Page 45 of My Vampire Plus-One

“Heseemsnice enough,” he said, his voice low and urgent. “I know Frederick through Cassie, and he’s one of the good ones. If Reginald is friends with him there’s probably no reason for me to worry about this. But if your date does anything…strange…will you let me know?”

Unbelievable.

Was Sam seriously doing the whole overprotective brother thing right now? Here, at a family party, where the most dangerous thing that might happen to me would probably involve Aunt Sue’s dairy-laden catering?

“Sam,” I said, exasperated. “Please calm down.”

Sam wasn’t deterred. “Promise me.”

I threw up my hands. “Fine,” I said. “If Reggie doessomething strange, I’ll let you know. But I already told you he’s not my real boyfriend. After tonight, I won’t see him again until Gretchen’s wedding.” I folded my arms across my chest. “After the wedding, I’ll never see him again at all.”

“Amelia.”

Sam and I turned our heads in unison at the sound of Reggie’s voice. Wow, he moved quietly. And fast. A moment ago, he’d been over there standing by a large potted plant. Now he held up a plate of food in one hand and a glass of white wine in the other.

“This is for you,” he continued. “I don’t know when the kitchen staff planned to serve these mushroom things, but when I glared at them, they handed over a plate.” He smirked. “I have an excellent glare.”

“Kitchen staff?” I blinked at him. “Do you mean my aunt and cousins?”

He shrugged. “Not sure. Whoever was preparing the food.”

Sam muttered something under his breath I didn’t quitecatch, though it sounded a bit likeI cannot believe I am going through this again.In a louder voice he said, only to me: “I have to find Aunt Sue. My firm agreed to help her make some changes to her will and we wanted to hammer out the details before Tuesday. I’ll call you soon, okay?”

Reggie and I both watched as he made his way out of the room.

“I don’t think he likes me,” Reggie mused.

“I’m sure that’s not true,” I said. “He’s just going through an overprotective phase right now.”

“No,” Reggie said. “I think itistrue. It’s fine. I get that a lot.”

His sad smile shouldn’t have tugged at my heart. He was a stranger. But something about seeing that flicker of pain cross his face did something to me. I wanted to reach up and smooth away the furrows in his brow with the tips of my fingers.

“I’m sure everything will be fine with Sam,” I said.

I hoped it would be, anyway. The last thing I needed was for my brother to be all weird about my fake boyfriend right before Gretchen’s wedding.

•••••••

The wine was good, andI drank down most of my glass in a couple of swallows. I hadn’t been in a particular hurry to start drinking, but now that a glass of wine had presented itself, I realized it was a passable way to calm myself down.

“Do you want a drink, too?” I asked Reggie. The sharp edges of my nerves were already starting to blur. “Something to eat?”

His eyes widened. He whipped his head around several times, as though trying to make certain no one had heard me. “Later,” he murmured, voice pitched low. “There are too many other people around.”

He said it so earnestly, the first hint of what sounded like actual anxiety in his voice since we’d gotten here. He was taking all this so seriously. It was sweet.

“I don’t think anybody would think less of you if you got a drink.” I nodded towards the kitchen, where a group of men I vaguely recognized as second cousins were taking beers from the fridge. I was amused to see that some of them were clearly underage—including Alex, a teenager I vaguely recognized as one of my youngest half cousins—but I was hardly going to rat anybody out at a family party. “See? People have already gotten started.”

Reggie stared at me incredulously for a moment, then turned his head in the direction of the kitchen. When he saw my cousins, he huffed a laugh.

“I suppose they have started drinking,” he said. And then added, unnecessarily, “Drinkingbeer, that is.” He inclined his head a little closer to me. His breath was cool and sweet on my cheek. “Listen, Amelia…”

He looked like he was about to say more, but my parents chose that moment to appear at my side. Reggie immediately swallowed whatever it was he’d been about to say. He pressed his lips together into a faint smile, schooling his features into an expression of polite interest.

“Well, hello,” he said, turning to them. “You must be Mr. and Mrs. Collins.”

Mom was beaming. She wore a pink dress cinched at the waist with little appliqué flowers across the neckline. It flattered her. I’d have to remember to compliment her on it later, when my heart wasn’t pounding so hard from nerves it felt like it was about to burst out of my chest.

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