He caught my hand and pressed a kiss to my fingertips. “My thanks.”
“It was good you didn’t hit back.” I paused. “I guess. Come on downstairs. You won’t believe this. Also your theory that it wasn’t a random baby-stealing dude just happening to wander by and snatch them was dead-on.”
His lips twitched into a wry expression. “I will not like what I see, will I?”
“I honestly have no idea,” I replied, because it was the stone truth. “See for yourself. You guys, too.”
We hurried back to the kitchen in time to hear Jessica’s shriek. Yep, she’d found the preschoolers and wasn’t at all pleased, and who could blame her? There was only so much stress a new parent could take before—boom. Meltdown.
I shoved at the swinging door and ducked inside before it could swing back and break my nose. The others, still behind me, were gonna have to fend for their own noses. “Jess, I know, and you’re right to be freaked, but—”
“Look at them!”
“Yep. I get it. But the thing is—huh.”
Jessica was pointing at the preschoolers, who were—when did that happen?—babies. Babies lying on the smoothie counter and starting to fuss. Babies who were definitely not preschoolers anymore.
“They could have fallen!” This while she and DadDick were scooping them up and cooing at them. She whirled on me, which made Thing One (?) let out a startled squeak. “You just plunked them on the counter and left?”
“They weren’t on the counter when—uh—I’m not actually sure what’s happening here. But whatever I did, I’m very sorry. Unless you’re glad. Then I’m proud of what I’m not sure I did.” I turned to Sinclair. “It’s not my fault! I told them to stay,” I whined.
Although. Technically they had.
CHAPTER
NINETEEN
“The important thing is,” Tina began, “the little ones are home and they’re safe.”
They weren’t so little when I saw them last, but I kept that to myself. I wanted to get Sinclair alone and explain what I’d seen so we could decide together what to do about it. Ironic, that I was doing that annoying trope where the female lead keeps an important secret to herself until it’s Almost Too Late, but there was a lot more at stake here than Jessica’s roused maternal instinct. And ugh, I just heard myself. What in the name of all that was (un)holy was I becoming as I approached my midthirties?
Something to obsess over later.
“Yes, thank . . . God.” Sinclair really loved being able to break that commandment. I think he and Tina must have come to an arrangement, because though he knew it hurt her, she didn’t glare or complain or give him the “I knew you when you were still in diapers, buster, so quit showing off” look. “That is, of course, the most important thing, quite right.”
“And they’re fine, too. Right, Marc?” Jess asked, kneading and worrying the corner of one baby blanket until it began to fray. Her gaze, wide and anxious, never left Marc’s face. “They’re fine?”
“Completely,” he assured her, putting away his steth and other medical goodies. Tina had bought him an old-fashioned doctor’s bag in which he kept meticulously cleaned instruments and Tic Tacs (he had a horror of rotten zombie breath). The first thing he’d done was give both babies a thorough once-over, then let DadDick and Jessica feed them their 6:25 p.m. bottles (soon to be followed by their 6:45 p.m. bottles, because those li’l buggers were bottomless yawning pits of hunger). “I can’t find a thing wrong with them.”
Then you’re definitely not looking hard enough. Actually, now that I thought about it, there likely wasn’t anything wrong with them, at least on a physical level. Too bad it wasn’t as simple as that.
“Okay. So.” DadDick smiled down at Pepsi, watching with a sort of concentrated raptness as he/she guzzled. “What happened? And could it happen again?”
“And what do we do if it does?” Jessica added, cradling Coke.
V-chip them? Recalling how my Sharpie plan had been received, I decided to keep that thought to myself, too.
The irony was neck deep. I was doing that thing I saw movie characters do all the time: I knew something about the zombies/plague/weird babies/sentient dogs/robot lizards trying to take over the world and rather than helpfully cough it up, I was keeping secrets. I had become the thing I loathed: the useless, dim, hysterical horror movie heroine.
“One thing at a time,” Tina soothed. “I think the best thing for now is to—”
Jess ignored her, locked eyes with Sinclair, and said it straight-out: “So what’s the policy on turning kids into vampires?”
Decades’ worth of cool self-control was probably the only reason Sinclair’s jaw just didn’t unhinge. My jaw, however, was now on vacation and my mouth was so wide a dozen bees could have flown in and had a meeting.
For a long moment no one said anything. Since I’d literally rather die than let a silence hang too long, I was the first to break.
“Where did that come from?” I managed (after three tries, which had sounded like “whuh? muh? derp?”). “The babies being gone? Because they’re back. And they’re fine. Marc just explained how they’re fine. You trusted him to deliver them, so we all know you both trust his medical opinion despite . . . despite stuff happening.” At the casual compliment (except it wasn’t so much a compliment as a statement of fact), Marc dropped his gaze and smiled a little at the floor.
“I’m just curious,” Jess clarified, as though she often wondered about vampires being babies or vice versa when we all knew her thoughts on the subject. Shit, she’d been dying, actually dying of cancer, and had made it clear she was not, not, not to be turned. By anyone. Under any circumstances. She hadn’t known at the time—no one had known; I hadn’t even known—that I’d accidentally cure her but she still made it plain she expected to die human and remain dead. “Just . . . just wondering. About things. Things I hadn’t ever really wondered about before.”
“Do you think someone stole your infants to bring them to another vampire to turn?” Tina asked, her face twisting with such dark emotion she wasn’t at all pretty for those few moments. “Because that would be unconscionable and we would never, never allow—”
“No, I don’t think that. I think Sinclair had it right.” She nodded at him. “I don’t think a regular person could have come in here to take them for any reason, never mind fetching them to a vampire for a midnight snack.” DadDick visibly shuddered at her words and clutched Pepsi closer. “But I’m wondering how we can protect them, going forward.”
“That is not the way,” Sinclair said, and thank goodness, because I was about to say the same thing but much, much louder.
“Okay,” she replied steadily, “but why?”
“Why?” I repeated, much, much louder.
“Is there, uh, is there an official policy?” Jessica looked around at us, clearly prepared to wait all night for an answer. “Or something?”
Sinclair looked at me. Which was unnerving, because, um, like I’d know? Oh. Right. Queen. “I have no—” I began, only to be cut off by Tina.
“Jessica, when was the last time you slept?” This in a lovely, gentle tone that didn’t have even a trace of also, have you lost your fucking mind?
“I don’t know,” she snapped. “What day is it? It’s not because I’m tired. You guys know it’s not because I’m tired.”
“Exhausted,” I corrected. “I get tired explaining why Payless sucks. I get tired when I have to buy ice because there is a ton of ice outside, all the time, through May. You’re not tired. You’re exhausted, and why wouldn’t you be? It’s no wonder sleep deprivation isn’t considered cool even among torturers. It’s true!” I added, like they were getting ready to contradict me. “You know a torture is bad when guys who torture are all ‘hey, man, you’d better back off, that’s going too far.’”
Jessica shrugged. “Like I said. I
t’s because I’m thinking about things I’ve never had to think about before.” I could sympathize, really. I hated when that happened to me.
“You cannot actually want your infants to become vampires,” Sinclair pointed out, sounding all reasonable and not a little aghast, which was good on him because I knew he was horrified. I could feel it, all the horror.
“No, I wouldn’t want them to be like this for all eternity,” she said, looking down at Coke.
I shuddered. Eternity as a newborn! A crying, shitting, nonverbal creature the size of a bag of flour who would only give negative feedback. Argh, kill it, kill it with fire! They could make that their new family motto.
“Has it ever been done?” DadDick asked, so suddenly I’d almost forgotten he was there. Jess tended to fill a room when she was wound up. I’d almost forgotten I was there.
No answer from Sinclair or Tina. And his thoughts, I couldn’t help notice, were carefully blank. Unlike mine, which were usually blank but not because I was trying.
“So, that would be a big fat Yes,” Jessica guessed, going with that whole “silence signals consent” thing. “It has been done before. So what—”
“The creatures were destroyed,” was Sinclair’s deadly quiet reply. “Immediately. Those who made them were also destroyed. Slowly.”
I suppressed a shiver as I watched my husband. Remember when we used to have pleasant conversations in this kitchen?
Not really, Elizabeth. No.
“Okay!” In my intent to bring this awful chat to a close, I spoke a little too loudly, if everyone jumping (except Coke and Pepsi, glutted and now in milk comas) was any indication. “If there isn’t an official policy, there’s definitely an unofficial one, one that I am behind a hundred percent. No babies turned into li’l fangers. No preschoolers, either. And no elementary-age kids. And middle school sucks; who wants to be twelve forever? For that matter, high school sucks, too, and it’d be beyond evil to condemn anyone to a lifetime of smelling like Clearex and sexual frustration. Except maybe sixteen should be the, what d’you call it, the cutoff?” I looked around the room. “Should someone be writing this down? And speaking of writing things down, I have to go back to Hell. I only left because of the text, but now that the babies got back (heh, get it?), I have to go back, too. I’m sorry.” I was speaking directly to Jessica now. “I’m not running away from this particular weirdness so much as leaving because I have to address a different particular weirdness.”
“Yeah, yeah.” She flapped a hand at me. “You’d better, I guess, although we don’t really feel safer knowing you’re down there doing stuff.”
“It’s not down there,” I began to explain for the ninth time, “it’s a whole other dimension.”
“And listen, about your dad—”
“Don’t worry about it,” I cut in, because yikes! How’d we get back on that subject? “I know you haven’t had any time to look into this, I mean—”
“Well, a solid twenty-four hours, which is—”
“—I’ve only been gone, what? Half an hour? But I’ll come back later and we can—”
“—not nearly enough time but I was able to figure—”
“—figure out . . . what to . . .” I trailed off as Jessica’s words sank in. “What now? How long was I gone?”
“A night and a day,” Tina replied, watching me carefully, “and now it’s night again.”
“No. No, that’s not—” I stared and, since I couldn’t think of anything else to do at that moment, stared more. And they were all looking at me like I’d been the one to lose track of time and not crazy, new-mom-hormonal, sleep-deprived Jessica. “Is it? That can’t . . .”
Sinclair’s big hand gripped mine and he gave it a light squeeze. “It seemed like much less time in Hell?”
“It was half an hour in Hell! Oh, hell. I mean, the hell with Hell. Argh! You know what I’m trying to get across.”
“Vaguely.” The corner of his mouth twitched, but he squashed the grin. “So in addition to mastering your newfound ability to move your physical body to and from another dimension, it seems you had best adjust to, and understand, the time issue as well.”
“I didn’t even know there was a time issue! How the hell am I supposed to address it? Don’t even get me started on understanding it.”
“By allowing me to attend you,” was his soooo smooth reply.
I yanked my hand away. “Aha! I see your subtle game, Sink Lair; you’re not fooling me.”
“The b in subtle,” he began with a mournful sigh, “is silent. As we have discussed.”
“Back off, Grammar Police.”
“Would that not be Pronunciation Police?”
“Don’t try to confuse me!” Alas, too late.
“Never mind that—what’s subtle about Sinclair saying straight-out that he wants to go to Hell with you and take some of the burden off your bony shoulders?” Marc asked with honest curiosity.
“He just wants to take over.” Weird how I snapped that like it was a bad thing. “All right, I’ll deal with that, too.” My brain waited hopefully, but no idea was forthcoming. I’d deal with my lazy brain later. It would be punished! Everyone would be punished! “I have to go.” Not least because Jess apparently had a Dad update. Pass. “You know you can text me if you need me.”
“Yeah, about that,” Marc began, and Tina’s eyes lit up. I could actually see them widen and get sparkly the way they did when she came home with a bottle of peanut-butter-flavored vodka.
“Yes, how interesting! And how fascinating, my queen, you must tell us how—”
“No idea.” Better nip that in the bud right now, the thought that I could actually be a helpful source of information for them. “Seriously, you guys. I’ve got no idea. And hanging in the kitchen isn’t going to help me get one. I’ll be back in—” A day? A week? Ugh, no idea, everything was horrible, life was horrible, Hell was horrible, Jessica’s weird babies were horrible, my vampire king husband angling for a supernatural corporate takeover was horrible, ugh ugh UGH!
I just really, really need to get the fuck out of here right now I have to have to have to—
CHAPTER
TWENTY
“Oh, now, what is this shit?”
I was back in the big fat nothing that was the pit, Hades, the place where you could never find your receipt and even if you could, Hell doesn’t take returns.
I’d wanted to be back in Hell—or at least gone from that kitchen. And I was. Blink! Jeannie and her pink outfit of scarves and air (and her disturbing habit of referring to an air force major as “Master”) had nothing on me. Too bad I had no real idea how I did it. More of that “Hell and its rules are shaped by the force of your will” bullshit? The force of my will? What, like, think positive? Don’t think you can run Hell . . . know you can! What? No. Nothing was that easy.
Could those business seminars I’d endured for various office jobs have been right all along? Communicating with Tact, Diplomacy, and Professionalism . . . do I have to say what a waste of money that was for management? Almost as much as the bucks they shelled out for Conflict Management Skills for Women. Should I hang some of those motivational posters in Hell? Be the Bridge: Problems become opportunities when the right people join together. Excellence: Some excel because they are destined to. Most excel because they are determined to. Are they also determined to end a sentence with a preposition? Because that’s what they’re doing. Show me that poster, thanks.
“Oh, look,” a familiar, bored voice drawled behind me. “It’s back.”
I whirled and glared at the Ant. “What the hell is going on in Hell?”
“You aren’t tired of hammering that stupid joke over and over yet?”
“I will never get tired of hammering stupid jokes,” I retorted. “Now tell me what’s going on. How long was I gone? And how come I was only here for a few minute
s but the gang said I was MIA for a day? And what’s up with the weird babies?” This was why I hadn’t said anything to Jessica or DadDick about what I’d seen their babies do. Because if there’s one person on the planet who loathes my stepmother more than I, it would be Jessica, who loathed her with all the power her love and loyalty brought to bear.
The Ant had, after all, been the one to tip me off to the problem with Jessica’s pregnancy9 and the strangeness therein; I assumed she’d also know what was up with Oil and Vinegar. But there was no way I could have said, Something unprecedented and terrifying is happening to your children and the only one who might be able to help us is a woman you and I both despise and have never been nice to, but, no big, I’ll go play Twenty Questions with her in Hell and maybe she’ll be helpful and maybe not. Later, bitch!
Uh. No. If I had, Jess never would have let me go back to Hell without her, and taking my best friend to Hell was not happening, ever. And she wouldn’t have forgiven me for going without her.
“Oh, now you want my counsel?” The Ant was cupping her elbows and shivering as if she were cold, which she totally wasn’t. She was also tapping one foot, which I assumed was to remind me that a) she was Very, Very Busy and b) she still had terrible taste in footgear. “That’s nerve. I thought since you killed my boss I was now the—how did you put it?”
“Annoying Nobody,” I reminded her, then realized I wasn’t helping myself. “Um, I think. I dunno, it was so long ago.” Maybe. “Look, just cough up what you know about this place, okay?”
“No,” was the predictable answer, and there it was, the thing I loathed more than pleather: the Pout. The Pout had precipitated my father filing for divorce, cruises to tropical islands, my father’s second marriage, and various shopping trips abroad. And that was just the stuff I knew about. It was the Ant’s mightiest weapon (aside from her stiff hair, which, I was pretty sure, was bulletproof from all the product she shoveled on) and one that never failed to work.