“But itisbias to assume thateveryparasite is out to kill, when the truth is that most take energy in non-life-threatening quantities, from volunteer donors.”
My scowl deepened. “That has not been my personal experience.”
“Thus the bias.” Lacey spun on his stool to face me. “Look, your utter lack of faith in humanity is definitely part of your charm, but—”
“Parasites are not human.”
“—but,” he continued. “Just for variety’s sake, maybe you should avoid pulling a gun on the customers until they’ve actually proven themselves dangerous.”
I arched both brows at him. “By then, it could be too late.”
Lacey sighed, his soldering iron held loosely in one hand.
“Did you…?” I frowned as my gaze skimmed the right half of the workroom. “Did you clean my space?”
He shrugged. “You’d amassed enough Twinkie wrappers to paper the room in them.”
I squatted next to the safe built into the floor and set the cash-filled envelope next to my left boot.
“You were supposed to lock that up last night,” Lacey said.
“Bite me.”
He chuckled, and I couldn’t resist a smile of my own.He onlylookslike a kid, I reminded myself for the thousandth time as I twisted the dial to input the first number of the combination. But the reminder did no good; when I looked at him, I still saw the twelve-year-old I’d hired fifteen years ago to repair phones and TVs after school. In part, that was because at twenty-seven, he still looked eighteen.
From puberty on, gremlins age slower than humans. They’re the late developers in every junior high gym class. The thirty-year-olds who get carded at R-rated movies. At a glance, he and Lori would have made a nice couple. But then, at a glance, I look sweet, and feminine, and delicate.
Appearances aren’t everything.
Lacey’s laughter faded into a familiar, comfortable silence as I dialed in the second number. “Anything new?” I asked.
“Nope.” He pressed a button on a pill speaker he’d found in the alley and repaired for fun, and rap music pounded, streaming through his phone from some app that made little sense to me. “And it’s a good thing, since you’re going to be busy with that new job for a while.”
I glared up at him until he lowered the volume. “What gave it away?”
“You’re wearing your traveling shoes, and you only travel for business.”
I glanced down at my most comfortable pair of black boots—low, leather tops, steel-reinforced toes, and cool-gel-padded soles—and couldn’t help but smile. Lacey was one of a kind, and I was lucky to have him, especially with all the other, higher-paying mechanical and technical jobs available for a talented gremlin with a good work ethic. Fortunately for me, Lacey liked my office hours. Or maybe it was the casual-to-grungy dress code, which he was exploiting today with a grease-stained T-shirt and a pair of ripped, baggy jeans that pooled on the floor around his sneakers, because he couldn’t find any short enough to actually fit him.
Hundreds of years ago, gremlins utilized their talents in intricate wood working and sculpting, but as technology progressed, they were right there on the cusp of change, leading the way for humans to follow. Historically, gremlins were vital to the emerging field of mechanics and had their dexterous fingers in every technological pie from the development of the automobile to the design and construction of automatic weapons. Later, when electronics surged to the forefront of innovation, several closet-gremlins were lauded as the fathers/founders of the computer industry and they’ve remained active in cutting edge research and development.
Despite Lacey’s considerable skill, he had no desire to work for a large tech or engineering company. He was happy keeping my car and weapons working and fixing the occasional old television set. And I was happy to let him do it.
While my only employee hummed along with the streaming rap music he played to drive me nuts, I spun the lock dial to the final number. The combination was the date of my death, with the numbers reversed. The three-inch thick door swung open, and I dropped the envelope on top of a partially disassembled handgun, one of Lacey’s works in progress. Which reminded me of the new toy I’d planned to buy. Alas, my gadget shopping spree would have to wait until I’d finished Devich’s job. The key to my afterlife trumped night vision goggles any day of the week.
Behind me, Lacey’s stool creaked as he stood, and the familiar clink of glass against porcelain told me he was pouring a mug of coffee. Acting on impulse, I snatched the envelope back from the safe and peeled several one-hundred-dollar bills from the stack within. Then I replaced the payment and closed the door, giving it a rattle for good measure.
“Here,” Lacey said, and I glanced up as he set a steaming mug of coffee at my workstation.
“Thanks.” I pushed up from the floor and set the money on my cluttered work surface, then I took a sip from the mug as I settled onto my stool. The coffee was perfect, as usual. Lacey deserved a raise—but not this week. Not until I’d bought my new toy.
I set the mug over an old coffee ring on my large calendar/planner and pushed the small stack of cash toward him.
“What’s this?” He flipped through the bills, counting, as I’d always insisted he do. Even if the money came from me.
“Next week’s pay. I’m not sure how long this job will take.” Nor was I sure what would happen once Devich paid me, and I finally—hopefully—had the information I’d been trying to acquire for more than two centuries. If I did have to find a way to visit the Gatekeeper, I’d need to make long-term arrangements for Lacey and the business, just in case.
“Oh. Thanks.” Standing, he slid the folded stack of hundreds into his hip pocket and headed back to the coffee pot to administer his own dose of caffeine. “So, you going to tell me about this new job, or am I going to have to root through your bag for clues?”
