Dead Rising by Debra Dunbar Page A

had to be some sort of vampire record as far as humility and manners went.
    “No biggie. I survived twenty-six years with them. One weekend won’t kill me.”
    We rounded a corner and the house appeared ahead. There was pretty much no need for headlights at this point. Every light in the place was on. Spotlights out front highlighted the three story Georgian façade. Little globes lit the circular drive and the way to the garages. As in garage, only plural. Even the stables were bright as day. I can’t imagine what kind of electric bills my parents had been paying over the years.
    “Seems like someone is afraid of the dark,” Dario drawled.
    “We’re Templars. The dark is afraid of us.”
    That shut him up. Well either that or the over-the-top ostentatious splendor that was my family home. It was Gone With The Wind meets Versailles. I loved it the way I loved the Temple, the way I loved the Smithsonian Museums, but in spite of the sheer beauty, I longed to be back in my apartment with the ratty carpet, stained padding, and newly replaced window.
    I parked smack in front of the main steps, figuring I’d move the car in the morning. The place had alarm wards as far out as the highway. My parents might not have known I was coming until I turned down the driveway, but they’d known there was a vampire in the area from the Berryville exit on Route Nine.
    Dario was gentlemanly enough to grab my duffle bag. He followed me up the marble steps half a pace behind. Close enough to indicate his equality in status to me without seeming rudely dominant. The guy was pretty savvy about human non-verbal cues for a vampire.
    My parents might not have rushed out the door to welcome me on the steps, but they were excited enough about my attendance to be waiting in the hallway. A chorus of greetings hit me before I had the door half open, and I realized that it wasn’t just my parents in the foyer, but my brother and sister, their families, and a couple of cousins, as well as the black sheep of the family before I took her place—Great-grandma Essie.
    “Aunt Ari!” My nephew Bors plowed into my legs, his face buried in my stomach. I hugged him back and greeted the rest of the clan, overwhelmed by hugs and cheek-kisses. It was an excessive display of affection from a family that was normally reserved about such things. It made me feel guilty for being away so long, for not returning half of the phone calls I’d received, for thinking all of those bad thoughts on the way up.
    “So, you’re back to take your Oath?”
    Mom. And now I wasn’t feeling so guilty about those bad thoughts. I was barely five feet in the door and she was nagging me about my Knighthood again. And ignoring Dario. Not one of them had asked who he was. Not one had greeted him or introduced themselves. I wrestled free from Bors’s embrace and reached out to put a hand on Dario’s arm, ignoring his slight flinch.
    “Everyone, this is Dario.”
    There was a moment of silence while my family waited for me to elaborate further. I didn’t. Let them think whatever they wanted.
    “Dario, this is my Mom and Dad, my brother Roman, his wife and two kids, my sister Athena with her husband. Over there are my cousins Bran and Cesare. And this is Great-grandma Essie.
    “He’s a fucking vampire,” Essie announced. She seemed rather cheerful about the whole thing, as if I’d brought a much needed bottle of Jack Daniels to Sunday church service.
    “Yes he is,” I responded.
    Essie walked around him, inspecting him as though he were a horse at auction. Dario looked appropriately terrified.
    “Can I kiss him?” she asked. Actually, she shouted. Essie was somewhere over one hundred years old, and although she walked around like she was a spry eighty, she was losing her hearing. Thus, she assumed everyone else was losing their hearing, too.
    “Later, Gran.”
    “Welcome, Dario.” Finally someone besides my crazy great-grandmother spoke up. Mom had obviously felt the