Stakes & Stilettos - Michelle Rowen [45]
When I reached the doorway I didn’t slow down. Which was rather unfortunate because at the threshold it felt as if I’d just walked directly into a plate-glass window. I slammed into the barrier and fell backward. Thierry caught me before I hit the ground.
“What the hell?” I said out loud, feeling bruised and shaken, not to mention charbroiled.
Barry appeared next to his wife. He was a full foot shorter than her and Amy wasn’t exactly an Amazon. He wore a small blue business suit and had his arms crossed and he studied me for a moment.
I was getting warmer in my cocoon by the second.
“Yes, it does appear to be some sort of curse,” he said.
And then he smiled at me. Smiled! At me!
That little rat bastard. From almost the moment we met he’d rubbed me the wrong way. They always talk about love at first sight. They never mention seething dislike at first sight. I’d tried to like him. Really, I had. And the fact that my best friend had fallen head-over-four-inch-heels for the creep, been sired into a life of fangs and immortality, and married him within weeks of meeting him didn’t exactly help the situation.
He seethingly disliked me, too. Something to do with my corrupting Thierry and making life more difficult for everyone involved.
Whatever.
I forced myself not to panic. “I can’t come inside. What am I supposed to do now?”
Amy was wringing her hands. “I’ll go get the fire extinguisher. Just in case!”
“No, that won’t be necessary.” Barry sighed. “I invite you into my home, Sarah Dearly.”
I glanced at Thierry. His expression was tight and he nodded.
I tried walking through the open door again, braced for any resistance, but there was none. Thierry closed the door behind me.
I let the comforter drop to the floor of Amy and Barry’s foyer. Amy hugged me and stroked the slightly sweaty hair off my forehead.
“Poor Sarah!” she exclaimed. “We’re going to find that witch and we’re going to break this stupid curse.”
“That would be a good thing,” I said. “It’s a little inconvenient.”
“Luckily, the sun sets before six o’clock these days.”
I summoned a weak smile. “Hooray.”
“Why are you still wearing those sunglasses?” she asked.
“Oh, just because.” I released her and pulled the shades away to show her my black eyeballs.
Her eyes went wide. “Yikes.” Then her gaze moved down to my hand. “You have a new ring! Ooo! Did Thierry give it to you?”
I nodded. “An early Valentine’s Day gift.”
“It’s beautiful!”
“Sarah must now be invited into a home before she can enter,” Thierry said aloud as if he were talking to himself. “She has uncontrollable thirst for blood and sunlight burns her.”
He shared a glance with Barry.
Barry studied me for a moment with a smile still curling up the corners of his mouth. “A very interesting curse indeed.”
I eyed him. “Thierry says you were cursed, too.”
“I was.”
“What was the curse?”
“That’s a little personal.”
I sat down heavily on a wooden bench they had in their front hallway. Beside it was a shoe rack that held Amy’s top twenty pairs of heels. One, I noticed, was a nice pair borrowed from me a year ago that I’d totally forgotten about.
“Barry was cursed to be unable to speak for a hundred years,” Thierry said.
I snorted at that. “Why did you have to break a helpful curse like that?”
Barry scowled at me. “It wasn’t funny.”
“Neither is this.”
“The curse was broken by getting the witch to remove the spell. It is as simple as that,” Thierry explained. “Barry, I’ve made some headway. I know she lives in the city, but her phone number is unlisted.”
“I will help you with whatever you require, Master.”
I rolled my eyes. It just creeped me out that he called Thierry “Master.” He also got a little peeved when everyone else didn’t follow suit. I guess I could understand a little. Three hundred years ago Thierry had rescued Barry from being on display as an abused and exploited miniature vampire in a traveling fair. Hearing about that had softened