Read Online Be the Death of Me by Rebecca Harris - Free Book Online Page A

a little hostile at being trapped inside a blanket.”
    “Billie.”
    “Sorry.”
    “Maybe in a bit,” Ford says, ignoring our comedy act.
    “What about your friends, Benedict? Do you think they’ll want anything to eat?”
    The old lady’s cheery question would have caused my blood to freeze in my veins if such a thing were possible. Judging from the look on Tuck’s face, he’s been thrown for a loop as well.
    Ford’s eyes shift nervously in their sockets before finally resting on us. “Fr . . . friends?” he stammers when her back is turned. “Wha . . . what friends, Gran?”
    She smiles, wide and toothy. “Didn’t you say you had a couple of friends coming over to watch a ballgame tonight? Some boys from school?”
    His shoulders deflate with a wild rush of air. “Oh, the guys from school. Of course. I mean, who else would you have been talking about, right?”
    I can tell, buried deep within those words is a cry of absolute desperation for her to see the two lightly glowing teenagers leaning against her kitchen counter.
    “I was thinking maybe fajitas,” she replies, crushing Ford’s hopes. “Do you think that’s okay, or should I cook something more conventional? I can make cheeseburgers if you want.”
    “Don’t worry about it,” Ford mutters, staring intently at his hands. “Turns out the guys can’t come after all. There’s a game at school tonight, so they’re going to hang there instead.”
    “Oh,” she says, her smile turning to a tiny, wrinkled pout. “Are you going to meet up with them at the game? Should I plan on dinner by myself?”
    “No,” he answers, still not looking up from the table. “I’m just going to stay in. I’ve got some things I have to do here anyway.”
    “Homework?” she asks, moving to pat her grandson’s shoulder. “Math again? I could help you with a few of the problems if you’d like. It’ll be our little secret.”
    “Trust me, Gran,” Ford says, finally lifting his gaze to stare–no, glower is more accurate–at Tuck and me. “I don’t think you can help me with the kind of problems I’ve got.”
    “All right.” She lets loose a sigh of acceptance. “I’m heading to the community center for the afternoon, hon. There’s a meeting about next weekend’s yard sale. Will you be okay by yourself?”
    Ford nods. “Yeah. I have a feeling keeping busy won’t be a problem.”
    His grandmother drops a folded newspaper and a stack of mail on the table in front of him. She leans down to kiss the top of his hair. “I saved the puzzle for you,” she says with a smile. “Try to stay out of trouble.”
    And she’s gone, unknowingly leaving her grandson at the mercy of the undead.
    “Okay, two questions,” I say the minute I hear the sound of an engine rumbling in the driveway. “Who are these boys she was talking about, and when do I get to meet them?”
    “Never,” he growls in my direction, unfolding the newspaper to the weekly crossword and reaching for a pen. “You never get to meet them.”
    “Well, that seems a little rude.”
    “You can’t meet them,” he clarifies. “They don’t exist.”
    “But she just said–”
    He lets out an exasperated huff, and tears his eyes from the paper. “Gran worries about me, okay? So to make it easier on her, I sometimes make up these fake plans to hang out with guys from school. She never seems to notice that something always comes up every time they’re supposed to come over.”
    He finishes and plunges back into his crossword puzzle.
    I stare at Tuck, who in turn is looking at Ford with an expression of disbelief and pity.
    “That,” I say, sweeping around behind him, “is the saddest thing I have ever heard.”
    “It’s better than having a seventy–year–old woman think her grandson is a loser.”
    “You thought the opposite of being a loser was to invent fake friends?”
    “Just drop it, okay?”
    “All right, all right.” I hold up my hands in surrender. “No need