Page 1 of The Vampire and the Case of the Baleful Banshee

Chapter 1

I woke when the world tilted sideways. The whole house was shaking and shuddering – and so was my undead heart.

‘We’re under attack!’ I shouted in panic to my pets. Fluffy gave a low whine, though he didn’t seem to be joining me on Team Freak-the-Fuck-Out. Shadow let out a yowl and disappeared under the bed. The bed! That seemed like a good option, actually.

And that’s when my brain connected the dots…

I suddenly realised that I wasn’t so much under attack, rather I was going through my first earthquake. Alaska is on an active tectonic plate boundary. I’d read about it – but it was a whole different thing to experience it.

‘Doorways!’ I barked to my dog. ‘We’re supposed to stand in doorways!’

You didn’t need to tell Fluffy twice – he is the very best boy. In seconds, the two of us were braced against the wooden beams, waiting for this fresh hell to stop. Shadow stayed under the bed, and who could blame him? The earth was supposed to gently revolve, not shake me like a magic eight-ball that’s providing a dissatisfying answer.

Finally, after what seemed like hours, the tremors stopped. I was being overdramatic – the whole thing didn’t last long – but it was my first freaking earthquake and it seemed like a big deal to me.

I bit my lip. I should probably verify that it was an earthquake and not some pissed-off witches casting spells at my house.

The metal shutters around my home were closed, but my watch told me it was late afternoon so I called Sidnee. She’d be up and she’d know what the heck was going on.

‘Sidnee,’ I said breathlessly when she answered, ‘was that an actual earthquake?’ I sounded a teensy bit excited; now that it had stopped, I could get behind a new experience. It wasn’t something that was going to happen often. Was it?

‘Yup,’ she agreed cheerfully. ‘A good-sized one too. A 5.5.’

‘That’s the Richter scale, right?’

‘That’s the one, although now we say magnitude scale,’ she chirped.

‘I wonder what happened to Richter to make him so interested in categorising earthquakes,’ I mused aloud.

‘Maybe he got dropped on his head as a baby.’ Sidnee’s tone suggested that was the only way someone could possibly find such things interesting.

‘During an earthquake?’ I joked, making her snigger.

A 5.5. I searched my memory for a frame of reference, or so I could add a frame of reference. I recalled that every point on the earthquake scale indicated ten times the increase in power. Shit. A 5.5 had almost given me a heart attack; the shock of a 7 would probably kill me.

Sidnee sobered. ‘Hey, are you okay? Any damage or anything?’

‘No, I don’t think so. There was a lot of shaking but nothing wiggled off my shelves. It’s just that it was my first earthquake. It was scary for a minute,’ I admitted.

‘Of course it was,’ she said softly. ‘But we have them all the time, so you’ll get used to them. Before you know it, they’ll seem ordinary.’

‘Great,’ I muttered grumpily, not encouraged by the thought.

‘Most are so small you barely feel them,’ she added hastily. ‘We’ve had two since you’ve been here and you didn’t even notice!’

‘Do you remember any bigger than a 5.5?’ I couldn’t quite hide my nervousness.

‘Yeah, there was one about six years ago. It was wild. But apart from that one…’ Then she added helpfully, ‘Mind you, Alaska had the second biggest earthquake ever recorded, a 9.2. Of course, that was way before my time,’.

A 9.2? Jesus, I couldn’t even imagine that. I hoped the quakes stayed sub-5; that would be scary but okay. I could cope with that. ‘I didn’t know that and I wish I still didn’t,’ I said drily.

Her tinkling laugh made me smile. ‘They’ll seem ordinary soon. I promise.’

‘They better. Talk to you later. I need to get ready for work. Thanks for reassuring me.’

‘Anytime, Bunny.’

We rang off and almost immediately my phone rang: Connor. I swiped to answer. ‘Hey.’ His tone was casual. ‘Just ringing to see if you’re okay after the shake. That was a big one.’

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