The Vampire Next Door Read Online Free PDF Page A

come up with that false wall?”
    He smiled. “I used to be an engineer. Not bad considering what I had to work with. I scavenged the wood and used a hammer and chisel to take the part of the rocks I wanted. Then mortar and superglue, and voilà!”
    Morgaine touched the stone face he had affixed to the double sheet of plywood. “It looks like a solid rock wall.”
    “And like it’s been here since the day the place was built,” Gwyneth added. “Y’all outdid yourself, Sly.”
    “Thanks. I was lucky the basement took a bit of a jog here. Otherwise I’d have had to make a much longer wall.”
    “It looks heavy, but y’all just picked it up like it was Styrofoam.”
    “That’s vampiric strength for you.”
    Gwyneth sidled up next to him and stroked his bicep. “My, my. I had no idea you was that strong.” She gazed at him like he had suddenly become a side of beef and she was starving. Maybe she was sex starved. How long ago had her old lover, Joe, moved out?
    Morgaine cleared her throat. “I can see a potential problem or two here.”
    Sly transferred his full attention to her. “What kind of problems?”
    “Well, ventilation for one.”
    Gwyneth said, “Oh, fiddlesticks. That’s right. Y’all have any windows down here?”
    “A couple.” Sly moved a few boxes to clear a path and led them to one of two small basement windows along the side wall. Since it was dark outside and dark inside, they must not have noticed them. Piles of old furniture and boxes might have also obscured their view. “Is this big enough?”
    “Does it open?” Morgaine asked.
    “It’s not supposed to, but it does. It used to be nailed shut, but I had to let Konrad in this way once when he got stuck outside buck naked.”
    Gwyneth laughed.
    “I think I remember him telling me about that,” Morgaine said. “He used to keep his clothes stashed behind the Dumpster before he shifted and went on his midnight runs. But he said they were stolen once.”
    “Twice. After that, he changed in his apartment, and either Nathan or I would let him out the door and back in again.”
    “Y’all shapeshifters and vampires might be strong as a team of horses, but you’ve got problems…” Gwyneth smirked.
    He caught Morgaine sending her a sharp look. “It’s okay for her to say that. It’s true. I hate my limitations. Hell, I missed out on raising my daughter because I’d never be able to drive her to soccer or band practice.”
    Gwyneth tipped her head. “I didn’t know Merry was in soccer and band.”
    “She wasn’t. I was just referring to all the things she might have wanted to do. Field hockey was her sport, and I think she took guitar lessons. Gave it up after her mother was killed by a stray bullet though.”
    “I thought y’all lost your wife from a vampire attack the night Merry was born.”
    “I did. I was referring to her other mother—the one who adopted her—Mrs. MacKenzie.”
    “The night you lost your wife… Is that when you were turned?” Morgaine asked softly.
    “Yes.” He hung his head, remembering that horrible night. “She was barely clinging to life, and the only way he’d help me get my pregnant wife to the hospital was if I allowed him to turn me.”
    “How awful!”
    Gwyneth crossed her arms. “I wish I’d been there. I’d have kicked his bad ass into next week and left him there—then helped you myself.”
    “He’d taken us God-knows-where. I’d have been wandering around a deserted warehouse area carrying a dying pregnant woman.”
    “So what finally happened?” Morgaine asked. “Did he use his vampiric strength and speed to take her to the nearest emergency room?”
    Sly frowned, remembering the fiend’s face. “He laughed. He said now that I was a vampire, I could get her there myself and pointed in the general direction of the hospital. It turned out we were only a mile or so away. I got her there in time to save Merry, but Alice had lost too much blood and died on the operating