Undead and Unemployed

I opened my eyes and was not at all pleased to see Marc standing over me. His mouth was hanging open and he was gaping down at me. And presumably, Sinclair, who had at one point kicked off the covers.



"What?" I leaned over Sinclair, grabbed the comforter, and spread it over us. "Somebody better be on fire, pal."



"Huh? Oh. Uh... sorry, the reason I came up here has been driven completely out of my head by the sight of your cellulite."



"I don't have any," I snapped.



"Neither do I," Sinclair said. "Good evening, by the way."



Jessica walked in. She slowed as she saw Sinclair next to me, then pretended like she hadn't just had the crap shocked out of her and strode briskly over to Marc. "Are you going to give her the phone or what? It's your boss," she added to me. "He sounds pissed."



I grabbed for the phone, which wasn't easy because Marc was still staring, and I had to wrestle it away from him while remaining modestly covered.



"Hello? Mr. Mason?"



"Elizabeth. You were supposed to be here an hour ago."



Shit! What day was it? What time was it? Wait a minute... "Mr. Mason, I switched with Renee for tonight. She's covering my shift."



"Oh? Because Renee isn't here, either."



Well, hell, go yell at her. "Mr. Mason, I'm not on tonight."



"The schedule disagrees."



"Yeah, but... we switched!"



"I see. Do you think you could come in for a couple of hours, since Renee seems to have forgotten your... ah... arrangement?"



"Sure," I said quickly. I was going to have to do some serious damage control on this one. "Be there in an hour."



"Good-bye, Elizabeth."



"Shit!" I said as he hung up. "He thinks I'm lying to cover my ass."



"And what an ass," Sinclair said admiringly.



"You stop that. Dammit, now I've got to go in and be all nicey-nice and kick Renee's butt up to her shoulderblades when I see her."



"At the same time?"



"Dammit!"



"Mason takes you for granted," Jessica declared.



"You're sweet, but I haven't been a very good employee lately, what with my-"



"Secret vampire life?"



"Well... yeah."



"Slut," Marc coughed into his fist.



"I am not! I've only had sex twice in the past... what year is this?"



Sinclair laughed.



"You guys go away," I ordered. "I have to grab a shower and get ready for work."



"The Blade Warriors are here," Jessica said, rolling her eyes. "Well, one of them."



I rubbed my temples. "It's Jon, isn't it?"



"If Jon's the one who looks like he should be on a beach with Gidget and her pals, yes."



Sinclair growled. Actually growled, like a wolf or something! "Send him away," he ordered.



"Calm down, O king of the dead people," Jessica said, smirking. "As it happens, he's insisting on talking to Bets, here."



"I could not care less. Send him away."



"Stop ordering my friends around!" I rested my chin on my fist. "Nuts. Well, I can't talk to him right now, I've got to get to work. I'll have to see him later. Nobody's died, though, right?"



"Not yet."



"Cheerful thought," I muttered, standing. What did I care? Jessica'd seen me naked about a million times, and Marc was a lot more interested in how Sinclair looked. "All right. I'll catch you guys later."



"Oh, come on," Marc whined. "We want to hear about what happened up here last night. Specifically, why Tina came down the stairs carrying a dead vampire. And why you didn't wake up by yourself."



"Later," I said firmly, and walked into the bathroom.



I was rinsing shampoo out of my hair when I heard someone pull back the shower curtain. "You'd better be anyone but Eric Sinclair," I said without opening my eyes.



"You'd prefer Marc? Or perhaps Jon?"



"Ugh, and again... ugh." I finished rinsing and opened my eyes. Eric was splendidly nude (still!), standing in front of me with his hands on his hips, smiling. "He's just a kid with a crush."



"You sound unsurprised."



"For some weird reason," I admitted, "teenage boys really like me."



"I can't think why," he said, idly tweaking my nipple.



I slapped his hand away. "What's got you in such a good mood? That's the second smile this morning. Evening, I mean."



"Oh, I guess I'm just an evening person." He grabbed me to him and rubbed his chest across mine. "More of that strawberry shampoo, I see."



I tried to wriggle away, but I was too slippery. I was like a trout in a live well. Nowhere to go! "Cut that out. I don't have time for your shenanigans. I'm late already." But hoo, man, was I tempted! No. I couldn't. My job in Heaven depended on not getting sweaty with Eric right now. Dammit! "Did I say I'm late? Because I really am."



"Spoilsport," he said, but he released me. "Why you insist on dashing off to a meaningless-"



"Don't start."



"I wasn't," he said, having the gall to sound wounded.



I tossed him the soap, which he snatched, one-handed, out of the air. "Sure you weren't. Lather up, big boy, and then it's time to hit the bricks."



"You can make getting clean sound so... dirty."



I laughed in spite of myself. "Don't start, I said!"



"I hear and obey," he replied, and then squeezed my shampoo bottle-when had he grabbed that? Strawberry gel arched out and splattered across my breasts.



I cursed, and ducked under the spray again to rinse. Then we ran out of hot water-stupid ancient water heater!-and we were both cursing.



I was headed down the back stairs-the quickest way from my room to the driveway behind the kitchen-when I heard Jon's plaintive, "But she likes me. I can tell!" and froze in mid-step.



I started to creep back up. I'd take the other stairs, go around the front way, but Jessica's words glued me to the spot.



"Jon, she's not just a vampire. Although that would be problematic enough, don't you agree? You and your little group of nerd hoods kill vampires."



"Only the bad ones," he said. "We voted. Sinclair and Tina and Betsy and Monique are off-limits. We were still trying to figure out about Sarah when she... well, whatever you guys did to her. But if we catch a vampire trying to hurt or kill a human, he's fair game."



"Spare me your twisted machinations. And you might want to run that plan by Sinclair."



"He's not my boss!"



"Okay, okay, don't burst a blood vessel. My point is, Betsy's not just a vampire, she's the queen of the vampires."



"So? She doesn't even like that job. And the way I hear it, it's an accident that she's even queen, anyway. She'd get out of it if-"



"Yeah, but she can't."



"If she really wanted to-"



"No, really, she can't. I guess the vampires have this book with all their laws and prophecies and stuff in it, and according to that book-which is like the vampires' bible, so they pay attention to it-Betsy's the queen and Eric Sinclair is the king."



"So?" Sulky now, not that I could blame him. It's not like Jess was telling him anything he wanted to hear.



I heard her shift her weight and almost grinned. She was losing her patience, and trying her best not to lose her temper as well. "So, it's like they're married. In the eyes of vampire law, they are married. Not only are you lusting after a vampire, you're lusting after a married one."



"So?"



"Don't be such a moron. They've got a kingdom to run, Jon, and in case you haven't noticed, the king is crazy about her. He'll pull your head off if you try anything. And be fair, it's not like Betsy's encouraged you. Right?"



Sullen silence.



"Besides... I think... maybe... she loves him, too."



"No."



I nearly fell down the stairs. Damn right, no!



"Oh, it's the best kept secret in the world. Even from her! But I guess my point is, why don't you drop this whole thing? She'll just keep rejecting you. Or, Eric will pull your head off. So we're looking at a lose/lose situation, right?"



"I'm still asking her out."



I heard a whoosh as Jessica threw her arms in the air. "Fine, get your head handed to you, see if I care."



"If she says no, she says no. But I'm asking anyway."



Great. Well, I'd field that one when I came to it. As for right now, the front stairs awaited. And so did Macy's!



I actually laughed while pulling out of the driveway; I couldn't help it. The idea was too absurd. Me, in love with Eric Sinclair? And him in love with me? Even sillier.



I drove him nuts. I knew it. He knew it. We all knew it. The only reason he even liked having me around was because I was the queen. Beyond that, we had nothing in common. Ab-so-lu-te-ly nothing. It was silly enough that we were destined to rule at each other's sides for, like, a zillion years. He had to be as annoyed about that as I was.



My cell phone buzzed. Boop-boop-boo-BOOP-BOOP-boop bip boop boop! Stupid "Funkytown" theme; I've got to get that changed. I fished it out of my purse. "Hello?"



"As usual," Jessica announced, "you've left an enormous mess for me to clean up."



"Sorry about that, but I had to get to work."



"And what did you do to Sinclair? He's humming! And he did the dishes! 'High time to earn my keep,' he says, and then he mojo'd the housekeeper into taking a nap. You should see the guy in Playtex rubber gloves."



I cracked up. "You're making that up."



"Who could make something like that up? And he shows no desire to leave, either-usually he does a fade when he finds out you've left. Not tonight. I keep tripping over the guy. It's creepy, but interesting."



"Yeah? Who's all there?"



"Everybody. Jon, Ani, Father Markus, Tina. Oh, I almost forgot the best part! After doing the dishes and rearranging your bookcase-all the titles are facing the right way, now-"



"Goddamn it!"



"He runs into Jon, who has got it bad for you, FYI-"



"I heard."



"Anyway, I figured they'd sort of growl at each other and beat their chests like gorillas on the Nature channel, but Sinclair just smiled at him and patted him on the head. Patted him on the head! Good thing I hid Jon's crossbow in the fridge or there'd have been real trouble."



"That is weird," I admitted.



"Weird, shit. It's bizarre and unprecedented, is what it is. You must have knocked his brains loose."



"Jessica!" Then I snickered. "Okay, well... maybe I did."



"What, did you grow an extra breast or something? And don't think I didn't notice the big chunks that fell off the ceiling in your room. I'm telling you, I've never seen this guy in such a good mood."



I swerved to avoid a red BMW-I hate those 'I've got a yellow light so I have the right of way' drivers. "Look, we had a nice night, okay? A very nice night. I was upset about the Ant, you know, and having to stake Sarah-"



"You killed her?"



"-and all the stuff that's been going on lately, and he, you know. He made me feel better."



I could feel Jessica leering through the phone. "I bet."



"Oh, stop it."



"Well, watch out for Jon-boy. He's determined to ask you to the sock-hop, or whatever kids his age do for fun."



"Sock hop? Cripes."



"Should have stayed dead," Jessica advised, "like a normal person."



"Oh, shut up."



"Spray it, don't say it," she said, then hung up on me so she could get the last word. Jerk.