Part 6 (1/2)
”You really are a nerd.”
”Nerds are hot. Just ask Chuck.”
Her grin was impish and easy. Too easy. She straightened, giving him an arrogant lift of her chin. ”Are you flirting by way of extolling your virtues?”
Sam pursed his lips comically and winked. ”I'm not sure. Clearly, if that woman was any indication, I'm not much for the foreplay of flirting. I prefer to tap right into the hot and sweaty.”
Phoebe let her eyes fall to the floor, s.h.i.+fting on her feet to avoid the discomfort the woman's memory brought. ”Well, that hasty, life-altering decision aside, we have trouble. So we need to figure this out, because I don't ever want to do what I did at Nina's again without maybe some warning-or cla.s.ses on how to, at the very least, land in the middle of Bergdorf Goodman's. I know my way around there.”
Sam grinned, devilish and amused. ”Could save a bundle on airfare.”
She snorted, twisting her hair between her fingers. ”Is that your shot at optimism?”
”I try to keep my gla.s.s half full.”
Phoebe fought to keep herself from drowning in the deep color of his eyes and stay focused. ”So the woman ...”
”Yeah. Wow.”
”You didn't know her?”
”Never saw her before in my life.” His eyes s.h.i.+fted away from hers.
She noted his flicker of embarra.s.sment in the way he looked up and away from her. ”Was it a work-related party? Do entomologists party? I'm having trouble with that image.”
”Obviously, we should stick to bugs, because when you let us loose, we party-big. And it's not something I do often.”
”Party?” Phoebe hedged.
”That or indulge in one-night stands. Which technically, I don't think actually occurred, but it's all really hazy.”
Crossing her arms over her chest, Phoebe couldn't help but smile. ”I'm so relieved.”
He wiggled his eyebrows. ”That it wasn't a one-night stand?”
”No. That you don't party much. Late nights and booze are bad for your skin. You have nice skin.” She paused, mortified she'd given him her a.s.sessment on his skin out loud. G.o.d. ”So the woman ...”
”The woman. Right. Yes, the party was work related, we had it right inside O-Tech's cafeteria, and there were a lot of people that I work with there. We bug dudes tend to run in stimulating packs of boring bug intellect.”
”So she could have been from O-Tech?”
”O-Tech's a big company. She could have been anyone from the mailroom on up. Or not.”
”Whose party was it?”
”My friend Joel organized it.”
”Another bug guy?”
”No. He's from Human Resources at O-Tech. And before you ask, I texted him about the guest list. No guest list. It was sort of a last-minute thrown-together thing, according to Joel. And no one saw me leave with mystery woman, either. Or even remembers seeing a woman matching that description.”
”So she just popped up out of thin air? Wait. Forget I said that. She probably did. Oh, Jesus.” The reality of their situation sank back in.
”So that brings us back to what she said,” Sam offered, though his reminder was steeped in hesitation.
Phoebe flapped a hand, pus.h.i.+ng herself to stick to the facts and not speculate too much or she'd lose her mind. ”Right. The dying thing. She said it wouldn't be long before we died. I don't know about you, but I really don't want to end up lunch for a whirring Dyson. That was brutal. No disrespect intended.”
Sam shook his head. ”Yeah. I don't get it. She vanished right before our eyes. If what Wanda and Nina told us, and the mythology of vampires is almost all true like they said, I was under the impression that vampires live forever unless they're staked through the heart with wood or their heads are chopped off.”
”Yeah. They do,” Nina stated, breezing in from the kitchen where she and Wanda had been contacting their vampire connections. ”Vampires also turn to dust after five hundred years unless they mate for life. Good times, right?”
Phoebe grimaced, wrinkling her nose. ”Golden. I have a little less than five hundred years to find the man of my dreams. That should be plenty of time to get things in order for my dream nuptials.” And find the right man. The kind who wouldn't walk out on her at the first sign of trouble. Especially if the trouble was big.
Sam's look was of surprise. ”Wait. Aren't you married, Nina?”
Nina nodded, her normally scowling face turned warm with a grin. ”Yep.”
”So you're mated for life?” Sam asked.
”For-ev-ah, yo. That's like rule number nine hundred in Vampires for Dummies. There's no divorce in Vampire-landia, kiddies. So when you get to pickin' a life partner-pick wisely, my friend, and don't wait until you're four hundred and ninety-nine and three-quarters to do it.”
”You speak from experience?” Sam inquired, his eyes wide.
”Oh, you bet she does,” Wanda called from the kitchen with a laugh.
Phoebe's brow furrowed. ”So wait. Then maybe Sam's girlfriend turned to dust because she was five hundred and had no mate? That makes sense, right? Maybe she meant we'd die if we didn't find mates? Or maybe she bit Sam as an eleventh-hour kind of d.a.m.n-I'd-better-get-to-gettin'-on-this-mate thing? You know, like an act of desperation?”
Nina shook her head, jamming her hands into the front pocket of her hoodie. ”If that was the case, she kind of jumped the f.u.c.king warning gun, don't you think? You guys have four hundred and ninety-nine years to go. And she apologized for biting Sam. She said it was an accident and she said she wanted to help. I didn't read any malice in that head of hers. Just panic and fear. Not to mention, what happened on that couch isn't your typical vampire death. I've heard about the turning to dust thing, and it isn't like that s.h.i.+t we saw tonight. The five hundred gig isn't pretty, but it's not like what just went down with all that flesh-eating c.r.a.p. That was some kind of heinous.”
Everyone grew somber again at the memory of the woman's screams.
”She also mentioned O-Tech,” Wanda said, weaving her way past Nina, cell phone in hand. ”And she had that O-Tech memo with Sam's name on it. So if she didn't work there, and we have no way of identifying her to see if she did, my next thought is, what does a vampire have to do with a pest-control manufacturer and how did she get her hands on Sam's personal notepad? Did you have it with you at the party? In your purse, maybe? That dress you've got on doesn't look like it leaves much room for a Thin Mint let alone a whole piece of paper.”
”Sarcasm. More, please,” Sam responded dryly, c.o.c.king his eyebrow.
Wanda smiled in return. ”Curtsy. So I'm guessing you don't carry around your memo pad with you?”
Sam's face went hard. ”Nope. It never leaves my desk because I don't really use it. I use my phone to keep memos, reminders, et cetera. I can't read my own handwriting and I have no clue what the letters TDB mean. But I didn't write that.”
”Yay,” Wanda retorted with sarcasm, clapping her hands together. ”Square one it is, then.”
Nina's expression took a surprising turn when she gave them all a somber gaze, jamming her hands into the pockets of her jeans. ”Well, we'd better figure out square two, because if what that broad said was true, Sammy and Fas.h.i.+on Spree Barbie are gonna bite it. Soon.”
Phoebe paid no mind to Nina's snarky reference to her. Instead, she found herself focusing on how she'd jumped from the frying pan smack into the fire. A couple of days ago, her life hadn't exactly been coming up roses, but it hadn't entailed a violent death the likes of which she'd seen on her sofa. Not one she'd remember anyway.
Everyone grew silent again, finding places to seat themselves other than the couch. Phoebe perched on the edge of an end table, listening to the hum of the vacuum Mark had broken out while she rethought her wish to be cremated.