Unholy Night
Book One
Candice Gilmer
ã 2008 Lyrical Press, Inc.
What am I doing here?
A woman dressed as a fortune teller with gypsy beads glittering around her neck and a large purple scarf covering her wavy black hair mingled about, stopping to take people's hands and whisper soft words. Some party-goers looked excited, some shocked at her words, but all seemed to take the woman's alleged wisdom to heart.
Marissa rolled her eyes. She didn't believe in the powers of mystics and the supernatural.
When someone is dead, they're dead.
Period.
If anyone knew that, she did.
The gypsy woman stopped in front of her. "It is not good for the soul to dwell on the past," she said, taking Marissa's hand.
She pulled her hand away from the woman. "Trust me when I say, do not go there."
The fortune teller raised her sculpted black eyebrow at her. "The future is always upon us, whether we wish to see it or not."
"Thanks for the tip."
The fortune teller tried one more time. "You shall be saved thrice before it is through, then you shall finally be free."
"I've never been saved once."
"Are you sure?" the fortune teller asked.
Before she could object and remind this woman she'd certainly know if she'd ever been saved, the gypsy wandered off in the crowd, beads clattering in her wake.
Marissa chugged the last of her punch to stop herself from going over there and knocking the woman down. How dare she? How dare she assume to know anything about her? The nerve of some people. After all, she'd certainly know if she'd ever been saved. What was wrong with people? Did they think putting on some funky costume suddenly made them an expert about the supernatural?
Making up mumbo-jumbo like that just for the hell of it, to get under people's skin-Halloween brought out the worst in people.
How she'd ever loved this holiday, she didn't know.
Yet her rebellious mind brought back a memory, one from only four or five years ago, where she'd worn a similar get-up and ran around a party, pretending to be some great fortune teller. She'd spat out future-babble for people, most of it so cheesy it could have come from a fortune cookie.
Gritting her teeth, she turned to look over the table of food again, as if it could erase her memory.
She grabbed the ladle and refilled her glass, taking a sip, then refilling her cup completely. She quickly downed the whole thing.
Just get through tonight. You can do this. You can. As she started to refill her glass again, she considered just sticking a straw in the bowl. Much easier to drown her anger that way. And faster. Of course, maybe if she ventured into the kitchen, she might be able to find the vodka bottle and get the alcohol straight from the source.
That's what she'd do. Go find the bottle of vodka.
Someone had the balls to interrupt her internal pep talk. "Interesting predictions," the male voice said.
"And what the hell do you know about it?" Marissa didn't look up as she ladled another cup, taking a sip, and repeating the process.
"Sorry," he said. "Could you hand me a glass? That is, if you're not planning on drinking the whole punch bowl."
About to spout off something incredibly rude, she stopped dead. "Here," she managed to squeak out. It was the best she could do when confronted with the most amazing eyes she'd ever seen.
"Thank you," said the green-eyed man. He took the ladle and filled his glass, his eyes wandering over her. He was dressed from head to toe like Bela Lugosi's Dracula, with the medallion, the cape and the tux. His sharp widow's peak was combed back into a mass of black hair and framed his strong face.
She stepped away from the punch bowl, looking for an escape route. This absolutely wouldn't do-men were not part of her mourning. Even sexy, blackhaired ones.
Nope, she told herself. Not going there. Her libido had suddenly jumped a thousand percent, and throbbed as he looked her up and down. She could hear her heart pounding in her ears, and the room started to take on a surreal feel, as if the two of them were the only ones in the entire world.
He radiated some weird vampire-esque type magnetism she'd read about in books. Her skin practically sizzled with desire as he raked his gaze over her.
This was so not good.
Not good at all.