“If you destroy anything else in my office, that will be the last thing you’ll ever do,” I hissed.
“Sorry. My bad,” Lizard said, trying to pick up the tiny shattered pieces of the irreplaceable eggs. “I can glue ‘em back together.”
While the thought was appreciated, the outcome would be ridiculous. “No, just find a midwife. NOW.”
“Roger that, Sire,” Lizard said with a salute as he vanished in a cloud of black smoke.
“As for the rest of you,” I said, eyeing the motley crew. “Get back to work. Mammy, you shall make another crock of beans-n-franks for Elle. She still craves them much to the dismay of my olfactory senses. Martha and Jane, you will put on some clothes that do not reveal your sagging privates and get to work on amusing my lover until the birth of our son.”
“Not to worry, Big Boner,” Martha said. “We have a few more chapters of your new book to read to her.”
“We added a lot of verbs so it’s better now,” Jane added.
“I’m sure it is,” I said dryly as the two Vamps scurried from the room. “Dino, Darby and Dagwood, convince the staff to come out of the closet and help you clean. You can tell them Mammy is on a trim break, and their scalps and nether regions are safe. The Dark Palace must be pristine for the arrival of my son and the celebration.”
“Yes, my Dark Lord,” the idiots said and exited quickly.
“I’m still tryin’ to figure out the answer to that there question ya asked me about the fine dining establishment, Red Lobster,” Murry said, scratching his mullet.
Instead of removing the appendages from his body, I sighed. “The answer is irrelevant. You will re-sniff all the female Demons in Hell. One of them is guilty and shall pay. Do you need to smell the letter again?” I inquired, pulling it from the top drawer of my desk.
“Sure,” Murry said. “You want me to read it too?”
“You can read?” Mammy asked, shocked.
“Yep,” Murry said with a wide grin. “Lord of Dark Shit fixed me up good.”
Mammy stared at me with such intensity, I prepared to zap the shit out of her again. I wasn’t sure if she was pissed or delighted about Murry being able to read. I could care less either way, but if she went for me, she was a dead Dragon. I would find someone else to make the damn beans-n-franks for Elle.
“I owe you,” she said quietly, still staring holes into me. “I owe you big time, Devil.”
“Define owe,” I snapped, wanting to make sure she wasn’t going to jump out of a closet and trim me bald.
“I owe ya my life,” she said, sounding old and weary yet humbled. “I’ve tried to teach my boy to read for thousands of years. Never took. You’ve given him the gift of Harry Potter and Fifty Shades of Grey. There ain’t no way to thank ya for such an offering. I’d offer a free trim, but don’t think you’d take me up on it.”
“That would be correct,” I replied.
“You’ll see,” she said with a smile pulling at her lips. “Once ya have yer own boy, you’ll do anything for him. I owe ya my life.”
“Don’t you think that’s a bit dramatic?” I questioned.
“Nope,” Mammy said with a chuckle. “You’ll see.”
It was time to end the conversation before Mammy removed her own head to make good on her promise of gratitude. Murry sniffed the letter and read it aloud to the amazement of his mother. They left my office hand in hand with Mammy promising to buy her son a library of romance novels and comic books.
For a brief moment, I felt pride about giving Murry the ability to read. I pushed the weak and sentimental emotion away immediately. Niceties were for my brother to perform. I should probably have Mammy and Murry sign an NDA and electrocute them if they shared my good deed. Quickly adding that to my never-ending to-do list, I smiled.
I was going to be the father of a son.
Life had never been better.
Chapter Twelve
My office was now a damned jungle complete with exotic wildlife. I’d already incinerated six parrots that had crapped on my leather couch. The timing sucked since Dino, Darby and Dagwood had finally gotten the stench of beans-n-franks out of the suite. The clean-up from the parrot shit, foliage, boulders and mounds of dirt would take a week. Of course, the one of a