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THIRTEEN

"O, enough!" I batted the ice pack away "I&039; to heal from this in half an hour; do I also have to heal the frostbite you&039;re inflicting on ood," Marc said, which was so obvious I was amazed he felt he needed to verbalize it

"Tell ht, she can really move when she wants to" And she had I&039;d been so astonished to see her leap frorab said chair, and bashcaughtacross the temple Some people see stars after a sharp blow to the head; I saw five Jessicas, all brandishing chairs and screa I knew I had ice on my face, and Jessica had been hustled out of the kitchen by a rattled-yet-proud Nick/Dick

"She did not take kindly to your revelation," Sinclair observed

"I knowwhy are we all feeling the need to state the obvious? Can&039;t blame her, either" I rubbed the side of my head "It was really stupid of me to let that slip"

"Yes," Tina and Sinclair said in polite unison

"And thanks for protectingshe didn&039;t try to stake me, huh?"

"I have no desire to cross Jessica while she is in a family way," Tina said, and Sinclair nodded so hard I wondered if he&039;dthese days," he said He brushed his fingers across the luainst my will, I could feel my irritation start to fade Dammit! Sometimes I wondered if Sinclair was a witch "And you seem to have weathered the blow"

"Yeah, barely Marc, stop with the ice pack! You&039;re not a doctor anymore" Oops Tactless "Lethadn&039;t saved ed pregnant millionaire in desperate need of a pedicure "I s to worry about"

"I&039;iven up with the ice pack, and sat back down at the kitchen table "What does that mean? Does my social security card work? Has my license to practice medicine been invalidated or revoked? How about my driver&039;s license?"

"I had a lot of the same questions when I died the first ti The whole queen gig came up, so I never really had to worry about that stuff"

"Worry about what stuff?" Antonia had stepped into the kitchen, Garrett on her heels They weren&039;t carrying bags of yarn or needles or what-have-you, but they were both flushed and bright-eyed "What&039;s the va about now?"

"Ah-ha! You were having sex in the spoon, ad Her black hair had been pulled back into a messy ponytail, which for Antonia was practically a snon "Why d&039;you care? Aren&039;t you dead?"

"Well, I&039;m a vampire, so technically-"

"Not you, moron" She pointed "Him"

"Hi," Marc said "I&039; "You&039;re dead," she said, as if accusing hi milk out of the carton

"Yeah" He sot better Time is a wheel"

"What? You said that before, I think"

"Said what?"

"What you just said"

"What are you talking about?"

Before I could answer, Antonia was right up in his face She was prowling around hi with a scent Which, I s&039;pose, she kind of was "You&039;re not a vampire-you&039;re not blank like these three"

"Blank? Oh, very nice, Antonia, just because we&039;re not all shape-shifting seers who-"

"I , duet so rattled around you? It&039;s creepy, not knohat duonna pull"

"You know, some people are afraid of me" I tried not to whine, but didn&039;t pull it off "Some people wouldn&039;t dare call me dummy, or dumbass, or idiot, or asshat, or moron, or dumb shit, or-"

"You&039;re not one of thehly I wondered if I was even in the roo around Uht past Marc to rue Since Antonia was alive, he didn&039;t give a shit about as happening in any other phase of his life Atup was mildly curious "Did you make him a zombie, Betsy?" He held up a can of V8 He was crazy for the stuff I tried not to think about why "Can I have this?"

"No"

"But it&039;s not even the last one"

"No tothat, not no to the V8-drink all the V8 you want, what do I care? It wasn&039;t meit wasn&039;t on purpose," I said "In fact, I&039; to do with it" Pretty sure But I was getting a bad feeling A bad intuition, call it Because who could have done such a thing? The list of candidates was laughably short And I was on that list