How to Party with a Killer Vampire by Penny Warner

Author:Penny Warner
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Penguin Group, Inc.
Published: 2011-10-03T22:00:00+00:00

I panicked the moment I reentered the cathedral. Mother was not in her pew. I searched the area and asked a few people sitting in nearby rows if they’d seen her, but no one seemed to have noticed the elegantly dressed woman in red with the netted hat. She’d vanished.

I ran out of the front entrance and scanned the area from the top step, searching up and down the hilly street. No sign of her. Someone came up behind me. I turned around to face the priest who’d ridden in the elevator with me.

“Are you all right, miss?” he asked. Apparently I didn’t look all right.

“My mother,” I said between rapid, shallow breaths. “I’ve lost her!”

In a calm voice he probably used to address the congregation, he said, “What does she look like?”

I described my mother to him. He nodded solemnly.

“I know the woman you speak of. She comes here from time to time. I saw her walking the outdoor labyrinth just moments ago.” He pointed to the right side of the church.

I let out a breath, shook the priest’s hand, and thanked him profusely. I’m sure he thought I was an overly dependent mama’s girl who needed to cut the cord. Following his point, I headed around the side to the courtyard where I found Mother walking the intricate path and mumbling to herself. As I approached, I heard her say, “ ‘Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer. . . .’ ”

I took a shortcut through the winding path and stepped over to her, gaining some irritated looks from the other walkers. Apparently one didn’t interrupt another’s path.

“Mom! You scared me! I didn’t know where you were.”

“Oh, darling, I was here. Where else would I be?”

On a cable car headed for Fisherman’s Wharf. In a cab traveling to the de Young Museum. In a bar flirting with a traveling salesman. God knew.

I took her hand. “We have to go now, Mom. I think we’ve had enough of an adventure for today. Let’s go get a bite to eat at Tommy’s Joynt. Then I’ll get you back home.”

“All right, dear, but I wasn’t finished with my maze walk. You know, walking this path is sort of like solving a puzzle, like those crimes you sometimes try to solve. Only I didn’t have a puzzle to solve, so I just recited ‘The Raven’ by Edgar Allan Poe:

Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels name Lenore? Quoth the raven, ‘Nevermore.’ ”

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