Page 33 of My Big Fat Vampire Wedding

“W hat is going on here?” Pandora asked when she walked into the sitting room to find Vlad on his antique perch. With Elizabeth the cockatoo cozied up next to him. No, not only cozied up. She had her wing wrapped around him.

“Don’t judge,” Vlad said, stifling a yawn.

“But you can’t stand her,” Pandora said.

“She’s grown on me.”

“Grown on you, or worn you down?” Pandora asked as Elizabeth turned to start preening Vlad’s feathers.

“Both,” he replied. “But she makes that arrogant crow that’s always in the garden jealous. So there’s that.”

Pandora broke into a knowing smile just as the knocker sounded, making her brows scrunch. It was still morning. Her entire family was upstairs sleeping. Including, of course, Henrietta’s dogs, who she’d somehow trained to be mostly nocturnal as well.

“Probably another package,” Pandora said, waving toward the tower about to topple over in the foyer.

Once Cody had introduced Ravenna and Reginald to the wonders of online shopping, it had been a steady stream of boxes showing up at the door.

Some contained things Ravenna insisted were “vital” to the wedding planning.

Others had replicas of things that Reginald missed about the “old days”.

Mostly, though, he liked to order costumes meant for Renaissance fairs or cosplay.

Then spend hours telling everyone what was, and was not, historically accurate.

From the design to the threads used in the stitching.

Pandora reached for the knob, expecting to just find a retreating parcel carrier and a box on the front steps.

Instead, Victor was standing there, backlit by the sun, making her notice flecks of gold and red in his dark hair that she’d never noticed before.

“Oh, hello,” she said, giving him a surprised smile.

“Sorry to just pop by. I figured it would be smarter to discuss things in person than try to answer …” He looked at his mobile. “Seventeen separate texts.”

“Sorry about that. My family has been a bit overbearing about some of the planning details,” Pandora said, moving back so he could step inside, glad for the opportun-ity to have him inside without worrying about her family saying or doing something absurd.

“I imagine they just want it to be nice for you.”

“For us,” she said. “Which is why they want me to consult you on all of these things. I am practically expecting Aunt Ravenna to require your actual signature on all these decisions.”

“I like Ravenna,” Victor said, taking off his backpack as they sat down at the dining table.

“She’s the best. OK, so, for the meal …” she said, ready to get down to business.

But it was right then she heard footsteps making their way down the staircase. Given that everyone else had just gone to bed, there was only one person it could be.

Dante.

Pandora put her finger to her lips.

Victor’s brows drew down but he didn’t say a peep as she slowly rose to her feet, making her way to the doorway to see, just as she’d expected, Dante making a beeline for the front door.

He paused, reaching to grab a coat from the hanger, pulling up the large hood, then reaching into the pockets to produce gloves.

Then he pulled open the door … and moved out into the daylight.

“Hey,” Pandora whispered, rushing back toward Victor, picking up his backpack. “Come on. We have a little mission today.”

With that, she rushed to the door, grabbing her own coat and gloves, then reaching for an umbrella.

“Oh, it’s not supposed to rain,” Victor said.

“It’s for the sun,” Pandora said, pulling open the door, then opening the umbrella. “I get burned very easily. Even on a cloudy day, I can get a little burn.” She made her way down the front path, trying not to run, while keeping an eye on her quickly moving brother.

“What are we doing?” Victor asked.

“Following Dante,” Pandora said in a whisper, not wanting Dante, who had super-hearing just as she did, to overhear.

“For what reason?”

“He’s been acting strange lately,” she told Victor. “Sneaking off, not telling anyone where he is going.” In the daytime , she added silently. “He’s looking more and more run-down, so I just want to make sure he’s OK.”

Victor’s gaze softened at that.

He might not have siblings of his own, but he clearly understood her concern as they followed Dante down the streets of London, then to the Underground, where they stood at the train car at the furthest end, their backs to Dante.

Not that he seemed to notice them. Or even seem worried about being followed.

Why would he?

None of his family went out during the day.

They could, of course. There were many times Pandora had needed to go out in the daylight over the years.

Precautions had to be taken. Long sleeves, gloves, oversized hats, and umbrellas or parasols.

Sometimes, especially in the summer, you could still feel the threatening burn of the sun through your protective measures, but Pandora had never been singed, let alone caught fire, before.

That said, Dante had no reason to think their family would even want to be out in the daylight.

They took pride in being creatures of the night.

Of being the shadows lurking in dark corners.

Of being the whispered sounds that haunted humans as they walked down alleys or alone on the pavement at night.

“Going quite far out there, aren’t we?” Victor asked as Pandora admired a particularly gorgeous garden, still alive with late-blooming dahlias and asters.

“Oh, sorry. Do you have to be at uni?” she asked, suddenly worried that she’d pulled him away from something important.

Really, she should have just made an excuse and gone her separate way from him back at the house. There was no telling what Dante might be up to – what she might need to protect Victor from.

She hadn’t been thinking straight, clearly.

Though, the larger part of her thought she simply wanted him there. With her. Especially when potentially uncovering something upsetting.

“No. No, I’m done for the day. I was just going to do the washing. This will be more fun than that.”

Eventually, Dante got off the train.

“Hampstead,” Victor said as they made their way through the station, following Dante at a safe distance as he made his way out onto the busy streets.

Pandora ignored the sideways looks from passersby as she walked under her umbrella.

“It’s been a while since I’ve been out this way,” Victor said as they moved from the busy city streets toward a more residential lane, the leaves crunching under their feet as they walked. “But … there’s not much out here now, is there? Now that we’re past the shops?”

“Not really,” Pandora said, watching Dante pause to pet a passing golden retriever before continuing on.

“Maybe he has a mate out this way. Or a girlfriend.”

Pandora hadn’t even considered that possibility.

It would make things make sense, wouldn’t it? If he’d perhaps got himself a human girlfriend. Why he was out all day and stayed holed up in his room all night. Why he was so supportive of her fake relationship with Victor.

“Maybe.”

But as they turned down the road that went from resi-dential to rural, she was pretty sure that wasn’t the case either.

It wasn’t until she saw Dante take a turn into a car park that she realized where he was heading.

“Is he going to the pond?” Victor asked, looking over at Pandora for confirmation.

“Seems like it.”

What the heck was he up to?

“Meeting with some friends?” Victor asked, suddenly sounding more hesitant, like he felt bad for following Dante if he was doing something so casual.

“I understand if you don’t want to go any further,” Pandora said. “But I’m already this far. I want to see what he’s doing.”

She couldn’t tell him it was because this wasn’t normal behavior. That he shouldn’t be out in the daytime at all, let alone out by the pond where the sun was even stronger.

“How about we take a stroll around the lake?” Victor said. “If you want to confront Dante, I will just hang back.”

She gave him a grateful smile. “Sounds like a plan.”

If they’d been there for any other reason, Pandora might have soaked up the moment. The riot of colours of the leaves on the ground. The scent of the fresh earth. The way the water rippled gently with the breeze as it picked up.

And, of course, sharing that with Victor.

But she was too busy searching for Dante.

She was about ready to give up when she suddenly saw him emerge from the lifeguard station.

Wearing the typical red-and-yellow lifeguard colours. Only, he had sports leggings on and a jacket. As well as a massively wide-brimmed hat.

In short, he looked outright ridiculous.

But he was clearly there with a purpose.

Being a lifeguard.

“Um, can you give me a few minutes?” Pandora asked.

“Sure,” Victor said. “Got some books in here.” He patted his backpack. “Take your time. I’ll be right here.”

As if to cement his point, he pulled out a book and sat down on the ground. He seemed engrossed in his reading before Pandora had even started to walk away.

Weeks of the weight of her concern fell away with each step, replaced with absolute confusion.

But before she could even come up with any plaus-ible explanations, Dante spotted her, his face going from shock to anger in a blink.

Then he was rushing toward her, making her anxiety shoot up when she noticed that, in his anger, he was moving at vampire, not human, speed.

A quick glance around, though, showed no one really noticed. It wasn’t exactly swimming season for most people, so the pond wasn’t as busy as it would have typic-ally been a month or two before.

“Pandy, what the hell are you doing here?” Dante asked, grabbing her around the upper arm and dragging her off the path and into the woods.

It wasn’t until they were out of sight that he released her. “Did you really follow me?” he asked.