Chapter Fifteen
Katie met me at Monkey Shines after work on Wednesday. I’d had a great day out with Julie, and my muscles ached in that way that assured me I was getting back into shape. It was a good feeling. I was sitting in the back, sipping my mocha, when Katie sauntered in with a glow and a smirk that told me she had news. She ordered a coffee and rushed back to where I waited.
“Guess who I heard from today?” she said, nearly bouncing.
“Not Charlie Hague,” I said, irritably. He was either dead or avoiding me. I didn’t like either option. “I called him after the attack on Circle Q and he’s been radio silent.”
“Hmmm … that’s not good.”
I sat fuming another minute, but Katie started bouncing again. “Guess.”
“Um … Melanie?”
“No, that was Monday. Guess again.”
I hated this game. “Gandhi?”
“He’s dead, guess again.”
I rolled my eyes at her. “You know it’s a good thing I love you, right?”
She laughed and bent down to kiss me on the top of my head. “One more guess.”
I thought hard. Who would she be excited to hear from? We had the same friends. Her old college professor in Bellingham, McCries-A-Lot, maybe? Rolph? “I don’t know. Skella?”
“Nope,” she said, flopping down in the overstuffed chair beside me and taking my coffee out of my hands. She took a long shuddering sip and passed it back to me. “Do you even put coffee in that?”
I grinned at her and shrugged. “I like it sweet. That’s why I like you.”
She pantomimed puking and jumped up when her name was called. The coffee she came back with was smaller than mine and a lot blacker. Real coffee, she called it.
She settled down on the couch beside me with her jacket and shoes off, her back against the arm of the loveseat and her feet tucked underneath my right thigh. The first sip of coffee caused her to close her eyes and wiggle her toes. “Heaven,” she said.
“So, who called you?” I asked, trying not to be impatient.
“Cassidy Aloysius Stone,” she said, beaming. “They just got back into town and wanted to know if we could meet them, get a beer, hang out.”
Interesting. I thought back to the picture that Jai Li had drawn that reminded me so much of him. Apparently, the Harpers were interested in making a movie soundtrack after all. Very nice.
“Did he say when?”
“Saturday night,” she said, then blew on her coffee. “I figured we’d be back in town around two. That would give us enough time to get cleaned up, have some quality time with the girl in the afternoon and maybe catch a nap.” She wiggled her toes again and winked at me.
“I know all about your naps,” I said, running my hand up her exposed calf and under her skirt to squeeze her knee.
She grinned and parted her legs a bit. “Don’t stop on my account.”
I looked around, suddenly beet red. She was way more brazen than I was, and she knew it. I pulled my hand off her knee and picked up my coffee.
“I thought we should talk to them, feel them out on the whole dragon connection.”
A look of concern flashed across her face and she set her coffee on the table beside her. “I really like them,” she said, almost pouting. “I don’t want them to be crazy, evil people.”
I totally got where she was coming from. “Qindra isn’t evil.”
“True,” she said, nodding her head, “and Rolph is pretty okay.”
“And Skella?”
“Oh, definitely,” Katie agreed. “Skella is one of my favorites.”
She studied me, the play going out of her face. “But that Gottschalk woman is bad news. And don’t forget Justin.”
I put my hand back on her knee and squeezed. Bad feelings, bad blood.
“I wonder if Cassidy will bring that torque?” I asked. He’d been wearing it the last time we saw him perform. I had a good idea it was old, Odin-in-his-prime old. I had a lot of questions for Mr. Stone.
“I may have mentioned it again,” she said, slyly.
I ran my hand up her thigh again, causing her to catch her breath. “That’s my girl.”
She grinned at me as I leaned forward and kissed her. “No more hanky-panky,” I said. “I need to get some knitting done. I’m making a present for Jai Li.”
“Oh,” she said, clapping. “Show me.”
I set my empty coffee mug down on the table and picked up my knitting basket. And by basket, I meant the open-topped toolbox I’d picked up at the hardware store. It fit my style a lot better than the woven basket Edith used. I was knitting Jai Li a Mohawk. More of a modified earflap hat with an added fringe of multicolored yarn in a wide stripe running the length of the head from the forehead to the back of the neck.
“She’s gonna love it,” Katie said. I used all her favorite colors—that is, every brilliant color of yarn I could get. Right now, I was up to seven different ones. “I hope so.”
Katie lay her head to the side against the back of the couch and just watched me knit for a long time. It was peaceful. She sipped her coffee and chattered about her day and I tried desperately not to drop any stitches. My hand was feeling pretty good these days. I hated to admit it, but the knitting really was good physical therapy. And my knitting had vastly improved. Not sure I was ready for anything as elaborate as socks yet.
After thirty minutes, she ran out of steam and I put my knitting aside. I rubbed her calves and brought up the harder subject. “We need to move out of Circle Q, consolidate into a place of our own,” I said, looking into her suddenly stoic face. “I think we should move ahead on getting a new place. Someplace we can have a little room for Jai Li, maybe have a couple of bedrooms, you know?”
She didn’t look totally happy. This wasn’t a new subject. “I can teach again next year,” she said. “I talked to Principal Nutter today. They’re all on board with it.”
That was new. She’d missed the end of last year, being in a coma and all.
“They’re totally relieved I’m fine and not insane or wacked out on crack.”
I raised my eyebrows at her, and she shrugged. “No one believes in magic, and the book is well hidden. Is there any reason I can’t teach again next year?”
“Depends on where we live, I guess.”
We’d discussed this on several occasions, but I understood her need for consistency; the way she loved her students. I could see giving up the movie shoot someday, but I wouldn’t want to give up smithing or farrier work.
“Let’s see what we can find and go from there,” I offered. “There’s no reason we have to go anywhere extreme. Kent is not that far south.”
“We’ll see.” That meant this conversation was over for now. She didn’t want to start getting into an argument at this time. Later, perhaps.
“No worries,” I agreed.
We sat in silence for a very long minute, each of us studying our mugs.
“So, guess why they called. The Harpers.”
I looked up, confused. “I thought you said that they wanted to get together, to hang with us.”
She shrugged. “That too, but listen.” She leaned toward me and lowered her voice to conspiracy level tones. “Cassidy asked if it was safe to come back to Washington. If anyone had been asking after them or anything. I asked why, of course.” She rolled her eyes. “Seriously. How narcissistic is that? Anyway, I explained that things were pretty quiet here. I didn’t tell him about the attack on Circle Q. Didn’t feel like something I should be sharing, you know?”
I nodded to her, just happy she’d taken a breath. I was beginning to wonder if she was on speed or something.
“I told him we could come watch you do your movie shoot, etcetera.”
“I wonder what he was worried about.”
“Who knows. Probably he and/or Maggie slept with someone’s wife or something.”
“Or maybe he’s in tune with what’s been going on around here lately.” I sat up straight, “Or …” I looked at her. “Maybe he’s somehow mixed up with whatever Gottschalk’s doing.”
Her eyes went wide. “Or that necromancer bullshit?”
I had to think. There had been a lot of odd things going on since we saw them last in Vancouver. I fervently hoped they weren’t involved with the damned blood cult.
But the dragons, maybe. That thought caused the runes on my forehead to tingle. Not exactly spidey sense or anything, but I was probably on to something.
If he was involved with dragons somehow, was he worried about Qindra and Nidhogg? That would be easy enough to smooth over. Or … There was that call I’d gotten from Mr. Philips. Could it be as simple as rumors of Frederick Sawyer’s baby dragon girl? “Where have they been touring?”
“New Mexico, Colorado, and Arizona. But we’re not even sure they’re dragon people, are we?”
“Well, there is that picture Jai Li drew.”
Katie thought about it for a minute. “We should definitely ask him about the torque,” she said finally. “That’s what you’re most curious about.”
I nodded. “Enough to ask a bunch of questions at least.”
“First, we gotta survive this Bellingham punk show.” She was grinning at me again. “I cleared it with Trisha. Jai Li can stay with her and the twins. Can we get a hotel room?”
It had been a while since we’d been alone together and healthy enough to mess around. It would be nice.
“Of course we can get a hotel.”
“Exxxxxcellent,” she said, tapping her fingers together like that old dude on The Simpsons.
Maybe I should be afraid.