vampire wedding? Are you low on your meds?"
Marc frowned. "Actually, yes."
"Never mind," I sighed. "There's lots of shades of white. Cream, latte, ecru, ivory,
magnolia, seashell—"
"You don't have to wear white," Laura piped up, curled up like a cat in a velvet armchair.
Her sunny blond hair was pulled back in a severe bun. She was dressed in a sloppy blue T-
shirt and cutoffs. Bare legs, flip-flops. She still looked better than I was going to look on
The Day, and it was taking all my willpower not to locate a shotgun from somewhere in
that bridal shop's secret back room and shoot her in the head. Not to kill her, of course.
Just to make her face slightly less symmetrical. "In fact, it's inappropriate for you to wear
white."
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"Virgin," I sneered.
"Vampire," Laura retorted. "You could wear blue. Or red! Red would bring out your
eyes."
"Stop! You're all killing me with your weirdness."
"What's the budget on this thing, anyway?" Cathie asked, drifting close to the ceiling,
inspecting the chandeliers, the gorgeous accessories, the beautifully dressed yet
understated attendants (who were ignoring all the vampire talk, as good attendants did),
the utter lack of a price tag on anything.
"Mmmm mmmm," I muttered.
"What?" Cathie and Jessica asked in unison.
"Cathie was just asking about the budget." One of the yuckier perks of being queen of the
dead? I alone could see and hear ghosts. And they could see and hear me. And bug me.
Any time. Day or night. Naked or fully clothed.
But even for a ghost, Cathie was special. As we all know, most ghosts hang around
because they have unfinished business. Once they finished their business, poof! Off into the
wild blue whatever. (God knows I'd never had that privilege.) And who could blame
them? If it were me, I'd beat feet off this mortal plane the minute I could.
But even after I'd fixed Cathie's little serial killer problem, she hung around. She even ran
defense between the ghosts and me. Sort of like a celestial executive assistant.
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"So?" Marc asked.
"Don't look at . . . me," Jessica gasped. Marc's lips thinned, and we all looked away.
"Gravy train's . . . over."
"Would your friend like some water?" a new attendant said, swooping in out of nowhere.
"Got any chemo?" Jess asked tiredly. "It's, um, three million," I said, desperate to change the subject. I couldn't look at Jessica, so I looked at my feet instead. My toenails were in
dire need of filing and polishing. As they always were—no matter what I did to them, they
always returned to the same state they'd been in the night I died.
" Three million ?" Cathie screamed in my ear, making me flinch. The attendants probably
thought I was epileptic. "What, rubles? Pesos? Yen?"
"Three milliondollars ?" Marc goggled. "For a party?"
All the women glared at him. Men! A wedding wasn't 'just a party.' A party was just a
party.' This would be the most important day of my—our—lives.
Still. I was sort of amazed to find Sinclair had dumped three mill into my checking
account. I didn't even bother asking him how he'd pulled it off.
"What the hell will you spend three million on?" Cathie shrieked.
"Cake, of course."
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"Talking to Cathie?" Laura asked.
"Yeah. Cake—" I continued.
"Cathie, you should go to your king," Laura suggested.
"King?" Cathie asked in my head.
"She means Jesus," I said.
"This haunting isn't very becoming," my sister continued doggedly.
"Tell your goody-goody sister to cram it," Cathie said.
"She says thanks for the advice," I said.
"Just think of all the charitable contributions you could make with that money," Laura
gently chided me, "and still have a perfectly