Undead and Unfinished (23 page)
Read Undead and Unfinished Online
Authors: MaryJanice Davidson
“A friend who never seemed to leave her teenage years, who always seemed to relate to the elders far more easily than people her own age. People who
looked
her own age,” he qualified.
looked
her own age,” he qualified.
“You never—”
“Our mother told us, when we started asking questions. Before we were invested in the Sinclair family secret. She said you were an angel. A dark angel, sent to protect us and watch over us.” His hands flashed, and suddenly he was gripping Tina’s shoulders and shouting into her face, “An angel!”
“She lied, of course,” Tina said calmly, as if she wasn’t being tossed around like a cocktail shaker on a gravel road in a small town in the middle of nowhere in 1920 (probably). “She lied because she couldn’t reconcile the truth with her religious upbringing. She couldn’t understand how a vampire could also be a friend of the family. She couldn’t understand how a creature of darkness and blood could enjoy the company of farmers, could babysit and take vacations with you. Could love you.
“And rather than question it, she created a convenient fairy tale, as her mother had done for her, and her mother before her.”
“Then why couldn’t you save them?” he cried, and his voice cracked like the adolescent he still was. Though I was betting nineteen years old in the (maybe) 1920s was the equivalent of thirty-five in the twenty-first century.
“Because I’m a vampire, not a goddess, and we’re not infallible. The reverse, if anything. Our appetites often lead us to trouble. Even our destruction. The only guarantee our state brings is freedom from aging bodies, never-ending thirst, and great strength and speed. Those are helpful much of the time. But they aren’t a promise. They are no guarantee.”
“You’re off, then. After the killers.”
“Yes.”
“Not by yourself. I won’t leave ugly work like this to a woman.”
Ahhh, there was the charming chauvinist I often fantasized about strangling. And not in an auto-erotic way, either.
To her credit, Tina didn’t go into gales of humiliating laughter. “I appreciate your concern, my dear. But I have been involved in ugly work long,
long
before you were born.”
long
before you were born.”
“Exactly. That’s why you’re going to make me one of you.” Sinclair took a deep breath. “And teach me. Everything. You’ll show me everything. And they’ll pay. They will pay and pay, and when I’ve finished with them ... in time ... there may be more to live for than vengeance and a living death.”
Another short silence, and I could have sworn Tina glanced at us pseudo-hiding in the ditch. “Yes, that ... that seems to be the thing to do, doesn’t it? Eric, you must understand—”
“Vengeance. I understand vengeance. If I’m damned because of it, then so be it.”
Again a glance in our direction. “I’m not sure damned is ... exactly ... the appropriate word.”
“We should go,” Laura whispered. “There’s nothing else for us to screw up.”
“Not yet.”
“Why?”
I didn’t know. I couldn’t figure it out myself, much less explain to Laura. I couldn’t shake the feeling that it would be a personal disaster to leave just now. But I didn’t ... know ...
why.
why.
“Let me tell you what it will be like.”
He made a curt gesture. “Irrelevant. There’s nothing I wouldn’t endure for vengeance. Losing my soul is the least of it.”
You won’t, though!
I almost shouted. Soulless was so not how I’d describe Sinclair. He came off as chilly and indifferent, until you got his pants off. I mean, got to know him.
I almost shouted. Soulless was so not how I’d describe Sinclair. He came off as chilly and indifferent, until you got his pants off. I mean, got to know him.
“The ... act itself isn’t unpleasant. You’ll get tired. You’ll sleep. And, as I plan to steal your body, you needn’t worry about waking in a coffin six feet in the earth. I cannot tell you how upsetting that is,” Tina muttered.
Jeez. I could imagine. I was learning more about Tina in one night than I had in three years.
“But you’ll be ... disoriented. You’ll—it might take a while to ... to learn ... how to be strong ...”
I leaped to my feet. Strong! That’s why we were still here!
I scrambled out of the ditch. Laura lunged but, since I was in superspeedy-vamp mode, missed by a mile (almost literally). I was moving so efficiently, Sinclair was only now starting to turn toward the racket I was making. And Tina, who
could
have stopped me, seemed frozen in surprise, or maybe disbelief.
could
have stopped me, seemed frozen in surprise, or maybe disbelief.
Eric didn’t turn quickly enough. I nailed him from behind, rode him all the way into the gravel, and sank my canines into his neck.
Chapter 52
W
hat are you doing?”
hat are you doing?”
“Oh, Betsy! This is so inappropriate,” the Antichrist scolded.
The teenaged Eric Sinclair also tried to protest, probably, but since he was facedown in the gravel I couldn’t make out what he was saying.
I won’t lie: his blood? His live blood, electric with the high-fat diet of the 1920s (probably)? Unbelievable. His live blood was worth the huge pain in the ass our time traveling had been. At least, I thought so. Laura probably wouldn’t agree.
Make no mistake: I always liked the taste of Sinclair; we often spent days and days where we only fed off each other. But live Sinclair, yummy with electrolytes and a healthy midwestern diet?
His blood sang with meatloaf and roast duck and buttery biscuits and lamb and chicken and radish roses and deviled eggs and potato salad and turkey and oatmeal and veal and beans and jelly and crumb cake and ham and gingerbread and beets and bread pudding and pork chops and rice pudding and oh, my, what is
this?
Teenage Sinclair was in
excellent
shape, what with all the farming and being gorgeous and suchlike.
this?
Teenage Sinclair was in
excellent
shape, what with all the farming and being gorgeous and suchlike.
Oofta.
Sinclair raised his head. “Uh, miss? I think you might have fallen on me by accident.”
“Go to sleep,” I told him, sitting up. Then I yelped and shoved my hands forward so his head didn’t clunk facedown into the gravel, but rather onto my palms. Probably should have thought that one out.
“Okay,” I said, looking up at Tina and Laura, who were staring down at us like they’d seen a woman in her thirties molesting a teen—oh. Huh. Ew. “Now you can bite him.”
“All right,” Tina said cautiously. “I’m not quite sure how to proceed. Do I take you to task for hurting a friend, a boy I think of as my grandson?”
“Could we stop with the ‘boy’ talk? He’s a grown man. Right? I’m not gross and inappropriate. Right?”
“Or should I bite the boy—”
“Dammit!”
“—and teach him all the ways of a living death?”
“Trust me, he’s not hurt. But he’s sure out cold. Ooof! Laura, I’m gonna carefully put his head down and then stand up, so if you could—”
“Wait!” I heard a tiny clinking, and Laura bent and picked something up as I lurched to my feet. Sinclair’s yummy rich blood was making my head swim. “This fell out of his pocket.”
“Oh!” I managed not to snatch it out of her grip, just gently grasped it. “He’s not gonna want to lose this; it’s Erin’s. I mean, it was Erin’s.” I held out the tiny cross on the gold chain to Tina. It would be mine, almost a hundred years from now. Sinclair would give it to me, his most treasured possession, and he wouldn’t know why.
At the time, I wouldn’t know why, either. Only that the jackass vampire I couldn’t ever seem to ditch had given me something of great value, great
personal
value. And when he did, for the first time I was able to see him as a person instead of a pain in my ass.
personal
value. And when he did, for the first time I was able to see him as a person instead of a pain in my ass.
Tina backed up very, very slowly. “I can’t touch that. But you can.” She leaned forward and seemed to peer at me. “You
are
a vampire! I couldn’t tell before.”
are
a vampire! I couldn’t tell before.”
“She probably figured it out when you leaped on him and gnawed like he was your own personal Chew-eez.”
“You’re very unattractive when you’re all sarcastic and snarky like that.”
“Who
are
you?” Tina asked. She seemed as intrigued as she was startled ... maybe even frightened. Or just really weirded out.
are
you?” Tina asked. She seemed as intrigued as she was startled ... maybe even frightened. Or just really weirded out.
“No one of consequence,” I said, ruthlessly stealing a line from
The Princess Bride.
“So, we’re out of here.”
The Princess Bride.
“So, we’re out of here.”
“Oh, thank God! I’ve had enough of Hastings.”
“What’ve you got against Hastings, Laura? It’s a perfectly nice river town. Um,
now.
Because I don’t know that it’s nice in the future or anything. I don’t have a clue.”
now.
Because I don’t know that it’s nice in the future or anything. I don’t have a clue.”
“Truer words,” Laura muttered.
“So, best of luck with everything. With the turning and the training and such.”
“Ah ... thank you, miss.”
I knelt, tucked Erin’s necklace back into Sinclair’s pocket, smoothed his hair back from his dirty cheek, and kissed him. “See you in the future,” I whispered, and it would have been an awesome and touching moment, except Laura grabbed my arm and hauled me off down the gravel road, so the last thing Tina heard was the vampire queen yelping like a stomped pup.
Chapter 53
O
h, come on!” I couldn’t believe it. Back in the waiting room again, and still no way to the front door. Or back door. Or whatever the fuck it was. “I don’t recall your mother mentioning that Time Travel 101 was going to take, I dunno, the best years of my life!”
h, come on!” I couldn’t believe it. Back in the waiting room again, and still no way to the front door. Or back door. Or whatever the fuck it was. “I don’t recall your mother mentioning that Time Travel 101 was going to take, I dunno, the best years of my life!”
“It’s true,” Laura said, already standing in front of a new door to try. She didn’t look terribly put out, I was annoyed to see. She seemed to be gaining confidence by the hour. By the door, as it were. “She didn’t. But she keeps them close to the vest, wouldn’t you say?”
“I would say.”
“So, ready?”
“Ugh, no. What’s next? We save Laura Ingalls from being set upon by vampires?”
“Only one way to find out.”
“You know what’s weird?”
She’d been reaching for a new knob but now looked at me and grinned. “I have to pick just one thing?”
I smiled back. Yes, this was dangerous. Yes, it was annoying. But I’d never had the chance to spend so much time with Laura, and I was finding the experience pretty cool.
Okay. To be fair: I’d never
made
the chance to spend so much time with her.
made
the chance to spend so much time with her.
“Good point. What’s weird is, the past doesn’t stink. It sucks, make no mistake, but it’s not smelly. I figured that with no running water or regular showers and such, and air freshener not having been invented, or antibacterial soap, that everyone would stink. But they didn’t. Things were dusty, you know, but not filthy or gross. Wait’ll I tell my mom.” My mom was a college professor specializing in the Civil War. She’d hang on my every word but would be too polite to say out loud, “If only you’d been exposed to death and danger during the battle of Gettysburg!”
“She wouldn’t say it, but she’d think it,” I muttered.
“Fascinating. So, onward and upward, sister mine. Next stop, who knows? Watch the birdie!”
“What? Dammit!” I clutched my now-throbbing eye, the knob easily turned beneath Laura’s hand, and we were off again like Magellan and Columbus. Or Abbott and Costello.
Chapter 54
S
eriously? You still have to beat on me to move through time? I assume this is all because God hates me this month.”
eriously? You still have to beat on me to move through time? I assume this is all because God hates me this month.”
“Yes, Betsy. It’s all about you.”
“Sometimes it is,” I whined.
“And sometimes it isn’t. Anyway, smacking you around for the greater good is a sacrifice I’m willing to make.”
“Yeah, real willing, don’t think I haven’t noticed.” I caught a glimpse of my reflection in the window. Fortunately, I was still awesomely pretty. “Well, what fire do we have to ... put ... out ... ?”
I’d trailed off because we’d materialized beside a house in the suburbs. A modern house in modern suburbs! With electric lights and everything! In fact—
“Isn’t this your old house? The one that had termites—whoof!”
She’d gasped because I’d picked her up and twirled her around and around. “Yes, yes,
yes!
It is my bug-ridden abode. It’s the house I lived in before Jessica and I moved to the mansion. We’re back! Laura, we’re back!”
yes!
It is my bug-ridden abode. It’s the house I lived in before Jessica and I moved to the mansion. We’re back! Laura, we’re back!”
“But why are we at your old house? Nothing ever happened here.”
“Hardly, ignorant child.” I set her down, but I could have danced her up and down the block for an hour and a half. “I was living here during the Ferragamo debut. And let’s not forget the hangover of 2000; gah, I thought I was going to yark up my liver. And the pseudo date-rape of 2002, and I say pseudo because I kicked his balls up so high he was strangling on them by the time the cops showed up. Ahhhh ... good times ...”
“But why would we be here? Does this mean we’re back? Maybe we should get a cab back to Summit”
“I s’pose—wait.”
“We don’t need a cab,” Laura observed, watching the car pull into what was once my driveway. “Because here you come now. Do you think you’ll give us a ride?”
“Oh ...”
“Shit,” the Antichrist agreed, and then we both dived out of sight as I got out of my car and headed up the walk to my front door.
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