Sex and the Single Vampire Read Online Free PDF Page A

clear?”
    “I am a Summoner,” I said with dignity.
    “Brava. Go Summon elsewhere.”
    “I know ghosts. Okay, you might be the first fully human ghost I’ve seen, but I know ghosts. Many times the deceased are confused about their status. The first thing they teach you in Summoning school is that not all ghosts are willing to admit they’re dead. Clearly you’re in that category. Now if you will just be quiet for three more minutes, I will finish the Release and you can go on your merry way.”
    The ghost leaped up off the table and stood glaring at me. I couldn’t help but look at where the cloth had fallen from.
    “Eep,” I said, my eyes close to bugging out of my head.
    He snarled something and grabbed the cloth from the floor, wrapping it around his hips. “By all the saints, will you just leave me in peace?” Oddly enough, that beautiful,silky voice didn’t lose any of its charm even when it was bellowing at me.
    I dislike being yelled at, however. It takes me back to the days when I was married and didn’t have enough brains to know that I didn’t have to take either the verbal or physical abuse. For that reason, I tend to be a bit snappish when someone starts lighting into me. “That’s what I’m trying to do, give you peace, you stupid spook! Now lie down and shut up!”
    I had dropped my notebook again when he leaped off the table, and bent down to pick it up, secretly amused by the stunned expression on the ghost’s face. My amusement died when I picked up the notebook. It was sticky with wetness. I flipped it open and noticed that everywhere I touched I left red smears.
    Smears of blood.
    I stared at my hands for a second, then down at the floor where the ghost’s blood had collected. “What is … Is it ectoplasm?”
    The ghost raised his hands to the heavens. “In all my years I have never been so plagued as I am at this moment! No, it is not ectoplasm!”
    I touched a wet spot on my notebook, then looked at a cut on his chest that was slowly seeping blood. Hesitantly I reached out and pressed a finger against his flesh. It was warm, firm, and felt like the softest velvet over steel. I instantly wanted to touch more, much more.
    Then I realized what it meant. I blinked. I swallowed. I cleared my throat. “You’re not a ghost.”
    The nonghost seemed to be breathing hard, which made his wounds seep blood all that much faster.
    “I am not a ghost,” he acknowledged, his teeth still apparently doing the grinding thing. “I have told you that at least six times now—”
    “Twice.”
    Breath hissed out his really nice lips. His eyes darkened until they were obsidian. His fingers clenched. “Twice what?”
    “You said you weren’t a ghost twice, not six times. Must be the blood loss making you a bit woozy.”
    Muscles in his chest rippled. I tried not to notice them, feeling it was rude to stare at such a magnificent—if bloody—chest when its owner was clearly in need of deep psychiatric and immediate medical care.
    “I have never been spoken to as you have spoken to me.”
    “Is that so?”
    “I do not like it,” he continued, just as if I hadn’t said anything. “You will cease it immediately and leave.”
    “Leave. As in … now?” Clearly he wasn’t thinking straight. It behooved me to try to calm him down before he did any more damage to himself.
    “Yes, now,” he answered me, a muscle in his jaw twitching. “You need to leave right now, before you ruin—” His lips clamped down on the words, cutting them off.
    “Ruin what?” I couldn’t help but ask. “I realize it’s a bit nosy of me, but I don’t often find naked men slowly bleeding to death in the basement of haunted inns. Call me silly, but I think you still need help. It can’t be good for you to slice yourself up like that and then lie around in the damp and drip blood everywhere. I’m sure there are some very nice doctors who would be happy to take care of you—”
    He said something in a language I