All Together Dead

with it. I wasn’t managing very well.
    “There is trouble,” the queen said. “Though I don’t understand what your presence will achieve.”
    I’d never seen Bill looking abashed, but he did now. “I apologize, my queen,” he said. “If you need me for something, I’ll have returned to my booth in the convention hall.”
    In icy silence, the elevator doors slid shut, blocking out my first lover’s face and form. It was possible that Bill was trying to show he cared about me by showing up with such haste when he was supposed to be doing business for the queen elsewhere. If this demonstration was supposed to soften my heart, it failed.
    “Is there anything I can be doing to help you in your investigation?” Andre asked Donati, though his words were really aimed at Christian Baruch. “Since the queen is the legal heir of Arkansas, we stand ready to assist.”
    “I would expect nothing less of such a beautiful queen, one also well-known for her business acumen and tenacity.” Baruch bowed to the queen.
    Even Andre blinked at the convoluted compliment, and the queen gave Baruch a narrow-eyed look. I kept my gaze fixed on the potted plant, and I kept my face absolutely blank. I was in danger of snickering. This was brownnosing on a scale I’d never encountered.
    There really didn’t seem to be any more to say, and in subdued silence I got on the elevator with the vampires and Mr. Cataliades, who had remained most remarkably quiet.
    Once the doors shut, he said, “My queen, you must marry again immediately.”
    Let me tell you, Sophie-Anne and Andre had quite a reaction to this bombshell; their eyes widened for all of a second.
    “Marry anyone: Kentucky, Florida, I would add even Mississippi, if he were not negotiating with Indiana. But you need an alliance, someone lethal to back you up. Otherwise jackals like this Baruch will circle around, yipping for your attention.”
    “Mississippi’s out of the running, thankfully. I don’t think I could stand all the men. Once in a while, of course, but not day in, day out, scores of them,” Sophie-Anne said.
    It was the most natural and unguarded thing I’d ever heard her say. She almost sounded human. Andre reached out and punched the button to stop the elevator between floors. “I wouldn’t advise Kentucky,” he said. “Anyone who needs Britlingens is in enough trouble of his own.”
    “Alabama is lovely,” Sophie-Anne said. “But she enjoys some things in bed that I object to.”
    I was tired of being in the elevator and also of being regarded as part of the scenery. “May I ask a question?” I said.
    After a moment’s silence, Sophie-Anne nodded.
    “How come you get to keep your children with you, and you’ve gone to bed with them, and most vampires aren’t able to do that? Isn’t it supposed to be a short-term relationship, sire and child?”
    “Most vampire children don’t stay with their makers after a certain time,” Sophie-Anne agreed. “And there are very few cases of children staying with their maker as long as Andre and Sigebert have been with me. That closeness is my gift, my talent. Every vampire has a gift: some can fly, some have special skills with the sword. I can keep my children with me. We can talk to each other, as you and Barry can. We can love each other physically.”
    “If all that’s so, why don’t you just name Andre the King of Arkansas and marry him?”
    There was a long, total silence. Sophie-Anne’s lips parted a couple of times as if she was about to explain to me why that was impossible, but both times she pressed them shut again. Andre stared at me with such intensity that I expected to see two spots on my face begin smoking. Mr. Cataliades just looked shocked, as if a monkey had begun to speak to him in iambic pentameter.
    “Yes,” said Sophie-Anne finally. “Why don’t I do that? Have as king and spouse my dearest friend and lover.” In the blink of an eye, she looked positively radiant. “Andre, the only drawback is that you will have to spend some time apart from me when you return to Arkansas to take care of the state’s affairs. My oldest child, are you willing?”
    Andre’s face was transformed with love. “For you, anything,” he said.
    We had us a Kodak moment going. I actually felt a little choked up.
    Andre pressed the button again and down we went.
    Though I am not immune to romance—far from it—in my opinion, the queen needed to focus on finding out who’d killed Jennifer