“No. Nicole. Your mother.”
Just hearing her name again after all these years gave it sort of a charged quality. As if the echo of it, said so many times here in the house where I’d grown up, suddenly hummed out from the walls like a struck chime.
“I don’t remember charity tea parties.”
He made a smallhmmsound. “It was before you were born. Bertie was behind the organization of the event, but your mother took care of supplying the waitstaff, which I volunteered to be a part of, and the uniforms we would all wear.” He plucked at the hem of the apron as if it were proof of the event.
“She had originally told me it would be black slacks and shirts with plain black bibbed aprons, which I told her was boring. Then when she found out I was going to be hers to boss around for a few hours, suddenly there was chiffon and lace and lemon yellow puffiness everywhere.”
He smiled, a tiny flash of fang. “Since then, it just seems like the thing to wear when serving tea.”
Which brought me to my next question.
“Why are you serving me tea? I thought we were getting together to talk about how to track down Lavius and save Ben, not to reminisce over oolong.”
“For one thing, you don’t like oolong,” he said.
It was weird and nice that he knew that. He didn’t stop with his preparation, his movements practiced and graceful as if he had unpacked tea parties from banana boxes on a regular basis.
“For another thing, we are going to talk about our plans at the meeting later today. And for the last thing…” He paused, turned to me. His glacial blue eyes warmed, carrying the pain, the apology, the deep patience that only hundreds of years could create. But there was more in his gaze. Something that looked like affection. “I don’t think I’ve ever told you how much I care for you, Delaney. I’ve never had a child. A granddaughter.” He stopped, swallowed. It didn’t look like he knew how to go forward from there.
I nodded, unexpected tears prickling at the corners of my eyes. I heard him. Heard his caring, his kindness, and so much fondness for me and my family and my mixed-up life spent policing this town filled with gods and creatures and mortals and monsters, that it almost seemed like love.
No, it was exactly that: love.
“Great, great, great granddaughter, at least,” I said with a sort of croaky whisper.
He shook his head. “Well, yes. At least. So.” He waved a hand toward the living room behind me. “Sit down and let me pour you some tea.”
I smiled as he went back to his ritual, filling the pot with water, and doing something with the cups and saucers. Then I left the kitchen and curled up on the couch with the afghan my sister Myra had made for me. I waited for my tea.
I fell asleep instead.
~~~
“Who’s watching the shop?” I asked.
“Roy. Ryder,” Jean, my youngest sister, said while she pretended to pay really close attention to driving. We were winding down Jetty, the street that paralleled the Pacific Ocean and gave us glimpses of the stunningly blue water and sky. “And we all have our radios. If there’s police work that need to be done, we’ll get it done.”
“I don’t have a radio,” I complained.
She smiled sunnily. “No, you don’t, do you? And do you know why?”
I mumbled under my breath.
“Say it louder for the class, Delaney.”
“Because I got bit by a vampire. How many times do I have to say I’m sorry about that?”
“You don’t have to say you’re sorry. It wasn’t your fault. But youdohave to let your stunningly gorgeous little sister get you out of the house for some sunlight and fresh air. You also have to tell your stunningly gorgeous little sister thank you. And pay for her lunch.”
“And I’m doing this because…?”
“Because you want ice cream?”
Thor had finally given up on his rain-a-thon protest. It was warming up to the mid-seventies today, and was supposed to be ten degrees hotter tomorrow. Summer that had skipped the little beach town of Ordinary, Oregon was back on, full throttle.
Months and months of rain evaporated in rising columns of steam off the roads, roofs, and sidewalks, making the still air thick and sticky.
