“Calling my mother.”
She stopped rubbing lotion onto her shapely legs. “Why?”
“Yeah. Hi, Mom,” Nick said when his mother’s voice mail picked up. “I’ve changed my mind. Riley and I will be over for dinner tomorrow night. I can’t wait for everyone to meet her.” He disconnected and crossed his arms. “Happy now?”
“No! Why would you do that? Your mom already thinks I’m a disheveled, sweaty mess. AndthenI accidentally read her mind, which she did not like at all.”
He advanced on her until she was pinned up against the vanity. “I didn’t tell them about you for two reasons. One, they were on a month-long cruise when we met and got shot. And two, my family is a bunch of weirdos.”
Riley placed a hand on his chest. “We just had a silent fast at my parents’ house last night, and this morning my grandmother poked me with a walking stick until I fell on the ground. There’s no way your family could possibly be weirder.”
“Baby, tomorrow night you’ll see how that’s possible.”
He dipped his fingers into the space between her breasts. “Now, tell me why you were roaming all over the East and West Shores and where the hell you left your Jeep.”
“I was with Kellen,” she said.
“Yeah. I got that much from my mother.”
“Get ready to raise the weirdo bar then,” she grumbled. “I had a vision during my grandmother’s Psychic Hunger Games this morning. I made the connection to another possible victim.”
She filled him in while she brushed her wet hair and pouted over the flecks of glitter sparkling on her skin.
“That’s impressive, Thorn.” He reached into her cleavage and released the towel to the floor.
“Uh. Thanks?”
“So where’s your Jeep?” His hands skimmed over her naked hips, and her eyelids went heavy.
“Oh. I kind of left it in the middle of a human stampede on Green Street.”
He chuckled and enjoyed the feel of goose bumps as they cropped up on her skin where he touched her. “Of course you did.”
“Help me get it later?” she asked, wetting her lips.
“Anything for you, Thorn.” He kissed her and breathed in her sigh of surrender like it was oxygen. His hands had just begun their journey higher when a loud screech interrupted them.
“Santiago, the po-po is here to see you,” Mrs. Penny’s artificially amplified voice rattled the door.
He dropped his forehead to Riley’s. “Who gave that woman a bullhorn?”
“She bought it on eBay to protest whales.”
On a sigh, Nick re-wrapped Riley and stomped into the hall. He looked down the stairwell to the first floor and spotted Mrs. Penny standing at the foot of the stairs.
“Thanks for the message,” he yelled dryly.
“You’re welcome,” she announced through the bullhorn.
Riley appeared next to him in a bathrobe. “Is she dressed like a mime?”
Mrs. Penny was indeed dressed as a mime with a black and white striped shirt, a beret, and white face paint. Nick sighed. He was going to have to go over the definition of “invisible” again.
Weber stepped into view. He held out his hand to the elderly mime. Mrs. Penny reluctantly handed over the bullhorn.
“Don’t get bacon grease on it,” she said.
“Get some clothes on, Thorn. We’ve got work to do,” Weber said into the bullhorn.
