We all looked over at Old Rossi. This was his call, his choice to out everyone in the town, to pull another agency into Ordinary and make some kind of tolerance deal with them.
“No,” he lied smoothly.
I guess that was the answer as to how well Rossi trusted the agency Ryder worked for.
My front door swung open and Crow sauntered in with a box of donuts from the Puffin Muffin. “I’m back! What did I miss? Did we tell Ryder there are gods in town yet?”
Silence.
Then Jean burst out laughing.
Ryder didn’t react to any of it. He just sipped coffee and watched each of us in turn. Finally, his gaze rested on me.
I could see the question there.
I rolled my eyes to tell him Crow was just joking. And crazy. Or both joking and crazy. And possibly dead after I got my hands on him. Crazy dead. No joke.
He narrowed his eyes, didn’t believe me.
Holy crap.
I looked over at Myra since Jean’s hooting was winding down.
Myra seemed to be weighing the consequences of telling Ryder the truth.
Mithra wanted Ryder there when I negotiated for the return of the god powers. Crow had just paved the way for me to tell him that yes, gods were real and he’d known dozens of them for most of his life and oh, hey, would he like to go with me to talk to one who had a beef with our town, and my family in particular, before those gods got really mad at me for letting their powers be burgled by a waitress?
“I can make him forget,” Rossi said as if he were offering to order pizza without olives.
“No.” Ryder didn’t deserve to have a vampire messing with his memories. He was innocent in Sven’s death and not the bad guy here. Sure, he’d lied about working for the secret government agency, but he claimed his agency was part of the good guys.
Right now all I wanted was to get rid of the bad guys. To do that, I’d have to find them.
Or let the old and very crafty vampire bend some of the town’s laws so he could find them.
No. It was never a good idea to break Ordinary’s rules.
“Ryder, would you do me a favor and step outside for a couple minutes? I need to discuss a few things with my sisters, Crow, and Rossi.”
The man knew when he was outnumbered. “All right. Let me know when you’ve taken the vote on whether you should just tell me everything or not.” He took his cup with him, palmed two donuts from the box Crow was holding open, then stepped outside.
“What. The. Hell. Crow?” I wanted to hit him, but he was wisely standing on the other side of the couch beyond my reach.
Jean hit him for me instead.
What were sisters for?
“You couldn’t keep your mouth shut?” Myra rubbed at her temples. She didn’t sound angry so much as just mildly disappointed. Yeah, we’d all grown up with Crow as more-or-less our uncle. If there was a pot to be stirred or trouble to start, Crow was for it one-billion percent. We expected that.
But, damn he had bad timing.
“Just because I’m Native I should be seen and not heard? Way to marginalize the Native voices.” He tried to sound offended but the huge grin was sort of a give away.
“Why?” I asked. “Why did you do that?”
“If Ryder’s going to know about the creatures in town, he might as well know about the gods. No one wants to have the Band-Aid ripped off twice. Donut?” He pushed the box out toward Jean who plucked up a maple bar.
“Really?” I asked her.
