Dead and Dateless Read Free Page B

ten-foot fence at the opposite end. An other impressive leap later, I’d cleared the fence and shifted into getting the hell out of here mode.
    A few frantic seconds and several blocks later, I shoved my stuff into the back of a cab and climbed in.
    The driver spared me a glance in the rearview mirror. He was in his twenties, with long blond hair pulled back into a ponytail. He wore a floral print shirt and a bored expression. “Where to?”
    I clutched my pillow tighter as if it were a life pre server. “Connecticut. And I’m in a really big hurry.”
    He grinned and eyed the pillow. “Hot date?”
    If only.
    “Business meeting.” When he glanced at the pillow again and flashed me a knowing look, I frowned. “Could you just get us out of here?” Sirens wailed several streets over and my heart beat faster. “Like, now. ”
    My gaze collided with his in the mirror and I saw something spark in the brown depths of his eyes. Recognition. Attraction. Desire.
    Bingo.
    “No problem, lady,” he told me, suddenly eager to please. He shifted the car into drive and pulled out into traffic. “You just sit back and chill. They don’t call me Fast Freddie for nothing.”
    I was willing to bet the reason they called him Fast Freddie had nothing to do with his driving. And I soon discovered, as we crawled over the Hudson, that I was right.
    I concentrated on willing him faster. Mind control was another vamp plus, as long as it was used on the opposite sex.
    Go, go, go!
    His smile widened and he glanced more frequently into his rearview mirror, but otherwise, we didn’t so much as increase a single RPM.
    Dread washed over me, along with a rush of fear that I was losing my touch with the opposite sex. (A hundred years, remember?) Sure, I’d shared a major hot kiss with vampilicious Ty and it had seemed like I still had it going on. But we’re talking a kiss. One measly kiss that hadn’t even led to a second kiss, much less wild, hot, frantic sex. Much less the satisfaction that I was totally and undeniably irresistible.
    I fought against the sudden tears that burned the backs of my eyes.
    I was a born vampire.
    Powerful. Smart. Superior. Invincible. Attractive. Even if I did have major gunk on my boots.
    I was not going to break down in the back of a New York cab, in front of a totally clueless and only minimally cute driver.
    Of course, once I reached Connecticut, and solitude, I fully intended to let loose with the water works and wallow in some major self-pity.
    That is, if the cops didn’t catch me first.

“A re you a parking ticket, because you have fine written all over you,” the cabbie said as we rolled to a stop on the well-manicured road that connected a handful of pricey estates, my parents’ among them.
    It was the cabbie’s thirtieth cheesy pickup line in as many minutes—the torture had started after we’d left the city and hit I-95 headed toward Connecticut.
    The first and classic “Do you have a Band-Aid? ’Cause I scraped my knees when I fell for you” had snapped me out of self-pity mode and started me rethinking my nonviolence stance.
    “Come on,” he went on. “Talk to me.”
    “I really don’t feel like talking. Here,” I told him, motioning to the side of the road. “Just drop mehere.”
    “But the house is way up there.” He motioned to the massive white colonial that sat in the far distance. “There’s no reason to wear yourself out walking.” He grinned and winked. “You should save your strength. We could go out. Maybe get something to drink. Or a lube job.”
    “Excuse me?”
    “With all those curves you’ve got, I need to make sure my brakes are in working order.”
    Pu- lease.
    While the go, go, go hadn’t worked, the old vamp magnetism was, unfortunately, alive and well.
    Thankfully. In my rush to escape, I’d left my purse back at the office, along with my bank card and my Visa. Not that I could have used either without alerting the police to my whereabouts.
    I know,