“Ooh!” Nina clapped her small hands and snatched up the label maker once again. “I’m going to go label my clothes by decade!”
She disappeared into her bedroom-slash-clothing showroom and I flopped onto the couch, upsetting Vlad’s laundry basket and blowing out a long sigh.
He folded a pair of Christmas-print boxer shorts and cut his eyes to me. “Everything all right?”
“No,” I moaned.
“Do you burst into flames when you go outside?”
“No.” I picked at an errant piece of chocolate on my pants. “It’s just that—it’s just that I want to help Sampson, but I feel like such a failure. I tried to get information today and you know what I got?”
Vlad raised his brows while he rolled his socks.
“Squat. I got squat. I feel like I can’t do anything right. My crime-fighting career is over before it started.” I was trying to make light of the situation, but what I really want to say weighed in my gut like a fat black stone. What really concerned me is that I had begged Sampson to stay and in doing so, I’d practically signed his death warrant.
“Hey.” Vlad chucked me on the shoulder, his cold fist feeling good against my hot skin. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. Things are going to be okay. And your crime-fighting career isn’t total crap. Remember? You caught the bad guy last time.”
“After accusing you and the entire Vampire Empowerment Movement.”
Vlad’s gaze was surprisingly sympathetic. “But you caught the bad guy eventually.”
“By shooting him in the ass.”
“So you need a little weapons work.”
I crossed my arms and shoved my bottom lip out. “I need a lot of work.”
Vlad pushed his laundry basket aside. “You know what I hate? People who feel sorry for themselves. People who can leave the house on a sunny day and not toast up like a charcoal briquette. People who have all the resources they need right in front of them yet systematically refuse to take advantage of them.” He crossed the living room and began rifling through the hall closet.
“What are you talking about?” I said, kicking off my shoes. “Oh my God!” I was on my feet the second Vlad turned around, brandishing the largest sword I’d ever seen. I threw my hands up. “Okay, okay, I’m sorry! I won’t complain!” I felt myself stepping backward, then felt the back of my calves clunking against the couch. “Don’t kill me!”
Vlad’s expression was staid. “I’m not going to kill you, I’m going to help you.”
I crawled up on the couch, eyes wide, heart so used to thunderous pounds I was certain it would never go back to normal. “What are you talking about?”
Vlad jumped into a prissy-looking fighting stance and brandished the sword. “I’m going to teach you how not to shoot an assailant in the ass.”
I straightened up. “You’re going to teach me to shoot with a sword? Even I know that’s not going to work.”
Vlad’s sword dropped and he pushed out an exasperated sigh. “Do you want to learn or not?”
My eyes traveled the cool steel length of the sword. “Really?”
“Don’t say I’ve never done anything for you.”
I stepped up and met Vlad in the center of the room, reaching for the sword. He handed it to me, then went back to the coat closet and pulled one out for himself. I pointed with the sword. “Do we really keep these in there? Because it doesn’t seem like such a good idea.”
“I’ll be sure to have Auntie Nina re-label the contents of the coat closet to include swords.”
I glanced at the razor-thin edge of my sword. “And a warning.”
Chapter Six
Vlad leaned up against me and the chilled wisp that came off his undead body gave me gooseflesh. “Hold it like this,” he said, clamping his hands over mine.
I grinned and looked over my shoulder at Vlad. This is what it must be like to have a brother, I thought.
He narrowed his eyes, the top of his lip turning up into a snarl. “Stop looking at me like that. It’s gross.”
Yep, exactly like a brother.
Once Vlad approved my grip—something between holding a golf club and swinging a softball bat—he stepped away and plucked up his own sword.
I swooshed my sword swashbuckler style and tried out a few pirate “Walk the plank, mateys!” and “Arggghs!” for good measure. “This is fun!”
He just shrugged, ignoring me, feeling the weight of the sword he held, tossing the jeweled handle from hand to hand. “This’ll do.” He pushed himself up and smiled at me. A kindly, affectionate smile. “Let’s spar,” he said.
I felt my eyebrows rise and my bladder fill. “What? Spar? In case you haven’t noticed, Vlad, these are real weapons. Really big real weapons.”