Page 52 of How to Stake a Vampire
“How did you get away?” Barney asked quietly.
Ellie indicated the back door with a jerk of her chin. I stared.
It was hanging off its hinges.
“Virgil came back.” Ellie brightened slightly. “You should have seen him, Abby. He was like a completely different person.”
I followed her enthralled gaze to where Virgil hovered anxiously by the storage shelves.
“What did you do?” Detective Johnson asked warily.
“I, er—” Virgil paused and scratched his cheek, clearly embarrassed, “I may have thrown him through the door.”
Surprise quickened my pulse. Samuel frowned.
Barney’s eyebrows shot up. “You threw a four-hundred-year-old vampire through a reinforced steel door?”
“He was hurting Ellie,” Virgil said simply.
Barney’s face hardened. “It seems you’ve been hiding your true strength.”
“I wasn’t hiding it,” Virgil protested. He faltered. “Okay, I was kinda hiding it. I don’t want my father to know I might be one of the most powerful vampires in Amberford.” He shuddered. “Can you imagine what he’d do to drag me back to the family? Besides, I don’t like violence.” His gaze found Ellie and his expression softened. “But nobody hurts my friends and gets away with it.”
I was still wondering at the strange look in the vampire’s eyes when Bo sniffed Ellie’s hand and whined.
“You smell different,” he told her, lowering his head.
My stomach dropped. “Different how?”
Bo’s tail drooped. “Not human anymore different.”
Ellie froze.
A sick realization dawned on me. I stared at the puncture wounds on my best friend’s neck before twisting around and fixing Barney and Virgil with a panic-stricken stare.
“Is Ellie?—?!”
“Yes,” Barney confirmed grimly. “The transformation has already started.”
“Our venom works quickly on humans,” Virgil said uneasily.
“Transformation?” Ellie’s voice climbed an octave. “What transformation? Nobody said anything about a transformation!”
Didi grimaced. Gavin and Detective Johnson exchanged an awkward glance. Samuel looked like he wanted to punch something.
I gripped Ellie’s hands as she started hyperventilating.
“It’s going to be okay.” I swallowed heavily at the fear in my best friend’s eyes and tried not to let my own dread overwhelm me. I shot another look at Barney. “How long do we have?”
“It depends on the vampire’s age and power.” A muscle jumped in his cheek. “Ludvik’s old enough that the process should be complete within the next day or so.”
“Complete into what exactly?” Ellie asked in a small voice. She’d gone deathly still.
I could tell she’d finally grasped what we were talking about.
“A vampire,” Virgil said gently before I could reply. He came over and squatted beside us. “I’m sorry, Ellie. Once you’ve been bitten by someone of Ludvik’s caliber, there’s no going back.”
Ellie stared at him for a long moment.
