Free NOT DEAD YET: A Lucy Hart, DEATHDEALER Novel (Book Two) by Eva Sloan, Alice Bello Page B

see the worry in her eyes before her eyebrows knitted together in a small, perplexed scowl.
    “Don’t worry,” Lucy told her.  “I won’t take the bus until we figure out what just happened, okay?”
    Jenifer’s expression softened, the look relieved.  “Thank you.  I’d feel better about that.”
    “But if it goes on too long, you know your mother is going to come banging on my door.”
    “I’ll tell her I saw you and you said you were taking... a little trip to wine country with you super hot fiancé here.”  She wriggled her eyebrows.
    Lucy laughed.  She could see more and more of Shirley in her daughter.  “You do that.”
    Jenifer peered over her shoulder to find a gaggle of teenagers clustered around the fallen axe and the puddle of blood.
    “Get out of there, now!”  And with that she beat feet in their direction, making them scatter like pigeons.
     
    ~*~
     
    She’d told what had happened about a hundred times to the police detective heading the investigation.  They’d been at the police station for hours.  Gabriel and Dante hadn’t left her side for a minute, and the police, though they asked many questions, were very, very polite. 
    They did say that the homicidal axe boy had no record, not even an identity they could dredge up.  That didn’t sound all that good.  And from the look on Dante’s usually emotionless, dapper face, she saw that that alone was a reason to worry. 
    Finally, after Dante politely put his foot down to more questions, they were allowed to leave.  The moment she was out in the dark, cool air of night, she felt better.  Just breathing it in, letting the night into her, anchored her in a way that nothing else did.
    Again, another reason to worry.
    Dante and Gabriel had come in separate cars, so she rode with Gabriel.  She didn’t know where they were going, but just then she didn’t care.  As long as it wasn’t a Wal-Mart or a police station, she’d be thrilled to be there. 
    As soon as she was in the car, and Gabriel angled into the driver’s seat, he said, “So what didn’t you tell the police?”
    She blinked at him incredulously as the car idled, but his even gaze at her as they sat there told her he knew better.
    Damn him and his observant behavior.
    “Well, there was the part where I was moving way faster than I should be able to... again.”
    Gabriel looked away as he put the car into drive and started to put distance between them and the police station.  She could tell by the tension in his shoulders that he wasn’t happy about that at all.  They’d already figured it was a vampire related strength—probably from when she’d drunk Vin Tokar’s Blood.
    She still shivered inside just thinking about having done that... but it had tasted so sweet, and it had saved her life.
    She rolled her eyes and plunged on.  “And I didn’t tell them that it was Abbey who saved me.”
    He looked at me bewildered for a beat, and then back to the traffic ahead.  “Abbey?  How?”
    “I’m not a hundred percent sure, but it seems my witchy best friend and neighbor has gotten her black belt in magical Kung Fu.”
    She could tell by the way his eye brows crinkled that she had to explain more clearly.  A good education and a career in business didn’t allow for her sweetie’s vocabulary to stray much.
    “She used magic to drop a TV monitor on him, just before he tried to chop me in half.”
    “Oh,” he said in relief, and then he turned and gave Lucy a startled look.  “Oh... ”
    “Yeah.  And though I’m concerned she suddenly has all this power... I guess I have no place to complain.”
    Gabriel looked straight ahead, and then took a deep breath.  “What else can your little witch friend do?”
    I shook my head.  That was a very good question.    
     
    ~*~
     
    Abbey Adams patted the ground down, and replaced the small circle of grass she’d carved out of her grandmother’s lawn.  Her knees were sore; even through the pair of blue