It Never Rhines but It Pours (13 page)

Sarah closed her eyes again and hopefully changed everyone’s memories so that all was back to normal.

“Well,” my mom said, opening her eyes. “Who wants a cookie?” She sniffed the air. “Do you smell something burning?”

Chapter Twelve:

Not
a Walk in the Park

I broke off half of a cookie and watched Pravus out of the corner of my eye while I munched. Plan A had gone wrong. What was Plan B? I thought some more. I wasn’t ready to try and force him to leave again. The next time I tried, I wanted to have backup, in the form of Cecily, there to help. For now it looked like he was going to be staying at my mom’s house. No way was I asking him to come stay with me.

He wanted his name cleared. Good. We had that much in common. I wanted his name cleared too. Not for any feelings of warmth towards him, but solely to find the one responsible for killing those students. We’d agreed that the next avenue of investigation needed to be Pravus’ enemies. If other people felt like I did about him, then it was no wonder that someone wanted him dead.
I
wanted him dead. Not in a “I’d like to kill him myself,” sort of way, but a “Oh, Pravus is dead? How sad,” sort of way.

I needed to get Pravus alone and talk to him. That shouldn’t be too hard. We had just set the table on fire with a magic battle and no one was the wiser. It should be child’s play to get him alone. Of course, children can get pretty violent with their play, but I was going to try a more gentle approach.

“Pr—Richard,” I corrected quickly.

“Yes, Cousin Piper?” he said smoothly.

“How would you like to take a little walk with me?”

“A walk?” my mom looked up from her conversation with Nana. “Isn’t it rather hot outside?”

“I know,” I said cheerily. “But I thought that we could take Bingley for a little stroll and get him used to dear cousin Richard.” I smiled sweetly.

“Okay,” my mom said slowly. “I suppose it would be good if Bing got used to Richard.”

“Great!” I jumped up. “Let’s go, Richard.” I gave him a look that said he’d better come with me and not argue. “Megan and Cassidy, ya’ll stay here with Nanny and I’ll be right back.” They barely acknowledged me, they were having too much fun being spoiled by their grandmother.

Pravus waited for me by the front door while I found Bing’s leash and went to the back yard to call him in. He was waiting patiently by the door, tail wagging furiously. I bent down and let him plant doggy kisses all over my face. “Who’s a good boy?” I asked him. “Who’s the good puppy? Yes, I know, you’re the good puppy.”

He went crazy with joy at the sight of the leash. I had a hard time holding him down long enough to snap it to his collar. Bingley only weighed about twenty pounds, but it was twenty pounds of Tasmanian devil when he thought he was going to go out.

“Come on, Bingley,” I said and was dragged through the house to the front door. As soon as he caught a whiff of Pravus, he stopped and every hair on his back stood up in a ridge. A low growl started in his throat and grew to a snarl and then a ferocious barking. For a little dog he could sure make a lot of noise.

“Stop that, Bing,” I said calmly and without the Voice. He kept barking. I hid a smirk. He was obviously more intelligent than I thought. Pravus took a step back and gave me plenty of space to open the front door. “We’ll just be gone a little while, Mom!” I called. I heard giggling from the girls and knew they wouldn’t miss me.

We walked down the front driveway, Bingley still lunging at the end of his leash and trying to get a chuck of witch. I halfheartedly pulled him back each time. “He doesn’t seem to like you,” I announced.

“Thank you, Captain Obvious,” Pravus snapped, jumping back as I let the leash get a little too long.

“Dogs are good judges of character.”

“Are they,” he said dryly.

“Yes.

“They also tend to be like their owners. In this case, I would say suspicious, yappy, and quarrelsome.”

I retaliated by letting the leash slip through my fingers at just the right moment. Bing caught a mouthful of pant leg and Pravus swore. “Oh, I’m sorry,” I said insincerely. “I was
yapping
so much I wasn’t paying attention.”

I finally tired of taunting Pravus and commanded Bingley to walk quietly. He obeyed but he was still on edge. “So,” I broke the fresh silence. “Who do you know that wants you dead?”

“Besides you?” he asked snarkily.

“Believe me, if I wanted you dead, you’d
be
dead,” I snorted. I sounded tough. Of course, it was all a lie. I’d never killed anyone. Not permanently. There was this vampire at my Synod hearing that I’d staked, but found out later, that since I hadn’t cut his head off and burnt it, he was going to recuperate. There were also some Triffids that I’d killed with soy sauce and water, but they were plants and didn’t really count.

We walked in silence a bit farther. Bingley finally relaxed and started to enjoy the different smells. “Who?” I asked again.

“I’m thinking!” he snapped.

“That many?” I said snidely.

He gave me a look and kept walking. “Ok,” he said. “There might be some beings that want me dead.”

“Beings?”

“Supernatural beings. Non-human.”

“Oh.”

We walked a bit further. I was starting to feel hot and sticky. Summer in Florida is very muggy. On a high humidity day you feel like you are moving through water instead of air. I thought I was being patient, but even I have a limit.

“Well?” I urged.

“Well, what?” he asked obtusely.

“Who wants you dead?”

“I told you.”

“No, you didn’t. You just said that there were some beings who wanted you dead. Not who they were. Whom they were? No,
who
they were.” Why did English grammar have to be so hard?

Pravus looked at me gravely. “I’m not sure I’m prepared to tell you at this time.”

“Not prepared - Listen buddy!” I was angry. “You want to stay alive, you’d better give me some names to look at
now
! If not, I might just start thinking that you look good for the murders.” I was bluffing, but he couldn’t know that, right?

He nodded. “I will think about it. There are some people who are better left alone, even if they are guilty. Perhaps you should be finding another way to complete your job.”

We were almost back at the house. Time was up and I hadn’t gotten much out of him. Besides, it was almost naptime for my girls, and if we missed that by too much they would get cranky.

“You’d better think fast, Pravus,” I threatened. “I don’t have a lot of time here. I need to get this wrapped up.”

He gave me a mock bow, “I will do my best, Cousin Piper.”

“Don’t call me that. And so help me, if you do anything to hurt my family …” I tried to impress on him the depth of my feelings on the matter with a glare.

He laid a hand across his heart. “I assure you that I will treat your family as if they were my own.”

Somehow, that didn’t comfort me.

Chapter Thirteen:

Dinner is Served

We made it through the rest of the visit without setting anything else on fire. Sarah followed me out to the car while I was buckling the girls in.

“Piper,” she whispered. “What are we going to do?”

I made a face. “I don’t know. Just stay out of his way if you can, and I’ll talk to Cecily tonight. Hopefully she will have an idea that doesn’t involve chopping his head off on Mom’s coffee table.”

“The fire was pretty impressive,” Sarah giggled.

I glared at her and she held her hands up in mock surrender. “It wasn’t funny,” I said.

“Yes, it
was
funny. You may not think it was funny now, but it
was
funny.”

I closed my eyes and briefly banged my head against the side of the car. “I’ll call you,” I said morosely and drove away.

I couldn’t sleep during naptime. I knew I was tired and needed to rest, but I couldn’t stop worrying about everything. I needed more information. Lots more information. Like a Zen master, the only thing I knew was enough to know that I knew nothing. Pravus being innocent was a good starting place but we couldn’t stop there. This wasn’t the good ol’ USA where you were innocent until proven guilty. In the US
B
you were guilty until proven innocent. And if you didn’t follow the orders handed down to you by the Synod … I didn’t know what would happen. Like I said, I needed more information. How much trouble had I gotten all of us into? How much time did we have to find the true guilty party? What kind of evidence did they require as proof? I had a hundred of these types of questions rattling around in my brain. Small wonder that I couldn’t sleep.

Thankfully, the girls slept well past four and were pretty well behaved for the rest of the day. They played nicely without much fighting and I was able to straighten the house and actually cook dinner. I cook dinner at least once a … hmm, once in a while? Once a month? No, more than that. I couldn’t really remember the last time I had cooked dinner. Does heating things up in the microwave count? Of course it does. If it’s hot, it’s cooked. So, with that reasoning, I cooked all the time. I cooked some microwave popcorn last night. And some Lean Pockets the night before.

I decided to make my version of Arroz Con Pollo, Spanish chicken and rice. It required pan cooking frozen chicken breasts and adding canned tomatoes, peas, black beans, and chopped onion. I poured water into a pot and started the yellow rice. Dinner would be ready in twenty-five minutes. I called Mark to make sure he would be home on time. Nothing made me more irritated than to cook dinner and not have anyone there to appreciate it. Yes, the girls would be there to eat it with me. I said “appreciate it.” Megan and Cassidy didn’t appreciate my cooking at all. There would be groans and whining and complaining. Mark would be the only one to say he enjoyed the food. In reality, I was cooking for him alone. If he wasn’t there to appreciate it I would be angry.

Mark answered his phone.

“Hey babe,” I greeted him. “I’m cooking dinner.”

There were sounds of gasps and amazement on the other end. I glared at the phone and uncharitably hoped that he really
was
having a heart attack.

“Are you going to be home at six?” I asked, annoyed.

“And miss seeing a modern miracle?” He was still using an awed voice.

I stuck my tongue out. “Are you going to be home at six?”

“I wouldn’t miss it, babe,” he assured me. “I always try to be on time for special occasions.”

I made a face and then had to laugh. He was right, and funny. “Love you.”

“Love you too!”

Megan and Cassidy wandered in to the kitchen. “What for dinner?” Cassidy asked.

“Chicken and rice.”

Cassidy watched Megan’s face carefully. I knew that she was waiting to see what Megan’s reaction would be before having one of her own. Megan was quick to make a face and say, “Chicken and rice! Yuck!”

Cassidy’s face wrinkled up in mirror image. “Yuck!” she said. “No like.”

“You do like it,” I said, stirring the chicken so it wouldn’t burn and stick to the bottom of the pan.

“Ugh!” Megan said loudly. “Why can’t we have something good for dinner?”

I gave her the evil eye. “We
are
having something good for dinner. You’ve had it before and you like it.”

Cassidy shook her head. “No like.”

I rolled my eyes. “The last time we had this you said you liked it.” Of course, that was at least a couple of months ago and I knew that their likes and dislikes could change by the hour.

“I want pizza,” Megan announced.

“Pizza!” Cassidy was in favor of that idea.

“No pizza,” I said firmly. “We’re having chicken and rice.”

Megan fell to the floor moaning. “I won’t eat it!” she cried. “I’ll just stay in my room and starve!”

Cassidy joined her on the floor. “No eat, no eat!”

I pointed the spoon at them, “You can both get your little butts off the floor and go clean your room, or I’ll give you something to cry about!”

They decided that cleaning their room was a good idea. Smart. Very smart. Dinner was ready quickly and I started to set the table, keeping one eye on the wall clock. It was five ‘till six and Mark wasn’t home yet. He said six, but did he mean it?

At six on the dot the table was set and I started dishing out the food into bowls. The girls’ would need to cool off a bit before they could eat it. I added picante and hot sauce to the table and poured water into the glasses. Still no Mark. I told the girls to go wash their hands and then come to the table.

We all sat down and stared at our plates. Steam was rising from the hot rice. “I hungry,” Cassy announced.

“I know, honey, we’re just waiting for Daddy.”

“Where is Daddy?” Megan asked.

I was very tempted to say that Daddy was inconsiderate and rude and late, but I didn’t. “He’s working. He’ll be here any minute,” I assured her.

Five more minutes passed. The girls were starting to squirm and the steam was no longer visible. I sighed and picked up my phone. “Where are you?” I texted and waited. Seconds later my phone beeped.