Last Safe Place, The by Ninie Hammon Page A

it’s easy for the fans to suspend disbelief and buy into the illusion that it’s all real.
    Cult fanatics have been camped outside the bookstore since early the evening before because the cramped space will limit the number of people who can get their books autographed, though Bernie does everything short of using a cattle prod to keep the crowd moving past Gabriella so their signed copies can be rung up at the old-fashioned cash register in the corner, the kind with buttons that really does ring out “cha-ching” with every purchase.
    Gabriella’s back hurts, her hand is cramped and her butt is numb. She glances at the grandfather clock in the corner and groans. Two more hours before she can go home and get out of this Halloween get-up, make SpaghettiOs for Ty and help him with his homework before bed.
    “… was so scared I had to sleep with the lights on for a month,” says a small, white-haired woman who resembles Tweety Bird’s grandmother. Gabriella merely nods, does not connect or respond. She has gone mercifully brain dead, has vanished into a kind of eyes-open coma where she’s only vaguely aware of the herd of readers passing in front of her.
    Then she spots him. He is tall, six three or four, and stands ramrod straight, dressed in black—turtleneck, sports coat and pants—with a small silver pentagram on a chain around his neck. His hair is pale blonde, his features patrician perfect, his eyes a shade of blue that seems to shift as she looks into them, from light ice blue to the turgid gray-blue of a stormy sea.
    A smile that reveals perfect teeth appears on his face as soon as she makes eye contact. It is a crooked smile, though, odd looking, like he’s taken lessons, worked really hard to learn all the muscle groups he must employ to pull his lips back in a particular fashion that’s defined as “smiling.” But he hasn’t got it quite right so one side of his mouth draws back farther than the other. There is no warmth in that smile. No warmth in him, either. In fact, as he steps up to her table he seems to bring cold with him, as a door left open on a blustery day allows a chill wind to blow through.
    And darkness, too, only that’s crazy. How can a man give off darkness like a candle gives off light? She senses something predatory, too, a subtle new pressure, the way the air feels before a violent thunderstorm.
    “Good day, my dear Zara,” he says, totally deadpan. That surprises her. He doesn’t strike her as the kind of man who indulges in illusion.
    “I’m not Zara.” For some reason, it is important to her to make the distinction between reality and fiction. “I’m Rebecca Nightshade.” Which, of course, isn’t really true, either. “Zara is a character I made up.” She tries to make lightof it. “Me Rebecca …” She taps the top book on the stack. “Her Zara. Me real, her fantasy.”
    He stands perfectly still, in quiet confidence—only for some reason it feels like the poised stillness before a pounce, the breathlessness of a coiled snake.
    “Your name isn’t Rebecca Nightshade.” His voice sounds like it comes from the bottom of an oil drum or some other deep, dark, echoing place. And there is a certainty in his tone that is unnerving. She had worked hard to keep the shield of the pseudonym between her and the prying public. “And Zara is no fantasy. She is as real as the beauty of my beloved Babylon and as old as the Endless Black Beyond, a kingdom she will rule with her mate by her side.”
    Gabriella catches sight of Bernie at the edge of her vision. He is grinning.
    “You got that right,” she says to the man standing before her, but she looks pointedly and defiantly at Bernie. “Zara is as real as Babylon and we both know how real that is.” She turns back to the tall, blonde stranger. “We’ve already opened the twenty-first century, taken the tag off and everything. Don’t you think it’s a little late to send it back?”
    Out of the corner of her eye