Now if you're anything like me, you're dying to know more about this party. You just want me to skip over any niceties like me checking in with the guys or even meeting up with Beatrice. It's okay: I completely understand. If this were a movie, we'd just skip through all of the fiddly bits and do a nice jump cut of Beatrice's car pulling up at a glitzy party with lots of paparazzi. There's maybe even a shot of Beatrice exiting the car dramatically, all legs, stunning red dress and diamonds, escorted by me looking as slick as possible in the very expensive (and custom-tailored) tuxedo she had provided for me.

It's all about the party, right?

Did Beatrice and I have sex almost as soon as she dragged me into the elevator? Of course, we did, and it was explosive and hot as always. It was a reminder of how good it felt to be alive.

Did I check in with the guys? Of course, I did. Natalie was a little bit testy, but that seemed to be her default setting recently; Benjamin was possibly suffering from some form of PSTD, Frankie was sulking, and Stanley was way too hyped up about getting a new workout routine. Other than that, they seemed perfectly fine.

I did find out that it had been almost eighteen hours since we had been killed by the woman in the alley. I still hadn't come up with a nickname for her so I couldn't even quip about it properly. Beatrice had actually returned to the church a few minutes too late to stop the attack, but she had been in time to stop our attacker from doing anything else drastic. By drastic, I mean cut our fucking heads off.

"What do you mean cut our fucking heads off?"

"If you want to kill a vampire, you gotta cut off the head. It's the only way to be sure."

"Was that a thing she was about to do?"

"No? Maybe? She did have a sword, so I'm going to assume she was going to use it."

"Fuck," I said, rubbing my neck absently. "Tell me the fight was at least epic."

"Oh it was fucking epic, but she got away."

Beatrice had brought us back to the facility, but that had been the previous night, so we had missed a whole day while in recovery.

We were in the car when she made this revelation. I had just noticed the time and wondered how it could be earlier in the evening than I had remembered it being. I thought to ask her why she had left us inside the body-bags and hadn't taken us to Madame Vera's, but then figured that she had her reasons. Good reasons, right?

Panicked, I checked my phone, and sure enough, there were a dozen messages from Sammy checking to see if I was going to make it to work on time.

"I can't go to a party!" I pleaded to Beatrice. "I have to go to work!"

"Too late sweetie," she had said, expertly guiding the car through the night traffic at speeds that were way too high for anyone who wasn't Beatrice.

"Sammy is going to kill me. She's going to yell at me first. Like a lot, but then comes the murder."

"It's just a job. I could pull some strings and get you a much better job..."

"While that would be so freaking awesome," I said with careful consideration, "right now, Sammy is depending on me to honour the promise I made. She's my friend, and I'm supposed to have her back at work. She's never going to trust me if I leave her stranded like this. It's a really shitty thing to do."

Beatrice glanced at me, but not too long since she was driving. You know those scenes in the movies where people spend too long looking at each other while driving, and you keep waiting to crash? This wasn't one of those scenes. We zipped in and out of cars on the busy downtown streets, and Beatrice needed to look where we were going. The look spoke volumes though. There was a hint of irritation, consideration and then cautious appreciation.

She slammed on the brakes as we came to a red light. I looked out the window at a slick-looking matte-black Audi. The driver was a fair-skinned black man who looked kind of familiar and was waving frantically at me—

"Bob!" The King called out as I finally figured out how to roll down my window. "How the hell are you, man?"

Now I know some of you are saying to yourselves, "Surely it can't be that the King, as in the famous rapper called 'the King', because that would be absurd, right?" Welcome to my life. It was definitely that "the King" and yes, he was a vampire. We had met at Harry's vampire club HTDK, but we'd really become friends after I'd been thrown off the roof. Long story, and no, I'm not going to go into it now, no matter how hilarious it may seem to you, and it is. I hadn't seen him in months, but he had sent me a "Glad You're Not Dead" card while I was recovering at Madame Vera's.

"Trying to keep my head down, you know how it is," I said, trying to be casual about the fact that I was riding shotgun in a car that was more expensive than his Audi. To be honest, it felt pretty damn awkward.

Let me take a minute to tell you about the car. You're going to want to know about the car. Ready?

The car Beatrice was hauling ass across town in was the Aston Martin One77. You don't know this, and I didn't realize it before I saw it, but the Aston Martin One77 is a remarkable piece of machinery. I had to look it up on Google just to see what the hell it was that Beatrice was driving. Apparently only seventy-seven of them had ever been made and just looking at it, you could see that it was worth every single penny of its $1.4 million price tag. Seventy-seven "one-off builds" according to the article. It looked like a slumbering dragon that was ready to take my damn-fool head off if I looked at it wrong; Beatrice drove it like she was taming a savage beast, and it was perfect.

"Yeah, I can see that," he said, definitely noticing the car and taking in every detail of it. He looked past me and nodded respectfully and cautiously. "Hello Beatrice," he said.

"Hello King," Beatrice said cooly. "Will you please tell your friend to ditch work and come hang out with me?"

"You should definitely do that man," the King said to me, but his hands were saying something else different. It was a huge reminder that everyone else saw Beatrice differently than I did. All they saw was the reputation of the vicious killer and not the caring and sexy woman that made my heart beat a little faster just at the sight of her.

I noticed the bowtie and waistcoat the King was wearing.

"Looking good man. Are we going to the same party?"

"I gotta go pick up my date first. If you do decide to go, I'll see you there. We'll catch up over drinks."

The light turned green, and Beatrice pulled out smoothly and quickly, leaving the King behind. I pushed the button to roll up my window.

"Let me talk to Sammy," I said. "I'll figure this out."

"Don't let me stop you," Beatrice said through gritted teeth and was she driving a little more aggressively than before? The answer to that is: yes. Definitely yes.

I pulled out my phone and texted to Sammy.

Me: I'm sick as shit. Literally. The "rear is dire" if you know what I mean. Can you get one of the new guys to come in?

I waited, watching the dots of doom as Sammy typed a response. Apparently, she was typing a lecture. Then came the response.

Sammy: Fine.

That caught me by surprise, and I almost breathed a sigh of relief, then another message came in.

Sammy: Fuck you.

Sammy: Fuck you.

Sammy: FUCK YOU.

I stared at the phone, wondering if it was too late to take it back, knowing that it was. I could always text back and say I was just joking and then bail from the car, totally abandoning Beatrice--

I looked at Beatrice again, and there came the thought again that her reputation had isolated her from everyone. I wondered how many friends she actually had. I couldn't actually remember ever seeing her talk to anyone besides Harry or me. It wasn't like she had a group of friends hanging around to joke and gossip with, no best friend to gossip about me with. It was just her, alone in the crowd... and she had chosen me for some reason.

I texted Sammy.

Me: Sorry. I promise I'll make it up to you.

Sammy: I want photos or it didn't happen!

Me: You want me to take photos of my diarrhea?

Sammy: JK! Just get better. And you better be in tomorrow.

I finally breathed a sigh of relief and looked over at Beatrice. I put my hand on her hand and smiled, hoping that I was reassuring, very much aware that I cared for this woman and didn't want to be the cause of her being hurt.

"We're good to go," I said to Beatrice.

She smiled and nodded, relief spreading through her. And you know what? Beatrice actually looked happy.