“For someone who doesn’t care for birthdays, you sure are hanging on to that with both hands,” she observed.
“This is my first birthday with you. It’s already the best.”
“Violent criminals broke into our house, drugged your entire birthday party, and tried to kill us both last night. I think you set the bar too low,” Riley teased.
“Still the best,” he insisted.
“Come on,” she said, pressing a noisy kiss to his cheek. “I’ll make you a birthday pot of coffee, and you can watch me shovel garbage out the front door.”
“Oh no, you don’t, Thorn. You’ve earned some time off. I had a lot of time to think when I was locked in my office last night,” Nick said as he got out of bed and dragged on a pair of sweatpants.
“What did you think about?” she asked, reaching for the closest sweatshirt. It was Jim’s that she had yet to return. Nick snatched it out of her grasp and handed her one of his Santiago Investigations hoodies.
She hid her smile as she pulled it over her head.
“I thought about how if I had just fixed the pocket door and scraped the paint off the window sills like I said I would, you wouldn’t have been able to lock me in there.”
“Ahh. Good old consequences,” she said when they started for the stairs.
“I’m done obsessing.” He slung an arm over her shoulders. “It’s time to focus on making this place our home. On growing our business.”
“On finding our missing dog,” she suggested.
“On spending some alone time with you,” he said as they hit the staircase.
“On figuring out what demon is living in the Creepy, Smelly Closet.”
Nick yawned. “Speaking of closets, last night you mentioned something about a parolee.”
“Yeah,” she said, drawing out the word. “I forgot to tell you. Christian Blight says hi.”
Nick stopped so abruptly on the stairs that she almost lost her footing.
“What?”
“Shaved head? Neck tattoos? He made it sound like you knew him.”
“I do know him. How doyouknow him?” he demanded.
“Uncle Royce was trying to slice me to ribbons, but Christian knocked him out cold with a guitar and cut the tape off me.”
“Christian Blight? Fresh out of prison? Hideously ugly and born to piss me off?”
“I don’t think he was hideously ugly. But maybe that’s because I have a thing for Batman,” Riley teased, tugging Nick into motion.
“Filing that away for future reference,” he said. “Why in the hell would he save you? He hates me.”
“Apparently I’m family.”
Nick froze again, and she laughed. “Not literally. He just considers me family since I got his niece’s bully arrested for arson. Technically there’s a possibility he’s related to Mrs. Penny.”
“You’ve got to be shitting me.”
“Surprise!”
They both froze on the next to last step to find Riley’s parents, Wander and Gabe, and Josie and Brian all lounging around eating cake in the sparkling-clean foyer. Burt was sprawled out on Mrs. Penny’s Cleopatra bed that had been pushed up against the wall outside the living room.
“What’s going on?” Riley asked, looking everywhere for signs of last night’s debauchery.
