the shop, I noted Kari talking with a stunning redhead. Exactly the kind of girl I’d always hated—model-tall, runway sleek, legs that probably went on for miles. Thank goodness they were currently covered up, along with everything else, by her Pilgrim suit. Sorry,
Puritan
. Only
her
dress was red. My signature color. All my secret insecurities rose to the surface. So I was short—no way around that. But I’d always fought frumpy and overlooked, tooth and nail, even before said weapons became instruments of crass destruction.

Kari’s eyes lit up when she saw me. The redhead’s eyes skimmed over Ulric, saw and dismissed me, and moved straight on to Bobby, where her gaze caught and held. Bobby seemed equally gobsmacked, to the point where I had to nudge him in the ribs—
hard
—to get him to blink.

“I’m so glad you’re all here. Gia, this is Rebecca. Rebecca, Gia. The boys will take the first two groups. Rebecca, Gia’s going to take you out and show you where it all happened so you can get in some practice before the filming tomorrow.” As always, Kari was way too cheerful about everything. At some point, I’d apparently gotten in touch with my inner goth, to the point where perky was now painful. Or maybe it just came with the whole creature-of-the-night gig.

“I am?” I asked.

Rebecca’s gaze slid toward me, as if now that she realized I was important she had to size up the competition.

“Hi,” she said, doing a halfway convincing impression of friendly.

She held a hand out to shake, and I’d love to say that it was clawlike with hangnails, calluses, and critically cracked skin, but it was perfect, just like the rest of her. She had the kind of hands they used in lotion commercials. Her fingernails were all buffed, shaped, and shined but without color, probably in keeping with her Puritanical role. When I looked from that hand to her face, she was just painfully pretty. Her skin could survive cosmetics commercial close-ups. Her uptilted green eyes were almost as bright as mine.

But I had two things on her.
My
glittering green eyes were framed by long black lashes most women would kill to possess, and while she might be a long stretch of highway you could handle full throttle, I was a cool, curvaceous road, like San Francisco’s Lombard Street, that needed serious time and attention to navigate.

“Sure,” Kari said, oblivious to any undertones. “You said you got stage fright, so Rebecca offered to step in.”

“I’m a drama major at Boston College.”

“Of course you are,” I mumbled.

“What was that?” Kari asked.

“I said, ‘Bet you go far.’ ”

Rebecca gave a million-kilowatt grin. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”
I mean, like, ever
. “Come on, I’ll show you what happened.”

“Don’t be long,” Kari said. “I need you to lead the nine o’clock tours.”

“Will do.” I’d have her back by eight.

We were barely out of earshot when Rebecca asked, “So, what’s the story on the new guy?”

“He’s taken,” I said, shortly.

“Taken?” Rebecca’s steps slowed and she turned to me, eyes wide. “You mean, you and him?” She looked me up and down, which didn’t take long considering my height.

“Yeah, is there a problem with that?” I asked. I hadn’t meant to seem so defensive, but somehow, tall and leggy (at least I presumed there were legs and not, say, a serpent’s tail under that costume) drama majors brought out the worst in me.

“Oh, no,” she answered, but not with conviction. “I just … didn’t realize.”

Moving right along. “Kari gave you the lowdown? You’re wearing a cross or some type of protection? A crucifix saved me yesterday.” And today my hair was arranged so that no one could see that it had also scarred me for life.

“Yeah. I’ve got protection.” She patted her chest, which I took to mean she had a pendant hidden under her costume.

“I’m not sure hiding it away is gonna help. The crucifix didn’t do anything until it touched whatever attacked me.”

Rebecca looked vaguely uncomfortable, which was interesting. “I’m pretty sure my religious symbol doesn’t go with the costume. Kari would probably have my head.”

Definitely
interesting.

“We’re not on a tour right now,” I argued.

We were already outside, heading toward the Old Jail. It was just the two of us, but still, it was a no-go. In fact, she put a hand over her chest—over the pendant—as if I might see it right through her shirt.

Curiouser and curiouser.

“Come on,” I wheedled. “What’s the big secret? This town was founded on the idea of religious freedom, right?”

“If you mean the right to practice one
particular
religion, then yes. Anyway, I’m sorry, but how is my belief any of your business?” she asked.

Fair point. It wasn’t …
technically
. Not unless she was some kind of witch and could actually work magic. Even then, I guess it wasn’t my business unless she’d used that magic to create the kind of supernatural incident that would bring the Ghouligans to town so that she could act out a little drama and get herself discovered. But even as I thought it, I knew it was more jealousy than logic speaking. If Rebecca wanted to find fame and fortune, there were far more direct paths on which no one had to die.

“It isn’t,” I admitted with a shrug.

She relaxed, her hand slipping away from her pendant. “Anyway, I’m supposed to be playing
you
, so I need to get into your head, not the other way around. Tell me all about yourself.”

My favorite topic.

Of course, I skipped right over my death and resurrection and started with going to work for Haunts. I took her through my near-death-due-to-strangulation, the feel of the chill hands on my neck, my collar twisted tight across my throat like a gallows rope …

When we hit the approximate spot where the attack had happened, I acted it out for her six or eight times, then watched her go through it herself, critiquing her performance, suggesting improvements. I had to admit that she was good, totally better than I’d be at taking direction. But giving it—that was a whole ’nother matter. Maybe my dreams of stardom hadn’t completely gone up in smoke with my death … maybe I just had to wrap my mind around working on the other end of the camera.
Directing
—now that was something I could sink my teeth into.

By the time we were done, I was almost having fun. Rebecca’s eyes were shining, and I was just glad Bobby couldn’t see her like that, because as knock-out as she was standing still, animated she was powerful. She made a better me than me.

“Nailed it,” I told her, and she came in for a high-five. I met her part way.

“You must have been terrified,” she said, not for the first time. “I almost wish I felt something here. It’s so hard to
imagine
that kind of thing … ghostly hands around your neck.” She shuddered.

Strangely, I was no longer compelled to throttle her myself so she could get the experience first-hand.

“Just be glad you only
have
to imagine. Remember, the last girl was killed. I only escaped by the skin of my teeth.”

The light in Rebecca’s eyes dimmed. “Sorry, I wasn’t thinking.”

I shrugged. “That happens to me all the time. Or so Bobby would tell you.”

“I bet he wouldn’t.”

It was sweet of her to say, but I suspected she wasn’t the kind to go around offering praise without an ulterior motive.

“So, is he The One?” she added casually.

“The one what?”

“
You know
.”

“You mean, like, forever, until death do us part?” Or …
not, in our case.

It was a terrifying thought. I loved Bobby, but eternity was a lot longer for us than for most people. I didn’t exactly have commitment issues, but I’d thumbed through the fashion spreads before placing the magazine back in the rack.

“Whoa, sorry, it wasn’t meant to be a tough question. You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

I smiled feebly at that and suggested we head back. Rebecca touched her chest again, as if to be sure the pendant was still locked and loaded before leaving, but I stopped her as I spotted something in the distance, which looked suspiciously like a lantern bobbing and weaving all on its own.

“What’s that?” I asked, forgetting her eyesight wouldn’t be as good as mine.

“Where?”

I pointed it out for her.

“Past the Old Jail? That’s the Howard Street Cemetery. It’s right by the site where Giles Corey was pressed to death. Didn’t you listen to the tour?”

“Not
that
,” I said, as if she hadn’t just scored a point. “
That
.” I directed her toward the light.

“Oh.” She laughed. “That has to be Tommy Haskins. He’s the caretaker. He’s a real throwback. Says electricity riles up the dead. I heard that Haunts used to lead tours through the cemetery, but then there were some incidents, and the people in the new condos at the Old Jail didn’t like it. Now no one’s allowed.”

“So it’s closed to the public?”

“Except by special arrangement.”

“What kind of incidents closed it down?”

“Ulric’s tour didn’t cover that part?”

“Um, maybe? It probably went straight out of my head when the Ghost of Murderers Past decided to put in an appearance.”