Before long, they were back in front of Bean There, Done That, now dark. “Will you text me when you get home?” he asked.
“Only if you do.”
“Wouldn’t want either one of us to get fired,” he added. Gods below, all he really wanted to do was lean across the center console and kiss her.
“It would be a shame,” she said quietly. After a moment, she shook her head, and then said, “Good night, Taliesin.”
Chapter Sixteen
The next day, Maggie lifted a pile of Dahlia’s rune-covered scraps of paper off Jim’s desk chair and scooted the chair to sit across from her. Dahlia was, almost literally, buried beneath the grading on her desk, which threatened to topple over at any minute.
“Next year, let’s find jobs with teaching assistants and graders,” Dahlia muttered.
“Deal,” Maggie said, knowing very well that they would not be looking for new jobs. Maggie gingerly set a bag containing one of the Bean There, Done That pastries on the top of Dahlia’s towering pile of papers.
“What’s that?” Dahlia asked with her eyes narrowed in suspicion.
“Just bringing my friend some breakfast,” Maggie said with a certain nonchalance that she knew Dahlia would see through immediately.
“You barely remember to feed yourself breakfast.”
“Fine. It’s an apology pastry,” Maggie admitted.
Dahlia tore off a piece of flaky croissant. “What did you do? Is Maggie Linden going to finally live up to her troublemaker reputation?”
Only Dahlia could joke about what happened to Maggieafter her ex blew up their relationship and her career at Bryn Ridge and make her laugh. It was one of the things that Maggie loved about her.
Maggie took a deep breath and braced herself. She knew exactly the kind of reaction she was going to get when she revealed why she owed her friend an apology pastry. “I had coffee with Arthur Taliesin last night.”
Dahlia sat up straight, shaking the crumbs off her hands over the pastry bag, and squealed before scooting her chair around the desk. “Coffeecoffee?” she asked.
“I don’t know what that means,” Maggie lied.
“You are a linguist; you absolutely know what I mean by a little reduplication. Coffee coffee,” she repeated. “Was itcoffee? Or was itcoffee coffee?”
“It was a working coffee.” She swore that Dahlia’s face fell slightly. Did she want her to go on a coffee date with Taliesin? “I offered to help him dissipate the pall.”
Dahlia took another bite of croissant and looked at her thoughtfully, but all she said was, “Interesting.”
“What doesthatmean?”
“It means it’s interesting! I’m frankly surprised he was willing to accept your help.”
Maggie bit her lip. “Well,” she said, pausing. “I might have threatened to investigate the pall by myself if he didn’t let me help.”
Dahlia shoved Maggie playfully. “See! Interesting. When did this happen?”
Maggie cringed. “Last Friday,” she muttered, and Dahlia gasped.
“So that’s what the apology croissant is for.” She dragged the bag back into her lap, an exaggerated pout on her lips. “I can’t believe you waited so long to tell me.”
“I’m sorry! I’ve been trying to come tell you, but I kept missing you.” She knew Dahlia would be distracted by the details, so she told her about Taliesin showing up in their office near death after spending the entire day trying to dissipate the pall on his own.
“The entire day? Was he trying to kill himself?”
Maggie shrugged. “I asked him what he had against help, and he said he didn’t want anyone else getting hurt.”Least of all you. The words were burned in Maggie’s memory, but even though she wasn’t in the habit of lying to Dahlia, there were some things that she still wanted to keep for herself. “And I figure the sooner we get rid of this damn pall, the sooner I get him out of my office. The sooner I can get to working on my translation ofBranagh’s Aubade.”
“So, you—and I just want to make sure I’m understanding exactly how this happened—threatened to put yourself in harm’s way if he didn’t let you help him?” When Dahlia worded it that way, it sounded ridiculous.
