I watched him for a minute, trying to figure out what he wasn’t telling me. But since Crow was a trickster as a god and also as a god on vacation, I had a bad feeling there were plenty of things he wasn’t telling me.
Chapter Two
The diner smelledlike grilled meat, french fries, salt, and rich, buttery caramel.
The place was packed, and the rise and fall of voices overtook Hall and Oats singing about how they can’t go for that.
I stood just inside the doorway and scanned tables and booths, noting faces I recognized and a few I didn’t. The mix of truckers, tourists, and families made the place feel cozy.
Four people sat at the curved corner booth: Two women, two men, one man with gray hair, the rest younger, maybe in their thirties, a mix of light and darker skin. They didn’t look related. Friends? Tourists?
They drew my attention. Not because they were doing anything to draw notice, but because they were doing the exact opposite.
While the rest of the place was laughing, making noise, they were all silent, quietly drinking coffee, eating desserts, and very carefully not looking my way.
The silence, the almost robotic movements, pinged my radar and made me want to keep an eye on them.
“Delaney?” Ahead of me, Crow spun on his heel, momentarily pausing in following the waitress to an open booth by the window. “You coming?”
I nodded and sat across from him, taking the side of the table that gave me a clear line of sight to the corner booth.
The waitress, short, plump, with the most gorgeous brown eyes I’d ever seen, was a new hire I hadn’t met before. Her name tag said Maria, and there was a winky-face drawn beside her name.
She put two menus down for Crow and me, then got busy filling water glasses.
“I’ll give you a minute unless you know what you want?” She paused, her pen poised over a small order book.
“Yeah,” Crow said, “I want—”
“Give us a minute to check the menu, Maria? Thank you,” I said over the top of Crow.
“Sure, sure. I’ll be back in a shake.”
She bopped over to the other tables, water pitcher in her hand.
“They’ve never changed this menu,” Crow said. “Do you really think there’s something on the menu you haven’t seen?” He picked one up and flicked something off the laminated surface, then put it down, already bored.
“All the same pies. All the same eggs and bacon and burgers. All the same everythings.” He folded his fingers together, propped elbows on the table, and rested his chin. “You look tense. Why are you tense? I said I’d buy. Lunchanddessert, since I am your favorite uncle.”
“Do you notice anything weird about those people in the corner booth?”
“They’re quiet?”
I hummed, which made him look a little closer.
“Does that seem out of place to you?” I asked.
He settled back in his seat. “Not really. Humans behave in a lot of different ways. There are reasons for groups to be quiet. This is more of your paranoia isn’t it?”
“I am the chief of police, you know.”
“So...is that a yes?”
I raised one eyebrow.
“It’s okay,” he said, “I gotcha, Boo. Tell Uncle Crow everything that he totally won’t use to rat you out in a memoir which will make him rich and famous.”
I shook my head. “Lunch better be fan-fuckin’-tastic,” I grumbled.
