California Demon (14 page)

Laura and I followed her back inside. Sure enough, among all the detritus, there was a small package, wrapped in brown paper, about the size of a juice box.

“Gee,” I said, glancing at the schoolbooks, CDs, Post-it notes, action figures, and Play-Doh sculptures scattered about. “I wonder why I didn’t see it.”

“Dunno,” Allie said, apparently not recognizing my sarcasm. “It’s been here all along.” She peered over my shoulder at it. “Who’s it from?”

“No return address,” I said. I hefted it in my hand, the weight minimal. “For that matter, there’s no address at all. Just my name.”

“So someone dropped it off themselves,” Laura said. “They didn’t mail it.”

“Maybe you have a secret admirer,” Allie said. “Stuart’s going to freak.”

“I don’t have a secret admirer.” Did I?

“Maybe it’s Stuart, then,” Allie said. “Maybe he’s making up for yesterday.”

“Then the present would be for you,” I said.

She shrugged. “I’m okay. We talked. You know. It was good.”

I studied her. Not the most rousing endorsement of my husband’s parenting skills, but I was pleased nonetheless. Stuart had screwed up, but at least he hadn’t scarred my daughter for life.

“It’s probably from Marissa,” Laura said. “It’s about the size of a cell phone. I bet she’s just returning the one you lost.”

That actually made a lot of sense. “Not really worth the trouble,” I said.

“Open it, Mom. It might be something else.”

I hesitated, running my fingertip over the brown paper packaging. It probably was my cell phone; what else would it be? But why wrap it? Why not leave it in the mailbox or simply in a small shopping bag?

If it wasn’t my phone, did I really want to open the package in front of Allie? No, I thought, I didn’t. The way my week was going, I wasn’t sure I wanted to open it at all.

I turned to Laura, hoping to buy some time. Or distract Allie. Or something.

“I should go,” she said. “Um, you want to come with me, Kate? I’m going to, um, go hide that big present.”

Subtle, my best friend isn’t. But at least I knew what she meant. She was going to take the Lexus—and the demon— back to her house.

“I’m going to do some more shopping, too,” she said. “I could use the company. The mall’s a madhouse this time of year.”

Allie cocked her head. “You guys are still up to something. What? Are you planning something for me and Mindy?”

“Keep asking questions, and you’re going to find nothing but coal in your stocking, young lady.” I turned to Laura. “Sure. I’d love to come with you.” To Allie, I said, “Watch Timmy, okay? We’ll only be gone a few hours.”

Not that I intended the kids to stay alone in the house. Before Laura and I got out of the neighborhood, I was going to grab Eddie from the library and bring him back home.

Probably an unnecessary caution, but a demon had just attacked me in my kitchen, and I wasn’t going to leave the kids alone. Eddie might be old, but he could still roll with the best of them. And I knew he’d do whatever it took to protect my kids.

I also knew he’d keep the doors locked, the alarm system armed, and he wouldn’t open the door to strangers. That’s the nice part about being old and curmudgeonly; you can piss off neighborhood callers and no one takes it personally.

Allie, however, was having none of it. “No way! That’s so totally not fair!”

“Alison Elizabeth Crowe, you know part of your allowance is compensation for watching your brother.”

“No, no, no.
That’s
fine. I’ll even play Candy Land with him. But you can’t go yet.” She made frantic gestures toward the package. “Open it!”

“Allie,” I said sharply. “Just drop it.”

“Jeez, Mom, what’s the big deal?”

I frowned, wondering if I were pushing too hard, bringing into sharp relief all my secrets for my daughter to see.

“
Mo-om.
Come on! It’s probably a Christmas present someone dropped off.” She bounced a little. “Just open the thing!”

I glanced at Laura, who shrugged.

I drew in a breath, wishing I had X-ray vision, psychic powers, something. I didn’t anticipate something dangerous—the danger, after all, had just attacked me in the kitchen. But danger takes forms other than the physical, and I could think of at least a dozen things that would have my daughter asking the kinds of questions I didn’t want to answer. Questions I wasn’t ready to answer.

Then again, maybe now was the time. I’d been younger than Allie when I’d started training, about her age when I’d killed my first demon. My heritage was her heritage, and someday I really was going to tell her. I just hadn’t planned on today.

I considered the box. I could stall, or I could open it and field whatever questions Allie asked.

Was I prepared for that? Prepared for my daughter to learn about my past? To ask questions about my present? To worry and fret and—God forbid—get involved?

No, I wasn’t. But I hadn’t been prepared for the sex talk, either, and I’d made it through that one relatively unscathed.

I’d make it through this, too.

I reached for the box, dragged my nail under the tape, and started peeling it back slowly.

“Could you move
any
slower?” my daughter asked, in a tone that suggested her mother was a complete loser. “It’s brown paper. Just rip it off!”

“Hey, you open your mysterious packages your way, and I’ll open mine my way.”

She made a face and bounced some more.

Honestly, her eagerness was catching. I ripped the rest of the paper off and revealed a plain white gift box.

I drew a breath, hesitating.

“Open it already!”

I did, yanking off the top before I could talk myself out of it. We both stared down. “A key?” Allie said, the confusion in her voice reflecting my own.

She reached down and snatched it up. A simple silver key. “Well, shit.” A look of horror, then, “Sorry, Mom.”

I didn’t bother to reprimand her. I was too busy looking at the key. I took it from her, then squinted at it. A number—287—was stamped in the metal, but other than that, there were no identifying markings.

“I think it’s a safe-deposit box key,” Laura said.

“No kidding?” Allie leaned forward to get a better look. “So it’s like spy stuff. Someone’s sending you secret clues, and you have to put them all together.” She nodded, pleased with that scenario. “Pretty cool, Mom.”

“Hmm,” I said.

“So let’s go,” she said.

“To the mall?”

“Duh. To the bank.” She reached over and took the key. “I mean, this is
so
Sydney Bristow.”

“I’m not sure—”

But Allie cut me off. “Come on, Mom! Aren’t you curious?”

Desperately curious, actually, but I wasn’t about to admit that to Allie. Actually, now that I had some time to think about it, I realized I should simply have told her the key was mine. That I’d dropped it, and Marissa had returned it.

A nice little lie, but it had come to me way too late.

I snatched the key back. “It’s a key, Allie. Nothing more. There was probably supposed to be a note. It’s probably not even a safe-deposit key. It’s probably for a locker. Some storage locker filled with fake flowers that Marissa wants me to sort in penance for falling down on chaperone duty yesterday.”

“So call her,” Allie said. “And if it’s not, we’ll go check at the bank.” She snatched up the phone and held it out.

But before I had the chance to take the phone from her, it rang. “Probably instructions from your handler,” she said, then answered with a quick, “Spies ‘R’ Us.”

I looked at Laura and rolled my eyes. “No more
24
for her, and I’m going to hide all the
Alias
DVDs.”

As she listened, Allie’s cheeks flushed bright pink. I shot Laura a knowing look.
A boy,
I mouthed. Sure enough, the next thing out of Allie’s mouth was, “No, no. It’s me. Hi, Troy. No, of course you’re not interrupting anything. I can totally talk now.”

With the phone pressed tight to her ear, she skulked away, heading upstairs where she would, undoubtedly, lie on the bed with her feet on the wall, and spend the next three hours on the phone. Not with Troy, of course. But with the post-call analysis with twenty-eight of her closest friends to get their take on every little nuance of Troy’s words, tone, and attitude.

In other words, where the key was concerned, I was off the hook.

Laura cocked her head toward the garage and whispered, “Do you really want to go with me to, um, move the package?”

I shook my head. “We’ll do it tonight, like we planned. But I do want to go check this out.” I held up the key. “Want to go with me?”

Laura hesitated, then shook her head. “I’m up to my eyeballs in laundry over there,” she said. “And Mindy’s probably home from choir practice by now. Besides, I think I’d be a nervous wreck if I couldn’t check on the car every six or seven minutes.”

I nodded, understanding exactly what she meant. “I don’t want to leave the kids alone, though. Can you take my car and go get Eddie?”

“Sure,” she said. And while Laura left to retrieve Eddie, I moved through the ground floor of the house checking the locks and sticking my head into every room, every closet, and under every bed. (Well, except Allie’s, but only because I couldn’t think of a reason for snooping.) All secure.

I found Timmy in the living room, about eight inches away from the television, completely naked.

I sighed, dragged him backwards so that I could at least later tell the Mayo Clinic surgeon that I tried to protect his eyes, and then shoved his legs into his Pull-Ups. “Why’d you take off your Pull-Ups?” I asked.

He peeled his eyes away from the television just long enough to answer me. “Gotta dance, Momma.”

Right. I mean, how can you argue with that?

“Stay here,” I said. “Any closer, and Dora goes bye-bye. You understand?”

A somber nod.

“And keep your pants on.”

“Not pants. Pull-Ups.”

That’s my kid, literal as they come.

“Mommy’s going upstairs. I’ll be right back. You be good.” But I’d lost him. He was back with the map and the girl and the talking monkey. Not a bad place to be, I thought, all things considered.

“Feet off the wall,” I said automatically, as I knocked and then opened the door to Allie’s room.

“Hang on,” she said into the phone, then rolled over to face me.

“I’m going out as soon as Laura gets back with Eddie,” I said, hoping the telephone call had distracted her from her desire to go with me. “Help him keep an eye on your brother, okay?”

“Sure thing, Mom. No problem. Want me to do a couple of loads of laundry, too?”

Because I am not a naïve woman, my senses immediately kicked into overdrive. “Sure,” I said. “And maybe you could clean the bathrooms, too? I think the cure to Ebola is growing in your bathtub.”

“No problem,” she said happily.

Yup, something was definitely up. “Give,” I said. “What do you want?”

“Nothing!” she said, her expression managing to reflect utter shock that I would paint her with any ulterior motive.

“Okay then,” I said, turning to leave.

“Um, Mom?”

I turned back. “Hmm?”

“I was wondering if, well, if I could go to the beach this afternoon.”

“The beach?” Clearly there was a catch. We live in a coastal town. Usually requests to go to the beach aren’t accompanied by offers to do the laundry and scour the toilets.

“Yeah. Okay?”

“With who?”

“Mindy will be there.”

“So you and Mindy are going together?”

“Um, not exactly.”

I moved and sat on the edge of the bed. I glanced at the phone. “Mindy?” She nodded, and I picked up the receiver. “She’ll call you right back,” I said, then hung up.

“Now,” I said, focusing on my kid. “Spill.”

“It’s just that Troy Myerson asked me to come, and, well, it’s
Troy Myerson.
And I really like him, Mom.”

“So I gathered,” I said, thinking of David, who’d been clued in to that little fact long before me. (I mean, I’m just the Mom.)

“Can I go?”

“On a date?” I shook my head. “You know we’ve talked about this. I don’t care what everyone else is doing, you aren’t dating until you’re sixteen.”

“I know! But this isn’t a date.” She pointed to the phone. “Mindy even agrees.”

“Oh, well, if
Mindy
says so . . .”

She made a face. “It’s like a party. And he called because he wants me to come. But it’s not like I’m his date or anything. It’s the whole surf club. They’re doing a barbeque. And Mindy’s going to be there, too, and a lot of the cheerleaders, and just because Troy’s going to
coincidentally
be there, too, doesn’t make it a date.” She paused for breath.

“Coincidentally?”

“Okay, maybe not so much of a coincidence, but please? Can I go? Honestly, Mom, if I can’t go I might as well just curl up and die now because my life will be so totally over.” She flopped back on the bed, my little drama queen.

“Chaperones?”

She sat back up, smelling victory. “Sure. Totally. Mr. Long will be there. It’s the surf club barbeque. They’re doing a cookout, and then the surf team’s practicing for the exhibition at sunset.”

“The exhibition?”

“Uh, yeah? I’ve only mentioned it nine thousand times.”

“Right.” I stifled a frown. Okay, so maybe she had told me. Has my attention span really been that deficient since I rejoined
Forza
? “The exhibition. Of course.”

“You could even come for the practice part,” she said, apparently unaware of my descent into guilt. “I’d totally be okay with that.”

I lifted an eyebrow. “Really?”

“Sure. I mean, don’t come too early. But the guys are really good on the waves. It’d be fun. And you could even see Troy.”