Free Secret Life Of A Vampire by Kerrelyn Sparks Page A

groaned.
    “You want to talk to Lara?” LaToya spoke with a high-pitched sweet voice. “May I ask who's calling? Why yes, Jack, I'll fetch her right away. Just a moment, please.” She covered the receiver with her hand. “It's the talking lizard. And honey, he ain't selling insurance.”
    Chapter Six
    Sometimes Jack wished he didn't have superior hearing.
    “He's not a lizard,” Lara whispered.
    “Then he's another kind of alien,” the other woman muttered. “And this Jack is jacking with your mind to make you see him as human.”
    He shook his head as the two women continued to discuss him in urgent whispers. Obviously, Lara had told her roommate about him. Now there were two mortals who knew too much. He could erase the roommate's memory, but Lara would probably resent his jacking with her friend's mind. And she'd simply tell her friend everything again.
    He retrieved a bottle of synthetic blood from the mini-fridge and popped it into the microwave. Whenever he was in New York, he resided at Roman's townhouse on the Upper East Side. The Russian-American Malcontents were headquartered in Brooklyn, not far away, but luckily, they were laying low at this time. And the security system at Roman's townhouse had been improved to make it safe.
    . Jack usually stayed in a guest room on the fourth floor so he could use Roman's office and mini-fridge on the fifth. The microwave dinged, announcing his breakfast was ready. He poured the blood into a wineglass, then sauntered to the desk with his cell phone by his ear.
    “Hello, Jack?” Lara finally answered. “Sorry you had to wait. I was… in the shower.”
    She was a lousy liar, but he considered that a virtue. “I hope you put something on, bellissima. Otherwise, my imagination will run wild.” As if it wasn't already.
    “I—I'm dressed. I'm glad you called. I left some messages on your phone this afternoon.”
    “I just heard them a minute ago.” He sat behind the desk and booted up the computer. “I work at night, so I'm… asleep during the day.”
    “Me, too, but I had trouble sleeping today. So I decided to cook you dinner, but when you didn't call back, we… uh, we ate it. Sorry.”
    “That's all right.” Jack sipped from his wineglass. He figured the dinner invitation was part of a plan to confront him with all her questions. Unfortunately, he couldn't give her any answers. “I'm sorry I missed it.”
    “That's okay. Maybe you could drop by for dessert?”
    Merda. He wasn't sure how to handle this. Maybe he could put her off for a few months. Then Ian would be back from his honeymoon, and Jack could return to Europe. Lara would never be able to track him down.
    He grimaced. Avoiding her till he could run away seemed cowardly. And the thought of never seeing her again was downright depressing. “I—I have to go to work soon.”
    “But I really wanted to see you tonight.” Lara's voice sounded strained. “I can meet you somewhere when you go on break.”
    She wasn't going to give up. Normally Jack admired a person who stuck to a project till it was done, but when the project was him, he was beginning to feel as desperate as Lara sounded.
    He didn't want to tell her where he was staying or where he was currently working. “I'll drop by your place for a few minutes.” He typed in her address on MapQuest.
    “Thank you! Do you need directions? Or does 'dropping by' mean you're going to magically appear in front of me?”
    Jack winced. How could he deny his ability to teleport when she'd seen it? He studied the map to her apartment. “I'll drive. I should be there in thirty to forty minutes.”
    “You know where I live?”
    “Yes.” He would ask Phineas and Connor to cover for him at Romatech for an hour or so. He heard Lara whispering again to her roommate.
    “I doubt he's driving a space shuttle,” Lara muttered.
    Nine circles of hell. Lara was going to be really angry when she realized he couldn't tell her anything.
    “So, uh, I guess you