First Grave on the Right

Just then, I heard Cookie, my neighbor-slash-best-friend-slash-receptionist, burst through the door, coffee cup in hand. Cookie was a lot like Kramer from Seinfeld, only not so nervous, like Kramer might have been on Prozac. And I knew she had her coffee cup in hand because she always had her coffee cup in hand. I think she had difficulties forming complete sentences without it.

“Honey, I’m home!” she yelled from the kitchen.

Yep, she had it.

“Me, too!” came another voice, soft and giggly.

I met Cookie when I moved into the Causeway. She had just moved here as well, following an ugly-ass divorce — her words — and we became instant friends. But she had a daughter, Amber, and they came as a package deal. While Cookie and I hit it off immediately, I was a little worried about the kid. I’d never taken to four- foot creatures who had the uncanny ability to point out all my flaws in thirty seconds flat. And just for the record, I can too read without moving my lips. But I was determined to win Amber over, no matter the cost. And after just one game of miniature golf, I was putty in her hands.

“I’ll be right out,” I said from the bathroom. Mrs. Lowenstein down the hall must be doing laundry, because it didn’t take long for the water to reach its usual two thousand degrees. Steam rose up around me as I splashed my face. Then I looked in the mirror and gave up once again. Thank God Dream Guy didn’t have to see me like this. I patted a towel over my eyes, then stepped back as a name glittered and formed in the condensation.

DUTCH.

My breath caught. Dutch. I hadn’t imagined it. Dream Guy, aka Reyes, aka God of Fantasies and All Things Sensual, had really said Dutch to me in the shower. Who else could it be?

I glanced around the bathroom. Nothing. I stopped and listened, but the only thing I heard was Cookie clanking around in the kitchen.

“Reyes?” I peeked behind the shower curtain. “Reyes, are you here?”

“You need a new coffeepot,” Cookie called to me. “It’s taking forever.”

I gave up the search with a sigh and ran my fingers along the path of each letter on the mirror. My hand shook. I snatched it back and, after one last sweep of the area, stepped out of the bathroom, bracing myself for the oohs and aahs my face would elicit.

“What the bloody heck in Hades for crying out…” Cookie had put the coffee cup down. She picked it up and started over. “What happened?”

“Ooh!” Amber crooned, skipping over to me for a better look. Her huge blue eyes widened as she studied my cheek and jaw. She looked like a wingless fairy, the promise of grace evident in every stride she took. She had long dark hair that fell in tangles down her back, and her lips formed a perfect bow.

I chuckled as her curiosity drew her brows together in deep concentration.

“Aren’t you supposed to be in school?” I asked.

“Fiona’s mom is picking me up this morning. We’re going on a field trip to the zoo and Fiona’s mom is a chaperone so she told Mr. Gonzalez we’d just meet the class there. Does that hurt?”

“Yep.”

“Did you hit back?”

“Nope. I was unconscious.”

“No way!”

“Way.”

Cookie pushed past her daughter and studied my jaw for herself. “Did you get checked out?”

“Yeah, by a hot blond who sat in the corner of the bar and made googly eyes at me.”

Amber giggled.

Cookie pursed her lips. “I meant by a doctor.”

“No, but a balding yet bizarrely hot paramedic said I’d be fine.”

“Oh, and he’s an expert?”

“At flirting,” I said. Amber giggled again. I loved the sound, like a tinkling wind chime in a soft breeze.

Cookie leveled a chastising motherly glare on her, then turned back to me. She was one of those women too big for the one-size-fits-all category, and resented the commie makers of such clothing wear. I once had to talk her out of bombing a one-size-fits-all manufacturing company. Other than that, she was pretty down to earth. She had black wiry hair that hung past her shoulders and lent itself nicely to her reputation as a witch. She wasn’t one, but the furtive glances were fun.

“Any coffee yet?”

Cookie gave up and checked the pot. “Seriously, this is beyond torment. This is like Chinese water torture, only less humane.”

“Mom’s going through withdrawal. We ran out of coffee last night.”

“Uh-oh,” I said, grinning at Cookie.

She sat at the counter with me as Amber rummaged through my cabinets for Pop-Tarts. “Oh, I forgot to tell you,” Cookie said, “Amber wants your dad to get a teriyaki machine so she can sing for all the lonely barflies.”

“I’m a good singer, Mom.” Only a twelve-year-old could make the word mom sound blasphemous.

I leaned into Cookie. “Does she know it’s not called—?”

“No,” she whispered.

“Are you gonna tell her?”

“No. It’s much funnier this way.”

I chuckled, then remembered Cookie’s doctor’s appointment the day before. “How’d your visit go? Any new debilitating diseases I should know about?”

“No, but I have reaffirmed my respect for lubricating jelly.”

“Fiona’s here!” Amber said, flipping her cell phone closed and rushing out the door. She rushed back in, kissed her mom on the cheek, kissed me on the cheek — the good one — then rushed back out again.

Cookie watched her go. “She’s like a hurricane on crystal meth.”

“Have you considered Valium?” I asked.

“For her or me?” She laughed and headed for the coffeepot. “I get the first cup.”

“When do you not get the first cup? So, what’d the doc say?” Cookie didn’t like talking about it, but she’d once fought breast cancer, and the breast cancer almost won.

“I don’t know,” she said with a shrug. “He’s sending me to this other doctor, some kind of guru in the medical community.”

“Really? What’s his name?”

“Dr. — Hell, I don’t know.”

“Oh, him.” I grinned. “So he’s good?”

“Supposedly. I think he invented internal organs or something.”

“Well, that’s a plus.”

She poured two cups, then plopped down beside me again. “No, I’m fine.” She stirred sugar and cream into her coffee. “I think my doc just wants to make sure history doesn’t repeat itself.”

“He’s cautious,” I said, stirring my own cup. “I like that in a person, especially one with the power of life and death at his fingertips.”

“Well, I don’t want you to worry is all. I haven’t felt this good in years. I think you keep me young.” She winked from behind her cup.

After a long sip, I asked, “Isn’t that Amber’s job?”

She snorted. “Amber takes every opportunity possible to tell me how old and uninteresting I am. ‘You’re nothing like Charley,’ she says. Repeatedly. She’s about ninety percent positive you hung the moon.”

“At least someone thinks so,” I said with a shrug of my brows.

“Uh-oh,” she said, putting her cup down. “Did you have another run-in with that hot skiptracer?”

I slumped back into my chair, annoyed that he’d even been mentioned. And in my own apartment, no less. “He’s such a jerk.”

“You did,” she said, her face brightening. She had quite the thing for Garrett. It was … disturbing. “So, spill.” She scooted closer. “What did he say? Did you two have words? A fistfight? Angry sex?”

“Ew,” I said, crinkling my nose. “Not even if he was the last hot skiptracer on Earth.”