Deadpool?”
“Just for Halloween.” Murphy lifted up his mask. “See?”
“How about that?” He dropped down, set Murphy on his lap. “You sure had me fooled.” He gave Murphy a bounce when Heather set the pizza on the table. “Good timing.”
“We have to call each other by our superhero names,” Liam informed him. “Murphy keeps messing it up.”
“I can tell Beckett ’cause he’s with us.”
“I don’t want pizza.” Harry scowled at the slice Clare put on his plate. “I’m not hungry.”
“That’s fine. I’ll just hold all the candy Marmie and Granddad gave you, and what you get later until tomorrow.”
“I’ll take your share. I’m hungry as the Hulk.” Beckett made as if to reach for Harry’s plate.
“I can eat it,” Harry muttered as he shifted it out of reach.
“Is it okay if I trick-or-treat with you guys?”
“You’re too old to trick-or-treat.”
“You, Wolverine, are mistaken.” Carpenter X shook his head at Harry. “You’re never too old for candy. Or pizza. Which as everybody knows is the favorite food of all superheroes.”
At six, superheroes, villains, pop stars, fairies, and a variety of undead swarmed Main Street. Teenagers ran in packs, parents pushed strollers inhabited by bunnies, cats, puppies, and clowns. Some led or carried toddlers, others herded older kids from shop to shop, house to house.
Hope sat on the steps of the inn, a big bowl of candy in her lap. “Power rations for superheroes.”
She held the bowl out as the boys shouted “trick or treat.”
“Great look for you,” she told Clare. “And you’d be who, Contractor X?”
“Carpenter X. My tool belt is always loaded.”
“So I hear.”
When Beckett laughed, poked an accusatory finger at Clare, Hope held out the bowl to the next group, answered a handful of questions about the inn.
“Everyone asks,” she told Beckett. “When you can give me an absolutely we’ll be done and ready date, I’m going to open reservations.”
“We’ll work out best calculation.”
“I love this.” She eased back. “I didn’t know exactly what to expect, but this is fun and sweet and a great way to people watch. But I seriously underestimated on candy.”
“You can get some from the bookstore,” Clare told her. “Or from Avery. We always get too much.”
“Mom!” Liam forgot his own directive as he tugged at Storm. “We want to go before the candy’s all gone.”
“Just go across the street for more supplies if you run out,” Clare called as her kids towed her down the sidewalk.
“It is fun.” Beckett stood with Clare while the kids dashed to the next bowl. “More fun with kids. They get such a charge.”
“And a sugar rush later. I have to let them eat some, which means they’ll be hyped at bedtime, then tired in school tomorrow.”
“Well.” He draped an arm around her as they followed the kids to the next stop. “Just make it snow a few inches, Storm. Buy yourself a delay.”
They held hands as they walked, keeping pace with the boys or reining them back when someone stopped to talk. The air cooled, and dry leaves, stirred by a frisky wind, bounced along the curbs.
“I should’ve brought their jackets along instead of leaving them in the car.”
“Are you cold? Because I’ve got to say, you look really hot.”
She offered him a flirty smile. “Then it’s worth the spandex. No, I’m not cold,” she added, “but Liam has the sniffles already.”
“We won’t be out much longer.” They’d already crossed the street, started up the other side.
“You’re right, and he has a thermal shirt on under the costume. Still—”
“Tell you what, Supermom. We’ll stop in the bookstore, give them a chance to warm up. I’ll buy the hot chocolate.”
“God, more chocolate. But that’s a good idea.”
When they stopped by the store, Sam Freemont stood across the street in a Jason hockey mask, sweatpants and hoodie. It gave him a thrill to stand there, in the open, watching her.
Trick or treat, he thought. He’d give her some of both, very soon now.
Satisfied with the timetable, he walked down Main with the crowd, continued on when it thinned. Porch lights gleamed as older kids ran around shouting to each other. No one paid any attention to him, strolling the sidewalk in his mask.
The power of it tangled almost erotically with the excitement of what was to come.
He walked steadily until he came to Clare’s house, then took a quick, casual glance around before sliding into the shadows of the trees that bordered the side.
He’d studied the house long enough to know its weak spots. The dogs set up a stir in the backyard, but he’d come prepared for that. He tossed his pocketful of dog biscuits over the fence.
Tails wagged immediately as they chowed down.
Choosing a window, he pulled out the pry bar.
Crappy little house, he thought as the window gave with a creak and shudder. Crappy little life. He was offering her so much more, and it was past time she listened.
He tucked the tool away, boosted himself inside.
And shut the window behind him.
By eight, the rounds complete, the boys sat in Vesta, eating and trading candy according to their mother’s three-piece limit. For himself Beckett ate a Butterfinger, a Snickers, and a small pack of Skittles—and felt just a little sick.
Kids, apparently, were made of sterner stuff, as Liam was already angling for one more piece.
“Tomorrow,” Clare told him to his desperate disappointment. Harry got the same treatment when he begged for quarters for the video games.
“It’s already bedtime.” She glanced at Murphy, who sat, focused on his third and final candy bar, as if his life had been sandwiched inside the chocolate and caramel.
“Time to go, Deadpool.”
“I’ll follow you home.”
“Oh, Beckett. There hasn’t been any . . . thing for days now. Plus—wait, there’s Alva and Joe checking out. Let me see if they’re going home now, and I’ll have an escort. Will that do?”
“I’d settle for it.”
She scooted out.
“I’m saving my gummy worms,” Murphy told him.
“Worms for a rainy day.”
“It doesn’t gotta rain. I’m saving them for tomorrow. Can we go back to the hotel place so I can see the lady again?”
“If it’s okay with your mom.”
“I just want to play
Beckett shifted his attention to a sulking Wolverine. “Tell you what, if it’s okay, we’ll go to the arcade this weekend, and we’ll play like maniacs.”
“Can we! But not Saturday ’cause it’s Tyler’s birthday. Can we go Sunday?”
“Works for me.”
Clare came back with Joe, who ruffled Liam’s hair. “We’ll be happy to escort these fine crime-fighters home.”
“We’re going to the arcade on Sunday,” Harry announced.
