It all clicked in my head, like a stack of thick dominos toppling.
“The crab claw.” I turned to Jean. “It ate the crab.”
“The ghoul is the crab?”
“Maybe. Probably. It was chewing on that crab claw. I think the ghoul turned into a crab and scuttled to safety right in front of our noses.”
“Well, hell,” Jean said.
Odin clapped, and the sound ricocheted like thunder in the metal building. “I’ll leave you two capable Reeds to it. Find my thief. I’d very much like to meet them.”
The way he said ‘meet them’ sounded more like ‘punch them in the face repeatedly.’
“We’ll keep you in the loop.”
He walked out of the building.
“I’ll wait for you out there,” Hogan told Jean, and followed Odin into the fresh air.
“Want me to call Myra and tell her about the ghoul situation?” Jean asked.
“I’ll tell her.” I walked around the car, looking in the windows. “Pop the trunk, will you?”
Jean reached under the dash to pull the trunk release lever. I pulled up the trunk lid and stared into the empty cavity. Nothing in there except clean black carpet. Not even a spare tire or jack.
“It’s normal, you know,” she said.
“What’s normal?” I tipped my head side to side to relieve the tension in my neck.
“Ryder getting cold feet about the wedding.”
I sighed and wondered if I came back in another life, if could request a sister who didn’t stick her nose in my love life.
“Ryder’s not getting cold feet about the wedding.”
She turned and thumped against the car, her arms crossed over her chest. “Well, I know it can’t be you,” she said. “You’re not actually screwing up your wedding to the man you love. That’s not what you’re doing, Delaney? Right?”
I flipped back the corners of the carpet, then folded it in half toward the middle. Nothing but metal. I flipped that back down and folded the carpet the other way.
“It’s not that I don’t…” I leaned into the trunk. Something was caught in the back corner. Just a small brown strip of…cardboard?
“Because I have not waited practically my whole life for the two of you to finally get married just to have you chicken out…”
I ignored her and carefully tugged on the cardboard. It came loose in one piece. I turned it to the other side.
Half of a red ink circle was stamped on it.
“Jean.”
“…like I’m expecting a niece or nephew one of these days, but at least do yourself a favor...”
“Jean,” I said a little louder.
“…he’s been waiting a long time for you too, you know…”
“Jean.”
“What?”
