Wolf at the Door - By MaryJanice Davidson Page 0,57
and scary, and yes, you do sound a little bit like . . . like the person who is Satan.”
This is getting weirder even faster than I thought it would. “Does Satan honestly have your number?” he asked breathlessly. This was the most interesting conversation he’d had in months. “Satan? The Dark Prince himself, he calls you?”
For what? Nefarious doings with the queen of the shambling eternally thirsty undead? Playdates? To talk about which movie based on a Marvel superhero or a Disney World ride they would go see together? What? Oh, he had to find out! Actually, if the things he’d heard about the queen were true, she’d probably tell him.
“Seriously, I think that’s amazing. I know it’s not cool to own that, but I’ll admit it: that is seriously cool.”
“What is?”
“Satan having your number. He’s got it, right? Don’t let this all be for nothing. Don’t let me get my hopes up like that.”
The woman laughed. “The landline, sure. Everybody’s got the landline.”
“So it’s true! This is so typical. The bad guys always act like they’ve never read a bestseller or seen a movie.”
“Bad guys? Now listen here, mister, I’m not the bad guy!” The pleasant contralto had a slight midwestern twang. Now was now-oo, here was hee-er, bad was bee-ed. Hilarious! “And I don’t appreciate random phone calls from fellas who tell me I am the bad guy.”
“Don’t get huffy. If you don’t want random calls, don’t list your number in a nationally mailed newsletter. Besides, you are the queen of the vampires.”
“Okay, yeah, I’ve got that going against me, but if you overlook that one little thing, you’d see I’m a good guy. Oh . . . who is this, anyway?”
“Listen, despicable vampire queen—”
“Oh, now that’s just rude.”
“Sorry,” he said, immediately chastened. Meanwhile, Rachael had buried her head in her hands and was moaning and rocking back and forth like someone trying to find her happy place. He gave her a big smile and flashed her a thumbs-up, but, weirdly, she wasn’t comforted. “It’s just, I always had a feeling I’d meet you someday, or somebody like you, so I kind of wrote the script for that meeting in my head.”
“And I’m not following your script?” she said, sounding like she was cheering up.
“No, not at all,” he soothed.
“Really?”
“Oh, we’re totally beyond my script. Years beyond.”
“Well, okay then.” Hmm, the queen of the vampires could turn a frown upside down in no time. “No harm done. What’s your name again?”
“I’m Edward B—” Rachael was making slashing-acrossthe-throat motions. Now she was miming hanging up the phone. Now she was miming strangling him. “Hey, it’s none of your business what my name is, Miss Nosy Parker Vampire Queen! But I am gonna be stopping by your lair with my hot new werewolf girlfriend, who wants to return some shoes, and we wanted to show we’re civilized by calling first. So we’re calling first. Bask in how civilized we are. Go on. Bask!”
“Some shoes . . . is your hot new werewolf girlfriend a medium-tall brunette? With big brown pansy eyes? And kind of a permanent tight-ass expression until she smiles?”
Wow. “Yeah, but it’s more a serious expression than a tight-ass one. Like a sexy librarian.”
“I pray she was careful with them.”
“You pray? With what?” A rosary? Shyeah. A Bible? Ha!
“The shoes! And I’m praying for them, not with them. I’ve never even met you, but I can already tell you’re incredibly weird. Are they okay? She didn’t scuff them or step in dog shit or anything, did she?”
“How should I know?” He covered the phone. “The vampire queen wants to know if the shoes are okay.”
Rachael, who’d given up with the slashing motions and just stood there listening with an appalled look on her face, nodded. “Sure. They’re fine. I’ve barely worn them. Just to here from her house. And now to her house from here.”
“Hear that? The blue thingies are safe and sound.”
“They’re not thingies. Little boys have thingies. You probably have a thingy.”
“Uh . . .” Out of nowhere, the queen’s voice had gotten deep and scary.
“Those are Beverly Feldman Bonvivant flats in navy blue.”
Little girl from The Exorcist deep and scary. “Okay.”
“With a satin underlay!”
James Earl Jones deep and scary. “Okay.”
“And a cushioned footbed!”
“O-kay!” He ignored Rachael’s renewed gestures of impending death. “My point was, they’re fine. In fact, we’re bringing them right over, so just chillax.”
“Oh, Edward.” Like magic—it was, probably!—the queen’s voice was back to the pleasant contralto of earlier. “Nobody says chillax