Revelations by Carrie Lynn Barker

course.”
    Philip rolled his eyes once more. “Would you mind showing Christiana to her room?”
    “Sure thing,” Jonas said. “Come on, Chris.”
    When he held out his hand to me, I only said, “Don’t call me Chris,” through my teeth. I didn’t take his hand, but he grinned and motioned for me to follow.
    “Phil, Allie’s in the kitchen,” he told Philip, and I suddenly knew I probably couldn’t keep this guy from calling me Chris if his life suddenly depended upon it. Not that it would, but still….
    I followed Jonas inside the house, Philip walking behind us. He pushed past Jonas as Jonas stopped in the living room and the so-called vampire headed for the kitchen, leaving me alone with the lizard man.
    “This way,” Jonas said, moving off down the hallway.
    I took a quick look around the living room before trotting to catch him. The living room was typical and quaint. It had an ‘L’ shaped sofa wrapping half way around the small room. There was a coffee table made of faded, dark wood with coasters stacked on it. I took notice of the water rings on the coffee table before turning back around to the task at hand, which was finding my bedroom. What did they need coasters for if they didn’t use them?
    “We all have our own rooms,” Jonas was saying. “Not that anyone would mind sharing, but there aren’t many of us here right now. Phil says you’re a mind reader, and a good one at that.”
    “Yes,” I said as I glanced in open doors and wondered about closed ones.
    When Jonas stopped before the last door on the right, I nearly collided with him as I looked at a picture on the wall of Sir Frederic Leighton’s “Flaming June.” I’d always liked that painting, and it caught my eye and nearly caused me to crash into the huge man before me.
    “Sorry,” I said quickly as I skidded to a stop.
    Jonas only smiled, not showing his teeth. “This one’s yours.” He opened the door and stepped aside to let me in.
    The room was simple. There was a bed with light blue linens. The nightstand was mahogany, and there was a chest of drawers to match. The closet doors stood open, and I saw clothes hanging inside.
    I instantly dropped my bag and went to the closet. I am a girl, after all. I rifled through the clothing, surprised to discover shirts and jeans of all the right sizes. “How’d you guys guess my size?”
    “Ah,” said Jonas, “that would be Allie. Alendra. Phil described you, and Alendra went shopping. She’s good at that kind of stuff.”
    “She must be,” I said quietly, already wondering about the lycanthrope who now sat in the kitchen.
    “Come on. I’ll introduce you then show you the rest of the grounds.”
    “Okay,” I said. This time, when he held out his scaled, clawed hand to me, I took it.
    His grip was light and gentle. He knew he had deadly looking nails on the ends of his fingers, and he was careful about that. I ran my forefinger over the top of his hand to better feel his scales. When I went against the grain of those scales, they bit into my skin. They were hard if you went the wrong way, but still soft when rubbing the right way. Does that sound dirty to you, ’cause it does to me?
    Anyway, Jonas led me to the kitchen. Alendra— I could only assume it was her because she was the only one in the room—was seated at the round kitchen table with a white coffee mug sitting before her. She stared at the steam rising from the mug and only looked up when Jonas cleared his throat.
    “Hi,” she said. She slowly rose from the table, every movement one of grace. “You must be Christiana.” She held out a hand to me.
    I dislodged my hand from Jonas’s in order to shake hers. Alendra’s grip was solid, and my skin seemed to tingle when she released me. “Hi,” I said after a moment.
    You see, Alendra left me momentarily speechless.
    To say Alendra was beautiful is a complete understatement. Alendra was a goddess on earth. She had silver-colored hair streaked with tints