Small Favor (The Dresden Files 10)

I squeezed her shoulder gently. "Involved, huh?"

"No," she said. Then she shook her head. "Yes. I don't know. It's complicated, Harry."

"Caring about someone isn't complicated," I said. "It isn't easy. But it isn't complicated, either. Kinda like lifting the engine block out of a car."

She gave me an oblique glance. "Leave it to a man to describe intimate relationships in terms of automotive mechanics."

"Yeah. I was kinda proud of that one, myself."

She huffed out a quiet breath, squeezed her eyes shut, and leaned her cheek down onto my hand. "The stupid part," she said, "is that he isn't interested in...in getting serious. We get along. We have fun together. For him, that's enough. And it's so stupid for me to get hung up on him."

I didn't think it was all that stupid. Murph didn't want to get too close, let herself be too vulnerable. Kincaid didn't want that kind of relationship either-which made him safe. It made it all right for her to care.

It also explained why she and I had never gotten anywhere.

In the event that you haven't figured it out, I'm not the kind of person to be casually involved in much of anything.

I couldn't fit any of that into words, though. So I just leaned down and kissed the top of her head gently.

She shivered. Her tears made wet, cool spots on the back of my hand. I knelt. It put my head more or less on level with hers, where she sat beside the bed. I put an arm around her shoulders and pulled her against me. I still didn't say anything. For Murph, that would be too much like I was actually in the room, seeing her cry. So she pretended that she wasn't crying and I pretended that I didn't notice.

She didn't cry for long. A couple of minutes. Then her breathing steadied, and I could feel her asserting control again. A minute more and she sat up and away from me. I let her.

"They said you were under the influence," she said, her tone calmer, more businesslike. "That someone had done something to your head. Your apprentice said that. But Michael didn't want to say anything in front of the other wizard, I could tell. And no one wanted to say anything in front of me."

"Secrets get to be a habit," I said quietly. "And Molly was right."

Murphy nodded. "She said that we should listen for the first words out of your mouth when you woke up. That if something had messed with your mind, your subconscious might be able to communicate that way, while you were on the edge of sleep. And you told us to listen to her."

I thought about it and pursed my lips. "Huh. I did. Guess I'm smarter than I thought."

"They shouldn't have suspected you," Murphy said. "I'm a paranoid bitch, and I gave up suspecting you a long time ago."

"They had a good reason," I said. I took a slow breath. It was hard, but I forced the words out. "Nicodemus threw one of those coins at Michael's kid. I grabbed it before the kid could. And I had a photocopy of a Fallen angel living in my head for several years, trying to talk me into picking up the coin and letting the rest of it into me."

Murphy glanced obliquely at me. "You mean...you could have become one of those things?"

"Yeah," I said. "Couple of times, it was close."

"Is it still...Is that what...?"

I shook my head. "It's gone now. She's gone now. I guess the whole time she was trying to change me, I was trying to change her right back. And in the Raith Deeps last year, she took a psychic bullet for me-at the very end, after everyone else had gotten out." I shrugged. "I had...We'd sort of become friends, Murph. I'd gotten used to having her around." I glanced at her and gave her a faint smile. "Crazy, huh? Get all broken up over what was essentially my imaginary friend."

Her fingers found my hand and squeezed tight once. "We're all imaginary friends to one another, Harry." She sat with me for a moment, and then gave me a shrewd glance. "You never told Michael the details."

I shook my head. "I don't know why."

"I do," she said. "You remember when Kravos stuck his fingers in my brain?"

I shuddered. He'd been impersonating me when he did it. "Yeah."

"You said it caused some kind of damage. What did you call it?"

"Psychic trauma," I said. "Same thing happens when a loved one dies, during big emotional tragedies, that kind of thing. Takes a while to get over it."

"But you do get over it," Murph said. "Dresden, it seems to me that you'd lock yourself up pretty tight if someone took a regular bullet for you with a regular body. Much less if you were under psychic attack and this imaginary friend died right inside your own brain. Something like that happens, shouldn't you have expected to be a basket case, at least for a little while?"

I frowned, staring down at my hands. "I never even considered that."

She snorted gently. "There's a surprise. Dresden forgets that he's not invincible."

She had a point there.

"This plan of yours," she said. "Do you really think it's going to work?"

"I think I've got to try it." I took a deep breath. "I don't think you should be involved in this one, Murph. The Denarians have human followers. Fanatic ones."

"You think we're going to have to kill some of them," Murphy said.

"I think we probably won't have much choice," I said. "Besides that, I wouldn't put it past them to send someone here for spite, win or lose."

Murphy glanced up at me rather sharply.

I shrugged. "They know that Michael and Sanya and I are going to be out there. They'll know that there will be someone here, unprotected. Whether or not they get the coins, Nicodemus might send someone here to finish off the wounded."

Murphy stared at me for a second, then looked back at Kincaid. "You bastard," she said without emphasis.

"I'm not playing big brother with you, Karrin," I replied. "But we are dealing with some very bad people. Molly's staying with Kincaid. I'm leaving Mouse here too. I'd appreciate it if someone with a little more experience was here to give the kid some direction, if it was needed."

She scowled at Kincaid. Then she said, "Trying to guilt me into playing worried girlfriend, domestic defender, and surrogate mother figure, eh?"

"I figured it would work better than telling you to shut up and get into the kitchen."

She took a deep breath, studying the sleeping man. Then she reached out and touched his hand. She stood and faced me. "No. I'm coming with you."