A little piece of egg dribbled down his chin and caught in his beard. The sight of it stifled some of my fear. He didn’t look like the Sicarius slayers of legend. He didn’t look like any kind of vampire hunter at all. He just looked like a messy old man.

I frowned, almost disappointed he wasn’t living up to my nightmares. “I never thought I’d meet a Sicarius,” I said. “You’re . . .”

“Not what we expected,” Reg finished.

I crossed my arms. I would have come up with something more colorful, but Reg was probably right to play it polite.

Salvador dragged a napkin across his chin, knocking the egg bit loose. It landed with a little splat on the table. “You expected a warrior? Someone in armor, maybe? Waving a stake?” He flipped the fork in his hand, so he was holding it like a weapon and stabbed the air. “Shouting, ‘I shall smite thee!’ or some nonsense?”

We cringed away from the fork until he aimed it back at the plate and continued to inhale his breakfast. “Well, sorry to disappoint. My days of wielding a pointy stick are done.”

“You don’t need a stake,” Reg said. “All you need are your hands.”

“That’s right. So maybe you know more than most.” Salvador carried his now-empty plate to the sink and came back to the table holding up the offending hands. “But do you know what these hands can do?”

“Kill?” I tried to say it with a duh, but it came out as more of a peep.

“Some vamps may see it that way.” He sat and gestured for us to do the same. I pulled my seat as far away from the table as I could and sat on the edge, ready to run if I needed to.

“My touch doesn’t kill,” Salvador said. “It brings you back to life.”

“Oh yes,” I said. “The healing touch of the slayer. That’s the fuzzy bedtime story I remember.”

He laughed like I’d made a joke on his behalf and not at his expense. “No, I’m sure you heard a much different version.”

“I understand,” Reg said.

“You do?” I cocked my head at Reg, but he kept his eyes on the man across the table.

“I’ve read about it in some of our older texts. Your touch can make us mortal.”

My eyes fell on the slayer’s hands, and I couldn’t keep the awe out of my voice. “Really?”

“Really.”

“But you didn’t touch us,” I said. “You didn’t do this.”

“I did, in a way.” He nodded out the kitchen window to the white fence outside.

“The fence?” I asked. “But how?”

He shook his head. “That’s about enough for now, I think. You kids ought to eat those eggs before they go cold.”

But even Reg had lost his appetite in the presence of a slayer.