Chapter 3

Silver

New Year’s Day, I wake to the sound of my phone buzzing on the pillow. I know who it is without even looking at the screen.

“Just grabbing my keys,” I mumble, lifting a corner of my sleep mask. “Give me five minutes.”

“Get a move on, woman,” Ollie screeches. “The parents won’t visit themselves.”

I’m so used to waking up the morning after with a hangover that it takes a few seconds to realize I don’t feel like something stuck to the bottom of my shoe. Maybe I’ve been imbued with some unique vampy power.

Remembering the steamy clinch, I dive out of bed, lurching toward the gilt-framed mirror hanging above my dressing table. No mark. I turn the other way, pulling my hair back to examine my neck. No mark there either. What a gent.

From outside, a car horn blasts, and I roll my eyes, snatching a duffel bag and parka from the back of the bedroom door. I’ll have to shower and dress at Dad’s today.

Home is a basement flat. After closing the front door, I scramble up the steps to street level. Ollie is leaning against his green, beat-up Mini, one lanky, denim-clad leg crossed in front of the other. His freckled face breaks into a massive smile as I emerge onto the empty street and dash over to hug him.

“Miss me much?” he asks, laughing as I give him the official death squeeze. “Are you really wearing pajamas under that coat?”

I nod, pulling away to get a better look at him. “Your hair got longer. You look more like Ed Sheeran every day.”

He smooths floppy, red bangs over his forehead, grinning. “Well, they don’t have too many barber shops in the Seychelles.”

“Lucky bastard. I can’t believe you got to spend Christmas day lying on the beach while I was stuck in Kent with the wicked stepmother.”

“How is Sheila? Did she leave you off the Secret Santa list again this year?”

Ollie is referring to the fiasco of last Christmas when Dad and my stepmother, Sheila, decided we should do a secret Santa. A marvelous idea, you might think—but somehow Sheila forgot to add my name to the little bag, so no one got me. I was giftless. I’m pretty sure she planned it.

I laugh. “Ha! They gave me a big check and a box of chocolates to atone for their sins.”

He opens the passenger door, and like a contortionist, I squeeze into the tiny front seat, flinging my bag into the back.

“Hope you’re ready for round two,” he says, folding his tall frame into the car and doing his best evil laugh. “Mwah-ha-ha-ha-haaaa.”

I point ahead through the windshield. “Just drive, moron, or I’ll force you to stay for dinner and charades.”

As we weave our way through early morning Chelsea, past the white, four-story town houses and wrought-iron railings, the leaf-strewn roads are surprisingly empty. An eerie, postapocalyptic stillness fogs the air.

Desperate for some life, I fiddle with the ancient stereo on the dashboard. “You need a new car,” I say as the little plastic knob breaks off in my hand.

Even though Ollie works for some top-notch pharmaceutical company and should, by rights, drive a soulless black BMW with a starched, Mr. Grey will see you now suit hung in the back, he insists on keeping the battered, snot-green Mini from his student days. It makes me question if these high-flying careers are really worth the effort. They only ever seem to make people nostalgic for the past, when they were penniless but got to do exactly what they liked all day. In Ollie’s case, playing bass guitar in a truly terrible indie band named the Cat’s Pajamas.

“So, how was the party last night?” he asks as we turn onto Embankment.

Giving up on the radio, I twist in the seat to face him. “Awful. But guess who I met after I was thrown out?”

A wry smile touches the corner of his mouth. “I don’t know, Johnny Depp?”

I tut with my tongue. “Oh, come on, be realistic. A vampire!”

He almost crashes into a parked car. “You’re kidding me.”

“Nope,” I say gleefully.

“There was a vampire at that posh twat’s party?”

“No, outside. Like I said, I got chucked out.”

“What about Joshua?”

My lip curls as an image of that rat Joshua attached to a pair of bee-stung lips pops into my mind. “Joshua,” I say with undisguised venom, “went off with another girl while I was getting a drink.”

Ollie shakes his head. “That guy’s an ass. How did you know this other bloke was a vampire?”

“He moved superfast and almost strangled two guys for disrespecting me.” I lower my voice slightly. “That, and I let him bite me.”

“Silver!”

“What?”

“You can’t just go around letting strange vampires bite you. What if he was a psycho?”

I shrug. “No one that hot can be a psycho.”

He sputters in disbelief. “Haven’t you seen America’s Most Wanted?”

I dismiss the question with a wave of my hand. “Psychos are nerdy types who torture cats in alleys. Stop being such a killjoy. You’re spending way too much time with Krista.”

A prickly silence drops over us like a cloak. My dislike for his current girlfriend is a sticky subject, to say the least. I mean, it’s not like I hate her or anything—she just bugs the hell out of me. Twenty-five going on eighty, with a soul-sucking job in banking, Krista is a girl who has become old before her time. She has a pension plan, for heaven’s sake. I know this because she made Ollie get one too.

“Did he leave bite marks?” he asks, breaking through the wall of quiet.

I quirk a smile, grateful to be past the awkwardness. “No, it’s the strangest thing. There’s nothing. And while it was happening, I sort of zoned out. I saw lights and colors. It was amazing, Olls.”

“Maybe you had too much to drink.”

“Actually, I was pretty close to being sober.”

“Pah! Silver, sober at a party on New Year’s Eve? I think not.”

I chuckle, snatching an ice scraper from the dash and throwing it at him. “Shut it. I’m a vision of sobriety these days.”

Krista forgotten, we’re us again.

* * *

The first thing Sheila asks when she opens the front door to find me standing on the doorstep is not Why are you in pajamas? but “Where’s this Joshua you said you were bringing?”

Here we go.

“He’s not coming,” I snip frostily. “Things didn’t work out.” I barge past her into the hallway and shrug off my coat.

Her thin brows shoot skyward, her gaze snagging on my piggy-print nightwear. “Again?”

I take a deep breath, wishing the ground would open and swallow her whole. “Yes, Shelia, again. I’m sorry to disappoint you. I realize at twenty-four, I should be married with dozens of kids by now.”

She ignores the sarcasm and tuts sadly, shaking her head. “What happened this time?”

“Turns out he prefers blonds,” I say, bending down to pull off my boots.

“Well, it would’ve been handy if you’d figured that out before I bought extra food.”

I’m poised to make a smart-ass comeback when Dad appears through the kitchen door. “There’s my girl!” he says warmly, holding out his arms and pulling me into a giant bear hug.

I smile into the comforting warmth of his scratchy wool sweater. “Happy New Year, Dad.”

Sheila retreats into the kitchen, clucking her tongue.

“Ignore her, love,” Dad whispers. “You know how stressed she gets cooking these big family meals.”

I nod into his shoulder. Oh boy, do I.

Dad knows better than to ask about the absence of Joshua. “I’ll get you a drink,” he says, pulling away. “Diet Coke?”

“Thanks, Dad.” I follow him through the immaculate beige kitchen, where Sheila is attacking a yucky-looking yellow mixture with a whisk, and into the large living area at the back of the house—also beige. My three stepsiblings are draped across the sofas, and I’m relieved to see Jess is here. She’s the only one I find remotely bearable. The other two, Chris and Debra, are of the same ilk as their mother—overbearing, judgmental, and dull.

Jess’s face lights up as I walk in. “Yay, you’re here!” Grabbing my hand, she drags me onto the sofa beside her. Chris and Debra look up, nonplussed, and mutter greetings before turning their attention back to the TV.

“What’s on?” I ask them.

“Raiders of the Lost Ark,” Chris mumbles in his droll, monotone voice.

Mousy Debra leans forward, grabbing a tube of Pringles from the coffee table. “I saved you some,” she says, throwing it in my direction.

I catch it midair, realizing it’s nearly empty. “Thanks.”

This will be the extent of our interaction for the duration of the day.

“Tell me about the party,” Jess demands, blue eyes lit with excitement. She is almost twenty-one and already planning an escape from the family home. In the meantime, she lives vicariously through me.

I lower my voice so the others don’t hear. “It was awful, full of idiots bragging about how much money their families have. Then I’m coming back from getting a drink, and Joshua is full on face-sucking with some Eurotrash skank.”

Jess’s eyes widen, her mouth dropping open. She lives for this stuff. “Oh. My. God.”

I proceed to fill her in about getting thrown out and snatching the coat—she cackles with laughter at that bit. When I mention the vampire, she rockets out of the seat. Snatching my hand, she pulls me up, dragging me through the steam-filled kitchen. “Come outside. I need a cigarette for this.”

“Where are you two sneaking off to?” Sheila probes accusingly, her short, gray hair sticking up in clumps. “I’m about to need help with the gravy.”

Jess grins. “Sorry, Mum, girl chat.”

Outside, we trample through wet grass to Dad’s shed, a damp little summerhouse he uses to get away from Sheila. There are tools and wood everywhere, and it smells of sawdust and tobacco.

Jess reaches up and pulls down a rusty, old biscuit tin from a shelf, fishing out a packet of Marlboro Lights. “Smoke?” she offers.

I decline—I gave up years ago. She lights up and happily puffs away as I describe my encounter with the sexy, green-eyed vampire.

“Did you see all the colors when you were kissing or just the biting part?”

“Just the biting part. But don’t get me wrong—the kiss is still the best I’ve ever had.”

“I’ve heard some women only ever date vampires.”

I frown. “Really? How do they find them?”

“Duh. Online dating. There’s a special dating site for human-vampire relations.”

“You’re joking. You mean you just go on and start chatting?”

“Yup. Megan’s cousin uses it. V-Date, I think it’s called. The cost of membership is extortionate, but apparently the men are panty-dropping hot.”

I narrow my eyes in thought. I wonder if my vampire uses the site.

* * *

Later, after dinner is over and Ollie has driven us back to London, I walk into my flat and collapse on the sofa in a heap of emotional exhaustion. Spending time with family always sucks the marrow out of me, and not just because I have to go a whole day without saying what I think. Going home to Kent reminds me of how I felt at thirteen when Dad remarried—like Little Orphan Annie, the spare part of the puzzle who didn’t ever fit in.

I hold a hand to my throbbing temples, wishing I’d asked Ollie if he wanted to stay and hang out. Having been friends since we were nine years old, he’s the only person who understands my childhood.

From inside my coat, my phone vibrates, beeping loudly. It’s a message from Jess. Did you look up V-Date yet?

No, I reply. Should I?

The phone beeps again. Yes. Hot men, remember?

Getting off the sofa, I pause in front of the mirror. The skin on my neck is still perfectly unmarked. How is that possible?

Remembering the sexy vampire, a wave of frustration sweeps over me. Even if he wanted to, he can’t find me now that I’ve lied about my address. With a weary sigh, I grab my laptop from the coffee table, carrying it to the long counter that separates the lounge from the kitchen. Hauling myself onto a high stool, I lift the lid and type V-Date into the search engine. A few other dating sites pop up but nothing about vampires.

On a mission, I snatch up my mobile and fire off a text to Jess. I searched for it, but there’s nothing.

The phone instantly vibrates, skittering across the countertop as if on legs. Type the full address in. It’s probably on the deep web.

I enter www.V-Date.com into the address bar and get instantly transferred to a professional-looking website. I’m not precisely sure what I was expecting, but it definitely wasn’t normalcy. The site looks like any other dating site—a slick image of an attractive couple plastered across the background. Peering closer at the models, I decide the man does look a little pale. Or maybe it’s the woman who’s a vampire. It’s sort of hard to tell—neither are displaying any fangs.

The motto of the site sits neatly beneath the spiky V-Date logo—Dating with a difference. “They got that right,” I mutter, clicking a button to choose who I am and what I’m looking for. I click I am a woman searching for a male vampire and hit Go, waiting while a circle swirls blue dots at the top of the page.

“Damn!” I say as it brings up a payment box. Jess was right about the extortionate charges. Who knew supernatural dating would be such a money-spinner?

I lean back on the stool, drumming my fingers on my knees. Did I really want to do this? I think of Joshua and all the other idiots I’ve met since moving to London. That one clinch with the vampire had been more satisfying than all those paltry offerings glued together. What’s more, human guys and I were proving to be something of a bad fit. Men were either utter douche bags like Joshua, or the settling-down types who try to hold hands in the street. Not my thing. I’m not the relationship kind, nor do I ever plan to be.

I leap off the stool and rummage in the kitchen drawer where I keep my emergencies-only credit card. Feeling a slight flutter in the pit of my stomach, I tap in all the numbers and click Join. I’m relieved to notice, unlike other dating sites, there is no need to complete an exhausting list of likes and hobbies—handy, seeing as my only hobbies are going to parties and shopping.

Once my picture is uploaded—black-and-gold sleeveless dress at work’s Christmas party last year—I’m released like an excited puppy into a forum of men’s photos. My eyes widen. Jess was right. A sea of male beauty swims before me. My eyes dart from one chiseled jawline to the next. It’s like being handed a copy of GQ magazine and asked to pick a model to take home for the evening. I grin maniacally and click on a picture of a dark-haired vampire named Christian. He’s a poet, apparently. No thank you. Poets are notorious hand-holders.

Next, I click on a blue-eyed hottie with perfect light-brown hair swept sideways off his forehead. All it says is Businessman. Now this is more like it. Labeling yourself an entrepreneur or businessperson is an unspoken promise of a swanky, all-expenses-paid date. He’ll probably own a Porsche. I click on the pink lipstick mark in the corner of his page, which will apparently zap him a link to my details, before returning to the profiles.

I’d gotten so excited by all the square jaws, I almost forgot to check for Mr. Irish himself. I lean closer to the screen, scanning every face for green eyes and deadly dimples. Nothing. I suck in a disappointed breath. Of course he doesn’t need Internet dating. All he has to do is hang around the streets looking sexy.

A pinging noise breaks into my thoughts, and when my eyes flicker back to the screen, I see a message waiting from the hot businessman I sent the lips request to.

Hey, it reads. Thanks for liking my profile. If you’re London-based, how about meeting up for a drink?

I take a photo of the message and send it to Jess. This is going to be fun.