Mary guided her up the stairs, her long dress brushing the steps with soft, whispery sounds. “Such a cute name! Who picked it?”
“A nurse at the hospital, I think. Sinclair is just the name of the ward.”
Growing up, she didn’t know that all abandoned babies in that particular hospital received the name Sinclair. She’d always thought her and Billie sharing it was a special thing just for them, the tie that made them real family when nothing else did.
But now she knew it wasn’t special. There were a couple dozen Sinclairs with the same story, as far as she could tell, and the name Francesca was picked on a whim by one of the charge nurses in the maternity ward.
She felt Mary’s scrutinizing look but chose not to meet it. Really, it was all she could do to not fall on her face as she tried not to trip on all that fabric swirling around her.
“I see,” Mary hummed. “Where I grew up, all the foundlings in the children’s home were given the same names. It made things easier on the staff, so they didn’t have to remember any of us as individuals. So it was me and about twelve other Marys alongside sixteen Davids for a long time. When I was twelve, I asked everyone to call me Bette instead. It didn’t stick. Not that anyone really calls me Mary these days. I’mdarlingorsweetnessor Mama, which is obviously my favorite.”
“Oh.” Francesca didn’t quite know what to say to that. She’d never met someone so open about being from a children’s home before. Mostly, people did their best not to talk about it. Not because it was inherently awful but because there were always too many follow-up questions.
Francesca had only met a handful of people who admitted to being from a children’s home in her life, and after one too many experiences with uncomfortable questions and pitiful looks, she decided that bringing it up just wasn’t worth it.
There was something a little shocking in how casually Mary brought it up, as if it was just another fact of her life.I’m from Ohio. I’m allergic to shellfish. Oh, also, I grew up in a children’s home.
It was almost like she saw it as normal. It was… nice.
They stepped into what Francesca could only describe as a palatial dressing, sunroom, and lounge hybrid. The space could’ve come right out of a French rococo palace, with all its gold scrollwork, wainscoting, and silk shot wallpaper. A massive, ornate vanity and stool set took up a corner, while lounges took another.
Mary led her across the plush carpet to an equally luxurious bathroom fitted with a tub that could’ve sat four grown people, as well as another long vanity. Attached to the bathroom was a closet the size of her apartment, from which Mary retrieved a satin robe and fresh towel.
Handing the bundle over, she babbled, “Here, sweetie. You take as long of a shower as you need. I’ll have the cook make you some soup. It’ll be so nice to have another eater around— Oh, no, don’t!”
Too late, Francesca turned to face the shower and was met by her own reflection.
A faint bruise was forming near her temple. Her hair was a rat’s nest. The smoky eye shadow she wore for work was a smudged disaster. Dried blood left dark tracks down her chin and neck. It was also smeared across her cheeks, showing exactly how ferocious she’d been when she tore that piece off her attacker.
“Fuck!”She jumped back like the thing in the mirror might try and get her. Francesca covered her eyes and moaned, “Oh gods, youcannotmeet me like this!”
Mary clicked her tongue and firmly steered Francesca away from the mirror. “No, no, we’re not doing that. You survived an attack no worse for wear. That’s what matters.”
“But all this is myfault,”she moaned, collapsing onto the vanity’s stool.
A new low, feminine voice drifted from the doorway. “What’s your fault?”
Francesca’s head jerked up to find a willowy beauty leaning against the door jamb. Long limbed, copper-skinned, dressed in expensive workout attire, and carrying a head of raven hair, she looked every inch the vampire the fangs made her.
Gaze bouncing between the two women, she mumbled, “I’m sorry, who…”
“Isabelle,” the brunette answered. “Luis and Milo’s other mother and this one’s mate, alongside our husband, as she calls him.”
On second look, the resemblance popped out at her, entirely obvious. It was in the straight nose, the skin, the crow’s feet.Even the eyebrows were the same.Thiswas his biological mother.
Aw, fuck,she thought, burying her bloody face in her hands again.
Mary rubbed her back in soothing circles. “You have nothing to feel bad about,” she soothed. “Vampires are just a really nasty sort of competitive. I didn’t understand that either when I met Isabelle. And the messIcaused! Good gods, you have no idea. But everything worked out, just like it will for you.”
“Our son is threatening to hunt Malachi down himself,” Isabelle informed her wife. “Young Felix is banishing him to a safe house.”
“Our son takes afteryou,”Mary replied, somewhat impatiently. “There’s no reason for him to take on Malachi by himself. That man has had a grudge against us since that awful business with little Ginny. It’s best if he just gets out of the way and keeps Frankie safe.”
Isabelle clearly wasn’t a fan of that idea. Her sloped nose wrinkled when she argued, “We could guard his anchor while he hunts. Besides, I’d like to get to know the woman who’ll bear my grandchildren.”
She paused before shifting her laser-like intensity to Francesca. “Miss Sinclair, can you fight? Mary couldn’t when we met and it proved extremely inconvenient.”
“Um…” Gesturing helplessly to her face, she tried, “I bit a chunk out of a vampire’s arm today. Does that count?”