CHAPTER

THIRTY-SIX

“There’s a mermaid on the phone for you.”

“Oh, there is not,” I said, freshly irritated. I’d just about decided what steps to take to fix my Hell problem where both Father Markus and my husband were concerned, and I wasn’t keen to start. It was one of those things where you don’t want to be right and, if you are right, you don’t want to have to take the next step. I couldn’t tell if my reluctance to proceed was sensible caution or just another manifestation of my chronic procrastination. Worse, I’d have to move soon, especially before Tina and Sinclair put their awful plan into action. And that was a whole other thing: their awful plan.

Marc was holding the phone out. I knew he wanted to distract me—Jessica, Dick, and the babies had moved out that morning. The fact that they had to drive their moving van past several reporters camped on our sidewalk just pissed me off all over again. And Marc’s new friend—Bill or Bob or whatever—the G-Spot guy, he was always the last to leave. I hoped it was for the reason I suspected, and not for the reason I feared.

He added, like it would having meaning to me, “It’s a Dr. Bimm? From Boston?”

“Nope. Take a message.”

“Says she’s the queen of the mermaids? Or something—yes? Ow.” Marc jerked the phone away from his ear, but even without vampire hearing I could hear the tinny shouts. “You should definitely take this,” he added, holding the phone out to me as if offering a dead rattlesnake. “She may come up here just to kill me if you don’t.” More squeaking from the phone. Marc’s hand started to tremble. “Jesus. She’s seriously scary.”

“You’re a terrible gate,” I told my terrible gate, snatching the phone. “Yeah? Hello?”

“Hello again, Betsy.”

“Hi. What’s up?”

“You’re asking me? Apparently you’re being outed, if the YouTube stuff my intern made me watch is any indication.”

“And you care because . . . ?”

“Excellent question. Because I have firsthand knowledge of how intensely annoying you are.” Dr. Bimm’s tone was cool, with just the slightest trace of a Boston accent. She wasn’t quite dropping her r’s, but only just. “Nevertheless, this isn’t about you and me as individuals, it’s about my people and yours. Society’s already endured finding out about the Undersea Folk, and I thought you might want some advice on how to handle the sudden, unwelcome intrusion of fame.”

“Who is this again?”

“Fredrika Bimm. Formerly of the New England Aquarium, currently on the phone with an idiot. You came to Boston at my intern’s request, and we foiled a stereotypically evil supervillain’s plot to destroy every merperson on the planet. Then you insisted we go out for smoothies, which put the surreal cherry atop the surreal sundae that was that night.”

“None of this sounds right.” Well, maybe that last part. The aquarium thing, though, that was ringing a faint bell. But for all I knew this was a reporter on a fishing expedition. Like those scammers who call and check your identity by making you tell them your account numbers and social security number. Like I’d fall for that again. “I think you’ve got the wrong gal.”

I heard a faint creak and realized she was tightening her grip on her phone. “Are you serious?”

“Look, lady, I don’t know who you are—”

“I have told you three times!”

“—but obviously you need a hobby if you’ve got nothing better to do than prank call and— Hey.” Sinclair, doubtless prodded by Marc, had come into the kitchen.

“Hey, what?”

“Not hey you, hey my husband.” I put my hand over the phone. “Someone named Ricky Binn says we helped her foil evil and then went out for smoothies.”

Faintly, from the phone: “I cannot believe this shit!”

Sinclair smirked. “Yes, darling, we did. Our august presence was requested by a young woman who was the adopted daughter of one of our subjects. We joined Dr. Bimm in Boston, where we discovered a diabolical plot to exterminate life in the sea, which we promptly foiled, then we celebrated with smoothies and later by making love in a suite at the Marriott Long Wharf.”19

“Oh, the suite sex! Right.” Into the phone: “You should have just said ‘suite sex,’ I would have gotten it right away. So, Fred, nice to hear from you, kind of. What d’you want?”

Nothing but a low grinding—were those her teeth? Then the disgruntled response: “Jesus Christ.”

“Oh, come on. Just having a little fun. The yuk-yuks have been pretty thin this month.”

“No doubt. Is it true? Is your sister trying to expose your people?”

“Yes. It’s her childish way of expressing her displeasure with pretty much everything I’ve ever said and done. You know how it is with little sisters.”

“Thankfully, no.” Her tone was getting less frosty, though it hadn’t quite crossed over into warm and friendly. “Would you like some help? Or advice?”

“No to the former, yes to the latter.”

“I’m impressed. I was sure you’d get those mixed up. Here’s my advice: no matter what you do or say, some people will always assume you’re lying and some will always assume you’re telling the complete unvarnished truth. The trick is getting the ones in the middle to come around to your way of thinking.”

“Uh-huh. And how do I make that happen?”

“Well, that depends,” the mermaid replied, “on what your way of thinking is going to be.”

I thought about that while Sinclair was whispering and gesturing, giving Marc the CliffsNotes version of our adventures in Boston last fall.

“Is this one of those things that seems like lame advice at the time, but later turns out to be perfect, dead-on advice?”

“That’s up to you, too.”

“Ugh. Got anything that isn’t a platitude?”

“Yes: your shoes are ugly.”

I gasped, horrified, then remembered. “Ha! Joke’s on you, Bimm, you can’t see me! I’m barefoot, so suck on that.”

“God help every vampire everywhere,” was the rejoinder, and then the grouchiest mermaid in the history of mermaids hung up on me. Not a moment too soon, either, because Marc was all over me.

“I can’t believe you met a goddamned mermaid and didn’t tell me!”

“Hey, there was a lot going on that week. Most likely.”

Sinclair chuckled. “Oh, my own, tell him the real reason you’ve repressed conscious knowledge of Dr. Bimm and the ways of her people.”

“No.” I pouted.

“As you like.” My traitorous husband turned to Marc. “The good doctor is, ah, volatile. And my beloved is flippant and easily distracted. At times,” he added, like that made it better. “Dr. Bimm despaired of keeping her attention, so she seized an issue of Time and struck the queen.”

Marc’s mouth popped open. “She hit you?”

I nodded. “With a rolled-up magazine.” I could still feel the sting. “On my nose.”

“Like a dog?” I couldn’t tell if he was thrilled or horrified.

“Exactly like a dog,” I confirmed. “I was so flabbergasted I forgot to beat her to death.”

“Dr. Bimm,” Sinclair said, already headed back to his office where Operation Terrible Plan was being ironed out, “does not suffer fools gladly.”

“Got that right,” I muttered, and when Marc started laughing and didn’t stop, I grabbed a coupon insert and smacked him on the nose. He shrieked and hit me back, and I ended up chasing a zombie all over our mansion the day my best friend moved away to guarantee her family’s safety. So, a mixed day.