I snorted and was on the verge of giving him a greatest hits compilation of the adventures of Amber Kowalski when Cookie cleared her throat and glared at me from behind Ubie’s back.
“Oh, right,” I mouthed. Thankfully, Ubie was studying the fare. I gave her a thumbs-up sign and changed the subject. “Did you grill Joplin yet?”
“Why would I grill Joplin? This smells incredible.”
“Because he’s the detective on our case.”
“Exactly. Your case. You grill him.”
“He hates me.”
“He hates everyone.”
“True.”
He was calming down. Cookie did that to him, but it didn’t make his earlier agitation any less concerning. Whatever had his hackles in an uproar could wait. It was probably work related, anyway.
He cleared magazines off the table, and we sat down to eat. The three of us at the table. The kids in the family room investigating a video of a possessed little girl. We were like the fallout of a nuclear family. I only felt a little guilty for eating without my love nugget. Then again, he was a spatula away from being a bona fide chef. He could fend for himself.
Amber came back in for seconds and gave him a hug. “Hey, Ubie.” She’d started calling him Ubie because calling her stepdad “Uncle Bob” sounded wrong on all kinds of levels. I agreed wholeheartedly.
She gave him a kiss on the cheek, grabbed another chile relleno along with more chips and salsa, and headed back to the family room. Before she got ten feet, she pulled a U-ey and stuck her head through the doorway. “I almost forgot. A blogger who goes by the name of SpectorySam would like an interview with you.”
“With me?” I asked.
“Yeah. About the video. He wants to do a whole feature and is pretty sure he can get it on Huffington Post.”
If I didn’t think Cookie would pass out, I’d have said yes. “That’s okay. Tell him I’m not giving interviews right now and to contact my agent. It’ll make me sound important.”
“Okay,” she said with a giggle as she pranced off.
“That girl should be in show business,” I said to Cookie.
“Oh, hell, no.”
“Not in a child-star capacity. Those poor kids. But more like an extra in a Tide commercial.”
Her brows formed one continuous hard line. I fought the urge to cough and say “unibrow” from behind my fist. It was so juvenile. The real trick was to do that during a sneeze. Sneezes were harder to fake.
“I’ll think about it,” she said. She was lying.
“So, what do you think he’s doing?” I asked.
Uncle Bob looked at his watch. “Damn it.” He took out a five and put it on the table.
Cookie snatched it up and displayed it between her fingers, making it dance and do flips like she’d won the lottery.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“You beat your record by five minutes,” he said.
“I told you.” Cookie squirmed with excitement in her chair.
“What the hell?” I asked, pretending to be offended.
“Last time you didn’t start asking about him, wondering what he was doing, begging for us to go borrow a cup of sugar to check on him, for a whole thirty-five minutes,” he explained.
“You broke your record,” Cookie said, tearing up. “I’m so proud of you.”
“Oh yeah, you guys are a riot. A laugh a minute.” I stabbed my relleno and shoved a huge piece into my mouth right before I said, “No, really, what do you think he’s doing?”
No matter how much I begged, neither of them would go across the hall—it was like ten feet—to check on my beloved. And I refused to sink to stalking, which I could very well have done incorporeally, but I felt like that would be cheating. Also, I was pretty sure he’d know if I were floating around the apartment, following him. Because that’s not creepy at all.
So, I got ready for bed and landed in the arms of Fabio.
He wasn’t nearly as cooperative as I remembered. Last time I slept with him, he curled around me, pushed his folds into my hips, let me ease a hand between his cushions. This time he was cold and hard, and there was a metal rod between the cushions I was trying to anchor myself to. I tossed this way and that, wishing I’d taken Ubie up on more hospitable accommodations. Not that I could’ve slept, anyway.
As I lay there contemplating the case and Emery Adams and the gods of Uzan and Beep and my cantankerous husband, I realized I’d forgotten to tell him I was being followed by three men in a minivan.
Oh, well. They were in a minivan. How dangerous could they be?
12
I love asking kids what they want to be when they grow up.
Mostly ’cause I’m still looking for ideas.
—MEME
I woke up to the smell of coffee brewing and bacon sizzling, but nature was calling. I wandered into the little girls’ room to answer it and brush my teeth. When I walked into the kitchen, Cookie was still in her robe, checking e-mail on her phone.
I smacked my lips and then headed for the Keurig. “I don’t know how this happened, but I think I just ate lotion.”
“My ex is such a douche.”
“How is it I’ve never met him?” I grabbed a coffee cup from the coffee cup cabinet. It was like a magic box full of devices specifically made to hold the blood of my enemy. Or coffee. They were equally capable of both.
“He said no.”
“How dare he,” I said, currently in the role of support personnel.
“I mean, I’m pretty hesitant myself, but he just flat out said no.”
“We could sue,” I offered, stepping into the role of legal advisor. I rested against the counter and took the biggest drink I could manage—of coffee, not the blood of my enemy—without requiring medical attention for third-degree burns in my piehole.
“It’s going to break Amber’s heart.”
I straightened and slipped into the role of BFF for life. “Oh, hell, no. Where’s your baseball bat? He has kneecaps, right?”
“It might come to that. It’s like he says no to things just to punish me. He uses his privilege of shared custody as a weapon against me, completely uninterested in what it does to Amber.”
I stepped over to her. “I’m sorry, hon. What’s going on?”
“I told him about NMSD and how Amber wants to go. He said no. Period. He will not allow her to be exposed.”
“Exposed?” I asked, completely offended, and I wasn’t even Deaf. “Exposed to what? A culture rich in history and traditions? A proud and powerful group of people who have to put up with more shit in one day than we have to all year? I mean, have you even tried to order a pizza through relay? Nightmare.”
“Exactly. She could learn so much.”
I put on my best mafioso and asked, “You want I should talk to him?”
She laughed softly. “No. I’ll do it. I can do it. Besides, the last time you helped, Fredo, there were dead fish showing up all over town, only these were gift wrapped and delivered by Pappadeaux. Cost us a fortune.”
“Hey, at least I got the message out. You do not want to mess with us. And we got some lovely thank-you cards in return.”
“I don’t think that’s how it works.”
“Wait, why Fredo?”
“I’ll talk to him myself.”
“Isn’t he shot in the head on orders from his own brother?”
“I’ll probably have to cave on something else he wants. God only knows what that might be.”
“What?” I asked, suddenly very interested. “So he manipulates situations like this to get his way with other things?”
She looked up at me and blinked. “That’s what marriages are based on.”
“Okay, but didn’t you divorce him?”
“Not the point.”
“’Cause, if not, we should mention that to Uncle Bob.”
“Are you kidding me? I have plans for that boy. He will never be the same after I’m done with him.”
 
; I laughed. “I don’t doubt that for a microsecond.”
“He left early, by the way.”
“Uncle Bob? Yeah, I heard him.”
“No. Mr. Farrow.”
“Ah yes. Mr. Smexy. The bane and bliss—mostly bliss—of my existence.”
“You know, you could do something crazy and talk to him. Open up a bit. Tell him about the you-know-who and the you-know-what.”
No idea what she was talking about. “I tried that. Last night. He is the stubbornest, most unwavering, bullheaded—”
“All synonyms of the same concept. One that, I daresay, applies to you as well.”
I gaped at her.
“Only sometimes,” she added. “Like yesterday when you ordered a burrito and they brought you a burger. You were totally flexible.”
She had a point. I had stretched before going in. Did a few lunges to warm up. I’m always more flexible after a good warm-up. I could even do the splits if the situation demanded. And it was amazing how often the situation actually did demand.
* * *
I felt eyes on the back of my neck as I walked to the office.
I got that a lot. Those prickly feelings that someone was watching me. Odds are, someone was. It could have been the Vatican guy. I hadn’t checked up on him since being back. I thought, perhaps, the Vatican had fired him. His cover was blown, after all. But now I wondered. The person wasn’t familiar to me, so I knew it wasn’t Garrett. I could feel him when he was close. I could feel Cookie and Ubie and Gemma. They had a very distinct vibration. A distinct essence that I now recognized. No, this was someone else. Perhaps more than one.
I finally found the source. The three amigos were back. Their lime green minivan sat about half a block away. I got the feeling they didn’t have a lot of money to throw at their stalking hobby. Or experience tailing people.
Before I could do anything about it, I felt a more familiar presence. I spotted the homeless girl I’d seen the day before down the street. She was leaning against Boyd’s in the same clothes, but she had her stuff with her. She’d gone back to get it, thankfully. I was worried someone else would get to it first.
Mr. Boyd came out then. In the sea of people bustling here and there, mostly college students trying to get to class, he’d singled her out. Walked over to her. Tried to hand her another yogurt and juice. He also had an apple, and I couldn’t have come up with a more appropriate metaphor if someone had paid me.
Without saying a thing, I slowly walked over to them. I knew Mr. Boyd flirted with the college kids, the younger the better, all day every day. But this was different. This kid couldn’t have been more than fifteen. And honestly, the guy was in his early fifties with a huge black mustache and a belly Jabba the Hutt would be proud of. What on earth made him think any of these young girls would be interested in him? Was he truly that delusional?
I slowed when the kid shook her head at him, pulled the strap of her backpack over her shoulder, and turned to walk away. She’d turned in my direction and spotted me instantly, but I was too busy giving Mr. Boyd the evil eye to offer her a hello.
“What?” he asked, taking a step in my direction.
I lowered my head and took another one in his. Then another until I was between Boyd and the girl. If he wanted a confrontation, he would most definitely get one. I’d been waiting for an opportunity to give him a piece of my gray matter. All squiggly and covered in slime.
Before it came to that, he noticed a couple of people noticing us. Things could get sticky fast for a perv preying so close to a very forward-thinking college campus. He backed down, throwing his hands up and walking back into his store.
When I turned to check on the girl, I’d expected to see her backside hustling down the street, putting as much distance between us as she could. Instead, I found her right where I’d left her. Her black jacket and black hair made her look more Goth than I guessed she was, considering she carried around a pink blanket and backpack.
“This from you?” she asked, pulling a ten out of her front pocket. It was all the cash I’d had yesterday when I stashed it in her things.
“Nope.” I pushed my bag higher on my shoulder. “I don’t carry cash.”
Her lids narrowed as she studied me. “Thanks,” she said anyway, not buying it.
I’d totally have to work on my sales pitch. Nobody was buying what I was selling these days. Maybe I’d lost my touch. Or left my touch in New York. Darn. I’d have to go back for it.
Road trip!
“You hungry?” I asked, pointing out the fact that the Frontier was a mere two blocks.
She looked back and then shrugged a shoulder. “I could eat.”
I wondered why she hadn’t already bought herself something to eat. She was shaking with hunger. Or fear. It could have been the fear causing her slim body to quake.
“Come on. I’m starved.”
Thankfully, even though I’d already had a lovely breakfast compliments of Cookie Kowalski-Davidson of runny eggs and burned bacon, I’d left room for Reyes’s homemade chips and salsa. Just in case a basket happened to end up in my arms as I took a shortcut through the restaurant, turned down the scenic route through the kitchen, then headed up the stairs. It was odd how often that kind of thing happened to me.
We ordered breakfast and then navigated the maze that was the Frontier to find a quiet table in the very back room. By the time we found a spot, our number popped up on the screen.
“I’ll get it,” I said, hoping she wouldn’t change her mind and bolt out the back door that stood ten feet from us.
She was uncomfortable but hungry. Her gaze had darted from plate to plate as we’d stood in line to order.
“Well, this looks amazing,” I said when I got back. I handed her the orange juice and #1 breakfast plate while I nibbled on a side of carne adovada with a side of carne adovada. One could never have too much carne adovada.
“It does,” she said, her wary expression doing a one-eighty and sliding headfirst into lust.
I liked her.
“So,” I said, taking small bites. Mostly because I wasn’t the least bit hungry. “Got a name?”
She hesitated, then gave me her real name. I was worried she wouldn’t. “Heather.”
“It’s nice to meet you. I’m Charley.”
I reached over and took her hand for a formal shake. She let me and then went back to tearing into her food.
“Can you tell me what’s going on?”
“Going on?” she asked, stuffing a huge bite into her tiny mouth.
“Why are you living on the streets? There are safer places to live, you know.”
“Right.” She swallowed and gulped half the juice in one round.
“Then can you tell me how old you are?”
“Eighteen.”
I gave her a moment, then asked, “Can you tell me how old you really are?”
She paused and looked at me from underneath her lashes, trying to decide if she could trust me.
“I guess I should have mentioned something before I invited you to breakfast. I have a superpower.”
She put her fork down and readied herself to bolt.
“I can feel other people’s emotions.” When she only squinted at me, trying to figure out my game, I continued. “I can tell when someone is afraid. Or when they are guilty of something. Or when they’re mad.”
“I’m not mad.”
“But you are afraid. I could feel it from a block away.”
“For reals?”
“For reals.” I spoke as unthreateningly as possible, keeping my tone light and my actions slow, as though totally uninterested in the fact that she was constantly about half a second away from rabbiting. “And you’re not eighteen.”
“What’s it to you?” she asked, suddenly defensive.
“You’re making it hard for me to breathe.”
“What?”
“When someone is as scared as you are, all the time like you, it tightens my chest and crushes my
lungs. It makes it hard to breathe.”
“Like asthma?”
“Very much like asthma,” I agreed, even though I was certain asthma was a thousand times worse, but it was a good analogy. “Your food’s going to get cold.”
She scoffed. “Cold food is still food.”
“Good point,” I said, laughing softly.
It was enough to set her at ease. She picked up her fork and continued eating.
“Nine?” I guessed, purposely insulting her.
She shook her head. “Twelve.”
Damn. Even younger than I’d thought. The thought of a twelve-year-old alone on the streets of Albuquerque shocked me.
“So, this superpower,” she said as she stabbed at an egg. “You use it for good or evil?”
Oh yeah. I liked her a lot. “It kind of depends on the day. I vacillate between the two depending on the weather. I will say evil is more fun.”
She laughed, the sound a little too breathy, her voice a little too husky, like she’d recently been ill.
“Now on to the tough stuff. Why are you scared?”
“I’m not,” she said, her barriers rocketing into place around her.
“My lungs don’t lie, and you’re on the verge of suffocating me.” I grabbed my throat with both hands. “Seriously. Not. Much. Time.”
As I slowly sank into my chair, she frowned. Took another bite. Then asked, “Are you messing with me?”
“Nope.” I straightened. “Maybe a little, but I won’t lie to you. Go ahead. Ask me anything.”
She sat back, gave me a thorough once-over, then nodded toward another patron. “What’s that guy feeling?”
I looked at him. He was an everyday sort, a nerdy college student but handsome as heck with a body to match, and the girl he was sitting with was more beauty queen than science geek. They were studying. He was most likely tutoring her. “He’s into the girl.”
“Too obvious,” she said, disappointed.
“Give me a sec. I’m working here.”
She grinned and waited.
“He’s really into her, but what I bet he doesn’t know is that she is even more into him.”
“Get outta here.”
“Totally.”
The woman leaned into him as he showed her how to find the area between two curves, whatever the hell purpose of that was. The odd thing about that situation was that she wasn’t learning anything. Like she already knew what he was teaching her.