A Girl's Guide to Vampires

Roxy shrugged and stuffed a forkful of pork and cabbage in her mouth. "Something to do with the manner of their punishment, I think," she said indistinctly. "Anyway, they can't eat or drink anything but blood—it doesn't have to be human, though—they can't tolerate sunlight, of course, and they have great powers of mesmerism. They can also change their forms into animals, and are difficult to kill or wound. A Dark One can't ever become human again, but once he has completed the Joining with his Beloved, the woman who is his soul mate, he can do a lot more stuff like tolerate a little bit of sunlight. But the best part is that they're all, without exception, fantastic lovers."

I stopped frowning at my salad and gave her an exasperated look. "Oh, for heaven's sake, Roxy—"

"Well, they are!"

"Dark Ones are fictional characters—"

"Damned sexy fictional characters!"

"What is this Joining of which you spoke?" Christian asked, mostly, I suspected, to keep the peace between Roxy and me.

She waved her fork at him as she chewed. "That's really cool. There are seven steps to a successful Joining."

I glanced at the small wooden clock on a shelf near the door. "Roxy, it's almost six. We really should be going if you want to have maximum play time at the fair."

"This won't take a minute. Christian's interested, aren't you?"

"Fascinated," he said, pushing his plate aside. I frowned at it for a minute. It was bare of all except a few pieces of garnish. He ate even faster than Roxy, and if she wasn't awarded the world's fastest eater title by the record-keeping people, it wasn't for lack of trying.

"The seven steps are this: First, the Dark One marks the heroine as his own; second, he protects her from afar; third, he conducts the first exchange—"

"Of body fluids," I interrupted. "Such as blood, saliva, that sort of thing. I know it sounds icky, but I have to admit, the way Dante writes it, it's really not. Usually the first exchange is a really steamy kiss."

"—followed by the fourth step, where he entrusts the heroine with his life by giving her the means to destroy him; then there's the second exchange." Roxy wiggled her eyebrows at him. "I'll let you guess what sorts of bodily fluids are exchanged there. The sixth step has the Dark One seeking the heroine's assistance to overcome his darker self, and finally, the last step is the ultimate exchange—their life-blood. The heroine redeems his dark soul by offering herself as a sacrifice so he can live. He doesn't let her die, of course, but it's all very romantic!"

"And utterly fictional," I muttered. Roxy didn't hear me, but Christian did. "That's it, Rox, you're done. Eat your dumpling and let's get a move on. The fair is about to start, and you're boring Christian to tears."

"Mmmm," Roxy said with a knowing smile, scarfing down the last of her dumpling. "The fact that a certain hottie guy will be hanging around there has nothing to do with your desire to check it out, huh?"

I stood up and grabbed my dearest friend in the whole wide world and muttered dire threats in her ear if she continued with that thread of conversation. She just stuck her nose in the air, and graciously allowed Christian to pay for our dinner.

We ran upstairs to collect our coats since the nights were starting to get cold. As I locked my hotel room behind me, I came to a fast decision.

"Rox," I said as she toddled out of her room. "I want to tell you something, but I don't want you to freak out."

She stared at me for a moment. "Well, I've seen you naked so I know you're not really a man. What's the problem?"

I cleared my throat nervously and tried to think of how to say it without sounding any more deranged than I was feeling. "You remember last night in the bar, when I got dizzy?"

She nodded, looking impatiently toward the stairs, taking my arm and trying to tug me in that direction. "Yeah. You said it was because of the beer, not that you had a lot of it."

"Well," I said, reminding myself that she was my oldest and dearest friend, and if she wouldn't be understanding and supportive in my time of need, no one would, "that wasn't exactly the truth."

Her eyes widened and she stopped trying to shove me toward the stairs. "Oh my God! You don't mean… Joy, why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't know quite how," I said miserably, playing with the buttons on my coat. "It's not quite something I want everyone to know."

"I'll say! Geez, this puts a whole new light on things, huh? When are you due?"

"Due?"

"The baby. When's it due? And what are you going to say to Bradley?"

I smacked her on her arm. "I'm not pregnant, you boob!"

"Oh." She looked a bit disappointed. "If it's not a baby that made you feel faint, what was it?"

I took a peek down the stairs to make sure no one was hovering just out of sight. "I'm having, for lack of a better word, visions."

"Visions?"

"Yeah. You ever had them?"

"You mean visions of the Virgin Mary, that kind of vision?"

"No, not that. My visions are about… a man."