Page 31 of My Roommate Is a Vampire

I had no ideawhoweird coffee shop guy was or why he was there. He, however, recognized me right away.

“Hey, Cassie Greenberg.” He sounded surprised to see me but not unhappy about it. He grinned, showing off perfectly straight, gleaming white teeth. He reached out his hand towards me. After an awkward beat I realized he wanted me to shake it. Slowly, as though moving through a dream, I clasped his hand in mine.

It was like holding onto a block of ice.

“I’m Reggie,” he said, still smiling. “We met the other night at the café.” He paused. “Well.Sort ofmet, anyway.”

Reggie.

Was this theReginaldFrederick had mentioned a few times in passing? He gave my hand a few quick pumps before I pulled out of his grip.

I looked between him and Frederick—who, for his part, looked like he wanted the ground to open up and swallow him whole—trying to understand what was going on.

“I told Freddie he needed to come clean with you.” Reggieelbowed Frederick in the ribs good-naturedly. “But I gather from the look on your face that he didn’t listen to me.”

He jabbed Frederick in the ribs again—more forcefully this time. But Frederick was clearly ignoring him. His eyes bore into mine, beseeching me wordlessly to understand... something.

“Miss Greenberg,” he began, sounding desperate. “Cassie,” he amended.

“What do you need to come clean with me about, Frederick?” Instinct told me I couldn’t trust Reggie—Reginald—as far as I could throw him. But Frederick’s desperation confirmed that he was right about at least one thing: there was alotFrederick wasn’t telling me.

“Speak up, Freddie!” Reggie encouraged. He clapped Frederick on the back.

“Leave,” Frederick muttered, his tone murderous. “Now.”

“In a minute,” Reggie said, in a light singsong. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen a good show.” He stepped fully into the living room, moving around both Frederick and the large, wrapped package at his feet, and then strode directly to the kitchen, where I still stood rooted to the spot beside the fridge of doom.

“I think I’ll have a snack before I go,” he whispered in my ear, conspiratorially. He opened the fridge with a flourish, then reached inside and scooped up several plastic bags of blood.

My eyes went wide.

With a wink at me, Reggie bit into one of the bags with what looked, to me, a hell of a lot like fangs.

As I watched him drink the bag down, then toss it into the trash—empty in seconds, drained entirely dry—and bite into a second, I felt the room start to spin. I’d never been a particularly squeamish person; but then, nothing in any of my life experiences had prepared me for what I was seeing now.

“Reginald,” Frederick growled warningly. “Get out.Now.”

He pouted. “But I just got here! We were going to have a little party before your roommate got here.”

“Reginald.”

“Freddie.” Reginald rolled his eyes. “Stop being silly. You’re just as hungry as I am. Don’t you want a snack, too?”

Without waiting for an answer, Reggie grabbed another bag from the fridge and tossed it to Frederick—who caught it, easily.

The sight of Frederick—my roommate who stayed out all night for cryptic reasons and slept all day, who dressed in vintage suits and spoke like someone from a different era—holding a bag of blood...

The last piece of the puzzle slid into place.

I knew exactly what he hadn’t been telling me.

“Frederick...” I began, the floor beneath my feet going decidedly wobbly.

How was any of thisreal?

Frederick cleared his throat. “It occurs to me that it is long past time I told you several... very specific things about myself.” He was glaring at Reginald, but it was clear he was talking to me. He had the decency to sound sheepish. Which... well. Good. I was pretty sure he’d been lying to my face about a lot of very important things since I’d met him.

Feeling bad about it was certainly a step in the right direction.