Page 54 of Road Trip with a Vampire

Vampires were notoriously terrible cooks. It made sense if you thought about it. A chef who couldn’t sample what they were making would always be at a serious disadvantage. Undoubtedly Peter knew this about himself, too. But tried anyway.

For me.

My laughter subsided, and a lump formed in my throat that had nothing to do with the horrible mess I’d nearly swallowed.

When I returned to my living room, I grabbed a pen and a sheet of scrap paper from my coffee table.

Texting him would have been a more efficient way to communicate than what I was about to do, but he’d just sent me a handwritten note.

It seemed only reasonable to respond to his note the old-fashioned way.

Peter , I wrote.

Thanks for the cookies. What a surprise! You really shouldn’t have. (Seriously.)

I paused, unsure what to write next. A million possibilities sprang to mind, but they all felt too sentimental. I hadn’t forgiven him— couldn’t forgive him—for the past. Letting him know how much I missed him would blur lines that had to stay firmly drawn.

Hope you’re doing well.

That was okay to say, I decided, even though things between us were over. It was the truth.

–Z

I kept the bag of transporting powder beside my dagger on my nightstand these days. I sprinkled a pinch of it over the note, thought Peter’s front right pants pocket as hard as I could, and watched as the note disappeared into thin air.

He couldn’t send a note back to me the same way. That was okay. If he wanted to reach me, he could text.

I chose to ignore the way my heart fluttered at the image of him finding my note in his pocket, opening it. Thinking of me.

Becky was checking students in when I returned to the studio thirty minutes later, box of cookies in hand.

My earlier fatigue had deserted me the instant I’d learned of my mysterious delivery.

If I laid down now, I’d just stare at the ceiling, giving thoughts that I definitely shouldn’t be having the opportunity to run rampant.

Keeping the inedible cookies in my apartment felt like a bad idea for similar reasons.

“What was in the package?” Lindsay asked. She’d finished the window clings while I’d been upstairs and had moved on to adding goat-themed decor to the Walnut Room door.

“Cookies,” I said, setting the box down where we kept the trash ready for the dumpster. After Lindsay’s reaction to me texting with Peter, it was best to keep the explanation simple.

“Who were they from?” Lindsay asked.

I came up behind her, eyeing her work. “I didn’t realize there were so many different options for decorating with goats,” I deflected, hands on my hips. She’d put up a bucolic scene of a goat frolicking through a meadow. I had to admit, absurd subject aside, it was very artfully done.

Lindsay turned to face me, eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Who sent the cookies, Z?” she asked again.

“Um. The cookies?” I mumbled, totally stalling now.

“It was Peter, wasn’t it?” Becky asked from behind the check-in counter. “Is that why you’re throwing them away?”

“I’m throwing them away because they’re terrible.

” It was a partial answer, anyway. At the knowing looks my friends were giving me, I caved.

“Fine. Yes. Peter sent them. His note said he made them himself, which I thought was sweet.” I still did, even if the cookie I’d tasted had been the stuff of nightmares.

My friends exchanged a look. “That… was really thoughtful,” Becky said carefully. “And he made them himself?”

“So he says,” I said. I believed him. There was no way he could have bought something like that from anyplace that had passed a recent health inspection.

“No guy has ever baked me anything before,” Lindsay remarked. She walked over to the box and opened it, considering the contents. Then she took out one of the cookies and sniffed it thoughtfully.

“Don’t eat that,” I warned.

She ignored me, taking a large bite—before spitting it out a second later. “Holy shit. You weren’t kidding; these are awful.”

“I told you so,” I said.

Lindsay wiped at her mouth vigorously with the back of her hand. “Still, though,” she said once she’d finished. “This was a nice gesture.”

My friends exchanged another look.

“Zelda…” Becky began before trailing off. “I’m sorry. I don’t know how to ask this without prying.”

“I don’t, either,” Lindsay said. “But I’m asking anyway.

Z, what happened between you two while you were away?

” When I didn’t answer right away—how could I?

—she went on. “I just mean that if a guy who is very obviously not a baker sends you a box of cookies he made just for you, it probably means he feels bad about things and wants to apologize.”

“He didn’t make them just for me,” I countered. “He said these were left over from a batch he’d made for unrelated reasons .”

Lindsay snorted. “And you believed that?”

I didn’t, of course. What other reason could he have possibly had to bake cookies? “Um,” I said, floundering now. “What happened to you hating him?”

“I never said I hated him,” Lindsay said. At my doubtful expression, she backtracked. “All right, maybe I was mad at him for hurting you. But you’ve assured us that he’s not a bad person. I believe you.”

“He’s not,” I said. “We just…don’t work.”

“Are you sure?” Becky asked. “We saw how excited you were when he texted the other night. If he inspires lie to my friends so I can leave the room and text him back feelings, maybe it’s worth reconsidering?”

I closed my eyes, reminding myself of all the reasons why reconsidering was not an option.

“We don’t work,” I repeated, more emphatically this time. “I wish we did, but we don’t.”