“Got it,” I said, clearing my throat and straightening to my full (though not impressive) height. “Thanks.”
I rolled my shoulders and took a deep breath. I noticed that Sam’s hand remained on the back of my neck, his thumb occasionally sweeping over my vertebrae. I shivered a bit, but Sam kept his hand there.
“Now, before I announce the award winners, which will be included in the first-ever Faux Type O cookbook, Blue Ribbons with Bite, I’d like to announce the honorable mentions. First, we have Rita Scott with her Chum Cherry Slushie, a delightfully pulverized mix of blood blended with cherry syrup and ice.”
A plump, pretty blond woman in a bright pink church dress squealed joyfully and went to the stage to accept her yellow ribbon and certificate. Jane turned slightly green around the gills. I gave her a sympathetic look but then started to giggle. She made a very rude gesture behind the thin shield of her left hand. When Ophelia announced the second honorable mention as Ginger Lavelle with her Bloody Mary Margarita, the haggard chain-smoker I’d seen earlier launched herself at Ophelia and snatched her victory ribbon, waving it like a war banner. Ophelia stepped out of range, an unimpressed grimace twisting her young features.
“Lavelle?” I looked to Jolene. “Any relation?”
Jolene huffed out an irritated sigh. “That would be my mother-in-law.”
We watched as Ginger Lavelle did a victory shimmy that looked like something from a burlesque performance. “Wow,” I marveled.
“Well, she stuck with her area of expertise,” Jolene grumbled. “Booze.”
I expected Zeb to take offense at this, but he just nodded. “It’s possible she would have stumbled upon this recipe without the contest.”
Ophelia moved on to the prize winners. Third place and a thousand-dollar check went to a blood-and-beef-broth concoction created by Martha Hackett, a sweet-looking elderly lady I’d assumed was human until she grinned and flashed her fangs at the crowd. The fact that another name was called filled me with equal parts dread and hope. If I hadn’t placed third, it was likely that I’d placed second or first. Then again, I might not have placed at all. I imagined the humiliation of explaining to Chef Gamling that I hadn’t… and there I was, bent over hyperventilating again.
“Would you stop that?” Sam exclaimed, pulling me upright and pressing me against his side.
Second place went to Lulu McClaine’s Thinned Blood Pudding, a “charming drinkable dessert that tickled each judge’s palate.” Jolene whooped and cheered for her aunt before giving me an apologetic look. “Sorry, family loyalties.”
I groaned. I knew I should have made blood pudding!
“This is what we want,” Sam reminded me. “We’ve still got a shot. And if you throw up on me, I will get seriously pissed at you.”
I kept my face buried in my hands as Ophelia built up to the announcement of first place, describing the fabulous photo spread each prize winner would receive in the cookbook, the cash prize, and, of course, “the knowledge that the winner had helped new vampires adjust to their new diet.” Finally, Ophelia felt that she’d tortured us enough and exclaimed, “Every judge was pleased with the first-prize winner. For our recently turned panelists, it was everything good about summer cookouts, without the regrets of solid food on the vampire digestive system. Ladies and gentlemen, the winner of the Faux Type O Bloody Bake-Off and the twenty-five-thousand-dollar grand prize—Blood Creek Barbecue Sauce by Tess Maitland and Sam Clemson!”
If there was applause, I couldn’t hear it. I was frozen, unable to move or see anything beyond Sam’s face and its elated expression. His bright, unearthly smile lit up the town square. We’d done it. We had the money to buy the house out from under Lindy. I could stay in the Hollow and live in the place I loved. For the first time, everything I really wanted was in my grasp.
Jolene hugged me, and I shrieked, hopping up and down like a maniac. Sam laughed, watching with amusement as I seemed to lose my mind. I threw my arms around him and squeezed until he made a wheezing uhf sound. I beamed up at him.
Well, maybe not everything I wanted. But it was a good start.
“You put my name on the entry slip?” Sam asked as we made our way to the stage. “I didn’t see you do that.”
As an overenthusiastic well-wisher slapped me on the back, nearly bowling me over, Sam caught my elbow and shot the guy a dark look. I laughed, waving off the back-slapper’s apologies. “Of course I did. You were just as much a part of the creative process as I was. Without you, the vampire judges might have ended up in the hospital with food poisoning.”
He gave my arm an affectionate squeeze. “Thanks, Tess. I mean it.”
“I meant it, too,” I countered. Sam leaned in closer to me, his eyes intent on my upturned mouth. I smiled up at him, my hand slipping over the fingers gripping my arm.
From the stage, we heard a none-too-subtle throat clearing. Ophelia stood there, holding an oversized novelty check, her eyebrows arched. I blushed, and Sam gave her an apologetic shrug. We crossed the stage and claimed the giant check and the blue ribbon. We shook the judges’ hands. And while Jane was clearly trying to maintain the appearance of objectivity, the excited squeeze she gave my hand nearly brought me to my knees.
“I didn’t know it was yours, I swear,” she whispered. “After all, your first efforts were so… uh, raw. I thought you’d made the Valentine’s Day Massacre Marinara Sauce.”
“That’s so wrong,” I whispered back.
Jane shuddered. “Yes, it was.”
Ophelia motioned for me to join her and Sam at the mic. I blinked at the sheer number of people gathered in front of me. Oh, hell. This was why I hid out in the kitchen at work. I was not great in front of crowds. Ophelia gave me another nudge toward the mic, where I spluttered, “Um, th-thanks. Thanks so much for this. I’m thrilled.”
Ophelia looked less than impressed with my oratory skills, and when I tried to back away from the mic, she looped her arm through mine and kept me in place. “Tess is a recent addition to Half-Moon Hollow. One of our judges has informed me that our winner will be opening a restaurant here in town soon. And I’m sure she will have a wide selection of vampire menu items.”
Ophelia gave me a pointed smile, which I supposed deserved a response. “Uh, sure.”
“What are you going to call your establishment, Tess?” Ophelia asked.I floundered, my cheeks hot. I couldn’t believe I still hadn’t come up with a name for the place yet. Stricken, I looked up to Sam, who leaned into the microphone and announced, “Miss Maitland’s new restaurant will be called Southern Comforts.”
“Yes,” I squeaked. “Southern Comforts.”
“Well, I’m sure we’re all looking forward to the opening,” Ophelia said, smirking. The crowd applauded, and I waved halfheartedly. Ophelia leaned closer and whispered, “You should go now.”
Still a bit rattled, I nodded, and Sam led me offstage. Ophelia’s assistant gave us paperwork to sign and details about collecting our winnings. We also received a large cast-iron pot full of Faux Type O products to “continue our experimentation.”
After we thanked Jane again, she warned us to beware the unexpected gift basket and the potential trouble it could bring into our lives. Explaining that Jane had “issues” with gift baskets, Jolene and Zeb helped us lug the check and the cast-iron albatross to the truck. Then they insisted on taking us for drinks over at the Fraternal Order of Police beer garden. I noticed that Sam snagged one of the “special occasion” bottles of Faux Type O High Life before walking back with us.
“Thanks for naming my restaurant for me,” I told him as we took our seats at a picnic table near an improvised stage, where the night-shift sergeants picked out old country-western standards on acoustic guitars.
Sam grimaced. “Yeah, sorry. You just had this frozen deer expression, and I didn’t know how long it would take you to snap out of it.”
“Or Ophelia could have snapped on you,” Zeb observed.
“It’s OK, I like it,” I said. “Southern Comforts has quite the ring to it. And it fits with the theme I’d planned.” Sam sipped his drink, looking pleased, so I added, “Of course, you’re going to have to be my guinea pig.”
He chuckled, then straightened his expression into a frown. “I never agreed to that.”
“I think you’ll be willing to renegotiate,” I said, arching my eyebrows into a supervillain expression. “Or I will lace every bottle of blood in that gift basket with ghost chili oil.”
He narrowed his eyes at me. “You are the most twisted, evil little thing.”
“Why does that sound all sexy when he says it?” Zeb asked his wife.
Shaking her head, Jolene raised her cup of beer in a toast. “Here’s to your first Burley Days.”
“So far, it hasn’t sucked,” I added, clinking my cup against hers. I caught Sam’s eye before repeating the gesture against his blood bottle. “To ceasefires.”
Sam’s lips quirked into a grin. “To ceasefires.”
—
A few beers later, Sam decided it was time to leave. I kept lingering, discussing plans for the restaurant with Jolene, until Sam and Zeb shared a determined “manly men together” look and dragged us away from the table.
“You know, if you make too much of a show of this, some very ugly rumors about vampire brutality on tourists will start spreading around town,” I told Sam, snickering as he slung me under his arm like a football and carried me down the darkened sidewalk to his truck.
“Yeah, because I have such a great reputation.” He grunted as he hauled me toward the truck. “My God, woman, how much funnel cake did you eat?”
“Nice.” I barked out a laugh while he opened the truck door for me. He grinned down at me, giving me a boost as I climbed into the passenger seat. His hands were resting on my hips, and I had the strangest urge to map that little constellation of freckles on his cheekbone with my tongue. His lips parted, and I leaned forward just in time to hear—
“Sammy?”
Breaking a Few Eggs
9
The spell broke as we turned to find Sam’s ex-wife standing on the sidewalk, gaping at us.
“Sammy, what are you doing here?” Lindy demanded, shrugging off the insistent arm of a blond, tan man in jeans and pink polo shirt. The guy was in his midthirties and had intentionally popped his collar.
An unfiltered expression of pain flashed across Sam’s face, particularly when he saw Mr. Popped Collar’s arm around Lindy’s shoulders.
“You know it’s not a good idea for you to be out in public.” Lindy sighed, as if she were scolding a small child. “You know how you are. What if you hurt someone?”
“I’m fine.” Sam growled, ever so subtly stepping away from me. I looked to Popped Collar, to gauge how he felt about interloping in the Clemsons’ bizarre marital drama. He appeared to be playing Angry Birds on his phone.
“Still, maybe I should take you home,” Lindy fussed. “You know how you get around humans. This has to be pushing your control to the limit. Let’s just get you home before you hurt someone.”
“Don’t you worry about me!” Sam barked. “You owe Tess here an apology for dragging her into our mess. How could you rent the house without even talkin’ to me? That’s out-there, even for you, Lindy.”
“Sammy, I didn’t want to rent out the house, but I needed the money,” she said, her voice rising to a wheedling, babyish tone that grated on my nerves. “You know how expensive it is to start up with a new apartment. I just need a little extra to put down the security deposit.”
I huffed. “Oh, come on!”