And that's how I ended up in the Cook County Morgue. In friggin' Chicago. Who knew there was a portal from my St. Paul house to hell to The Magnificent Mile in Chicago? Not that it seemed so magnificent when the fish truck creamed me and knocked me through a (meditate on the irony) Payless Shoes store window.

Of course they thought I was dead and stuffed me into a smelly body bag. You know how when you get new inflatable toys for summer swimming and they have that peculiar plastic-ey smell? Yup, like that. Except a dark color so blood and other fluids wouldn't show up. Oh, and the zipper. Let's not forget the great big zipper.

Screeeeech, kee-RASH! Thump, thud. Broken glass everywhere. Pulseless (yet sexy) corpse buried under dozens of buy-one-get-the-second-half-off anklet boots in many unflattering dark colors. It was like being buried under a mountain of Splenda when you wanted real sugar. Or being trapped in a cave with nothing but diet pop when you wanted the real deal.

Sing it with me: "Weeeeee're off to see the coroner, the wonderful, wonderful coroner. We hear he is a whiz with a knife, if ever a whiz there was! If ever a knife could cut up my type, could cut up my type and make me feel right, we-" Never mind. That sucked. And when did I start making up songs in my head?

I had to put the whammy on the poor guy who had been paid by the county to cut me open and weigh my internal organs. Don't judge: I normally tried to feed only on the jerky, or my husband. But these were dire times. I had to get back to St. Paul. I had to find Laura. I had to find some underpants.

I didn't know where my old clothes were, and didn't care. They were probably all bloody and ruined, anyway, bagged and tagged and sitting in another cold room. It's not like I'd been carrying ID; anything that identified me was still in St. Paul. Anyway, who'd connect an unsatisfied dead morgue customer in Chicago to weird goings-on in St. Paul?

That said, I wasn't going to be naked for another minute. I was able to scrounge, with the help of my newest fan, the dazed and bitten Dr. Graham, clean scrub pants in poop brown, a "Stereotypes Are a Real Time-saver" T-shirt a size too small, but not in a sexy way, and bare feet.

Bare feet! In November! No problem; it was either that or paper slippers. Or Dr. Graham's shower slippers, little rubber boats of fungus. I nearly screamed when he tried to hand them to me. We were both having a shitty day.

"I'd say something like 'this is hell,'" I told the goofily smiling Dr. Graham, "except I've been to hell and this is worse." At my gesture, he handed over his cell phone. "Thanks. Uh, some privacy, please?"

Graham wandered off, holding his neck. I stabbed a phone number that was practically tattooed on my heart, the private cell number of my beloved . . .

"Elizabeth? Hello?"

. . . a number only two people on the entire planet knew, we each had the other's soul and we each had the other's private cell number . . .

"Elizabeth? Are you hurt?"

. . . because that's how special I was to him. That's how special his cell number was to me. Also his Bergdorf discount. It was comforting to know that in a world gone wild, and a hell gone worse-

"Elizabeth!"

"Ow, don't scream. Shrill is not a good sound for you."

"Ohthankwhoeveryou'reallright," he gasped. It was kind of funny . . . Sinclair wanted to thank God, except if he said the actual word, he'd probably get blisters in his mouth.

"That's okay," I said. "I'll thank Him for you. I pray for you every night anyway. Well, almost every night. Okay, every week. What is this, a witch hunt? Once a month for sure."

"WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU?"

"Oh, you can just take that tone and jam it right up into your teal blue silk boxers from ManSilks, pal! You have no idea of the hell I've been through. Literally. It's wrong that I know that. No one should know that!"

"I am going to lock you in a room and fuck you for hours," the king of the vampires growled, "and then I will kill you. Where are you?"

That sounded pretty good. The first part.

"Elizabeth!"

"I'm in a Roadrunner cartoon, Sinclair. And I'm the coyote." The events of the last few hours/centuries got on top of me at that moment and I burst into tears. "Come get me, Sinclair, okay? Sinclair? Okay?" I was crying harder and couldn't hear him, but could hear how pathetic I sounded, so I hung up.

I slid down the wall; Dr. Graham had kindly escorted me to a different part of the basement and I had privacy for my meltdown. So I sobbed and stretched out my legs and kicked my bare feet and slapped the wall and wiped my eyes with the cell-I couldn't make tears, but old habits, you know?-and it beeped in my hand.

"Who is it?" I wept. "Dr. Graham isn't here. And I shouldn't be."

"My own, my queen, you forgot to tell me where you are."

I cried harder. "Sorry. I'm having a terrible night."

"Don't cry, Elizabeth, it tears my heart."

"And I don't have any shoes!"

"And yet you must find the strength to go on," the king of the vampires soothed.

"Are you making fun of me?"

"Never. And I would instantly destroy the soulless cur who would dare."

"Yeah, that would be good. Destroying soulless curs." I perked up a little. "Okay. I love you."

"I love you to, my own, but-"

"Here comes Dr. Graham. I better-"

"Elizabeth!"

"Don't yell, I'm having a bad night!"

"Where. The hell. Are you. My love?"

"Oh. Yeah, that would be helpful, wouldn't it? Chicago. Cook County Morgue."

A long sigh on the other end, which was cute since Sinclair didn't have to breathe. He sometimes forgot when he was aggravated.

"We are coming, my own. I will see you in less than six hours."

"Six hours? It's dark now; what's the holdup? What about Jessica's private pl-?"

"If anyone gets between thee and me, I want you to kill them, Elizabeth. Even . . ."

"Even what?"

"Even if they are friends."

"Yeah, I'm gonna take a pass on that."

"Or were friends. You are far from me, darling, and many of our people have not yet accepted you as queen. The city of Chicago should not know the vampire queen is there, alone. Stay low if you can. Find a sheep if you can, and hole up with him or her and get your strength back."

"Sinclair!" I was truly shocked. People weren't sheep. What I had done to Dr. Graham was bad enough; I wasn't going to haul some pour soul off the street, make them take me to their home, then feed on them like a blond wood tick'til the cavalry came while I emptied their fridge of all things liquid. Guh-ross!

He sighed again. "If you cannot or will not take such measures, protect yourself however you can. And, Elizabeth . . ."

"Yeah?" I'd gone from comforted to scared and lonely.

"Don't pray for me. Pray for you. And tell . . . tell Him"-his voice was getting choked, difficult to hear-". . . to . . . to keep you safe."

"I will," I said, touched. "I love you."

"Yes," he said, and clicked off, the arrogant ass.