I’d planned on buying a canister of the cocoa mix, but I thought better of it. Instead, I gathered up the books and CD and went to the checkout to pay for them.
Mitch was nowhere to be seen.
* * * *
On my way out of the mall I passed the sole card store in the area, and then backtracked. There weren’t a lot of people I needed to get Christmas cards for, my friends mostly, but I wanted to get a special one for Dad.
After I selected the cards, I went to take a look at the ornaments. Peanuts, Star Wars, Star Trek, Disney. Would Mrs. Wilder like a Barbie ornament, or would she consider that chauvinistic?
An hour later I came out, shaken. I’d spent over two hundred dollars, just on the ornaments alone.
Would the next vampyre who came to call chew me out—I gave a hollow laugh at my uninten
