Undead 6, Undead And Uneasy - MaryJanice Davidson Page 0,2

originality in name-calling).

We lived (and would presumably for the next thousand years—hope Jessica was paid up on her damage insurance) in a big old mansion on

Summit Avenue

in St. Paul. Me, Sinclair, my best friend Jessica, Marc, and a whole bunch of others I'm just too tired to list right now. I adored my friends, but sometimes I couldn't help wishing they'd all just disappear for the sake of some peace and quiet.

Retreating to the master suite, where we were currently arguing, was an acceptable substitute for actual solitude. I'd never seen a divine bathroom before, much less been in one, but after taking a bath in the eight-foot-long whirlpool tub, I'd come to believe God could act through bubbles.

The whole place was like a bed and breakfast—the fanciest, nicest one in the whole world, where the fridge was always full, the sheets were always fresh, and you never had to check out and go home. Even the closets were sublime, with more scrollwork than you could shake a stick at. Having come from a long line of tract housing families, I'd resisted the move here last year. But now I loved it. I still couldn't believe I actually lived in a mansion of all things. Some of the rooms were so big, I hardly noticed Sinclair.

Okay, that was a lie. Eric Sinclair filled every room he was in, even if he was just sitting in the corner reading a newspaper. Big—well over six feet—with the build of a farmer (which he had been) who kept in shape (which he did): wide, heavily muscled shoulders, long legs, narrow waist, flat stomach, big hands, big teeth, big dick. Alpha male all the way. And he was mine. Mine, I tell you!

Sinclair was seventy-something—I was vague on the details, and he rarely volunteered autobiographical info—but had died in his thirties, so his black hair was unmarked by gray; his broad, handsome face was without so much as a sun wrinkle. He had a grin that made Tom Cruise look like a snaggle-toothed octogenarian.

He was dynamite in bed—ooh, boy, was he! He was rich (possibly richer than Jessica, who had arranged for the purchase of this mansion). He was strong—I'd seen him pull a man's arm off his body like you or I would pull a chicken wing apart. And I mentioned the vampire part, right? That he was the king of the vampires?

And I was the queen. His queen.

Never mind what the Book of the Dead said, never mind that he'd tricked me into the queen gig, never mind what other vampires said; shit, never mind what my mom said. I loved Eric (when he wasn't being a pud), and he loved me (I was almost positive); and in my book (which wasn't bound in human skin and written in blood, thank you very much) that meant we collared a justice of the peace and got him to say "Husband and Wife."

Two years ago, I would have said a minister. But if a man of God said a blessing over Eric Sinclair, sprinkled him with holy water, or handed him a collection plate, my darling groom would go up in flames, and it'd be really awkward.

Anyway, that was the way I wanted things. The way I needed them. And really, it seemed a small enough thing to ask. Especially when you look at all the shit I had put up with since rising from the dead. Frankly, if the king of the vampires didn't like it, he could take a flying fuck at a rolling garter belt.

"If you don't like it," I said, "you can take a flying fuck at a rolling garter belt."

"Is that another of your tribe's charming post-ceremony activities?"

"What is this 'my tribe' crapola?" I'd given up on the announcements and had started folding my T-shirts—the basket had been silently condemning me for almost a week. Jessica had hired plenty of servants, but we all insisted on doing our own laundry. Except Sinclair. I think Tina (his super-butler/major domo/assistant) did his. He could hold his damned breath waiting for me to step up.

I dropped the fresh, clean T-shirt so I could put my hands on my hips and really give him the glare. "Your dad was a Minnesota farmer. This I'm-an-aristocrat-and-you're-a-peasant schtick stinks like a rotten apple."

Sinclair, working at the desk in the corner (in a black suit, on a Tuesday night—it was the equivalent of a guy getting up on his day off and immediately putting on a Kenneth