Read Online A Drop of Red by Chris Marie Green - Free Book Online

said,” Natalia answered, “he was more a zombie.”
    “Got it,” Frank said.
    “Of course,” Natalia added, “I reported her passing to the authorities. I told them my family had a copy of her apartment key and she was sick, so I was bringing soup when I discovered her body. The authorities never suspected what truly happened. Her husband was never seen in the area, and my parents told me to leave it at that. I was young, so I did. And once she was properly buried, her voice disappeared from my hearing.”
    Frank said, “Too bad you couldn’t ask her questions.”
    “That’d be helpful in our line of work,” Kiko added.
    “The dead can be very focused.” Natalia didn’t even acknowledge Kiko’s slight dig. “I find that they’re normally seeking peace or righting a wrong.”
    “You ever actually see a revenant?” Dawn asked. “Or a ghost or a vampire?”
    Natalia shook her head.
    Kiko took the cue. “There’s a big difference between eavesdropping on ’em and actually coming face-to-face, which we do all the time.”
    The new girl raised her eyebrows a little.
    Even though Dawn was skeptical about Natalia, she liked the effect the second psychic was having on Kiko. Maybe, with his beloved job at stake, he’d get off those pills.
    “What about now,” Frank asked, “since you moved away from your parents, Natalia? Do you tell people about your talents?”
    “Not generally, but I do what the dead ask of me in my own discreet way. The voices I heard this morning . . . They needed me to come to you, and I’ve never turned my back on them.” Her smile grew wistful. “They led me to you, and they’re giving me what I most need.”
    “A job?” Dawn asked.
    “A job,” Natalia repeated. “I came to London to use my university degree and work for an honest wage, then send money home. Yet finding employment hasn’t been as simple as I had hoped. I’ve been living on savings, and they’re almost depleted. Before now, I thought revealing my gifts might give future employers the impression that my sixth sense made me a ‘gypsy’—a criminal. An outcast even here.”
    For some reason, Dawn related to her situation: being ear-marked as something you weren’t and trying to make up for it.
    Natalia addressed Kiko, her expression hopeful. “We have a lot in common, yes? Perhaps we can share stories someday.”
    He didn’t say anything, just focused his reddened eyes on the empty, ash-scarred fireplace.
    Although Natalia only smiled at Frank, just like she was signaling that she was fine with Kiko, Dawn knew she’d been stung by the blow off.
    But Frank did his best to soften the injury. “I suppose I should add that I have a few psychic stories to tell, myself.”
    “Ah,” Natalia said. “I knew there was something about you. With Dawn, as well. You both seem . . . different. And I should know the very definition.” She smiled, as if she’d finally found good company.
    “You mean we don’t resemble anything close to normal?” Dawn asked.
    Kiko leaned toward Natalia. “You can read Frank?”
    Not even Sober Kiko could read Frank. Something to do with vampires lacking souls.
    But the other psychic shook her head, and Kiko’s knuckles got a little less white.
    “I cannot read Frank exactly,” she said. “Yet when he’s near, I can . . . hear . . . something I’ve never heard before. Not a whispering like the dead. Just . . . This will sound odd, but it’s as if he is an empty room.”
    Stunned, Dawn could only widen her eyes.
    But Kiko was all over it. “So you do have vamp radar.”
    Natalia froze. “He’s a . . . vampire?”
    “So’s Dawn,” Kiko said, taking great pleasure in it.
    “I’m not a vamp,” Dawn said. “I just used to be.”
    “I . . . see.” Natalia sat there, hands in her lap, looking like maybe she wanted to scram after all.
    When she didn’t, Kiko’s curiosity got the best of him. “What did you hear in Dawn? Does she sound hollow, too?”
    “No, it