“I haven’t heard anything about barking. The information I got is that they’re keeping him here overnight for observation. He has a concussion.”
“Nothing unusual?”
“There’s a rumor going around that he was covered in pink rabbit fur when he was brought in, but that’s about it.”
I thanked Nergal and relayed the information to Diesel.
“So the stone isn’t on Ammon, and it’s not with Rutherford, and it’s not in the vault,” Diesel said. “My second-best guess would be the Marblehead house.”
“I see where this is going, and I’m not searching the Marblehead house until I’ve had my ice cream.”
“You can take your time with the ice cream,” Diesel said. “I think it will be just about impossible to search the Marblehead house without the distraction of a party and a fire. We’re going to have to find a way to make the stone come to us.”
“That shouldn’t be difficult. Ammon will get out of the hospital and retrieve the stone. All we have to do is snatch Ammon and rip the stone out of his demon hands.”
“Yeah. Why didn’t I think of that?”
“Or we could snatch Rutherford,” I said. “He probably helped hide the stone.”
“Even better.”
The waitress brought our food, and we stopped talking and concentrated on eating.
“Anything else?” she asked when we were done.
“Ice cream,” I said.
“We have vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, coffee, tutti-frutti, butter pecan, and chocolate chip.”
“Yes,” I said. “That’s what I want.”
“Which one?”
“All of them.”
Twenty minutes later Diesel was slouched in the booth, smiling at me. “You ate all that ice cream,” he said. “Impressive.”
“Yeah, but I’m feeling sick.”
“My original plan was to have you lure Rutherford away from the hospital tonight, so you could sweet-talk the information out of him. I’m thinking that just went out the window.”
Upchucking tutti-frutti seemed like an okay trade-off to sweet-talking Rutherford. He wasn’t as evil as Ammon, but he creeped me out. All that smiling and good cheer and the ha-ha laughing made me want to kick him in the knee. Not to mention, I was pretty sure I lacked the sweet-talking gene.
“I need to go home and lie down or throw up or something,” I said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
It was five in the morning, I was at the bakery, and so far my day was looking good. I had woken up to a house that felt relatively normal. Just Cat and me in the velvety darkness. Di
esel had patched my doors the night before, so they would at least stay closed. He promised to get me new ones today. My kitchen felt welcoming when I switched the light on. No sign of Mammon. No Rutherford. No Wulf.
Clara bustled in and went to her workbench. “Four dozen cupcakes for Mr. Dooley today,” she said.
“Four dozen cupcakes coming up.”
She looked over at me. “Have you heard any more about Ammon?”
“So far as I know he’s in the hospital with a concussion.”