Minnie meowed, and I unzipped her carrier so she could escape. She leapt out and hightailed it to the bedroom, while I completed my short tour.
The kitchen was the same, only cleaner—all the dishes done. If it weren’t still winter, I’d open up the small window to let out the remaining scent of bleach. I went back down the hall, found my bathroom same as it’d been left, and then turned toward my bedroom. It, too, was the same. Gah. I had a suspicion that the cleaner had been too busy dealing with traceable evidence. The DNA was gone, but my trashed closet was left up to me.
It’d take me all afternoon to clean—I wondered what time it was. I dug my phone out of my purse and texted Sike—
I decided to wash anything that the intruder or Veronica might have touched. So I wandered around my room, putting all the clothing he’d pulled out into a huge laundry bag, and hauled it down to the laundry. Numerous quarters later, when I came back, Jake was waiting outside my door.
My heart dropped. “Jake? Are you okay?”
“I just wanted to say hi was all.” He was carrying his new backpack and a large duffel bag. “How’s it going?”
“Busy.” We couldn’t stand outside talking forever—I wasn’t dressed warmly enough for the occasion.
“Can I come in?” he asked.
I wanted nothing less, but I said, “Sure,” and I reluctantly opened my door.
Jake let out a low whistle behind me. “What is this?”
“My landlord remodeled.” Because there’d been a dead body on my floor less than a day ago. But don’t worry, the vampire and daytimer left, so it’s fine.
“Four days after Christmas? And two days before New Year’s Eve? In the winter?” Jake asked. He walked over to my new couch. “He get you a new couch, too?”
“Don’t ask questions, Jake.”
“Why not? You get to feel high and mighty all the time. It’s my turn now.” He sat down, patting the cushion beside him. “How could you afford this, Edie?”
“Not now, Jake.”
“It’s never a good time for you, is it? But it’s always a grand time to interrogate me.” He leaned back, clearly feeling superior.
“Look, I’m not the one who stole things from you before. So I still get to have the upper hand.” He opened his mouth to say something else. I cut him off. “Why are you here, Jake?”
“I was just going to give you money for the phone bill. Like I said I would. Business is brisk.” His face softened a little. “Plus, I was worried. You’ve been strange for a while.”
“Worried about me? Wow.” I was taken aback. No drug worth selling would be handing out empathy to Jake like that. “I was worried about me, too. But things are getting better,” I lied.
He looked around my living room, and then shook his head. “If you get into trouble, you can tell me, you know. No one’s gotten into as much trouble as I have.”
“I know.” I stood a little straighter. “I’ve got a lot of laundry I have to wash today—”
He jerked his head at me. “I don’t suppose—” he began and swung his bags around, like he should set them down. After all, I did have a fabulous new couch for him to sleep on.
“Not yet, Jake, okay? After the holidays maybe.”
“Okay.”
“Can you get home on your own?”
“Yeah. See you around, Sissy.”
It wasn’t until after he left that I realized he hadn’t gotten around to pitching in for his share of the phone bill.
I spent the rest of the morning picking things up in my bedroom and putting them away, then I got another load into the laundry.
I threw clothing in willy-nilly—there wasn’t a single thing I owned that couldn’t be laundered on high—and heard something clink. I reached in and felt around.
The vials of Luna Lobos that Jake had given me. Goddammit. I had to convince him to get off this stuff. Selling energy supplements wasn’t going to give him a normal life. I put the vials into my purse so I could take them to work and put them in the incinerator box.
Lucas had been right, it wouldn’t be the safest thing ever to sleep at my house right now, but the locks on my door worked. I latched it—the dead bolt and the chain bolt. Then I took my step stool and unfolded it underneath the door handle to block further entry, and slept with my phone nearby.
I didn’t wake up till eight P.M. There was a lump on my mattress where the strange were had knifed through it, and I could feel it under my left knee. Minnie was sprawled alongside me, the trespasses of the night before seemingly forgiven.
I got up, showered again, and got ready to leave. I needed to eat, and I needed food for late dinner tonight. I didn’t look in the parking lot for a guard, but a black foreign car followed me from my lot to the grocery store, and out again from it, until I found myself on hospital grounds.
I was in the locker room when Gina came in, humming a happy tune. I confronted her. “You’re cheerful tonight.”
“And you’re not. It’s like we traded places.”
“I had a long night off.”
“Me too. But in a good way. I talked things out with Brandon. He doesn’t care if I don’t change.”
“For how long?”
“He says, for forever.”
“For real, forever?”
“For long enough.” She smiled at me. “I knew I didn’t screw up falling for him, Edie. I knew it.”
I found a smile somewhere deep inside me—probably pulled it out of another fucking dimension—to share with her. “I’m really glad for you, Gina.”
She hugged me tight and let me go. “Come on. Let’s have a great night.”
I walked out to the floor without her to see who we were getting stuck with tonight.
“Meaty—is there any other possible assignment?” Gina and I were with Winter. Again.
My charge nurse shifted behind the desk to give me a look. “Charles gets the daytimers, you two get the weres. It’s only for two more nights, Spence. Suck it up.”
I muttered, “Fine.”
I braced myself to go around the corner and see Lucas there—but he had to fight again tonight. Of course. I peeked around, and for once there were no visitors. None at all. I felt myself relax, and Gina joined me for report.
Everything we were doing now for Winter was entirely for show. Either the moon would heal him—right down to his cavities, apparently—or it wouldn’t. I checked orders with Gina and co-signed all the changes. We didn’t bother to use the rifle anymore, not even when she was near. The Domitor was turned off—if the moon was going to work, we didn’t want to prevent his change—but there was nothing frightening about him now. The bleed in his brain had taken care of that.
At three A.M. Gina was on break in the extra corral next door, and I was reading a book outside Winter’s room. Things were peaceful. I should have known it wouldn’t last.
“Incoming, Edie!” Meaty shouted from around the bend. I put my book down and tried to look official.
Lucas came around the bend, wearing his hoodie again, looking rough, smelling like sweat. He seemed bigger than he had last night, and he was breathing hard. When he saw me he stopped, his face hard to read. “I just want to talk to the old man.”
