Wicked Business (Lizzy and Diesel 2)

“Beastly. She was practically snarling. She said I was ten minutes late. And she demanded I tell her the location of the little key. Can you imagine?”

“Did you tell her?”

“I told her it was sold with the book. And then I offered her a Zuzu wafer because she was so angry and I thought it would calm her. They’re very delicate and they smell wonderful. Like cinnamon and roses. They’re made from shortbread dough rolled paper thin and infused with essence of crushed Zuzu berries.”

“And these cookies make you happy?” Glo asked.

“No,” Nina said. “They give you diarrhea. Zuzu is really nasty stuff.”

“Has anyone else asked about the book or the key?” I asked Nina.

“That’s it so far.”

“Do you have any other books by Lovey?”

“No. I just had the one. I don’t even know when I acquired it. I was dusting one of the top shelves, and I came across it and was taken with the engraved cover. Anyway, I put it in the window and did a little research on it.”

“I bet you used Ryan’s Big Book of Enchanted Works,” Glo said.

Nina straightened a row of glass jars holding pickled eyeballs. “Actually, I Googled it. You know, the Internet. There wasn’t a lot out there . . . just that his sonnets were said to inspire lust and some woman was accused of witchery because of them. I don’t think she was ever convicted.”

We left Nina, and we went to a nearby pub. Glo and I got cheeseburgers and beer. Broom didn’t seem to want anything.

“He never eats when people are watching,” Glo said.

“He’s a broom,” I said to Glo. “Brooms don’t eat.”

“True, but I’m pretty sure he’s an enchanted broom. And sometimes when I get up in the morning, food is missing. Once there was a half-eaten bagel on my kitchen counter, and I know I didn’t eat it.”

I looked at Broom, leaning nonchalantly in the corner, against the back of the booth, and I thought he might have twitched a little. Probably, he was laughing at us.

“Too bad about your date tonight,” I said to Glo. “Why was he arrested?”

“The usual. He shot someone in the head with a nail gun. Honestly, I’m going to stop going out with carpenters. This is getting really old.”

It was after ten when I got home, and Cat was waiting for me. I closed and locked the door and bent to scratch Cat behind his ear. We went into the kitchen, I gave him a pumpkin muffin and some milk, and waited while he ate.

“I had another one of those strange days,” I said to Cat. “Diesel thinks the hunt is on for one of the SALIGIA Stones, and it looks like someone was killed because of it. What do you think?”

Cat looked up at me and blinked.

“Yeah,” I said. “That’s what I think, too.”

I turned the lights off, and Cat and I padded up the stairs to my bedroom. My bedroom walls are pale green, and the sheers on the window are white and floaty. I found my bed in a secondhand store, and it was exactly what I wanted. It’s queen-size and has a wrought-iron frame that has a fanciful, scrolly design on the headboard and footboard. I have a small table and lamp at bedside, and a small chest of drawers at the foot of the bed. No television. Just a notepad and pen on the table, and a book.

I puffed my pillows and snuggled under my genuine synthetic down comforter. Cat curled at my feet.

“This is the good life,” I said to Cat.

Cat didn’t look around at me. Cat knew it was good. Probably, he would think it was even better if he hadn’t been neutered, but there wasn’t much I could do about that. I thought about reading a few pages, but that’s as far as it went. It had been a long day, my stomach was full of cheeseburger, and I was tired.

I never have problems falling asleep, and I rarely wake up in the middle of the night. My eyes open every morning at 4:10 A.M., which is five minutes before my alarm goes off. So it was odd to wake to a dark room and see 2:00 on the digital display of my clock radio. I lay very still, barely breathing, listening, knowing something had dragged me out of sleep. My eyes adjusted to the dark, and I saw that Cat was crouched in the middle of the bed, his tail bristled out like a bottle brush, his attention riveted on a shadow at the far end of the room. I realized the shadow was a man, and my heart stopped for a moment.

It was Wulf. He was standing statue-still, silently watching me.

“How long have you been here?” I asked him, my voice barely above a whisper.

“Not long.”