Mina patted Marius’s leg, like he’d made a sweet gesture instead of a murderous threat. But brutal, bloody vengeance appealed to me too.
“Would a really bad joke help?” Bene ventured quietly.
“No,” Marius muttered.
Mina smiled. “Yes, please.”
“A dragon, a tiger, and a lion walk into a bar…”
Mina and I smiled, while Roux and Marius groaned. Henrik shook his head in disgust.
“The lion asks for a Johnnie Walker,” Bene started. “The dragon orders a vodka. The tiger only wants water, and the bartender says, ‘Don’t you want something with more bite?’”
Everyone groaned, and Roux swirled the liquid in his glass. “This is rum, for the record.”
“Okay, okay. Second try,” Bene announced.
I couldn’t wait, but Marius made a cutting motion with his hands.
“No need to make a bad day worse,” Henrik sniffed.
But Bene plowed on. “A dragon, a tiger, and a lion walk into a bar…”
“No vampire?” Henrik grumbled.
“No, because this is funny. Now, listen,” Bene chided. “The bartender is a witch, and she says, ‘I’ll add a little something to your drinks. As a result, you,’ she says to the dragon, ‘get a brain.’”
Marius shot Bene a dangerous look, but he went on, unperturbed.
“‘You,’ she tells the tiger, ‘get a sense of humor.’”
Roux rolled his eyes as Bene plowed on.
“‘And you,’ she says to the lion, ‘get drinks on the house. You’re gonna need it with this crew.’”
I chuckled. It didn’t take a brilliant joke to lift my spirits at this point.
Marius rolled his eyes. “I’m the one who needs the free drinks.”
Bene shook his head. “Greedy, greedy. You already have Mina.”
Huh. Did I sense a touch of yearning there? Not for Mina, perhaps, but for someone to call his own?
Marius grinned from ear to ear. “True.”
“I deserve the free drinks,” Roux insisted.
“No, I do,” Bene shot back.
Mina stuck up her hands, cutting them off. “Oh no. No fighting. Not tonight.”
They quieted instantly. Obviously, Mina’s experience in disciplining unruly middle schoolers applied here too. A parallel I didn’t think the guys would appreciate, so I kept it to myself.
I opened my sketchbook and gripped my pencil, ready to take notes. Notes and doodles always helped me focus. And boy, did I need that now.
“We have to try to make sense of what’s happened,” Mina went on. “Who killed Claudette? Why? Is that related to the attack on Gen and Roux?”
Everyone mulled that over, sipping drinks or staring into the crackling fire.
