Fred didn’t invite us for shit, which I appreciated. She thought I was interesting, like a bug nobody knew existed, but had no interest in being bosom buddies. This, I also appreciated.
The next day, she came to see us on her way to the airport. She took a cab, thankfully, not the Mississippi River, so she was as dry as a bone when I let her in. Good thing, too. Muddy Fred is Grumpier-than-usual Fred.
Sinclair and I had the Park Suite, so we made ourselves comfy at the glossy dining room table in the parlor. It was gloomy; Tina was in there, too, and was vulnerable to sunlight, so all the shades were drawn. She had a new laptop (she backed up her files obsessively, multiple times a day, so she wasn’t missing a beat with her work . . . she was only missing her vodka) and was tapping away at the end of the table. Sinclair had gone to the swanky doggie spa where Fur and Burr were currently incarcerated, to check on them and terrorize anyone trying to feed them commercial dog food.
Fred opened the conversation by slurping something green in a Starbucks cup. “I hear you’ll be able to make complete repairs.”
“Seems like.” Ronald Tinsman’s parting gift was more an incendiary device than a blow-’em-up banger. Instead of the entire mansion going ka-blammo, the monitor room went ka-blammo and the resulting (thankfully smallish) explosion worked as a fire spreader. We’d heard the bang, but unless you’d been in the monitor room, you were safe from immediate immolation and/or being blown to bits. Unfortunately, you then faced slower immolation as all the lovely old wood that made up the mansion caught fire and helped the fire spread.
“I’m glad for you,” was all she said, which was about as warm and sweet as Fred got.
“I’m glad for me, too. And I’m also glad you weren’t hurt.”
“No, just a little dehydrated.” She smirked and slurped. “This is my fourth one of these in the last two hours.”
“Yikes. Bathroom’s over there on the left.” Fun fact: mermaids and vampires didn’t do well in fires. Michael and Jeannie Wyndham had helped Fred through the smoke and flames on their end of the basement, and Michael had carried her through the tunnel all the way to the dock. Then at her order (I can only imagine the commands she barked at him), he unceremoniously plunked her into the river.
Five minutes later, she was much improved. The vampires and werewolves who’d come through the tunnel had found this as interesting as anything else that went on that night. Fred was the new paranormal Miss Congeniality, which was weird in about eight different ways.
“They—Michael and Jeannie—asked me to come visit, and I’m taking them up on it,” Fred the suddenly social added. “One of the world’s best marine biological labs is right up the road from them in Woods Hole.”
“Which is good, I take it?”
“I plan to take full advantage,” she said with relish. “I hope the Wyndhams won’t do anything tiresome like expect me to make dinner conversation every night. Or have dinner with them.”
“Oh good, there you are. I was wondering what happened to the real Fred.”
“Shut your fang hole, you dolt.” And she said it with such a lack of heat that the giggle just bubbled up out of me. “The reason I wanted to see you before I left—”
“I’m in love with you, too, Fred. What will society think?”
“That is not remotely amusing. But I had some thoughts about the triad.”
Ah. The triad. Fred’s bright, brilliant plan that, thanks to a timely house fire, everyone was on board with. I’d missed most of it, because I’d been in the corner coaching Marc on improving his love life while Will Mason bled to death on our sidewalk.
So here was the gist of it, as reconstructed for me later by Tina, Sinclair, and Fred herself.
CHAPTER
FORTY-ONE
“Betsy’s got the right idea,” Fred began. It was unsettling to have the undivided attention of several vampires and werewolves, but she’d tolerated worse. Once you fought your father to the death, things like unblinking regard weren’t nearly so unsettling. “And there won’t be a better time for our three species to band together. Especially since we’ve always known about werewolves.”
“Beg pardon?” This from Michael Wyndham. “I have to respectfully disagree, Dr. Bimm. Some individuals may know we exist, but in general, most people don’t.”
“Most humans don’t,” she corrected in a tone that was probably annoying or condescending or both. Mindful of her audience, she dialed down her near-constant impatience with people. “The Undersea Folk do. What, did you think in the history of both our species, no werewolf ever crossed paths with a mermaid?”*
From their expressions, Fred guessed it hadn’t occurred to any of them, and continued. “Their—our—habits are different.” She decided to use they instead of we so as to foster the impression of objectivity.
“The Folk can’t hide from the fantastic and frightening; it’s not in their nature. And there are so many astonishing and fantastic things in oceans and lakes and rivers, it’s almost a matter of course for them to embrace the unusual. Things no human has ever seen, even now, when we’ve explored virtually every corner of our planet.
“Once enough of us knew about werewolves, that was that: they all knew. Because it’s not in their nature to talk themselves into thinking it wasn’t true. It’s not in their nature to ignore the unusual. And, with respect to your current situation, avoiding it or trying to change things back is going about it all wrong. I know it’s only been a few years, but the planet hasn’t shaken itself apart because more people now know mermaids are real. How have any of your lives changed as a result of the Folk coming forward?”
Silence was her answer, eventually broken by the man in charge, who let her have the floor out of courtesy, and let her keep it out of interest.
“Perhaps because it may be a matter of territory,” Sinclair began, and Fred nodded at once. Here was a concept she understood, that any of her folk would grasp.
“Of course. Yes. The Undersea Folk control the oceans. Anyone who has ever seen a globe understands that’s three-quarters of the planet. That gives them tremendous leverage. And they’re fantastically wealthy: by maritime law they own all the sunken treasure; any precious jewel or coin or natural resource in the water is ours. Use that; use us.”
“I’m sorry,” Jeannie said bluntly. “I don’t get it.”
That was fine. She was ready for that, and again willed her impatience back. Giving in to her urge to snap, I’m one of the smartest people in the room, I do my homework, I’m right, so just agree so we can put an end to the tedious explanations and get to work, would have a deleterious effect.
“I’m saying the USF have the numbers and the money and the territory, so the nations of the world have to play nice with us. And to their credit, they realized that pretty quickly, which is why this has gone as well (so far) as it has. It may sound cynical, but that meant they couldn’t marginalize us. And they couldn’t pretend we were a hoax—too many people knew the truth. So they had to work with us, and they had to be decent about it. Nobody wants to look like the assholes bullying mermaids.”
“But what would be in it for you, Dr. Bimm?” This from the small brunette, Tina, who had heard every word while never leaving Sinclair’s side.
She thought about her father and his bad choices and how she’d had to kill him to save not only herself, but countless others. “Allies are always good,” she replied simply. “I don’t think there’s a person in this room who would deny it.” Not even Betsy, who was over in the corner giving Marc a piece of her mind—not that she could spare it. Now, now. In her own way, she cares for her people easily as much as I care for mine. If she wants to yell at a doctor about shoes, where’s the harm?
“So rather than be your own separate small nations at the whim of the world, ally with us. I know about werewolves, and since I met Betsy I’ve known vampires were real, but I woul
d never presume to guess how many there are. Less than a million in each case, I would estimate.” She was being generous. She figured the number was quite a bit lower. “That’s the population of Rhode Island.”
“Yes, we are few, comparably speaking,” Sinclair said. “And . . . ?”
“And now the world knows about vampires. My suggestion is, the three of us become the faces of all three newly acknowledged species. A triad.”
“Us versus them?” Wyndham, always a predator, asked.
“Us combined with them.” She turned to Sinclair. “This is your wife’s purpose. It’s mine, too, I think—why I was born. And”—with a nod at an expressionless Michael Wyndham—“my understanding is that Michael fought for his spot at the head of the Pack—to the death, I would guess.” No one said anything, but Jeannie’s gaze shifted to Lara, who blushed and looked down, fingering the hem of her New England Aquarium shirt.
“So here we three sit, so to speak,” Fred continued, “controlling thrones (so to speak) by right of conquest. And maybe destiny is a lie; maybe there’s no such thing and it’s just an astonishing string of coincidences. Either way, we’d be fools to turn our backs on what is an unprecedented opportunity.”
“I think Dr. Bimm makes some excellent points. We can—” Sinclair cut himself off and cocked his head. “I hear gunshots.”
CHAPTER
FORTY-TWO
“The timing just seemed to come together,” Fred finished. “And the consequences are fascinating, to say the least.”
“You said consequences,” I commented, “but this was a good thing.” A very good thing. Or a very bad thing: the day was young. Either way, me, Michael, and Fred versus humanity was going to be interesting.
“Consequence doesn’t denote bad,” she explained. “It’s simply something that happens because of something else.”
“Like a spring shoe sale in the spring?”
She snorted. “If that helps you.”
My shoes. Ah, best not to think of them now. Hopefully I could salvage most of them. The third floor had been the least damaged, and our room the farthest from the device and resulting smoke. Better to focus on the positives: the triad, vampires accepting being out in the open, and we’d only lost Will. And then only for twenty minutes or so.
Fred was chucking her empty Starbucks cup and preparing to leave, thank God. One thing we had in common: we could tolerate each other only in small doses. By the wry smile on her face, I guessed she was thinking the same thing.
“I know you don’t think much of all the ‘Elizabeth the One’ rhetoric—”
I made a face. “It sounds like a Matrix parody.”
“—but have you considered that this is, for want of a less hokey term, your destiny? Your rule was foretold—that’s what Tina tells me—”
“Keep me out of it,” Tina replied, eyes on her screen.
She smiled and shrugged into her sooty hoodie, which clashed with her stretch pants and faded T-shirt, because she dressed like a young bag lady. “And here you are, bringing the vampire nation into the light. And here you are, allies with werewolves while in a cordial relationship with the face of the Undersea Folk . . . You did that long before I came to town and talked about the triad. And that would have been impossible a hundred years ago. Perhaps ten years ago.”
Have I mentioned I like Fred? She had a nice way of taking all my blunders and putting them in the “I did that on purpose” pile.
There was a short silence, broken by Tina’s, “Majesty, you’re doing it again.”
“What?”
“Saying things out loud, instead of just thinking them.”
“It was a test,” I decided on the spot, “and Fred passed.”
“Sure it was,” Fred said, and shocked the shit out of me by hugging me good-bye.
CHAPTER
FORTY-THREE
“One Betsy . . . to rule the world.”
“Will you knock it off?” I leaned over to cuff Marc on the back of the head, only to be body blocked by Will Mason, who was getting cockier every day he was a zombie. “The triad doesn’t need a motto, and if we did, it wouldn’t be that. Oof! Jeez, Will, you almost knocked me into a bush.”
“Don’t touch him,” Will mock scolded. “He’s miiiiine!”
“Yeah, all yours. Take him and go far, far away.” We’d piled out of various cars and were eyeing the ongoing construction at the mansion. The fire had been two weeks ago; we’d come to check on the progress. Since it was the middle of the afternoon, Tina had stayed behind. Fred, the Wyndhams, and the assembly o’ vamps were, of course, long gone.
“We’re staying put.” This from Marc, who had his arms twined around Will and was nuzzling the space behind his ear. Zombie PDA: exactly as weird as you’d expect.
“You couldn’t chase us away if you tried,” Will added, because he was saucy now. Note to self: don’t make any more zombies. At least he’d gotten around to thanking me. It had been sweet and a little embarrassing. Lots of “I’ll be forever in your debt!” and “You’ll never regret doing this for me!” And “I don’t know why you saved a nobody but I’ll spend the rest of my days paying you back!” and “I feel like giving you something—can I give you something?”
Marc had been way more sophisticated about it, snuggling up beside me on the couch while we watched Deadpool again, never saying a thing because he knew I knew what he was really doing. That sometimes there weren’t words when a friend stepped up.
“Nobody’s chasing any of us away. Nobody’s making us leave our home. Well, permanently, I mean. We’ve been temporarily relocated by choice. We’ll rebuild.” I gestured at the scaffolding, the workmen, the cheerful progress in the sunshine. “It’s what we’re supposed to do.”
I started to walk around to the side, Jessica beside me holding a baby carrier. She’d brought Elizabeth, solo. Dick was doing something baby related with Eric that I didn’t care about, and so didn’t listen when she explained. Thank God they don’t outnumber us, she’d confided at the end of her super-long baby story. We divvy them up and go about our day.
“I’ve been meaning to ask you,” she said. “How do you know? I mean—obviously that’s what we’re seeing, but you were saying that the night of the fire, when we didn’t know how extensive the damage was. You always made it clear that you’d be back. We’d all eventually be back. But you couldn’t have known that.”
“This will sound crazy, but—”
“My babies told you.”
“Or it’ll sound completely sane, but only if you’re us. And yeah, they did.” Just not in so many words. Their ease with the mansion made me realize anew that in every timeline, the twins grew up here. So, obvious choice: rebuild.
And like she’d been conjured from thought, the door to the mudroom opened and a tall, slender teenager was standing in the doorway, waving us over.
We all looked down. Jessica’s baby carrier was, of course, empty.
* * *
“So!” Elizabeth Berry said with a bright smile. “Your house is trashed, Onnie Betsy. And it’s not even homecoming season. Be desperately ashamed.”
“I will not,” I snapped back. “And it’s deeply, deeply unfair that you’re gorgeous and fresh faced and have a flawless complexion at oh-God-thirty in the morning.” It was true. Same foxy, pointed face as her brother, but with a feminine cast to her features. Her small rose gold earrings set off the gold undertones in her skin, and she was wearing stuff, I couldn’t say what. That’s how great she looked: her outfit was irrelevant. Which was a thought I had never entertained before. “You’re not even wearing makeup; what a show-off.”
“Oh-God-thirty? It’s past lunchtime.”
“Who cares?” But hanging on to my grumpy mood was tricky. The mansion was coming along nicely, though Elizabeth and I were standing on plastic in the kitchen, and the main fridge h
ad been pulled like a tooth and toted away. Just as well Tina wasn’t able to visit the vodka crime scene.
Elizabeth hopped up on the one stretch of counter that wasn’t filthy or covered in plastic. “So any new plans to, oh, I don’t know, step up the security setup? Cameras and motion detectors and bug detectors, and everywhere for a change?”
“Ya think?” Just like that, my bad mood was back. Should have done it years ago. Like, the day we moved in. We’d been lucky something wretched hadn’t happened before now.
Laura had planted the bomb in the one room that wasn’t bristling with sensors and cameras: the monitor room. Because duh. We had no clue until the ceiling fell on us.
“No harm done.” And she wasn’t smiling anymore. And I jerked my head up, shocked, because she must know that Laura was dead; she seemed to know an awful lot, just like her brother. But she didn’t falter. “I’m sorry if that hurts you,” she continued gently, “but it’s the plain truth, Onnie. No. Harm. Done. What can be fixed will be fixed. And what’s gone should stay gone.”
“Maybe, but that’s not for you to say to me today. It’s still a little raw. Or, as we fuddy-duddies like to say, ‘too soon.’ Change of subject. Now.”
“Um . . . good job spinning it for the media?”
I was silent, because I wasn’t proud of that. We’d returned from Hell and vamp-mojo’d the firemen, police, ambulance attendants, media, and a few of our neighbors, just to be on the safe side. It was the first time I was glad there was an assembly of vampires to lend a hand.
We didn’t mess with them too much—we weren’t trying to trick people into thinking the fire didn’t happen. But the reporters reported that the fire was started quite accidentally by bad wiring. And the subsequent investigation
(“Your investigation will match those findings.”
“Yes, my investigation will match those findings.”)
matched those findings. And Will Mason—whoever that was—had never been shot. And he certainly hadn’t died. And the man who had tried to bring him back definitely wasn’t a zombie.