The Dangers of Dating a Rebound Vampire

by Molly Harper

  “Molly Harper writes characters you can’t help but fall in love with.”

  —RT Book Reviews

  Praise for the Half-Moon Hollow novels

  A WITCH’S HANDBOOK OF KISSES AND CURSES

  “Harper serves up plenty of hilarity . . . [in] this return to the hysterical world of Jane and crew.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Clever wit and heart. . . . Fans of the series and readers new to Half-Moon Hollow will enjoy the fun and frivolity.”

  —RT Book Reviews (4½ stars, Top Pick)

  “A fun, sexy, fast-paced story.”

  —Fresh Fiction

  THE CARE AND FEEDING OF STRAY VAMPIRES

  “A perfect combination of smarts and entertainment with a dash of romance.”

  —RT Book Reviews (4½ stars, Top Pick)

  “Filled with clever humor, snark, silliness, and endear­ing protagonists.”

  —Booklist

  NICE GIRLS DON’T BITE THEIR NEIGHBORS

  “Terrific. . . . The stellar supporting characters, laugh-out-loud moments, and outrageous plot twists will leave readers absolutely satisfied.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  “Molly Harper is the queen of side-splitting quips. . . . Hilariously original with imaginative adventures and one-of-a-kind characters.”

  —Single Titles

  NICE GIRLS DON’T LIVE FOREVER

  RT Reviewers’ Choice Award winner!

  “Hilariously fun.”

  —RT Book Reviews (4½ stars, Top Pick)

  “The Jane Jameson books are sheer fun and giggle. No, make that chortling, laugh-out-loud till you gasp for breath fun.”

  —Night Owl Reviews

  NICE GIRLS DON’T DATE DEAD MEN

  “Fast-paced, mysterious, passionate, and hilarious.”

  —RT Book Reviews (4½ stars)

  “With its quirky characters and the funny situations they get into, whether they be normal or paranormal, Nice Girls Don’t Date Dead Men is an amazing novel.”

  —Romance Reviews Today

  NICE GIRLS DON’T HAVE FANGS

  “Harper’s take on vampire lore will intrigue and entertain. . . . Jane’s snarky first-person narrative is as charming as it is hilarious.”

  —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  “A chuckle-inducing, southern-fried version of Steph­anie Plum.”

  —Booklist

  Praise for the Naked Werewolf novels

  HOW TO RUN WITH A NAKED WEREWOLF

  “Harper is back with her trademark snark, capable heroines, and loping lupines.”

  —Heroes and Heartbreakers

  “Alaska is the perfect setting for a protagonist looking to hide out and start over—while encountering some werewolves along the way. . . . The hero and heroine have wonderful and believable instant chemistry and it’s fun to see them learn about each other beyond their powerful attraction.”

  —RT Book Reviews (4½ stars, Top Pick)

  “Exciting, hysterical, sexy . . . No one writes paranormal romance with as much sarcasm and charm as Molly.”

  —Harlequin Junkie (5 stars)

  THE ART OF SEDUCING A NAKED WEREWOLF

  “Harper’s gift for character building and crafting a smart, exciting story is showcased well.”

  —RT Book Reviews (4 stars)

  “The characters are appealing and the plot is intriguingly original.”

  —Single Titles

  HOW TO FLIRT WITH A NAKED WEREWOLF

  “Mo’s wisecracking, hilarious voice makes this novel such a pleasure to read.”

  —New York Times bestselling author Eloisa James

  “A light, fun, easy read, perfect for lazy days.”

  —New York Journal of Books

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  For Leah, Jaye, Nicole, Heather, and Mom

  Acknowledgments

  As always, it takes a cast of talented people to get my book from desktop to page. A big thank-you, as always, to my agent, Stephany Evans, and my editor, Abby Zidle, who are not afraid of letting me put my characters in ridiculous and dangerous positions. Thank you to Jennifer Fusco and Melanie Meadors at Market or Die Author Services, who never shy away from proofing late-night blog posts.

  To Leah Hodge, Heather Osborn, Nicole Peeler, and Jaye Wells: you are the best bad influences a girl could ever ask for. Mom, thanks for keeping us all in line and well fed. To Jeanette Battista, my work wife: thank you for all the times you have read nonsensical snippets of information and helped me turn them into chapters. I am so lucky to have my evil snark twin for a critique partner. To Eli Knight: thank you for making my fight scenes better and teaching me every incorrect Sun Tzu quote I know.

  Thank you to my family for everything you do to keep me on track. And thank you, as always, to my husband, David, for the inspiration.

  1

  You never get a second chance to make a first exsanguination.

  —The Office After Dark: A Guide to Maintaining a Safe, Productive Vampire Workplace

  The sensible beige pantsuit was mocking me.

  It was hanging there, in my closet, all tailored and boring. And beige. Yes, wear me to work, and let all of your new coworkers know that you have no personality! it jeered at me. Look at you, all nervous and twitchy. Why don’t you just stay home and work for the Apple store, you big baby?

  “That is one judgmental pantsuit.” I flopped back onto my bed and stared at the ceiling. I deserved this job. I was qualified for it. I’d gone through a particularly difficult test of my intelligence and ingenuity to get it. So why was I so nervous about my first day?

  “Because you are Queen of All Neurotics,” I grumbled, scrubbing my hand over my face. “Long may you reign.”

  Honestly, I was nervous because this job—programming an internal search engine of vampires’ living descendants for the World Council for the Equal Treatment of the Undead—meant something. Because if I played my cards right, this would be the only first day of work I would ever go through. The Council was known for offering increasingly attractive perks and salaries to hold on to competent human employees, resulting in lifelong appointments. Then again, if I played my cards wrong, this could be my last-ever first day of work, because I would be dead.

  OK, if I continued this line of thinking, what would the final outcome be? Not taking the job with the Council. And then I tried to picture my sister Iris’s face if I told her that I’d decided not to take the job after all. First there would be elation, and then relief, and then would come the “I told you so’s.” I really hated the “I told you so’s,” which were sometimes accompanied by interpretive dance.

  Even after having months to adjust, Iris was “displeased” about my employment, which was like saying PETA was displeased by the popularity of TripleMeat Whataburgers. Iris wanted me to work in some respectable office, where my coworkers wouldn’t pose an immediate threat to my person. It was nice to know she cared about my safety, but seriously, she was getting on my nerves.

  “Right. Spiting your sister is an excellent personal motivator. Let’s go.” I launched myself out of bed, slipped
into the suit, and pinned my hair into a

  responsible-looking chignon. I was thankful, at least, that I didn’t have to deal with Iris’s hair. It wasn’t that her dark curly hair wasn’t beautiful, because it totally was, especially now that she had all that vampire-makeover mojo on her side and looked like a sexy undead Snow White—if Snow White was remotely sexy or tousled, which was tough to pull off in that Disney headband. The point was, I could barely handle my own heavy dark hair. I couldn’t imagine throwing crazy curlicues into the mix.

  Iris and I also shared our mother’s cornflower-blue eyes and delicate features, though I’d inherited Dad’s height. It really irritated Iris when her “little sister” propped her elbow on top of Iris’s head. Which meant I did it every chance I got.

  Yawning, I picked up my equally practical beige pumps and checked my purse for the third time that afternoon. I’d stayed up all night, then slept through the morning, in an attempt to adjust my schedule to my new hours, working from two p.m. until two a.m. This was considered the early-bird shift for vampires, and it was going to be an adjustment for my very human body clock. But at least I would see more of my recently vampirized sister and her equally undead husband.

  The house, as expected, was pitch-black, thanks to the heavy-duty sunshades my brother-in-law had installed to protect him and Iris from sun exposure. Carefully, I clicked a button at the end of the hall and waited for the circular “tap lights” to illuminate the stairs.

  I turned the corner into the kitchen and punched in my personal security code. Before I could use my “clearance” to open the downstairs windows, I felt a sudden strike at my neck, the sensation of hands closing around my shoulders. I gasped as my unseen assailant yanked me back against his chest, hissing in my ear. I curled my fingers around the offending hands and dropped into “base,” the stable fighting stance taught to me by the jiujitsu instructor Cal had insisted I train with for the past five months. Spreading my arms wide to loosen his grip, I thrust my hips back, knocking him off-balance. I stopped my face-to-floor descent with my palms, cupped both hands around his foot, and yanked—hard. The force of my pull was enough to send him toppling back on his ass.

  I sprang up and flicked on the lights to see my beloved brother-in-law sprawled on the floor with a big, stupid grin on his face.

  “Cletus Calix!” I yelled, giving him one last kick to the ribs before climbing onto one of the breakfast bar stools. “What is wrong with you?”

  “I just wanted to get your blood going with a prework reflex test,” he said, pushing to his feet. “Well done, you. Your reaction times are much faster.”

  I grunted and threw a banana at his dark head; of course, he caught it, because he has superhuman response times. Totally unfair. Cal had thrown these little tests at me nearly every day since I’d come home for the summer. Always at a different time, always with a different mode of attack. The fact that Cal had probably downed a half-dozen espressos just so he could get up at this hour was somehow very sweet and

  super-irritating all at the same time. I understood that he wanted proof that I could defend myself if necessary and that the insane amount of time and money he’d spent on my martial-arts education wasn’t wasted. But seriously, I just wanted to make coffee without someone putting me in a choke hold.

  “One of these days, Cal, you’re going to sneak up on me, and I’m going to stab you with something wooden and pointy. It’s not an idle threat. You’ve stocked my bag with a scary array of antivampire technology. If Ophelia ever decides to search me, I’ll probably be fired based on the threat my change purse poses to the secretarial pool.”

  “Which means my evil plan will finally come to fruition.” Cal snorted. He had lots of reservations about my working for the Council, so he’d devoted the past semester to preparing me for working around vampires. Brazilian jiujitsu classes, crossbow lessons, small-blade combat training. The good news was that I was no longer afraid of walking through the campus parking garage at night. The bad news was that most of the people in my advanced programming classes were now afraid of me, because they spotted my knifework gear in my shoulder bag that one time.

  “And if you manage to stab me, Gigi, I will deserve whatever pointy revenge you inflict.”

  “You’re so weird.” I sighed, catching my reflection in the glass microwave panel. “Now I’m going to have to go fix my hair again.”

  “It’s not that bad,” Cal protested. I dashed into the powder room off the kitchen and ran a comb through my mussed hair. Cal leaned his long, rangy form against the doorway, watching me fuss. “Iris would get up and wish you luck, but she hasn’t worked up to daylight waking hours quite yet. It’s more of an advanced vampire trick.”

  “There’s also the small matter of Iris not wanting me to work at the Council office,” I said, leveling him with a frank smile. “It’s OK, Cal, you don’t have to sugarcoat it for me. I know I’m making Iris unhappy.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said breezily, following me back into the kitchen.

  “Aren’t you kind of old for blithe denial? Like several thousand years too old?” I asked, ducking when he attempted to ruffle my hair.

  “Keep it up, and I won’t give you this delicious lunch I packed for you,” Cal said, digging into the fridge and pulling a small blue canvas bag from the top shelf. I opened it to find that Cal had made me a California roll and nigiri with his own two little vampire hands. I’d developed a taste for sushi at school, and there were no quality Japanese restaurants in the Hollow. So Iris and Cal had watched YouTube videos to figure out how to make it for me, if only to save me from truck-stop sashimi. This might seem like a minor gesture until one considered that to vampires, human food smelled like the wrong end of a petting zoo. “You’re the only human I know whose comfort food involves raw fish and rice.”

  “Vampires living in blood-bag-shaped houses shouldn’t throw stones,” I told him. “And this is very sweet. I sort of love you, Cal.” I kissed his cheek, something that had taken him years to accept without flinching or making faces.

  “You completely love me. Now, have a good first day at work. Play nice with your coworkers, but don’t hesitate to use your silver spray. If you get into trouble, there’s an extra stake sewn into the bottom lining of your purse. Call us before you drive home so we can wait up for you.”

  “Your employment advice is not like other people’s employment advice.”

  • • •

  Ophelia didn’t deign to visit us on our first day. My fellow recruits and I talked exclusively to Amelia Gibson, the stern vampire head of HR, while sequestered—I mean seated—in the windowless conference room decorated in various shades of gray. In fact, almost everything in the newly renovated Council office was gray: gray walls, gray carpets, gray cement block, and gray laminate office furniture. Cold, impersonal, efficient, it wasn’t exactly home away from home.

  While the grim-looking security guards processed our security-pass photos, we had to sit through the upsetting orientation videos. Most of them involved strategies for not provoking our vampire coworkers into biting us. Since I was pretty familiar with these tips—including “Lunch Break Hazards: Say Good-bye to Garlic and Tuna Salad” and “Empty Toner Cartridges: Replace Them or Die”—I spent my time studying my coworkers.

  Jordan Lancaster was sweet-faced and might have looked like the girl next door, if not for the full ROY G BIV spectrum of streaks in her hair, the heavy navy-blue eyeliner, and the double nose ring. She’d chosen to wear a My Little Pony T-shirt declaring her allegiance to Rainbow Dash, dark-wash jeans, and high-top sneakers. I knew she looked unprofessional. I knew she was reinforcing the stereotype that computer geeks were poorly socialized kids with weird hair and unfortunate wardrobe choices. Ms. Gibson had looked directly at Jordan when she mentioned reviewing the dress code. But I couldn’t help but feel just a little bit envious of her while I sat there,
tugging at my uncomfortable pantsuit.

  Also, I was considering stealing those violet Converse high-tops.

  Marty McCullough was a tall, slender guy with piercing dark eyes and a pale, pleasant face. He wore a plaid work shirt and chinos and seemed just a bit too relaxed around the vampires, as if he thought they were too civilized to hurt him. I hoped he would figure out how wrong he was without my having to use the first-aid kit too many times.

  Aaron Chen slept through the orientation, but no one could tell for the first hour or so, because his outdated and overgrown Justin Bieber haircut covered his eyes. And when Ms. Gibson woke him up, he didn’t even say he was sorry. I think I was looking forward to working with him most of all.

  It was sort of a mixed bag for me when it came to vampires and trust issues. I mean, Ophelia was a four-hundred-plus-year-old vampire who looked like a teenager and schemed like a Bond villain. So I was going to avoid any situation that would lead to sitting in her office near a hidden trapdoor. And sure, I’d been duped and supernaturally hypnotized by a vampire sent by a local supervillain to date me under false pretenses. But thanks to the hypnosis, I’d blanked out most of the unpleasant parts and only remembered dreamy scenes of teen vampire romance.

  It was interesting to me that none of the programmers was older than mid-twenties. The oldest of us, Marty, looked to be about twenty-three or twenty-four. Then again, working at the Council office full-time, we would be exposed to many of the vampire world’s secrets and machinations. We would have access to their leaders. We would figure out how they managed to save enough money to survive for centuries. That was a considerable liability, as far as the vampires were concerned. Maybe responsible adults in their thirties didn’t work for vampires because they were too worried about the families they could leave behind.

  And while there were a few vampires out there who could do the work, the Council didn’t hire them. The rumor was that the Council members didn’t trust their own kind enough to handle the genealogical information. Long-standing feuds between vampires could escalate swiftly if one knew where to find the living great-great-grandchildren of one’s arch­enemy. So the coding was farmed out to us ­nonsuperpowered humans who had been through a rigorous, highly intimidating vetting process. The theory was that properly intimidated humans wouldn’t use their access to secret vampire records to track down (or assist other vampires in tracking down) other humans to hurt them.