War-N-Wit, Inc. – MeanStreet, LLC (7 page)

“Real plan?”

“You’re so damn
casual
about all this! What is it with you, Gabriel? You run MeanStreet like a luxury corporation! There’s no
structure,
no
strategy,
no
chain of command
! You’re just sitting back and hoping the humans’ll automatically know what to do! Oh, yeah, they’ll just save the day! And everybody runs all
over
you! That break room, for crying out loud! Like a five star resort!”

Gabriel’s face tightened.
“It’s called
faith
, Michael! Do you even have yours anymore? Or has structure and
strategy and command replaced that? I
believe
in the humans. What do you believe in now? Anything? Why are you so convinced they’re inferior to us? We’ve never had brother against brother, jealousy, greed? We’ve never torn heaven and earth wide open? Oh, no, we’re just one big happy family! Tell you what, brother, if we were going into
your
territory, we’d run it your way,
General
. But since you don’t have any idea where in the hell your break is—Paris, London, Madrid, Berlin—or even some po’dunk little pub in the back of the Irish beyond—I guess we’re doing it
my
way!”

* * *

“There they are.” Micah, in human form, pointed to a happy family reunion in the airport terminal. “See ‘em?”

Mia studied the group closely. “Yeah. They’re—different, somehow.
The younger ones, I mean. They—
glow
, sorta.”

“Good ey
e. Yeah, they do.”

“Why?”

“Magic, sweetheart. See the guy with the silver streaks in his hair? Chad Garrett. His term for it is
persons of power
. And those four? Yeah. Loaded with it.”

“So you know them? From somewhere else?”

“You might say that. See the girl with dark hair? That’s Ariel Garrett. Chad’s wife. Bit of a late bloomer. And the tall dude is Chad’s brother—well, foster brother—Spike. That’s what most folks call him. He’s actually Dr. Stuart Forrester. Pediatrician.”

“
Him
? But he’s so
big!
Doesn’t he scare the kids?”

“Oh, no. Kids are full of magic. They always recognize it. He’s a bit of a late bloomer, too. And the bright-haired girl is Stacy, Ariel’s sister.
The older couple’s the girls’ parents. Out here for Spike and Stacy’s wedding. Hope that doesn’t get interrupted. Too little joy in life for most folks.”

“Did you have much?”

“Much what?”

“Joy in life.”

Micah laughed shortly. “Had my moments. On the whole? No. Not a hell of a lot. You?”

“No. No, I don’t guess
I had a whole hell of a lot either.”

“Maybe it’s a prerequisite
for angelhood.”

* * *

“Wow, Antsypants! Vegas agrees with you!” I pulled out of our patented sister hug, guaranteed to squeeze the meanness out of both of us. Of course we’d had a hug fest all around, unavoidable when southerners meet. Depending on the circumstances, we hug total strangers. A family reunion in the airport? Any fellow travelers with a fetish against touching better steer clear of us. They’re assuming the risk if they accidently end up in the family circle. “Look at that tan!”

Stacy laughed. “Heat without humidity! A Georgia girl’s dream!”

“Well, I think maybe the company has something to do with it, too.” Mom looked Spike over carefully. An impressive specimen, my brother-in-law. “So glad to finally meet you in person, Stuart. You seem to be takin’ care of our little girl just fine.”

Stacy and I grimaced simultaneously.
Especially me. I recognize a not-so-subtle putdown when I hear one. Mom still hadn’t come to terms with my new life-style. The private investigator part, that is. She’d never know about the
other
part of my new life-style. And she didn’t think Chad took care of me in the manner to which she’d like me to become accustomed. As in wrapped in cotton and tucked away on a shelf like a china doll.

“Mom,
nobody calls him Stuart. He’s Spike. And I’m not a little girl and I don’t really need to be taken care of. It’s kind of a we-take-care-of-each-other thing, you know?”

“Of course it is, dear!” Mom hooked an arm neatly under Spike’s and Chad’s simultaneously. Never let it be said my mother played favorites. Not so’
s you could pin her on it, anyway. “Stuart, Chad, I’ve always had a fantasy of being escorted through an airport on the arms of two handsome men! Indulge an older woman.”

Stacy groaned.

“Mom! The luggage?”

“Oh, my! I figured you two liberated women were taking care of that.
With your father, of course. You mean you’d like help?”

“Don’t bat those eyelashes at us
! And drop the Ya-Ya Sisterhood act! Behave!”

Mom laughed and dropped the act along with the clinging vine grip she had on Chad and Spike.

“Busted! Like I’d trust y’all to make sure you had all my luggage?”

Daddy sighed and headed toward the conveyor belts of luggage.

“Welcome to the family, guys. Hope you both got a good sense of humor. Gonna need it.”

Chapter Ten

“Are you
sure
we couldn’t have hit one more casino?” Mom wasn’t happy with us. “And we didn’t take in but one show, either!”

“Mom
, it’s already past midnight and we’ve got a ton of things to do tomorrow! When did you turn into such a party animal?”

We piled i
nto Spike and Stacy’s great room—under protest—after a night on the Strip.

It was time to pull out the big guns.
“Mom, I swear I’ll print those pictures of you dancing at the casino and post ‘em in your garden club bulletin if you don’t settle down!”

“
Really, Ari!” Mom blinked owlishly and enunciated carefully. “No need to resort to threats. If y’all can’t keep up with me, just say so!”

“Mom. You’re really, really sloshed. You know that?
Don’t you think it’s time to hit the bed?”

“This early? Why do I want to do that? At least let’s have a nightcap! And Stacy, I meant to ask—are we putting you out of your room? How many guest rooms do you have, Stuart? There’s Stacy and Chad and Ari and us, I don’t want to put anybody out.”

Stacy rolled her eyes and Daddy put a finger to his mouth and shook his head violently. I hadn’t thought even Mom was naïve enough to think Stacy didn’t settle into the master bedroom as soon as she’d gotten here last month but apparently, yes, she was.

“Oh, it’s fine, Mrs. Anson,” Spike assured her. “We’ve got four. Guest rooms. It’s a five bedroom house.”

Bless his heart. Absolute truth. No need to get into who was using which one.

“Oh,
good!
Plenty of room for the babies when they come. Ari, you and Chad need to start thinking about that, you know. Your little tree house is just a perfect little dollhouse for a couple, but for the babies—heavens, suppose they crawl right off that deck? I could cry to think of what could happen!” Mom blinked owlishly again and tears welled from the corner of her eyes for the unborn grandbabies not even thought of yet. Yep. Sloshed to the gills. “And call me Grace, both of you. Let’s not stand on formality.” She plunked down, not gracefully, on one of the couches.

Chad moved over to Spike’s bar. “Grace,
what’s your pleasure? For that nightcap?”

M
ineral water!
I shot the order to him silently.
At this point, she won’t know the damn difference!

“
Scotch on the rocks, please. And make it a double.”

“Gracie!” Daddy reached breaking point. “What the hell’s gotten into you?
C’mon, time for us to go to bed. While you can still walk up the stairs!”

“Bobby, don’t be such a spoilsport!”
Bobby?
Daddy was either Bob or Robert. She
never
called him Bobby. Mom stood up. Then she swayed. Her eyes rolled back in her head and she went limp. Daddy caught her before she hit the floor.

“Just
great,” he sighed.

* * *

Outside the sliding glass wall leading to the Forrester patio-pool, two sleek, supple cat forms, blacker than the shadows they patrolled, paced restlessly back and forth. Guard duty. Nothing could happen to this little private coven. Not tonight. The world couldn’t afford it.

The larger of the shadows moved in close to the smaller and rubbed his head against hers.

You okay?

Fine
.

Mia was more than fine. The sensitive whiskers, new fashion accessories fo
r sure, quivered. The new sounds, the new smells, the new
awareness
! Had the world always been so rich, so full of scent, so full of sound? How much humans missed!

You sure?

Micah, I’m just glorious!

Yes,
you are.

* * *

“I can’t
take
it anymore!”

The magician’s obligatory lovely assistant shrieked and threw off her human skin. Of course, she did that every night. Harold was used to it. It reminded him of his
first wife tearing her bra off as soon as she came in from work. And his second and his third, come to think of it. Must be a girl thing. It didn’t even rate a “
Squawk…invasion of the body snatchers
” from him anymore.

“
Irene! Keep it down!”

“My name’s
not
Irene! It’s Raxchanxchn! Your name’s
not
Damien! It’s Xanchoxn!”

“It’s one more night, woman! We can stand anything for one more night! Now get your damn skin back on and let’s get up to our room. A couple of more humans, that’s all we need! To open the breach forever!”

“Don’t you
dare
call me woman! Like I was some—some—
human
! And we’ve got enough as long as the other teams are doing
their
share. Have you checked on them lately?”

“What sort of idiot you take me for?”

“You
really
don’t want me to answer that, do you?”

Harold blinked and yawned. Oh, yeah. These demons were married, for sure. Or whatever passed for it in their little corner of their dimension. Guess some things just didn’t change, no matter what dimension you were from.

“One day, Raxchanxchn!
One day!
”

“One day what?”

“You’re going to the moon!”

“Promises, promises.”

* * *

Mom came down the steps. Very carefully. Had to give it to her, though, that was the only sign of last night’s excess
es.

She sat down on one of the kitchen bar stools and smiled brightly.
To cover the wince. Antsypants and I looked at each other and nodded. Special treatment coming up. I sat a big mug of coffee in front of her and added a glass of fresh-squeezed orange juice from the carafe sitting on the bar. Stacy cracked more eggs into a small frying pan and popped bread into the toaster.

“Here you go!” Stacy sat the breakfast plate in front of her with a flourish.

Mom turned slightly green. “Thank you, dear, but—”

“Don’t even. First sip the juice. Then sip the coffee.
Then eat and you’ll feel right as rain. I’ll even fork over some aspirin, but not till you eat. We’ve got a lot to do today.”

Mom stared at the juice and then picked it up and sipped gingerly.
She took a big swallow and switched to coffee. Then she actually picked up her fork and started eating.

“
Where’re the guys?”

“Spike
leaves by seven every morning, he does the hospital checks before he goes to his office. This is the last day he’s working for a week, he’s covered after that. And Chad took Daddy out for a ride. You never told us Daddy knew how to ride a motorcycle.” Stacy opened the dishwasher and started loading the breakfast dishes.

Mom dropped her fork and clutched my arm.

“Your
daddy’s
out riding a motorcycle?!”

“Well, yeah.” Stacy bent over and loaded
more dishes in the dishwasher. “Didn’t know he knew how.”

“He hasn’t been on one in
years!
He’s goin’ to kill himself! Especially on those monster things in your garage!”