“Let’s get back on track here,” I said, deciding to ignore the fact he’d just put printer cartridges into his briefcase and that one of Gigi’s birds had just pooped on the leather couch. “Will you do anything about the portals and the Demons coming through?”
Satan feigned deep thought for a moment and then a slow stomach-churning grin pulled at his lips.
“Will you consider my offer to have the wedding in Hell?” he countered.
It wasn’t really a question at all. It was a bargaining chip—blackmail. I knew it and he knew it. He was a son of a bitch, but what should I have expected from the Prince of Darkness?
After a long moment where I considered the pros and cons of tying the knot in the Land of Evil, I nodded my head. The Demon problem far outweighed my need for a human ceremony. The Vampyres were up our asses about the Demons—not to mention the Demons were dangerous to humans. If I could solve those problems, I could move on to the next one—getting the stingy, miserly Vampyres to pay their share to society.
Nothing on my list was appealing, but it all had to be done. Just a day in the life of a newbie Vampyre with far too much power.
“I’ll consider it,” I said slowly and prayed my smile didn’t look like I’d swallowed a lemon.
“Excellent,” Satan said. “Let me know when you arrive at a decision and I’ll get right on the portal leaking issue.”
Wait one damn minute…
“Did you open those portals on purpose?” My eyes narrowed and my hands began shooting sparks. I didn’t care who he was, he was about to get a massive ass burn.
“Of course not,” he said with so much indignation I was inclined to believe him. “I may be evil, but I’m not stupid. Till we meet again.”
In a blast of black sparkling magic, Satan left. Of course he didn’t leave empty handed. Nope, he’d absconded with half of the contents of Ethan’s desk and left me with a stupendously ugly deal on the table.
Ethan was going to blow.
Maybe I’d wait to put the suggestion out there tonight… in bed… when I was straddling him.
Chapter 3
“It wouldn’t be my first choice of venue, but if it will stop the onset of Armageddon you might want to consider the offer,” Gemma said as she modeled her maid of honor dress.
She looked exquisite, but I couldn’t enjoy the moment of watching my best friend, and soon to be Queen of the Fairies, try on the gorgeous Marchesa dress I’d chosen for her. My priorities were screwed.
“It’s not an offer,” I said morosely, as I flopped down on my bed and stared at the ceiling. “It’s a fucking command performance.”
“It could be worse, Astrid,” she reasoned with a giggle.
“Tell me what’s worse than getting married in Hell?” I challenged.
“Having your Uncle Satan preside over the wedding?” she suggested.
“Shit,” I muttered. I grabbed a pillow and tried to suffocate myself with it. Of course this was impossible since I was already dead. Being a Vampyre came with a few disadvantages. The inability to put yourself out of your own misery was one of them. “I have to tell him no, but I need him to close the portals. Wait, what the hell am I thinking? I know how to close the portals—I’m just not quite sure where they all are. Fuck it. I’ll whip up some magic voodoo and shut the damn things myself. I don’t need him—I’m definitely going to tell Satan no about letting him host the wedding.”
“Let me know when you’re going to do that,” my BFF Gemma said.
“Why? Do you want to be there?” I asked, peeking out from behind the goose down.
“Nope,” she said with a shudder. “I plan on going to another realm during that conversation.”
“Thank you for the moral support.” I threw the pillow at her head. “Your overwhelming confidence in me being able to make a deal with the Devil is heartwarming.”
“Dude, you don’t have a heart.”
“Now that’s just rude,” I snapped. However she was correct. Technically I had one, but it didn’t beat and I don’t breathe.
“Look,” Gemma said as she got on the massive bed and shoved me over. “You just have to reason with him.”
“He’s the Devil. Don’t think reasoning will work.”
“Fine. Blackmail him. Do you still have the recording of him singing Journey songs in his sleep?” she asked with a wince.
“Oh my Uncle God, I do.”
During a horrendous sleepover on Christmas Eve, I’d recorded my Uncle Satan singing in his sleep. He’d decimated most of Journey’s Greatest Hits in the key of Z minor. It was all kinds of ear-bleeding awful and it would be all kinds of awesome to use it to my advantage.
“You know he wouldn’t hesitate to blackmail you if he wanted something badly enough. Case in point, forcing you to spend the biggest day of your life in Hell,” Gemma reasoned.
“This is true.” A smile pulled at my lips as I imagined the look of horror on Satan’s face when he heard himself singing. “But it’s kind of mean and could backfire in a big bad way.”
“It is, and it could,” she agreed with a thoughtful nod. “Maybe you should just go with the flow. Let him close the portals… getting married in Hell might not be that bad.”
The glare I gave her simply made her laugh. I was losing my touch. “It’s not funny. Shall I define not that bad for you?”
“Please do,” Gemma said as she sat up and pulled her knees to her chest trying unsuccessfully to bite back her smile.
I wanted to wipe the grin off of her lovely face and the gritty details of my nuptials in Hell would certainly do it.
“Well,” I said, as I piled the pillows into a small mountain and got comfortable. “Mother Nature has two thousand on her guest list and Satan has three thousand. At Christmas, Gigi offered to cater the affair. That alone is enough to cut the RSVP list of immortal whack jobs down to about twenty-five hundred attendees who will most likely die of food poisoning. That will be one stinky health hazard. On top of that, there’s no doubt that Mother Nature will pole dance since Satan has stripper poles all over the Dark Palace. I’m fairly sure my Uncle still has plans to abduct Steve Perry again, who by the way, is a Unicorn and I’m gonna guess that the dress code will be all black.”
“Dude.” Gemma shook her head and looked appropriately horrified. “Wait. Steve Perry is a Unicorn? An honest to God Unicorn?”
“Apparently. It’s certainly sheds some light as to why he wasn’t so freaked out on Christmas morning when the Sins had him bound and gagged under the tree for Satan.”
“You have to blackmail your uncle,” Gemma announced with fierce determination. “And I can’t believe Steve Perry is a freakin’ Unicorn.”
“Right? But if you really think about it, it makes sense in a farked up way. I mean his hair does kind look like a mane,” I pointed out.
“Good use of the word farked,” Gemma congratulated me.
“Thank you,” I said, accepting her praise. I’d been trying to curb my potty mouth since my son was a repeater.
“But when I think of a Unicorn I picture My Little Pony—you know, all rainbow-y and weird—kind of scary like a clown. Clowns totally skeeve me out.” Gemma shuddered.
“Clowns are fucking petrifying,” I agreed. “But I picture the all white Unicorn from that movie Legend with Tom Cruise. But that wouldn’t be right for Steve. I’d think he would be all black with maybe a red mane and a purple horn.”
“No, I think he’d be chocolate brown with a multicolored mane and a silver horn that lights up like a rock concert,” Gemma mused aloud.
We both let that visual sink in for a moment.
“Do you realize that if normal people could hear us right now, we’d be institutionalized?” I asked with a giggle.
“Dude, not a day goes by that I don’t wonder the same thing.” Gemma blew out a long sigh and flopped back on the bed. “We’re the weirdos.”
“Agreed. Think about it, we make clowns look safe for children. I’m dead
and you’re a Fairy. We can both fly, my uncle is Beelzebub, and I’m basically unkillable. Normal left the train station a long fucking time ago.”
“Clowns are supposed to be safe for children,” she countered.
“That’s a total conspiracy and I call bullshit on that. I’ve had nightmares about clowns my entire life.”
“Word,” Gemma agreed with a shudder.
Both of our lives had changed dramatically in the past year. I’d tried to quit smoking and ended up undead and she found out she was the long awaited reincarnation of the Fairy Queen. Creepy clowns had nothing on us.
Of course, I’d met the love of my undead life and had a child against all odds since my plumbing didn’t exactly work anymore. Fortunately, I was the Chosen One and it was all part of the prophecy. My son, Samuel, was the light of my world and I wouldn’t go back to my old life for all the money of the greedy Vampyres combined—even though not being able to eat food was a bitch.
“So what are you going to do, Astrid?” Gemma asked softly as she played with my hair.
“Honestly, I have no clue. I want to talk to Ethan about it and I have to go online and order more office supplies. Then I’m going to play with my baby and make sure Martha and Jane are obeying the new dress code. Venus is going to try on her bridesmaid dress later as well. After that, I plan to sit in on some of the meetings with the irate Vamps… and then I’m going to get laid.”
“I followed most of that,” Gemma said with a laugh. “Except for the office supply thing.”
“Don’t ask. It’s stranger than Steve Perry being a Unicorn.”
“Gotcha,” she said as she rolled off my bed and changed back into her regular clothes. “I’m meeting The Kev for lunch. We’re starting to make plans to go back to Xanthia for my coronation. Apparently there are some problems brewing.”
“Are you ready for that?” I asked, hanging the beautiful pale pink bridesmaid dress back on the silk hanger.
“Nope,” she said with a grin. “Being ready and having to actually do something doesn’t always occur at the same time. However, I was very clear that I wasn’t going anywhere until after your wedding. Just promise me one thing.”
“Anything,” I told her and meant it. Gemma was the closest thing I had to a sister. My real sister, Juliette—the Vampyre from Hell—didn’t count. I’d only known about her for a short time and she was batshit cray-cray. She’d tried to kill me more times in the space of a year than I could count on two hands. Blood was not thicker than water in our case.
“Don’t elope,” Gemma said. “I’ve been waiting for this day for one of us since we were kids. You have to promise that you’ll do it no matter where it takes place and no matter how many freaks of nature are invited.”
In that moment, I realized Gemma and I were hanging onto our former human lives and the rope we dangled from was getting very frayed. We weren’t human any more and never would be again. I understood her desire for one last hurrah—I needed it as much as she did. Amidst the whirlwind of change our lives had become, something familiar was worth fighting for, even if no one understood it except us.
“I promise. I can’t guarantee that it will be what we dreamt of as children with all the dead people, the pole dancing, and the Unicorns,” I said with a grunt of laughter. “But it will definitely be happening.”
“Just don’t invite any clowns,” she said, seriously.
“You have my word,” I answered just as gravely.
“I love you, Astrid.”
“Love you more, Gemma.”
***
“So that’s the shitty plan Satan proposed,” I said, picking up Samuel’s toys and putting them back in the toy box. Thankfully Samuel was napping, he didn’t need to hear this conversation.
“Absolutely not,” Ethan growled as he followed behind me and picked up the stuffed animals and trucks I’d missed. “We will not be married in Hell. Demons don’t even believe in marriage. It’s ludicrous.”
“While I agree with you, I’d just like to point out that Vampyres don’t believe in the institution either,” Gareth chimed in from the couch in the grand living room of our suite.
Glancing over at Ethan’s brother Gareth, I held back the need to wrap him in a blanket and offer up a vein. He was a shell of his former self and it broke my non-beating heart. He looked at least forty-five and we stopped aging around thirty. His jet-black hair was laced with grey. His blue eyes were dull with world-weariness and his face was gaunt.
At one point he’d stood at least six foot four, but now appeared to have shrunk. Gareth was still a beautiful man, but he’d been cursed by the notorious Vlad the Impaler, with the help of some particularly heinous Angels. Gareth was aging and dying. We’d found him locked in the Catacombs under Paris and moved him to our compound in Kentucky.
There were two ways to save him. We either needed to find Vlad and the Angels and reverse the curse, or Gareth needed to find his true mate before he aged to the point of actual, natural-causes type death. Being that he’d always had a very active reputation with the ladies, finding his mate was a long shot.
Even if she was out there, she’d probably avoid Gareth like the plague. He was a manwhore to the nth degree. So a contingency of Vamps from every Dominion in the world were searching for Vlad. Ethan and his nine siblings each held a territory and everyone had sent their best to unearth the vicious Dracula—a name Vlad despised. Time was of the essence since three other royal siblings—Laila, Alexander and Nathan had been cursed as well, but both Ethan and Gareth were certain Vlad would be found.
Gareth was the Vampyre Prince of the Asian Dominion of the world, but in his absence the territory was being ruled by their sister Raquel and her mate Heathcliff, who also happened to be my cousin. Thankfully the region was peaceful at the moment, but if the Demon issue spread it would be a problem.
Hence, the Devil’s deal…
“Don’t believe I was talking to you,” Ethan commented evenly to his brother.
“That’s never stopped me before,” Gareth shot back with a grin so reminiscent of Ethan’s I had to laugh. “Are we sure Satan didn’t open the portals as leverage to blackmail you into having the wedding in Hell?”
“Fine point. Well made, and no, I’m positive he’s not behind it,” I said as I took a seat next to Gareth. “But he could definitely put an end to it.”
“Then tie the knot in Hell,” he suggested with a wink. “It will certainly make for a good story.”
“It will be a farce and don’t wink at my mate,” Ethan snapped in annoyance. “We can close the portals ourselves. We don’t need the Devil to do it.”
“I beg to differ, sire,” Venus said as she entered the suite.
The mood in the room changed abruptly. There was an edge to Venus that always brought a bit of danger to the party. I adored that about her and was curious to hear what she had to say.
My dear friend had gorgeous skin as black as night and was as beautiful and deadly as they came. She’d been my first ally after I was turned and our friendship had deepened since. She would die for me and I would return the favor any day of the week.
“Speak,” Ethan said tersely.
“There are too many portals and we don’t know who’s opening them. We could close every portal in the North American Territory and they could be reopened within the hour,” she replied in frustration, running her hands through her wild curly hair.
“Hello, darling,” Gareth said to Venus in a voice rich with sexual undertone.
Venus raised a delicate eyebrow, gave him a look that would have withered a mere mortal and then ignored him completely.
Interesting… and I wished I had time to question Venus about it.
“So you’re in agreement with Gareth that we should be married in Hell and let the bastard blackmail us?” Ethan asked. He sat down in an armchair and crossed his arms over his broad chest.
“First of all, my liege, I’m not with Gareth on anything. Secondly, I would neve
r assume to tell you what to do. I have far too much respect for you and Astrid to be so presumptuous. However, I do believe we need Satan’s help with the portals,” Venus replied.
“I think Venus looks tremendously sexy in those pants,” Gareth announced to room. “The way they hug her delectable ass is sinful. She could knock the Demons right back to Hell with that edible bottom.”
She turned on him so fast, I literally got blown across the room—even Ethan ducked. Her eyes blazed and her hiss was positively feral. Gareth grinned like an idiot—an idiot with a death wish.
“I think you might have spoken,” Venus ground out as she approached the delighted Gareth. “But I couldn’t make it out because it was so insultingly condescending, sexist, and stupid.”
Fashionably Dead and Wed Book 7 Page 3
