Free Fall of Night by Rachel Caine Page B

anime.’
    ‘A
little
about it? Girl, we need to get you on a study programme, fast. You’re not going to last a week around here if you can’t keep up with the pop culture references. How about
Lord of the Rings? Firefly
?
Doctor Horrible
? No? Clearly, we have a lot of work to do.’
    He chattered on, and it was warm and funny and sweet and for a change, not at all life and death drama. She lost track of time and progress, and all of a sudden she realised they’d walked right past the steps to her row house apartment. She turned and backtracked, and gave Nick an apologetic smile.
    ‘Ah. The old homestead, I perceive. Well, I did my Guy Duty – you’re okay from here?’
    ‘Yeah, I’m okay,’ she said. She glanced up. Elizabeth’s windows were dark; she’d already gone to bed. ‘I should probably—’
    ‘Go, yeah, you should. So just … see you around, then?’
    ‘I’ll see you around, Nick.’
    ‘Goodnight, Claire.’ She gave him another smile, and he returned it, and took a few steps away before he turned back toward her, pulling out his phone. ‘Okay, this is probably way out of line, and feel free to Xena Warrior Princess my ass, but can I—?’ He waved the phone at her, and he looked so puppy-dog cute that she almost said yes.
    ‘I can’t,’ she said, quietly. ‘Sorry. I’ve got a boyfriend.’
    ‘Oh. Oh, right, of course you do. What was I thinking? Sorry.’
    ‘No, don’t be – look,
I’m
sorry. I guess I was just – I shouldn’t have let you think that. I was just lonely, you know?’
    ‘I know lonely. Lonely is a good friend of mine. No harm, Claire. I’m not going to go curl up in a fetal ball and cry for more than, you know, six hours, max.’ He flashed her a ridiculously funny smile, and she laughed in return. ‘See you around, then.’
    ‘See you.’
    He walked off, hands in his pockets, all loose angles and baggy jeans. The only thing he and Shane had in common, she thought, was the confidence. Shane could sling a casual nerd reference, but Nick probably couldn’t string together more than a few sentences without one; Shane knew his way around a fight, and Claire was fairly certain that she could take Nick with one hand tied behind her back. Maybe two.
    And yet, there was that traitorous little tingle of interest. Probably just because he represented everything that wasn’t Morganville – a normal world, where the biggest thing most people had to worry about was the latest episode of their favourite show, or whether or not a girl would give up her phone number for a winning smile.
    She liked that world. She just wasn’t sure that she was part of it … or ever would be. That was, Claire realised, what Nick represented to her: a world where a guy could just be amusing and interesting and funny, and not fight for his life every day against overwhelming odds. A life with a home, and kids, and just the usual, mundane worries.
    No vampires and monsters. No wonder she felt some tingle of attraction.
    Claire unlocked the front door, smiling quietly to herself, feeling oddly relaxed now, off her guard, and when she heard the scrape of footsteps behind her she turned, still smiling, and said, ‘Nick, I thought—’
    It wasn’t Nick.
    She didn’t know this guy. He was tall, broad-shouldered , handsome in a heavy kind of way that was probably going to turn unpleasant on him in a few years. He was Monica Morrell’s type, she thought, and all that went through her head in the same second as her threat assessment. No gun, no knife, but he carried himself as if he was ready to move at her, and alerts flashed red somewhere deep inside her.
    She braced, ready to move.
    ‘Hi,’ he said, and stopped a few steps below her, but blocking the way down. ‘So, you’re Liz’s new roommate, right? She said she had an old friend moving in with her. I’m Derrick.’
    ‘Derrick,’ she repeated. Liz hadn’t mentioned him, but then, that didn’t necessarily spell trouble. Nevertheless,