Fashionably Dead and Loving It: Hot Damned Book 14 Read online

  “Do you value your lives?” I asked Martha and Jane.

  “Well, now… we’re dead,” Martha replied, scratching her sparsely haired head. “Is that a trick question, Monster Hooters?”

  I zapped her. It couldn’t be helped. I was over the boob jokes. Apparently, the old dummies would never be over them. The idiot just grinned and slapped out the fire on her booty shorts. Martha was supposed to be in Hell watching over Luke, Satan’s new baby boy, along with her cohort, Jane. However, for some reason they were back in my neck of the Universe.

  “Do either of you own any Prada?” I questioned. It was a ridiculous thing to ask, but my dream was still forefront in my brain.

  “Don’t rightly know,” Martha said, confused. “Is it contagious?”

  “Banged an old, uncircumcised geezer named Prad Tostada ’bout twenty years ago,” Jane offered. “Does that count?”

  “Umm… no,” I said, wincing. Talking to them was like bashing my head repeatedly into a brick wall on purpose. However, I was relieved that they didn’t have any Prada hidden in their closets.

  “Well, now, speaking of valuing life…” Martha said, tsking at me. “You’re gonna regret eatin’ that big time, Knockers LeMelons. Dead men can’t eat.”

  “Neither can dead hookers,” Jane added, pointing her bony finger at me. “Meaning you.”

  “Got that,” I said with an eye roll.

  The two old Vampyres were the banes of my existence. However, they’d saved my son’s life and I was in their debt for eternity.

  I was also the True Immortal who embodied Compassion.

  Sometimes it sucked to be compassionate.

  True Immortals were unkillable unless we chose to die by the Sword of Death. There were thirteen of us. I represented Compassion. My uncles, God and Satan, embodied Good and Evil, respectively. Mother Nature was Emotion and Bill—Satan’s father, my grandfather and Mother Nature’s mate—was Wisdom. My Demon cousin Dixie manifested Balance and her mate, Hayden—the Angel of Death—represented Death. The Angel of Light, Elijah, epitomized Life. And the woman he pined for, Lucy—the daughter of the original Eve—was Temptation. The three Fates, including Satan’s mate Elle and her mother Sadie, personified Fate.

  And that left Samuel. My son was Utopia, the most powerful of all the True Immortals. He was a combination of all of our gifts. His future terrified me. Keeping him safe as he matured into who he was to become was paramount to both Ethan and me. While I knew there would come a day when my child would have to spread his wings, I hoped it wasn’t anytime soon. He was truly my miracle.

  Martha and Jane, on the other hand, were not miracles. While I would never voluntarily admit it, I did love the old bats even though beheading them sounded like a fine plan most of the time… like now, for example.

  “Why are you here?” I demanded, narrowing my eyes at them. “You’re supposed to be in Hell.”

  “Oh, you know, regular Underworld bullshit,” Jane said, sitting down at the vanity and pawing through my nail polish. “Elle said Satan wasn’t stepping up enough with the baby, so she gave us the week off.” She pointed at my head. “Nice crown, Gazongas McHoullihan.”

  “Thank you,” I replied. A compliment was a compliment no matter what the idiot chose to call me.

  “Yep, Elle is not happy with Mr. Evil Bitable Buns,” Martha said, adjusting her elastic top as one of her floppy torpedoes fell out of it. “She’s gonna make the Devil change diapers. Told him if he didn’t, she was cuttin’ him off.”

  I grinned. The visual was kind of delightful. To call Satan a handful was an understatement. My uncle was a self-absorbed jackhole. However, I did adore him. I couldn’t help it. As evil as he was, he was also a really good guy. The Devil, and Demons in general, didn’t create evil, they simply thrived on it. Satan was the first to blame his brother God for mankind’s evil ways. It was a stretch, but with my Uncle God giving humans free will, they had the choice between good and evil. It delighted Satan to no end how many went down the wrong path.

  Telling Uncle Fucker I loved him was one of my favorite things to do. It was so much fun to watch him throw a shit fit.

  “That’s right. Elle means business—electrocuted that sexy piece of ass six times when he bitched like a little girl about his gag reflex gettin’ triggered by poopy diapers,” Jane added. “Dastardly Smackable-booty is gonna get a purple pecker unless he gets with the plan.”

  “Should be interesting,” I said, flopping down on one the overstuffed chairs in my closet. My closet in the Cressida House was bigger than my first apartment.

  Looking at Martha and Jane, I shook my head. I remembered the day I’d had them turned with sickening clarity. It was the very same day I’d ended the life of my sorry excuse of a vile mother and even sorrier excuse of a Demon father.

  I felt no remorse for ending the lives of two people so viciously evil. My parents defined the word. I suppose there might still be a small part of me that wished my mother had loved me, but it was a waste of time to pine for the impossible. Instead, I made sure that my son knew how much I loved him every single day.

  Yes, Samuel was apt to roll his eyes and groan when I sang ‘You Are My Sunshine’ in the key of Z, but I was fully aware he secretly loved it. I was creating happy memories that may or may not send him to therapy. At least he didn’t cry like my second-grade class had when I sang.

  “I’m not gonna do it,” I admitted, gazing longingly at the chips and salsa. “I think I was just hoping I could taste it for a second. The pain would be worth it.”

  “I feel ya,” Martha said, picking her fangs with my comb. “I miss Spam, onion and blue cheese sandwiches somethin’ awful.”

  Jane found a shade of polish she liked and shoved it into her booty shorts. “I miss them Vienna cocktail weenies and prune juice. Used to keep me real regular.”

  In the space of two minutes and three seconds, I’d lost a comb, a bottle of nail polish and was gacked out beyond reason. If Martha didn’t take the comb with her, I was burning it. They were gross.

  Martha cackled. “You don’t need prune juice anymore, dumbass. Your shitter got plugged up the day you died.”

  “You got that right! No more praying to Jesus to help me drop the kids off at the lake when I’m constipated and sweating like a hooker in confession on the crapper,” Jane agreed, stealing a few more bottles of polish.

  “Is there a reason you two imbeciles are in my closet?” I asked, ignoring every word Jane had just overshared. If I acknowledged it, I’d be forced to incinerate her to ash. With a snap of my fingers, I sent the chips and salsa away. It was far too tempting to have them in front of me.

  “Yep, there’s a reason,” Jane confirmed.

  “Absofuckinglutely,” Martha added, whipping out a pile of magazines and slapping them down on the now snack-free antique table. “I think we have some sphincters to dislocate.”

  “Mmkay,” I said, glancing down at the pile.

  My blood began to boil. Dead Buzz was on top, but I spied a copy of the Daily Fang, the Bloody Times and the National Dhampir. When I was human, I occasionally read the celebrity gossip magazines knowing they were filled with bullshit. However, I never gave them much thought. Now that I was dead, I despised them. Vampyres were vicious. The stories were completely fabricated and mean as all get out. And I was their favorite topic.

  Finding where the magazines were housed was next to impossible. I’d tried. Ethan told me to ignore them. It came with the territory of being a royal. But they adored Ethan and his family, while they terrorized me.

  Picking up the copy of Dead Buzz, I stared at the shitty drawing of me sitting on a throne coupled with an article about how I had no taste in fashion. The cartoon was insulting. Of course, there were no photos in the fucking rag mags since Vampyres didn’t show up on film, but this illustration was particularly heinous. My nose was half of my face and my hair looked like a red-streaked bird’s nest.

  “Unreal,” I hissed. “I mean, I have
plenty of bad qualities those sons of bitches could harp on, but my sense of fashion is not one of them.”

  Martha nodded. “Next to me and Jane, you’re the best-dressed dead person we know.”

  I said nothing and quickly sat on my hands, so I didn’t zap her. She was trying to be nice. Martha was woefully mistaken considering that she was wearing what amounted to a low-rent stripper outfit, but it was the thought that counted here.

  “Want us to kill ’em?” Jane offered.

  I was seriously tempted to say yes, but there was no way in hell that I would. Flicking my fingers and burning the pile of crap, I shook my head. As good as it would feel in the moment, in the long run it would suck. I was a target for many reasons. Being royal was only one of them.

  “Nope,” I said. “No killing, but I wouldn’t mind if you tore a few new butt cracks.”

  “The technical name for butt crack is intergluteal cleft,” Martha informed me.

  “What did you just say?” I asked, squinting at her.

  “My bad.” Martha cackled and slapped me on the back. “I forgot how dumb you are, Chesty Honkerburgers. Let me explain.”

  Jane smacked Martha in the back of the head and sent her flying into my Chanel bags. They had about three seconds before I electrocuted them and sent them back to Hell.

  “Martha, who was dropped on her head multiple fucking times when she was in her twenties, was using scientific language that she learned by cheating on her vocabulary tests in eighth grade. A more layman’s term for a hooker like you would be that the intergluteal cleft is the poop shoot or, more politely put, the Hershey hole.”

  Crawling out from under the bags, Martha unfortunately joined in. “I’m partial to puckered starfish or corn pocket.”

  Jane nodded in appreciation. “Yep, corn pocket is a good one. I also like fart box and mud clam.”

  “You want to know what I’d like?” I inquired so quietly both idiots paled.

  “Umm… to join in on the stink star contest?” Jane whispered.

  “Nope,” I snapped. “I would like you to shut your pie holes or I’ll turn them into intergluteal clefts. You feel me?”

  “Roger that,” Martha said. “So, it’s a no-go on killing the fuckers from the rags?”

  “It’s a no-go,” I said with a sigh. “However, if you’d like to threaten and dismember a few of the reporters, I’d be down with that.”

  “Woohoooo!” Jane sang as she did a little jig that reminded me of Elaine’s dancing from Seinfeld. “We’ll get our hot piece of man meat, Lizard, to help us. That sex god can scare the shit out of anyone.”

  She was correct. Their mate Lizard was a Demon/Fairy of few words and dreadful taste. He had also been in my dream. Case in point of his shitty taste, he’d mated with Martha and Jane. However, I liked him tremendously. His name wasn’t a mistake. Lizard could literally shift into a massive prehistoric-looking lizard with teeth like I’d never seen. He was indeed terrifying.

  “Fine,” I agreed. “But let Lizard know that no one dies. Removing appendages is not a problem. They grow back.”

  “What about heads?” Jane asked.

  “Heads do not,” I replied with an eye roll. “Do not decapitate the jackholes. Am I clear?”

  “Yep,” Martha said. “We’ll bring you back a few intergluteal clefts!”

  On that horrifying note, before I could tell them under no uncertain circumstances that if they brought me a poop shoot, I would have them thrown in the dungeon, they disappeared in a cloud of stinky purple smoke.

  “Fuck,” I muttered, looking up at the ceiling. “Can this day get any worse?”

  Chapter Three

  Actually, the day could get worse.

  And it did.

  I had no clue why everyone thought it was fine to poof into my closet this afternoon. New rules needed to be made. However, right now wasn’t a good time. The Devil was having a meltdown.

  “I’m fucking Satan,” my uncle growled, stomping around and examining my shoe collection.

  I was relieved I hadn’t eaten the chips and salsa. I would have been in the fetal position on the floor. Being busted by Martha, Jane and Satan would have been far too much to live down.

  “How many times have I told you that you need a new catchphrase?” I inquired, closing the closet door and slapping my hands on my hips. “You can’t fuck yourself. And if you can, I do not want to know.”

  “You don’t understand, Astrid,” Satan said, ignoring the fact that I’d pointed out he’d announced he could bang himself. “I don’t change diapers. My cologne doesn’t mix well with eau de barf. I have evil shit to do—tons of evil shit. I’m a very busy, bad man. Turn your head while I steal a pair of wedges for Elle.”

  “We don’t wear the same size,” I told him.

  “What a pity.”

  “Not really,” I replied.

  “Nice crown. Are you fond of it?” he asked, eyeing it enviously.

  “Extremely,” I said. “Don’t even think about leaving with it. I’ll make you regret it.”

  “Understood.”

  Satan’s hair stuck straight up on his head, and he was a disheveled hot mess. I’d never seen the Demon so sloppy. My uncle was beautiful beyond reason—and very aware of the fact. Satan stood over six feet tall, had long raven-black hair and a perfectly muscular build. The arbiter of evil reeked of magic and immeasurable power and was always impeccably dressed.

  Not today.

  His shirt was wrinkled and untucked. His Armani suit had what I could only guess was spit up on the shoulder, and he was wearing ratty-looking running shoes. If he looked in the mirror he would implode. Good thing I didn’t have any. Grabbing the Devil by the balls was a very bad plan, so I shoved him out of my closet and into my suite before he started pillaging my Prada.

  “My schedule is full. Everything will go to Hell if I’m indisposed. I simply don’t have time to add anything to my plate.”

  “I call bullshit, Uncle Fucker. And Luke is not just anything. He’s your son.”

  Satan’s eyes turned a sparkling blood red, and he stared at me with displeasure. “I shouldn’t have come here. I was sure you’d have my back.”

  I squinted at him, then laughed. “Nope, you came here because you knew I would tell you the truth,” I informed him. “I’ll never be a yes-woman for your sorry, evil, pathetic butt.”

  “You’re incredibly rude,” he hissed.

  “And you love it,” I pointed out, seating myself in my favorite comfy armchair and waiting for the hissy fit to continue.

  “This is true,” he agreed, pacing the room erratically. “Does Ethan keep any office supplies in here?”

  “He does not.” I bit back my grin with effort. “Would you like to go to his office so you can pilfer shit while you have your breakdown?”

  Satan considered the change of venue for a few moments then shook his head. “No, not unless he has any staplers or letter openers that are baby-proofed.”

  “Nope, can’t say he does,” I replied, watching my uncle come undone. “You’re lying to me.”

  He threw his hands in the air and laughed. “Your point? I always lie. It’s in my DNA.”

  “Sit,” I said, pointing at a black leather chair. “Now.”

  The Devil huffed, blew up a priceless ottoman then did as he was told. I said nothing. Normally, I would zap his destructive ass for ruining my stuff, but he was on edge. Getting him to tell the truth would be difficult. However, I knew that was exactly why he’d come.

  My day was supposed to be for me, but it would not be good for anyone in the Universe if Uncle Fucker truly lost his mind.

  “Speak,” I said. “And for every piece of fiction that leaves your lips, I get to zap you.”

  “Seems a little harsh,” Satan said, glancing down at his horrifying shoes and letting his chin fall to his chest in defeat.

  “I’m good like that.” I actually felt sorry for him. Not that I would let him know it. He’d use my compassion t
o his advantage. I didn’t know how. I just knew he would. “Is the problem really poopy diapers?”

  “How do you know about that?” he demanded, surprised.

  “Martha and Jane were here. So… you have a problem changing diapers?”

  He shook his head and sighed. “No.”

  I waited.

  And waited.

  And waited.

  “Would you care to expound on that answer?” I questioned.

  “Do I have to?”

  I zapped him.

  “Damnit,” he bellowed and slapped out the fire on his pants. “I didn’t even lie.”

  “Think of it as incentive not to. Wait. What in the ever-lovin’ heck?” I shouted in alarm, as the cushion beneath me began to vibrate. Zombies were still forefront in my mind. If there was a Zombie under my chair, I was going to lose my shit worse than Uncle Fucker. Hopping out of the chair, I ran across the room. “Are you messing with me?”

  Satan, sensing my alarm, poofed to my side. “Define messing with.”

  “Did you make the chair move?” I demanded, watching the piece of furniture closely. I was prepared to incinerate my favorite armchair if an eyeball or a green body part popped out.

  “I did not,” he replied as his fingers began to spark and a smile pulled at his lips. “Shall I detonate it? It would be a pleasure to damage something by request.”

  “Not yet,” I whispered as my fangs dropped. “Need to see what it is.”

  Satan huffed and shook his head. “I never get to have fun. Fine. What exactly do you think is hiding in your chair?”

  I was embarrassed to say it. I wasn’t even sure they existed. However, if Uncle Fucker laughed, I’d take a picture of him in his state of disarray and blackmail him with it. “Umm… a Zombie.”

  The Devil was shocked into silence.

  It was a very rare occurrence.

  My stomach cramped, and I shot him a look.