Low Midnight (Kitty Norville 13)

But Ben was waiting in the driveway. He must have heard the Jeep’s engine and come out to meet them. He was barefoot, in his casual/sloppy mode, wearing jeans and an untucked T-shirt, and his arms were crossed.

Kitty scrambled for her phone. “Why is it off? Did you turn it off?” She fiddled with it a few seconds and groaned. “He’s been trying to call for an hour. Did you turn your phone off, too?”

“Yup.”

She let out a growl and stormed out of the car, slamming the door behind her.

He still might have had a chance to escape, but Ben came over and put a hand on the roof over the driver’s-side door. Cormac had spent all day going face-to-face with blowhards, and found he couldn’t stand up to Ben. He rolled down the window.

Kitty went around and leaned next to her husband.

“And how was your day?” Ben asked wryly.

She said, “You’re gonna have to ask him, I’m done playing go-between.”

Ben tilted his head, took a searching breath. “You shifted. What happened—wait a minute, are you bleeding?” The anger vanished. He held her shoulders, faced her, studied her all over, searching and smelling.

“Not anymore,” she said brightly.

He breathed a word that might have been a curse, wrapped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her into an embrace, kissing her forehead, resting there a moment. When he turned back to yell at Cormac, he didn’t let her go. Kept that arm around her, kept her pulled close, and she melted into the contact.

Cormac thought, not for the first time, that she was better off with him. He couldn’t do what Ben did, wrapping her up with affection so casually. She got sliced up and the best Cormac could do to comfort her was hand her a blanket.

Ben said, “What the hell have you gotten into? And is that a black eye? You got into a fight? Thank God you’re off parole.”

He didn’t know where to start, and when he looked at Kitty—the talker, who was so much better at explaining things than he was—she wasn’t any help. She blinked those big brown eyes expectantly at him and stayed quiet.

Cormac sighed. “You remember Anderson Layne?”

He had to think about it a minute. Kitty was watching for his reaction. “The militia nut who hung out with my dad? You ran into him? While looking into a century-old murder? I’m confused.”

“I didn’t go looking for him. He’s hired himself a wizard and is getting into the prospecting business. Jess Nolan’s around, too. The two of them are working up a rivalry and I got caught in the middle.”

“And you got Kitty caught, too.” That edge of anger returned.

“We agreed I should keep an eye on him, right?” she said. She brushed an arm against Ben, and he visibly calmed. “He hasn’t shot anyone. Yet.”

“Did either one of them try to hire you?” Ben said, in full interrogation mode now.

The Jeep’s engine was still running. Cormac could drive away, right now.

“Layne did.” The fact that he took Layne’s money meant he’d essentially been hired.…

“You told him no, right?” Ben sighed, not bothering to wait for an answer. “Okay. Fine. I trust your judgment, and if you need to work with these guys to learn more—”

“I don’t,” Cormac said. “I’m done with them. I’m walking away and won’t run into them again,” he added.

“Seriously?”

“I’ll figure out some other way to get at Crane’s murder. Or get at Amy’s book without help. I don’t need these guys. You’re right, they’re trouble.”

Ben might say he trusted Cormac, but that pause revealed a little too much uncertainty. Like they were still kids, right after Cormac’s father died and everyone walked on eggshells around him, wondering when he was going to blow up.

“Good,” Ben said finally.

His cousin might have been about to invite him in for a beer and further debriefing, but Cormac cut him off before he had the chance. “I’d better get going,” he said, shifting the Jeep into reverse. “It’s been a long couple of days.”

“We’ll talk later,” Ben said.