Undead and Unforgiven by MaryJanice Davidson Read Free Book Online Page B

world,’ for lack of a less lame phrase, I can only do vampire queen stuff. Down here I can do a lot more. But it’s all over the place, and totally unreliable. Sometimes I can make things happen . . .” I waved my clipboard, which in addition to holding all the stats on the new arrivals also smelled like blueberries. I had made yesterday’s clipboard smell like strawberries and planned to run the gamut of fruit scents before the month was out. It was important to have goals. “And sometimes not. Watch this. Rain. I want it to rain in here really hard.”
    Cathie and Marc let out unanimous yelps of alarm, but even as they scrambled to take shelter beneath the Lego table, nothing happened.
    â€œOh, God, what does it rain in Hell?” Marc shrieked from the floor. “Acid? Blood? Clumps of pubic hair?”
    â€œRight now it’s not raining anything, even though I ordered it to rain in here. My point! Why do some commands work and some don’t? Oh, come out from under there,” I added impatiently.
    Only Father Markus had kept his shit together and remained seated. “Frustrating,” was his only comment, and was that a smile?
    â€œYa think? Quit grinning at me, you’re awful.” He shrugged it off, which was fine because I hadn’t meant it.
    â€œSince it didn’t rain pubic hair,” Marc said, climbing out from under the table and collapsing back into his chair, “I think it’s as good a time to adjourn as any.”
    Not much had been accomplished, but Father Markus seconded it almost before Marc had finished the sentence and, like that, I was paroled from another meeting. Yippee! I was like a kid let out of school! Except I was a kid (one of the youngest in the room, never mind the whole of Hell) let out of the bureaucracy of Hell, which was even better.
    â€œSame time tomorrow?”
    Oh, blech.

CHAPTER
    SIX
    â€œExcuse me, Mrs. Sinclair?”
    Like an idiot I looked around for whomever she was talking to. Then I realized: “Oh. Me. It’s me? Yes.”
Mrs. Sinclair. Mrs. Eric Sinclair. Mrs. Sink Lair. Mr. and Mrs. Sink Lair?
    When I was little I was nervous about trying a kiwifruit. Fuzzy brown skin, green inside with icky-looking black seeds, it was some sort of fruit/Tribble hybrid and I had no interest in sticking it in my mouth. Nothing that looked that weird could be yummy.
    But my mother hectored me until I bit into it. It was perfectly ripe, if not entirely sweet, with an odd texture that wasn’t unpleasant, just strange to me. It took me a few seconds to decide if it was vile or delicious; I eventually settled on delicious, but only when I was in the mood for one. That was how it felt now, hearing someone callme Mrs. Sinclair, which was my legal name even if I never, ever used it.
    It was not that I didn’t love Eric Sinclair. It was beyond love; I’d die for him and kill for him (and had). But our relationship was at once like and unlike any union between lovers. We were in love, yes. But we had a business relationship, too; we were co-monarchs . . . except not really. As the foretold vampire queen, I outranked the king. Tina had explained it to me: Sinclair was a king consort, I was a queen regnant. I reigned in my own right; Sinclair, to be blunt, was just along for the ride.
    Like most lovers (but not many business partners), I had no secrets from him, and he didn’t have very many from me (given his exquisite skills in the bedroom, there were some things I didn’t want to know . . . hearing your lover’s bang résumé wasn’t at all romantic). And though we’d touched and kissed and caressed every inch of each other, I almost always called him Sinclair, and he always called me Elizabeth. It sounded formal (in his case) and flippant (in mine) to everyone else; to us, it was like a stolen kiss.
    We also shared everything . . . kind of. I let Sinclair