Fix It Up (Torus Intercession 3)

“Must be,” I said, shrugging. “What did Derek say?”

“Derek is hiding and not saying shit. Kara is telling the story all over social media about how he tried to knock her out, and I stepped in.”

“Well, that certainly makes you look good.”

“It does, yes. But I wonder who Derek is afraid of.”

“Yeah, I dunno, since you and I were on our way home.”

“Look at me.”

“I’m driving.”

“Then pull over.”

“I wanna get there,” I explained. “Don’t you? Aren’t you hungry?”

Heavy, aggrieved sigh.

I glanced over at him and found him staring at me. “What?”

“You have an antiquated idea of justice, Locryn Barnes.”

“Sometimes,” I began slowly, “you have to let other people know what their limits are, and that if they stretch them, nothing good will come of that.”

“Is that right?”

“It is,” I assured him. “Take Derek for example. He mistakenly believed that he could strike a woman in front of her friend, and when that action was interrupted, that he could then lay hands on the friend instead.”

“You’re unbelievable.”

“No, listen. If you’re Derek, now you’ve had that assumption corrected. So next time he goes to knock the crap out of someone, he’ll probably flash back to this and think, huh, I wonder if this person I’m about to hit has someone around who will care that I’m hurting them.”

“Then it’s certainly lucky that whoever beat him up gave him that life lesson.”

“It certainly is.”

We were silent for a while, looking at the miles of cactus-covered nothing.

“Thank you for being my champion.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Have it your way,” he said, reaching out and putting his hand on my thigh.

He didn’t move it for the rest of the drive.

I think he was expecting a house like his, more like a resort, but when I turned in and there was a cattle guard and a fence with a gate that I had to get out, unlatch, and swing open, he was taken aback. Once we drove across, I had to stop, go back and latch it, and then return to the car.

“There’s no security camera?”

“No.”

“What about farther in?”

I shook my head.

“But I googled her,” he told me. “Your mother has a huge following; she’s a bestselling author, so how is she just out here without any security?”

“I think you have to be like Margaret Atwood big or Stephen King or James Patterson or a much bigger name to have gates and people separating you from the rest of the world. And I know people who’ve seen Stephen King at the gas station, so I really do think that your definition of famous and my mother’s popularity are two totally different realities.”

“Huh.”

After a few minutes, he pointed at the lampposts on either side of the drive, like something you’d see on a Christmas card. “Are those for security?”

“I think they’re mostly decorative, but they do light the property some at night,” I said, and then clarified. “It’s still not great, they’re not like floodlights, more like big lanterns on poles.”

We had to stop for a family of javelinas, then a couple of coyotes, and he marveled at all the trees—not cactus, but trees.

“It’s because of the water,” I told him.

“There’s water?”

“A creek and, yeah, you’ll see,” I assured him. “From her back patio you can see Cathedral Rock, and her property borders national forest land, and that’s impressive, but Oak Creek—the fact that it’s right on the water is really something.”

“Drive faster,” he prodded me.

When I pulled up in front of the house, we both got out, and he stood there staring at the large farmhouse with the wide porch and a riot of plants and flowers, the birdbaths, bird feeders, bee feeders, hummingbird feeders, and windchimes of every imaginable size and shape. The glass and wood double doors were standing open, and you could see straight into the house and out the other side.

He did a slow pan to me. “You have to insist that your mother get some kind of security for her home.”

I grunted.

“Sweetheart!”

Turning, I saw her walking toward us, having come from her rose garden, the wide-brimmed hat as ridiculous as the first time I saw it, and a basket hanging from her arm, her dogs running alongside her.

“Oh,” Nick said, seeing the nine dogs that made up her pack, all Dobermans, some with their ears cropped and tails docked, some not, but all looking equally intimidating. She had gotten them all from a rescue, having a real affinity for the breed, and had failed at fostering many times because when it came time to surrender the dogs, she couldn’t let them go. She was doing better, judging by the fact that her brood had only grown from eight to nine since I’d last seen her two months ago.

The new addition, Bruja, my mom informed me, held back a bit, so I dropped down to one knee, and when she took that as the signal to greet me, they all flew forward at once.