C.E. Murphy - Heart of Stone

Or not at all. The thought whispered through Margrit’s mind and she pushed it away with a shake of her head. There would be a way to make it work, as long as they were willing to try. As long as they could find enough common ground to keep them together through the rough patches. She scanned the streets and pathways near where she sat, suddenly have the sensation of being watched.

But no one was skulking nearby, there was no sign of her sometimes lover, and who else would be watching? Sunset was still more than an hour off, Alban imprisoned in stone until then. A bus lumbered up, belching and groaning, and Margrit limped up its steps, watching shadows gather in the park as it pulled away from the stop.

“Ow ow ow ow ow.” Margrit slid down the inside of the apartment’s front door, untying her boots and peeling her socks off carefully. She crawled into the bathroom to find astringent and bandages, while Cole came to frown at her.

“Cops rough you up?” He was only half kidding; Margrit looked up at his tone and cracked a smile.

“Yeah. Friction burns to the feet. It’s a new torture-eeeyow, that stings!-device.” She wrinkled her face and waved her feet in the air, hissing as hydrogen peroxide worked into blisters and raw spots, clearing potential infections away.

“That why you decided to take a nap at the dining room table this morning?” Cole’s voice was brusque to hide worry, and Margrit gave him another fond smile.

“No, not really. They let me go around 1:00 a.m., I guess. I had some stuff to do after that. Thanks for picking me up this morning, Cole. I thought I could just tough it out, but the last thing I remember was putting the yogurt down. My stupid feet are from going running in dumb shoes.”

“Something happened with the case.” Cole walked back down the hallway to the kitchen, making his words a statement instead of a question.

“Yeah. I think I found out why Daisani wants that building knocked down. It looks like it might be some kind of long-term personal thing for him.” Cara, she realized, had never verified that Daisani was a member of the Old Races. Margrit muttered under her breath, wondering if the girl had avoided answering because it wasn’t true, because she didn’t know or out of misplaced loyalty to discretion in the face of discovery. Bandages in place, Margrit abandoned her socks on the bathroom floor and hobbled down the hall after Cole, still mumbling.

“Is there any point at all in suggesting you should think about dropping this case, Grit?” Cole stood over the stove, intently watching a pan of oil heat. Margrit peered around his shoulder hopefully.

“Is that going to be fried chicken?”

“I don’t know how you can tell it’s fried chicken from a sauté pan full of oil. Don’t avoid the question.”

“Possibly the chicken in the fridge this morning tipped her off,” Cam said from her perch on the dining room table. She’d cleared several inches of space, piling Margrit’s paperwork even more precariously than it had been. Every time her weight shifted, so did the stacks of files. Margrit came over to extract a portable file box holding folders labeled Important, Really Important and Russell Will Kill You If You Don’t Finish This. The last was stuffed to bursting, and Margrit shuffled through more papers from the table, sliding them into the appropriate folders.

“Hello, how are you, it’s nice to see you, too, and what’d you tell him, anyway, Cam?”

“Just that the mayor came looking for you personally to head you off on the Delaney case. You know-” Cam looked over her shoulder with a grin “-the truth, and that sort of thing.”

“We lawyers try to stay away from that,” Margrit said, mock severely. “Anyway, you’re the one who told me I was bullish in my acquisition and destruction of targets, Cole. If you want me off it, you should probably be telling me to go for it gung ho. Do not,” she added, “suggest that path to my parents. It’d probably fool me if they tried pulling it.”

“Eliseo Daisani and Mayor Leighton and who knows who else…” her friend murmured. “Are you sure you’re not in over your head, Grit?”

“Not at all. Fortunately, it’s my head. Besides.” Margrit leaned on the table, making it wobble threateningly. Cam put a hand out for balance, looking alarmed. “Besides,” Margrit repeated, “for one, it’s just starting to get interesting. For two, there’s no way to see if I’m in over my head without going for it, right? And for three, if I win this case I am going to be like unto God.”

“Or dead.” Cole turned to face her worriedly, while the oil gave a sudden pop. “Margrit, I’m wondering if you being hit by that car wasn’t an accident.”

“Dear Lord,” she exclaimed. Her pulse accelerated and she grinned faintly, oddly relieved to be talking with a mere human and not to Janx. Then she almost laughed at herself. A mere human. How quickly she’d become accustomed to the impossible. “Now I’ve got hit men after me? Cole, are you sure you’re not turning into my mother?”

“God, I hope not,” Cam said fervently. Margrit laughed and Cole cracked a grin that faded quickly.

“I’m just worried, Grit. Eliseo Daisani is big guns.”

“Ah, but I’m faster than a speeding bullet.” Margrit looked at her abused feet. “Well, usually, anyway. And chicken’s almost the only thing you actually fry. Usually you bake stuff. If I peel potatoes will you make homemade french fries?”

“I’m not getting across my sense of urgency to her, am I,” Cole said to Cam.

She laughed. “Try again after dinner. You know how she is about food.”

Margrit glanced out the kitchen window. “Better hurry, if you’re trying again after dinner. I’ve got a date.”

“With Tony?” Cam and Cole chorused the question, both turning to gawk at her.

Margrit blinked. “Yeah. Because things are going really smoothly with us right now, what with him picking me up for murder and all.” She pressed her lips together, then muttered, “Shit. The Superbowl’s tomorrow.”

Cole and Cameron exchanged guilty looks. Margrit snorted. “You guys should go. I just don’t know that I’ll be joining you, under the circumstances.”

“The circumstances might be exactly why it would be good to go,” Cam suggested.

Margrit shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe if I talk to Tony. I don’t know if I bend that far. Besides, I’ve got a lot of work to do, especially with missing Friday because of the concussion.” She lifted a hand to press her palm over her goose egg, wincing mildly. “So don’t worry about it.”

“Mmm. Who’s the date with, then?” Cole turned back to his oil, rolling flour-breaded chicken into it.

“Oh, you know.” Margrit sighed. “The usual. Alban Korund with the knife in the bookstore.”

CAMERON, LAUGHING, DUG out the Deluxe Edition Clue game, and between fried chicken and home fries they determined it was really Miss Scarlett in the library with the rope. Margrit slipped away to her date-coffee with a coworker, she’d finally ended up claiming, since neither of her apartmentmates would believe the truth-a couple of hours after sunset.

Huo’s On First was startlingly busy, with a book signing and reading going on in its crowded foyer. The bells on the door rang as Margrit pushed her way in, apologizing in murmurs to both the author and the people there to see her. Chelsea waved from atop a bookshelf-apparently it was her natural habitat-and nodded toward the back room. Margrit edged her way through the stacks and brushed the beaded curtain aside as quietly as she could.

In the prosaic yellow light of reading lamps, Alban seemed larger than she remembered him. He sat in an armchair meant for someone smaller, his shoulders overflowing it as he leaned to one side, head braced against his fingertips. He looked, Margrit thought, exhausted and terribly human. Suddenly at a loss, she hung back in the doorway, watching him. It was long moments before he lifted his head, and she saw his eyes dilate with surprise before she smiled crookedly. “Hey.”