Dead Beat (The Dresden Files 7)

When Mouse saw Murphy, he made a little huffing sound of greeting and trotted over to her, his tail wagging. If I had leaned back and kept my legs straight I could have gone skiing over the gravel, but other than that, the big dog left me with no option but to come along.

Murphy knelt down at once to dig her hands into the fur behind Mouse's floppy ears, scratching vigorously. "Hey, there, boy," she said, smiling. "How are you?"

Mouse slobbered several doggy kisses onto her hands.

Murphy said, "Yuck," but she was laughing while she did. She pushed Mouse's muzzle gently away, rising. "Evening, Harry. Glad I caught you."

"I was just getting back from my evening drag," I said. "You want to come in?"

Murphy had a cute face and very blue eyes. Her golden hair was pulled back into a ponytail, and it made her look a lot younger than usual. Her expression was a careful, maybe even uncomfortable one. "I'm sorry, but I can't," she said. "I've got a plane to catch. I don't really have time."

"Ah," I said. "What's up?"

"I'm going out of town for a few days," she said. "I should be back sometime Monday afternoon. I was hoping I could talk you into watering my plants for me."

"Oh," I said. She wanted me to water her plants. How coy. How sexy. "Yeah, sure. I can do that."

"Thanks," she said, and offered me a key on a single steel ring. "It's the back-door key."

I accepted it. "Where you headed?"

The discomfort in her expression deepened. "Oh, out of town on a little vacation."

I blinked.

"I haven't had a vacation in years," she said defensively. "I've got it coming."

"Well. Sure," I said. "Um. So, a vacation. By yourself?"

She shrugged a shoulder. "Well. That's sort of the other thing I wanted to talk to you about. I'm not expecting any trouble, but I wanted you to know where I was and with who in case I don't show up on time."

"Right, right," I said. "Doesn't hurt to be careful."

She nodded. "I'm going to Hawaii with Kincaid."

I blinked some more.

"Um," I said. "You mean on a job, right?"

She shifted her weight from one hip to the other. "No. We've gone out a few times. It's nothing serious."

"Murphy," I protested. "Are you insane? That guy is major bad news."

She glowered at me. "We've had this discussion before. I'm a grownup, Dresden."

"I know," I said. "But this guy is a mercenary. A killer. He's not even completely human. You can't trust him."

"You did," she pointed out. "Last year against Mavra and her scourge."

I scowled. "That was different."

"Oh?" she asked.

"Yeah. I was paying him to kill things. I wasn't taking him to b-uh, to the beach."

Murphy arched an eyebrow at me.

"You won't be safe around him," I said.

"I'm not doing it to be safe,'" she replied. Her cheeks colored a little. "That's sort of the point."

"You shouldn't go," I said.

She looked up at me for a moment, frowning.

Then she asked, "Why?"

"Because I don't want to see you get hurt," I said. "And because you deserve someone better than he is."

She studied my face for a moment more and then exhaled through her nose. "I'm not running off to Vegas to get married, Dresden. I work all the time, and life is going right by me. I just want to take the time to live it a little before it's too late." She pulled a folded index card out of her pocket. "This is the hotel I'll be at. If you need to get in touch or anything."

I took the folded index card, still frowning, and full of the intuition that I had missed something. Her fingers brushed mine, but I couldn't feel it through the glove and all the scars. "You sure you'll be all right?"

She nodded. "I'm a big girl, Harry. I'm the one choosing where we're going. He doesn't know where. I figured he couldn't set anything up ahead of time, if he had any funny business in mind." She made a vague gesture toward the gun she carried in a shoulder holster under her jacket. "I'll be careful. I promise."

"Yeah," I said. I didn't even try to smile at her. "For the record, this is stupid, Murph. I hope you don't get killed."

Her blue eyes flashed, and she frowned. "I was sort of hoping you'd say something like, 'Have a good time.' "

"Yeah," I said. "Whatever. Have fun. Leave me a message when you get there?"

"Yes," she said. "Thanks for looking out for my plants."

"No problem," I said.

She nodded at me, and lingered there for a second more. Then she scratched Mouse behind the ears again, got in her car, and drove off.

I watched her go, feeling worried.

And jealous.

Really, really jealous.

Holy crap.

Was Thomas right after all?

Mouse made a whining sound and pawed at my leg. I sighed, stuck the hotel information in a pocket, and led the dog back to the apartment.

When I opened my door, my nose was assaulted with the scent of fresh pine-not pine cleaner, mind you. Real fresh pine, and nary a needle in sight. The faeries had come and gone, and the books were back on the shelves, the floor scrubbed, curtains repaired, dishes done, you name it. They may have weird bylaws, but faerie housecleaning runs a tight ship.

I lit candles with matches from a box I had sitting on my coffee table. As a wizard, I don't get on so well with newfangled things like electricity and computers, so I didn't bother to try to keep electric service up and running in my home. My icebox is a vintage model run on actual ice. There's no water heater, and I do all my cooking on a little wood-burning stove. I fired it up and heated some soup, which was about the only thing left in the house. I sat down to eat it and started going through my mail.

The usual. The marketing savants at Best Buy continued in their unabated efforts to sell me the latest laptop, cell phone, or plasma television despite my repeated verbal and written assurances that I didn't have electricity and that they shouldn't bother. My auto-insurance bill had arrived early. Two checks came, the first a token fee from Chicago PD for consulting with Murphy on a smuggling case for an hour the previous month. The second was a much meatier check from a coin collector who had lost a case of cash from dead nations over the side of his yacht in Lake Michigan and resorted to trying out the only wizard in the phone book to locate them.