The Survivors: Body & Blood (book 3)

Extraterrestrial, pt. 1

SHE AGREED TO MEET ME FOR DINNER, MEANING THAT MY CHARM had worked perfectly. She shouldn't see me, and she knew it. But she maybe wouldn't mind being wined and dined and ending up naked at the end of it.

Or so I told myself. Realistically, I knew could be walking into a trap. I told her I was alone — convinced her I was, really — with no one to protect me. It was just Sadie and me, with no Winter clan to stand behind us. If she and Raven's henchmen didn't mind another scene, maybe they'd tear me apart.

Or maybe I'd end up in bed with her.

A range of possibilities! That night I sat at a table in a quiet corner of Spring Street Natural, a healthy vegetarian-friendly place I found. Somewhere in my memory, I remembered Sam — then Parker — mentioning she was a vegetarian. This amused me because she was part animal, and relieved me, because the last time I encountered a nosferatu, she was eating the entrails of a human being.

I also thought, in the Charm sense, this would get me points for remembering. Girls liked when you remembered pointless shit. Remember that, boys.

She was late, and I was starting to stress. I had ordered a bottle of wine, a Montepulciano, and the aptly-paired Mediterranean Vegetable Antipasto for two, which I had now consumed entirely by myself. I ordered another round of it in the hopes that it would arrive after she was here and my first plate had been cleared. I, like Ginny, ate when I was nervous, when I was craving human blood, and when I was craving a naked girl. My current mood — stressed, hungry for the Real Thing (because I was in a warm restaurant in the most populated island on the planet) and craving Sam — couldn't have made me hungrier.

From across the restaurant, Sadie whispered in my ear, "Calm down. She's flaky. Lateness is not unexpected." I'm sure she sensed my nerves because they were inevitably overflowing my useless bulwark, flooding her with an awkward mix of stress, concern, anticipation, nervousness, and arousal.

I tried not to think about it.

The Bluetooth earpiece worked remarkably well. I heard Sadie softly in my ear, like she was speaking into it. She was whispering softly enough that I couldn't hear her from thirty feet away, so I knew Sam wouldn't hear her either. My only concern was getting rid of the earpiece once it was time to, and, well, there was always time-freezing for that.

I glanced back in Sadie's direction, but she promptly hissed, "Don't look at me! You can't let her know I'm here. It's risky enough as is." But it wasn't that risky. Sam couldn't track or sense like we could. She was more like a human. And Sadie was sitting at a carefully positioned table; neither of us would be able to see her from our vantage point. For good measure, she was wearing leggings, an old school jean jacket, and had her hair in a braid under a baseball cap. She looked as effortlessly unpolished as I'd ever seen her. Of course, she still looked like an effing supermodel, but that was neither here nor there.

So I drummed the table and bided time.

And then Sam appeared. She was wearing the perfect date attire, her look the kind that told a guy you totally tried without appearing to have tried too hard, a look that says you'd maybe been wearing this outfit all day and simply appeared here, effortlessly, but there was enough cleavage, eye makeup, and attitude to make it pretty clear you hadn't.

"Sam," I said as she neared. I got to my feet and kissed her on the cheek, smoothly slipping my hand inside her jacket to hug her, instead of keeping it appropriately on the outside. Her heart rate audibly sped up when I did this, and she flushed.

Suddenly I felt much calmer.

"Sorry I'm late, handsome," she said, taking a seat. When she sat, I could see more of the mocha-colored skin I'd been deprived of for so long. Her neckline was a little more adventurous than I'd initially given her credit for. She had on a dress and a fitted blazer, printed tights, and a short boot with a heel worth noticing. She also wore fake eyelashes and a deep red lipstick.