This is the strangest place I’ve ever been.
As if he heard my thought, Wesley chuckles, presses a kiss to my temple, takes the cat carrier, and lets Nicole lead me further into the mansion.
29
Madison
Usually it takes people a whole interaction before they decide they don’t like me.
Eleanor, Nicole, and the mini horse lead me into the kitchen, and I try—and fail—not to audibly react to the splendor. But this is some serious Iron Chef shit, with gleaming stainless steel appliances and polished stone. The island lives up to its name—a large entity in the center of the room. I can see several half-started projects, with a flour-covered rolling pin, half-diced vegetables in piles on different cutting boards, and stainless steel bowls filled with shredded meat. It’s like being at Abuela’s for Christmas tamales, when all mytíaswould make an assembly line with stations for each phase of the labor-of-love process, and it smells so good that my stomach immediately starts growling.
I want to examine what’s on the stove, but Nicole leads me to a big glass table along the wall and sits me down. “I’m going to go get my kit.”
“It’s really just a scratch,” I protest.
“Yeah, but George probably drooled all over it, right?” Eleanor says, then starts cooing at the dog, “Yes you did, because you’re a big, dumb, slobbery sweetheart, yes you are.”
He pants back with a dog grin, a glob of said drool falling to the floor with a wet slap.
“Oh, maybe,” I say, though I’m sure soap and water would suffice.
“Better safe than sorry,” Nicole says before she disappears through the big French doors that lead out to a patio with what I assume is a covered pool. The mini horse follows her to the door, presses his nose against the glass and whines once, then settles into an enormous dog bed in the corner of the room.
I glance around, grappling for something to say. I’m not great with new people—especially when I’m not sure where to find common ground—but I want to try, since it seems like everyone in this house is so important to Wesley.
But Eleanor saves me from having to come up with the small talk, and it’s such a relief I could kiss her.
“I still can’t believe you’re the girl from the Rouge Elephant,” she says, shaking her head as she resumes what I assume was her position before all the hullabaloo—between the stove and island, in front of a large wooden cutting board with half-chopped stalks of celery.
“Small world,” I agree, thinking about how Wesley and I have lived so close all this time. “Do you guys still go to dinner there?”
The smile freezes on her lips. “Not so much anymore. It was our favorite restaurant for a while, but… something happened. Made it kind of hard to go back.”
“Someone spat in your food?”
She laughs, but there’s no humor in it. “I wish.” Just as I’m about to ask her to elaborate on that weird as hell comment, she gasps. “Oh my God, I love your nails!”
I look down and grin at the colorful designs. They needed a fill, like, last week, but I’ve had other priorities. “Thanks, I love my girl, Natasha. Want her info? She makes house calls.”
She casts a disparaging look at the tips of her own fingers. “As much as I wish I could be that girl with the cute nails, it never works for me. I’m too hard on them in the kitchen. The acrylic always pops off.”
I make a noise of commiseration. “You gotta try hard gel. The same thing used to happen to me since I type so much, but this stuff is great. I haven’t had one pop off in ages.”
Her eyebrows lift, and she reaches for her phone. “Hard gel, you said?” she asks, tapping like she’s looking it up or adding it to her notes app.
I grin and nod. “I can send you what she uses, if you want.”
“Oh!” she smiles brightly. “Yeah, once you get your phone back, definitely send it to me.”
I frown, confused, and lean forward to dig into my pocket, just in case she knows something I don’t because she sounds so sure. But, nope, my phone is still there, so I pull it out and show it to her. “Or I could do it now?”
She gapes. “They didn’t take your phone?”
I clutch it against my chest, an odd flare of panic rising. “Theycan try…”
Laughing at my reaction, she sets the knife aside and disappears behind the island for a second, reemerging with a large steel bowl that clangs loudly against the marble when she sets it down. “No, sorry, not like that. I meant they’d take it temporarily until everything blows over. It’s like a safety thing so no one can track you that way. They put mine in a little metal box and got me a new one. Nicole’s fared a bit worse,” she grimaces, then lowers her voice. “She said Dimitri threw it out the window of a moving car.”
“Oh,” I feel myself relax, then I chuckle. “Yeah, no one’s tracking me with this phone. No need for a Faraday box—that metal box they put yours in that blocks the signals,” I explain. “I added a whole bunch of goodies to it for my personal safety. Hazard of the job.”
