“You three are a real treasure,” Gus said. “I was strolling through life without a care until I needed the Terminator to save my goofy brother. The roller coaster ride hasn’t stopped since then. We’ll have to enjoy the rest of the day and evening, because I have a feeling things will be getting complicated tomorrow. Any thoughts on the police angle, Nick? It was like the reporter said – every witness in the school had you at hero status. Jean, and Ms. Kader told Sergeant Dickerson exactly how it went down.”
“I’ll have to get back to you on that one, Gus. By the time I have my laptop open to ‘Assassin’s Folly’ and a nice boilermaker in front of me to sip with accompanying finger foods, I’m certain I will think of a plausible plan for tomorrow morning’s meeting.”
They arrived at the house a moment later. Rachel backed the Escalade into the remotely opened garage. She shut off the engine. “I’m starving too. I know this will get points docked off my Mother of the Year tally, but would veggies, dip, and the three bags of those little pizza snacks from the freezer do for a meal?”
“Yes!” Jean pumped her fist. “I love pizza snacks.”
“That does sound delightfully good,” Nick said. “I’ll help you get-”
“We’ll handle the food,” Gus interrupted. “You go upstairs and get situated on the balcony with that alter ego of yours, Diego. The rest of us will join you in short order. Take the boilermaker with you, but sip it until we get there.”
“Aye, aye, El Capitan,” Nick agreed. “I need to restock the balcony bar.”
“Can I have some wine and ginger ale?” Jean made the plea with hands clasped in prayer.
“Yep,” Rachel stated without hesitation. “After the day you went through, I think that’s an excellent treat.”
Chapter Five
Unfinished Business
Nick sipped his drink alone, laptop open, watching the inevitable fog bank roll in slowly over the darkening ocean. Deke lay next to him on his balcony bed. He knew overdoing the drinking would be a stupidly bad idea. The sky cast a gray foreboding stillness over everything. It wasn’t that overcast skies were a rare occurrence, because they actually represented the norm at dusk. It felt more like a chilling undercurrent affecting his thinking, rather than a physical deviance. Nick smiled. He never overlooked his sixth sense. Pieces fell into place in his mind, either assumed or anticipated. The Kader family wasn’t done with him yet. Tonight would bring a quick stab at his home if his intuition proved correct. Nick planned to be ready, whether it ever panned out or not. He began writing with an excited passion, warming to the scene his character Diego would be handling with cold hearted steadiness.
A half an hour later, Nick heard the laughing approach of his three companions. Deke jumped to his paws for a fervent doggy greeting. When the sliding door to their balcony opened, the dog leaped to his three familiar humans with anticipation. Gus served the tray of people food, while Rachel delivered their drinks. Jean placed a big bowl of mixed wet and dry food in front of Deke, who went right to work on it with gusto.
“How’s Diego doing?”
“He’s the scourge of Western Europe right now,” Nick answered. “I heard the phones melting down. I guess you shut them all off, huh?”
“Absolutely,” Rachel answered. “I doubt we’ll miss anything important. “We brought you a refill, but I see you have some will power and common sense. It’s another eerie fog roll in, and I’m sure you’ve been enjoying it.”
“You’re right,” Nick agreed. “I’m not stupid. I’ll sip a couple, but I have no intention of overdoing anything. I have thought over the police angle. They’ll be neutral, but pressured by the public. The public with brains watch the news, and think, oh yeah! The public tied into Islamic outrage will be pursuing the usual crap about being singled out as ‘murdering while Muslim’. They will be the vocal voice eating the police department’s ass.”
Nick grinned as his companions enjoyed the ‘murdering while Muslim’ remark. “See… I’m all over this. I’ll be fine tomorrow. I have my bandage, and I’ll play the heroic invalid card to the max. What the hell can they say if facts have any meaning? The only other outcome was to stand aside and let Saif murder his cousin in cold blood. Good Lord, these veggies taste great with the ranch dressing.”
Jean drank from her wine cooler as she dipped her small rectangular pizza snacks into the ranch dressing with visual enjoyment. “There’s sauce in the snacks. That’s a veggie, right?”
“You’d best be dipping the carrots, tomatoes, peppers, and olives into that dip, or I’ll cut your butt off from that wine cooler before you can blink,” Rachel cautioned.
“Fine!” Jean gulped down a bit more of her wine cooler, and began eating carrots and dip. “Hey… these are pretty good. Maybe I need to be drunk to eat my veggies.”
That comment got a laugh, but also a back of the head slap from Rachel. “There better be a lot more veggies going down than pizza snacks. We’re watching Nick’s favorite movie later: The Last Boy Scout. If you want to indulge in our buttered popcorn treat, eat the veggies.”
Nick perked up. “Really? I get to watch The Last Boy Scout in surround sound?”