Undead and Unwelcome (6 page)

lurking in the back were lime, juniper, peppercorn, espresso, fennel, mint, garlic, cherry,

sun-dried tomato, mustard seed, apple, and horseradish.
Dude, I am not making this up,

or exaggerating for humorous effect. In a household of oddities and the undead, Tina

was everywhere and nowhere. She excelled at going unnoticed and she could pull that off

anywhere in the world . . . except our kitchen freezer. Vodka was her vice; the more

obscure the flavor, the more she had to try it. She drank it neat, using a succession of

antique shot glasses, which were always kept chilled.
Tina had offered to make me a

drink once. I had accepted. Once.
I did not have time to swing by Cub on the way to work

and would be too tired after my shift; time to order pizza again. Green Mill was

practically on my speed dial.
Sighing, I swung the freezer shut and my senses, instantly

overwhelmed by someone they hadn’t smelled, seen, or heard, but who was all of a

sudden
right there,
went into overdrive. My adrenal gland dumped a gallon of F.O.F. into

my system (what my interns called Fight or Flight juice) and for a long minute I thought

my heart was going to just quit from the shock.
She greeted me with “I am out of

cinnamon vodka,” then grabbed my shoulder and prevented me from braining myself on

the metal handle as I flinched hard enough to be mistaken for an epileptic.
“Tina,” I

groaned, yanking my hand out of her chilly grasp, “that’s the second time today. I’m

putting a bell around your neck. Or sewing one into your scalp, I swear to—” No, don’t

swear to God; just hearing the
G
word was like a whiplash to a vampire, the movies had

gotten
some
things right. “I swear,” I finished.
Tina looked mildly distressed. Most of

her expressions were mild versions of what humanity could come up with. What would put

you or me in a killing rage would cause her to raise one eyebrow and frown. Frown

sternly
, but still.
The smooth efficiency and profound, almost unshakable calm were at

odds with her appearance. Tina looked like an escapee from Delta Nu, the sorority Reese

Witherspoon’s character made famous in
Legally Blonde.
(Great movie, dude. “All those

opposed to chafing, please say aye.”)
Tina had long, honey blond hair—past her

shoulders in rippling waves—and big, dark eyes, what Tina called pansy eyes. Not only

did Tina look too young to vote, she would probably get carded if she tried to buy

cigarettes. And she dressed to play up her appearance in a never-ending variety of kicky

plaid skirts, white button-downs, anklets, everything but a backpack full of high school

textbooks. She looked like a walking, talking felony. One far older and smarter than any

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would-be college boy who might try out a little date rape.
Also, she was about as noisy as

an unplugged television. If you don’t believe that, dude, you couldn’t feel my heart just

now.
“I apologize, Marc. I honestly don’t mean to frighten you.” This was true, and

scary in its own way—I hated to think what she could do to my nervous system if she

really put some thought into it. “We’re just two peas rattling around in a can ’round

here, aren’t we?”
She laughed a little and I noticed she had slipped again. Most of the

time, Tina had the smooth, accent-free tones of a weather reporter. But occasionally a

Southern accent would creep in. I loved it when that happened because she seemed less a

smooth-voiced butler and more like a walking, talking, feeling person.
Don’t

misunderstand; I have no problem with the undead, although I was dying to learn all I

could and trying to work up the nerve to ask Betsy if I could autopsy the next Big Bad she

would inadvertently kill with a heretofore unknown superpower. Nope; no real problem

with them, I just thought they should get back to their roots a bit more often.
Besides,

Tina made me nervous.
And she knew she made me nervous. This was nothing I could

discuss with Betsy, of course . . . my feelings were too vague and unformed and frankly,

my best gal wasn’t what I would ever call a deep thinker. As Susan Sarandon said in the

greatest movie in the history of cinema,
Bull Durham
, “The world is made for people who

aren’t cursed with self-awareness.” The world was made, in other words, for people like

Betsy.
She had no time for “Hmm, Tina’s a quiet one, huh? Perhaps we should ponder

what that signifies,” particularly during the fall when she had to update her collection of

winter footgear. But it was there and I couldn’t deny it: Tina gave me the creeps.
I knew

she had been born the year the Civil War had begun.
I knew she had been a vampire long

before Sinclair.
I knew she had made Sinclair, had remained by his side all the years

since then, and was his capable assistant.
And that was all I knew about her. And I only

knew those things because Betsy had told me. In other words, that was all
Betsy
knew

about her, too. And
she
was the queen, for the love of . . .
Dude, there are all sorts of

etiquette rules for living with vampires. There had to be; there was etiquette for

everything. But it was hard to come up with a tactful way to ask, “So, how’d you get

murdered, anyway?” And that was only one of the things I would love to learn.
All this

went through my head in about eleven seconds. Meanwhile, Tina was still lurking—well,

standing—by the fridge.
“Will you have a drink with me?” She opened the freezer and

reached for the first row of bottles. I saw she had extracted mustard seed-flavored vodka

and, thanks to years of seeing man’s inhumanity to man via the emergency room, I

manfully concealed my shudder.
“I have to get to work,” I said glumly.
Curious, I waited

a beat, but Tina did exactly what I anticipated. “Oh, that’s too bad, Marc. A pity you

won’t have time to shop first.”
Dude, if I had been Sinclair or Betsy, her answer would

have been something like, “Oh most wondrous undead monarch, please give me, your

humblest, lamest, most slovenly servant, your grocery list and I shall fill your fridge with

any produce, meat by-products, Little Debbie snack cakes, and dairy products you desire

and also pick up your dry cleaning on my way home, unless you would prefer I simply

run out to KFC for some original recipe chicken.”
Alas, it was not to be: not only was I

alive and well, I was neither the vampire queen nor the vampire king. Tina was
their

willing and untiring slave, not mine.
Still, we
were
roommates. You would think that

would lead to some kind of bond. The Sacred Roommate Bond. Would it kill her to bring

home a gallon of milk once in a while?

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Chapter 11

The words
wife
or
queen
seemed almost to hang in the air over our heads. I had the sense

that they weren’t asking these questions out of idle curiosity, or to be polite. No, no.

Michael was a predator, of course, as Antonia had been, which meant he was constantly

on the lookout for weakness. He couldn’t help it. Probably he didn’t even know he was

doing it. Wife or queen? A question I had asked myself on more than one occasion.

Sinclair was bigger, stronger, faster. Older. Richer. Better educated. More even-tempered,

more in control. Frankly, there were times—lots of times—when I wished I could just be

the wife, and leave the whole vamp royalty thing to him. But I could do things no other

vampire on the planet could. Seemed dumb not to take advantage of that, or at least

acknowledge it. So we existed in an interesting state of love and respect. Well, occasional

respect, when I wasn’t giving him a Wet Willy or poking him in his flat belly when we

showered together—the man wasn’t ticklish! Talk about an unnatural creature. He’d

bowed to my authority on more than one occasion, too—usually just before I started

hurling heavy objects at his head to emphasize whatever point I was making. You want to

see something funny? Eric Sinclair, following one of my orders. Believe me, it didn’t

happen all that often. Whenever it did, he always had an odd expression on his face: part

admiration, part annoyance. Now where the hell was I? Dammit! It was three A.M., I was

tired out from being on edge all night, and was having more trouble than usual following

the conversation, which had veered from funeral rights to religion to atheist vampires to

my title. “Funny thing for
you
to ask, Jeannie,” I finally said. I guess it wasn’t exactly

unheard of for a werewolf to marry a—you know, a regular person. But it was rare

enough so that the two of them caused a stir now and again—I’d gotten that much from

Antonia, and that only after she’d been living with us for a while. Get this: not only was it

rare for werewolves to marry boring old humans, it was considered super-lucky for the

Pack, and the offspring were usually exceptional Pack members. For example, Antonia—

But I wasn’t ready to go there again. Call me a chickenshit coward; that’s fine. I just

couldn’t do it again right now. “Mmm.” Jeannie grinned, but didn’t rise to the bait, just

shrugged. “Good point.” I cleared my throat, because I was having trouble swallowing the

whole—the whole mundaneness of the thing. Mundaneness? Mundanity? “So there are

Presbyterian werewolves, and Catholic ones, and Lutherans—” “And Buddhists and

atheists and Hindus,” Derik added. “Will you please stop that pacing and sit the fuck

down? Ow!” I yanked my poor sore ankle out of reach of Sinclair’s foot. “You look like a

cheetah on crack.” “Back off, blondie,” Derik snapped back and, if anything, sped up the

pacing. “I’m surprised you didn’t draw your own conclusion,” Michael said loudly, clearly

trying to distract us. I think he was clearly trying. It was hard to know
what
the guy was

up to. “Because clearly, all vampires are Christians.” “No,” Sinclair said. No? What, no?

How did we get off the topic of werewolf retribution for Antonia and on to religion? I got

enough of the “let’s all pray to Jesus meek and mild” stuff I needed from Laura. “No?”

“No. We, too, have Muslims and Catholics and pagans. We, too, have—” “Whoa, whoa,

whoa,” Jeannie interrupted. “That makes no sense at all.” “We do not go about our lives

with the objective of making sense to strangers,” my husband said with terrifying

pleasantness. “Fuck.” Derik, thank God, had grabbed a chair, dragged it over, turned it so

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) it was facing backward, and sat. His blond hair fell into his eyes and he shook it out of his

face with a quick, impatient movement. “Why would a cross work on an atheist vampire?”

Sinclair and I traded a glance. Jessica, I noticed, was all ears as well—she’d been so quiet

I’d almost forgotten she was in the room. “Or someone Jewish?” Derik continued.

Because vampirism was a virus. A virus that was very hard to catch, and even harder to

pass on. This was Marc’s theory, backed up by Tina and Sinclair—again, not all of a

sudden. After months and months and months. Tina and Sinclair couldn’t be much more

tight-mouthed if someone sewed their lips shut with ultralite fishing line. Vampirism, as a

virus, slowed your metabolism waaaaay down, but didn’t stop it. Good points: you no

longer sweated, or peed. Aging seemed to stop altogether. You were faster, stronger.

Heightened senses. Blah-blah. Bad points: vampires were highly susceptible to suggestion.

(All of them—modest cough—except me.) Tina, my husband’s right-hand woman (she

had been the one to turn him into a vampire in the early part of the twentieth century . . .

yup, I was in love and regularly boinking a man old enough to be my grandfather), had

eventually advanced this theory with Marc. Marc went into MD mode and had tentatively

concurred (on the grounds that he could change his mind if further proof emerged) that

yes, it was a virus, and yes, a Jewish vampire would cringe away from a cross. Because we

all know that’s what vampires do.
They
are vampires;
ergo,
crosses and holy water can

hurt them. I know, sounds stupid, right? Give it a minute. If you catch a disease that

makes you highly suggestible, and you have the weight of a zillion horror movies telling

you holy water burns . . . then holy water burns. But we were getting off the point. And it