“Rhodesdemonswereinvited, Iwasstayingthenightafterbringing—” And the rest of her sentence ran together in a hopeless tangle.
“Slower,” Dahlia said, making sure she sounded like she meant it.
Diantha sighed noisily, looking as exasperated as the teenager she appeared to be. “Since I was here for the night, they invited me to come with them.” She put an almost visible space between each word. “Nothing else to do, so I came with.”
“You’re visiting from Louisiana on a business errand, and you came to the mansion with the Rhodes demons because they were invited.”
Diantha nodded, her green spikes bobbing almost comically. If Dahlia hadn’t seen demons fight before, she might have laughed.
“How did you happen to enter the kitchen?” Katamori asked. During Dahlia and Diantha’s conversation, he had circled the table to stand at Diantha’s back. She had turned slightly so she could keep both vampires in view, since she was now bracketed between them. Despite Dahlia’s assurances, the half-demon girl didn’t like her situation at all. Her knees bent, and her hands fisted, ready for a challenge.
But when she spoke, her voice was steady enough. “I was going to the refrigerator,” Diantha said, still making the effort to speak slowly. “You guys were out of Sprite, and I thought it would be all right if I checked to see if there was more in the refrigerator. Ismelledtheblood—”
Dahlia held up an admonishing hand, and Diantha slowed down. “I yelled because I smelled the blood as I stepped in it.”
“Not before?” Most supernaturals had a very sharp sense of smell.
“Smell of vampire had deadened my nose,” Diantha said.
That made sense to Dahlia. Though the scent of vampire was naturally delightful to her, she had been told many times that it was overwhelming to other supernaturals.
“Was the blood still running when you came in?” The thicker trickles from spurting arteries were barely moving down the shiny surface of the appliances, and the cast-off drops that had been slung away when the throat had come out were beginning to dry at the edges.