Kitty's House of Horrors (kn-7) by Carrie Vaughn (christmas read aloud txt) 📕

we were. Otherwise, we must have looked like a couple of really girly girls, hugging and carrying on.

Tina stepped aside, and I glanced past her to see Jeffrey and Ariel, also waiting for the same flight out. TV psychic Jeffrey Miles gave me a big hug. In his thirties, clean-cut, with sandy hair and a photogenic smile, he was handsome and charismatic. Friendly as all get-out. You couldn’t help but like him.

“You look great!” he said. And he totally wasn’t kidding about that, because he could read auras. At least, he said he could. The first time we met, he’d pegged me as a werewolf before I’d introduced myself. Like Tina, he was too nice and friendly to be too scary.

I beamed at him. “Thanks. It’s good to see you.”

I’d never met twenty-something Ariel in person, but I recognized her because her photo was on her website, and we’d talked on the phone—a lot. Ariel, Priestess of the Night, hosted a talk-radio show like mine, if a bit fluffier. She was way nicer to her callers. Her black hair was pinned up in a bun, and she wore a black dress with a lacy black cardigan, and cool boots. Goth-y, and she wore it well.

“Kitty!” She squealed, just like Tina had. God, this was going to start sounding like a fourth-grade sleepover. She wanted to hug me, too. “I’m so happy you’re here and I finally get to meet you.”

“God, Kitty. Do you know everyone or what?” Tina said.

“Kinda. Just because I end up interviewing everyone on my show. Come on, sit down, tell me everything.”

We traded gossip and recent life stories for about half an hour before the pilot for the local commuter airport came to tell us the plane was ready. We filed out behind him to the tarmac.

My confidence was not boosted. The pilot was brusque, not talkative. He wore what he probably considered to be a uniform, the logo of the tiny commuter airline embroidered on the sleeve of his khaki shirt, tucked into slacks. He wore aviator sunglasses and didn’t smile. And the plane—I wasn’t convinced it would even get the five of us and our luggage off the ground. We barely fit inside, and the walls seemed paper thin.

I hesitated, staring at the tiny airplane.

“Come on,” Jeffrey said, urging me on with a smile. “It’ll be an adventure.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” I replied, scowling.

But the pilot knew what he was doing, and the little plane did get off the ground. The engine rumbled so loud we couldn’t talk—or even think much—which left me staring out the windows at the scenery. We quickly left civilized territory, the city falling away, development growing more sparse, until all I saw were open meadows, forests cut through by hills, then mountains. Forty-five minutes later, we landed on a narrow airstrip nestled in a mountain valley. I closed my eyes during the landing and tried not to think about being trapped in a little metal box, hurtling toward the ground.

The plane pulled to a stop, the pilot opened the doors, and we all piled out. The clean mountain air hit me, and all was forgiven.

Another plane, a bit larger than ours, was parked at the end of the narrow airstrip. The pilot explained that it belonged to the production company and had been used to fly in equipment and supplies. The production crew had a pilot with it—there was our escape route. We wouldn’t be completely cut off.

The descriptions I’d been given, variations of “a beautiful mountain retreat,” didn’t do the place justice. I’d seen mountain lodges that didn’t have much thought put into them, squat buildings that looked like they’d been dropped into the landscape by a crane with no consideration of surroundings. This place nestled at the edge of the valley like it had grown there. I had to search for it, where it sat against a hillside—part of the hill, almost. A meadow swept down from it, a clean expanse of rippling green grass dotted with patches of wildflowers. I bet elk and deer grazed here in the mornings. A wide stream ran through the meadow to a lake, and on the other side of the lake—ringing the whole meadow, in fact, up to either side of the lodge—was a forest of tall pines. And beyond the forest, on the horizon, were the mountains. A spur of the Rockies jutted out here, bluish-gray peaks capped with snow even at the end of summer. They were sharp, grouped together like teeth. Clouds were gathering above them. The sun was setting, casting the whole valley in a rich blue twilight. I hoped I got a room with that view.

A few aspens butted up against the lodge itself, which was tasteful log architecture rather than the obnoxious version of it. The whole thing had a warm, rustic atmosphere. My muscles started relaxing.

We spent a few moments just looking around, admiring. I closed my eyes and drew a deep breath of air: trees, stone, a hint of snow, cold water, sun-touched grass, animals in a collage of trails and scents. Untouched wild. So much prey here, my Wolf thought. So many creatures, vegetation, smells all jumbled together, I couldn’t make them all out right away. Also, predators: bears, maybe even mountain lions. Their smells were dangerous.

The pilot unloaded our luggage. I turned to thank him, but he had already climbed back into the cockpit and revved the engines. Taxi ride over. We collected our bags and found a path that led to the lodge.

I took out my cell phone just to check, and sure enough: no signal. I couldn’t say I was surprised. Middle of nowhere and all that.

We climbed the steps to the lodge’s front porch and went inside.

Stopping inside the front door, with the other three crowding around me, I had my first look at the place: the entire first floor was open, with a large, modern kitchen on one side and a living room area on