CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
WHO, INDEED
OUTSIDE MY BEDROOM window, in the beginning light of day, an owl sat on a branch that came close to the house. It blinked at me as I started to draw the curtain, thought better of it, instead opening the window and leaning close to the screen. “Tell Germanigold that Tessa needs to talk to her.”
The large golden eyes closed once, twice, and then the bird ruffled up his feathers and flew off. I’d no idea if I’d done it right or if I was an idiot talking to strange owls, and I was too tired to worry about it.
Staying dressed, I collapsed diagonally across the mattress, uncaring if the covers wrinkled under me or not. With any luck, I could catch a couple of hours before Mom got up. I drifted off, thinking of Malender and his coat of inky darkness and stinky odors and if I was creating some kind of prison break every time I hit him with salt. Somewhere in my dreams, Malender morphed into Carter and I was leaning forward, hoping for another kiss with a bone-melting hug, but he began to shake all over and buzz irritatingly loud—
And my phone woke me up. On silent, but vibrating and buzzing with the intensity of it and it wouldn’t stop. The call stopped and then began again and then a third time while I wrenched it out of my pants’ pocket.
Evelyn’s number popped up and I caught her on the fourth call back.
“About time!”
“Sleeping.”
“I’m at the hospital. Please come pick me up.”
I lowered the phone a bit and stared at the number, just to be sure the whispery voice came from Evelyn and the phone ID matched. It did. I raised the phone again. “What do you mean, you’re at the hospital? Are you all right? What happened?”
“Bumped around and my leg looks like somebody went after it with a crowbar, well, actually somebody did, but I’m okay.”
I had two thoughts and the first one I blurted out. “I’m going to kill Dean.”
“No. No, no. He had nothing to do with it, well, he did, but . . . just come and get me and I’ll explain.”
My second thought followed. “What about your parents?”
“They don’t know yet, and I have to figure out a way to explain it to them. Pleeease, come get me. I hate these places.” Her voice choked up a bit.
“Where at the hospital?”
“ER, but I’ll be in the lounge. They’ve already released me.” A sniffle. “Thank you, Tessa. And hurry.”
So I did, and true to her word, she was sitting in the lounge waiting for me. Her jeans were torn, and not artfully as if they were meant to be, and she held a disposable ice pack to her shin. I helped her to her feet. Her eyes glistened with tears waiting to be shed. I grabbed a tissue from a box at the check-in desk and handed it to her as we limped out the door. Once in the car, she sat back with a quavering sigh. I put the key in the ignition but didn’t turn it.
“Home?”
“Not yet. I’ve got to get a cover story.”
That started to boil my temper. “Then it is Dean’s fault.”
She waved a hand at me. “No. Not really.”
“You can’t sit there looking like someone battered you and tell me it wasn’t really his fault. That’s the syndrome, you know. Making excuses for the inexcusable.”
“You think Dean did this? Oh, hell no. One of the protestors got me.”
I turned the car on then because the interior held a chill, and I didn’t want her to start shivering along with everything else that bothered her. “Protest? You got caught in a protest?”
She pointed out the windshield. “Drive. Your place. Please.”
“Just what kind of a cover story do you think will work? What protest and where and what makes you think anyone involved won’t tell your father what happened?”
Evelyn shifted her ice bag to a slightly different spot on her leg, hissing a bit in pain, and began her story. “Dean picked me up for a late hamburger, and we heard on the radio that there was a midnight protest against that big old Confederate flag just raised on the edge of town. We went there to support taking it down. It was something I wanted to do, and Dean agreed. It seems important.”
“Mmm. But your dad supports removing those.”
“He does. But he doesn’t support my getting involved in it. Some of the believers are pretty nasty on social media and stuff—” She peered down at her exposed leg. “In person, too, I guess. Anyway, there were candles and singing and it was pretty peaceful, if tense for a while. Then tempers flared up and—good golly, Miss Molly—we had a riot. Dean took off—”
“He what???” I was back to killing Dean mode. “He left you there?”
“I thought he’d just gone to get the car, but he never came back. I got surrounded. There was no place to go, and fists were flying, and then this big ole guy came through swinging a crowbar.” Her eye leaked a slow tear. “He did leave me, didn’t he?”
“Sounds like it.” My hands tightened on the steering wheel. “In fact, I think there is no doubt about it.”
She blurted, “He just burned his last bridge.”
It was not the time to ask about the other bridges, but I would hear about them, eventually. I looked at her. “I don’t think there is a cover story that will handle this. It’s bound to get back to your father, even if there were no hospital bill showing up, but there will be, and pictures and maybe even a podcast that will place you on the scene. You’re pretty identifiable as Evelyn Statler.”
She brushed her light blond hair back. “He’ll be upset.”
“Yeah, dads who care about you are like that.”
The gray early morning lifted into a brilliantly blue day with high, wispy clouds as we turned into my neighborhood. It would be a crisp, clear day. I added, “Look. Have breakfast with us, then call home, and if they can’t pick you up, I’ll drive you over.” I felt pretty certain the Statlers would be over in a flash and she might be in for both a lecture and an embrace. “And if you are ever nice to Dean again, I’m cutting you off as a friend.”
She laughed at that. “You wouldn’t do that to your partner in crime.”
She reminded me that I had never told Carter or the others about her going to Silverbranch with me. I protected her whenever I could, unlike Dean. “I would certainly think about it, though. Honestly, whatever made you do it?”
“I wanted to be badass, like you.”
“Me? You wanted to be like me?”
“You don’t stand down, Tessa. No matter what life hands you. I want to be worthy of being your wingman, and I need to toughen up.”
“Oh, Evie. I don’t want someone tough. I want someone understanding, and you fit that pretty perfectly.”
“I do?”
“You’ve stood by me through thick and thin. That’s enough for me.”
She took a deep, quavering breath. “Still . . .”
“Nope. No, no. Not an argument. I’m the one who tears down a hockey field, pushing people out of my way left and right, one goal in sight, and I tend to do the same thing in life. Meanwhile, you stand on the sideline, cheering the good guys, whoever they are . . . and I need to be reminded of that. There are good guys everywhere.”
She put her hand up. “I am swearing off men.”
“I would note that time and date, but I know it won’t last.”
Her nose wrinkled. “Too true.” She moved the ice pack again. “I think this is about done in.” She waved the limp thing.
“Mom probably has one in the fridge.” I negotiated the turn into the drive.
We were into a batch of newly baked biscuits when Mom came downstairs. She raised an eyebrow at the sight of Evelyn sitting at the kitchen table, her leg up and one foot resting on the seat of another chair. She steered to the fridge and made herself an iced tea. “Trouble . . . or should I even ask?”
“You know that Confederate flag—”
“The great big one? The only thing good about it is that the loblolly pines hide half of it.”
“It’s down.”
“Oh, really?” She toasted Evelyn. “Then you fought the good battle. I respect Southern pride, but I have a stopping point.” She sat down carefully, leaving the next chair empty so as not to jostle her leg. “Battle injury?”
“Riot.”
“Oh, my. Your father know yet?”
“He has a business and prayer meeting this morning, but he’ll be over soon.”
“Be sure and tell me when the thundercloud gets here.”
Evelyn and I grinned, and I passed Mom the biscuit plate. She sliced one open deftly and slathered it with butter. “If he gives you any trouble, Evie, I’ll run interference.”
“I think he already knew and my mother already has, but thanks.”
“Any time.” Mom traded looks with me. The guys should be showing up any time soon to make Eye of Nimora retrieval plans. The strategy session would have to be postponed until she left. I gave her a slight shrug, which Evelyn didn’t catch because she eyed the biscuits.
“You’ve only had one,” I told her.
“One should be enough.”
I fingered the tear in her jeans. “Oh, like you’re busting out all over.”
She snorted.
I pushed the plate over. “They’re small.”
They weren’t. We don’t make small biscuits at the Andrews house. We make ginormous biscuits that would fill Hiram Broadstone’s palm if he held one. Not to mention mouth-meltingly good.
I passed along some fine, homemade peach jam to go with. And sat back to watch Evelyn do battle with herself, glad that she had something else to fret over.
She’d just about devoured all but a few crumbs when the house trembled slightly. I could hear the front door opening.
“Hello the house.”
“Hiram’s here.”
Evelyn grabbed for a napkin to wipe her mouth and fingers off. She would have bolted to her feet, but instead let out a little cry when the foot of her injured leg hit the floor as she tried to stand. She pitched my way, and I grabbed her up even as Hiram came in.
Their gazes met across the room.
I realized I could no longer say that I didn’t believe in love at first sight because I was seeing it happen. Hiram, taller than the average Iron Dwarf, straightened in his black, shiny boots and working man garb, put his chin up and his hand out long before he got close enough to touch hers, as if he couldn’t resist. His auburn hair curled neatly behind his ears, just above his shoulders, and his warm brown eyes took her in as though no one else stood in the room with them. Evelyn pushed away from me a little bit as if she intended to stand on her own two legs, her blond hair swinging about to tangle gracefully down her back. Her makeshift ice bag dropped, forgotten, to the floor. Her gray-blue eyes locked onto his face and stayed there, and her hand drifted up to take his in response.
“Mmm. You don’t want to be doing this.”
Neither of them heard me. My mother’s iced tea glass clattered in the kitchen sink as she put it there, and it sounded like a firehouse alarm bell, but they didn’t notice.
“I’m Hiram Broadstone,” he said, deep tones ringing. “A friend of the Andrews.” He made it sound like a testament to his good standing, and maybe it was. Neither Mom nor I suffered fools, but still . . .
“You must be a linebacker.” Evelyn smiled, a genuine smile, the first ray of true happiness I’d seen from her since I picked her up.
“Sorry, no, miss. I’m in construction and mining. Broadstone Family Enterprises?”
“Oh! I’ve heard of you. You’re doing part of the restoration on the Washington Monument!”
A becoming blush tinted his face. He’d had a small, neat auburn beard until very recently. In fact, I’d guess that he’d clean-shaved just that morning, and his face bloomed slightly. It was almost as if he’d known he would be meeting his own true love. “That would be us.”
She limped forward a step. “I’m Evelyn Statler, Tessa’s friend.”
Their hands touched. His engulfed hers tenderly, and his eyebrows drew down in concern. “But you’re injured. Please, sit down.”
“Oh, it’s nothing.” Evelyn fidgeted with the torn flap of her jeans a moment, but it didn’t look like “nothing.”
He ushered her to the nearest chair and settled her. “You’re hurt! Tessa, what happened?”
“It’s all right, Hiram, the hospital released her this morning. It’s a heavy contusion, but she’ll be fine—”
“Miss Statler is not fine if she’s in pain.” He let go of her hand and strode to the base of the stairs. “Brian! We have a guest who needs you. Bring something for pain down with you!”
The house shivered again, in vibration with his voice, and then it was Evelyn’s turn to color, her face warming.
Brian came down hastily, almost took himself out on the bottom step as he saw Evelyn beyond in the kitchen, and Hiram took hold of the envelope in the professor’s hand.
“Just a half teaspoon,” he cautioned. “In a drink of some kind. And, ah, good morning, Evelyn.”
“Hi, Bri,” she answered faintly, her attention still on Hiram as he got a glass and fixed her a cold drink with the potion shook into it, the guys knowing our kitchen just about as well as anybody in the household. She took it and began to drink.
I grabbed Brian by the shirtsleeve and asked quietly, “You’re not stoning her or anything.”
“Of course not. It’s just soothing.”
“And how soothed is she going to be?”
Brian watched, eyes getting a little bigger, as she basically chugged her entire glass without taking a breath. “Very. But that will pass.”
Good lord. I didn’t need to have Statler breathing down my neck because his daughter was higher than a kite.
Hiram swept her up out of the chair. “I think the couch is the best place for you, to keep the leg elevated.” He took her into the living room where he deposited her gently, the rest of us trailing behind.
Brian whispered to me, “What just happened here?”
“You have as much of a clue as I do.” I looked at Brian then, thinking of both the souls in one body, and amended, “Or maybe you don’t. But I think they fell in love.” He stumbled, jolting into me. I gripped his shoulder as he straightened himself out. “I know.”
“This can’t be.”
“Tell me about it. Her father’s coming to get her, but I think it may already be too late.”
He raised his hand and whispered, “Somnus.”
Evelyn suddenly yawned. “Oh, excuse me.”
“Think nothing of it.” Hiram leaned close and touched the back of her wrist. “Rest, it will do you good,” whereupon, as if she’d turned into Sleeping Beauty, Evie dropped into sleep. Hiram squinted a suspicious look at Brian as he turned around and passed us going to the dining/conference room.
Muttering, “Wish I’d thought of that,” I met my mother in the kitchen, cleared breakfast things up, and sorted items out for lunch. Hiram excused himself and came back in with two grocery bags brimming with goods, recognizing the expense of feeding a small army, or at least a couple of guys who could eat like a small army. “I almost forgot that I’d brought these.” He helped Mom put everything away and by the time they were done, Evelyn’s father arrived, we exchanged information over her condition, and he escorted her to their very nice and expensive sedan out front.
Evie waved a hand at Hiram, ignored the rest of us, and promptly went back to sleep in the front seat. We watched them pull away, Statler’s forehead creased in concern, with no one conscious to yell at.
“How long is that going to last?”
“The somnus? Maybe another fifteen minutes. The potion should be in effect most of the day. That will be all right?”
“That’ll do,” my mother told him. “Although you should have done it sooner.”
Brian coughed. “I’m getting the Andrews in stereo.”
He stopped grumbling when the smell of home cooking wafted through the house. We almost had everything ready and Carter had joined us when I heard the hoot of an owl coming from somewhere in the backyard.
The professor’s eyes met mine.
“Is there something we should know about?”