Sally came out of her daze and risked a peep downward.

They were over purple blue ripples, painted with gold as the sun neared the western horizon. Lavinia was still crazed with pleasure and there was no sign of land.

Sally hadn’t known flying fast would be so noisy. Her head was pressed against Lavinia’s chest and muffled orgasmic shrieks battered that ear like a fist in a boxing glove. The raw wind dug at her other ear like bare knuckles.

Idiots! We were idiots! Flying over the Atlantic ocean with no navigation device except Lavinia’s beeline to wherever we’re going.

They’d intended to fly west from San Francisco, across the Pacific chasing the sun, and then (vaguely) over Asia and Europe. That would have been a lot further and they would have been over water twice as long; they were lucky Lavinia’s inner radar had chosen the shorter route east.

The first day they’d been over the continental United States. Sally still shivered from her dread of heights but at least there’d been the comforting assurance that if worse came to worst they could land somewhere. But all day today they’d been over water a mile deep. They had to reach land before the sun set and it was damn close to the horizon. Why had they been such fools? Why hadn’t they let the others buy them a plane ticket?

But she knew why she’d been such a fool. It was even more than knowing Walter was the evil vampire who had killed Jeremy’s little brother. Sometime in the next few days, she would face an evil in a dark forest. The only thing she knew for certain was that it would be more terrible than anything she’d faced before. It had been easy to sit in the comfortable, elderly camper and think about going into the presence of evil but she would be there soon.

She’d hoped for a few precious extra days with Lavinia.

Sally Yan had been raped when she was seventeen. She could still smell the man’s beer breath, feel the icy blade edge at her throat and the punches she’d taken, could still see the shards of a grimy broken window she’d fixed her eyes on while it happened. Soon after, she had started strength and martial arts training and she had forced herself to walk down that street again until she mastered the fear.

But now she felt seventeen years old again, helplessly heading for that broken window and that monster. And except for a forced “You okay tiger?” she’d had no interaction with Lavinia. When they landed in a corn field last night Lavinia fell asleep like an unplugged blender and this morning Lavinia grabbed her, leaped into the sky and started the porno video again. Eyes stabbed by wind-whipped hair, terrified of the gulf below, Sally held on grimly.

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The next time she looked over her shoulder in the direction they were flying, the sinking sun shone on a band of distant clouds. Whenever Lavinia had flown into cloud shadow, she’d slowed but had enough oomph to fly out again. Would those clouds ahead be thick enough to stop her?

Sally was exhausted, and hungry. She had food and a water bottle in her coat pocket but to get at them she would have to force her wind-chafed hands to let go of their death clasp behind Lavinia’s back.

If only she knew how far it was to land. She might have GPS signal, but she’d have to let go that same death clasp to lever her smart phone out of her pocket.

There was still no speck of land, no passing ship. She was lonely! She was sure that if she smacked Lavinia’s face and screamed, she’d get her attention. But every time Lavinia came out of her ecstasy to check on Sally, she lost speed. She’d tough it out.

Lavinia angled upward; she must have seen the clouds. That was a relief – except that it got colder the higher they went. Was Lavinia climbing as high as an airplane? Didn’t people use face masks for oxygen when airplanes lost cabin pressure? Instantly it felt harder to breathe.

She had to eat and drink so she could think and then she had to try and find out where they were. Hands, unclasp, she ordered. Lavinia is holding me. I’m perfectly safe.

She forced her hands to unclasp and snaked the right around Lavinia’s solid form while the left stayed suction pressed against a vertebra. Heart thumping over the wind’s roar, she plunged the hand into her jacket pocket and felt the granola bar, the bag of Dorritos and the apple.

She wrapped her hand around the granola bar, then realized she’d need both hands to tear it open.

I’ve killed vampires! I’ve jumped from windows! What is wrong with me? She was just plain terrified of heights and nothing was going to change that.

She felt the pentagram she’d bought in Rainbow’s store. She’d left it on her bedside in Jesse and Walter’s house but Charla had said, “This is yours too,” and handed it to her. That meant she was supposed to take it, she’d told herself. Was it a magical thing? Might it help her now? It felt like one more burden.

She was tempted to pull it out and accidentally drop it in the ocean.

She let go of it and grabbed the apple instead, levered it to her mouth and took a juicy crunchy heavenly bite. She hadn’t realized how dry her mouth was. She took another bite, holding the apple with the same death grip of her other hand on Lavinia’s back. Just the thought of dropping it sent chills of horror through her groin and legs. She ate it to the core, then let the wind snatch it out of her hand.

But now she was fully aware of how hungry she was. The world spun, her head buzzed and the tears wouldn’t stop. She couldn’t even swear; all that came was helpless blubbering.

And it was definitely harder to breathe.