Keeping it polite, I smiled. “I’m sure the same could be said for my hometown.”
“I would rather donate my eyes to science today than give this up.” His mouth flattened. “But I’m sure it’s great. There’s got to be something decent there to keep Linus’s attention.” He wiped a hand across his mouth. “I’m going to stop there. Trust me, it’s for the best.”
A booming feminine voice rang out from the back, and a woman who appeared to be in her late fifties power-walked into the office I had vacated. A well-preserved sixty-seven indeed. She waved Linus and me in, then shut the door in Oslo’s face before he could join us.
“This is her?” she demanded. “You can’t be serious, Doodlebug. Sneeze, and she’ll blow away.”
“Why is it open season on my weight?” I folded my jacket over my chest and the boobs that required no bra to fight gravity. “Trust me. I miss my curves. I’m working hard to get them back.”
“Curves don’t vanish,” she scoffed, indicating her rounded hips. “Trust me. I’ve fad dieted off and on for four hundred years.”
“Maybe you should try prison.” Chin up, I sank into the chair across from hers. “It worked wonders on me.”
“Shit,” Mary Alice snarled at Linus. “This isn’t just—” she made air quotes, “—a friend who needs help.”
“I never said—” he began.
“This is Grier Motherfucking Woolworth.” She shoved him hard in the chest. “Do you know what a hot-ticket item she is right now? Word on the street is there’s a bounty on her head that would buy me this whole block.”
Dizziness settled around me as the blood drained from my head. “Since when?”
“Yesterday.” Her frown sliced through me. “I had no idea Doodlebug brought you here. I’m guessing that’s the only reason you’re still alive. Not many would square off with the potentate in his own city. All bets are off once you leave, though. I hope you’ve got someplace safe to go.”
“Can you get us transportation?” Linus pressed. “Nothing fancy. A van or SUV if you’ve got one.”
Huffing out a sigh like he’d asked for her firstborn grandchild, she snagged a pair of keys off a hook by the door. “Take my ride. There are spare plates in the trunk. Folks might be looking for an Atlanta tag.”
“Thanks.” He bent and kissed her cheek as he accepted the keys. “I’ll have it returned to you Monday.”
“You do that.” She straightened his collar. “You sure this girl’s worth the trouble?”
“I’m sitting right here.” I waved at her in case her eyes had gone bad. “Can you not talk over me?”
Mary Alice continued ignoring me. “Well? Is she?”
“Yes,” he said without hesitation.
“All guys think that right before the truth smacks them between the eyes.” She flicked a dismissive glance my way. “That wraithlike waistline won’t last forever. The looks won’t keep either. There’s no good reason for a kid your age to settle down. Let alone with this one. She’s going to get you killed or end up dead herself. Still think she’s worth it?”
My gaze clashed with his, black and endless, and held longer than a simple yes or no required.
“Yes,” he told her, his voice raw in a way I had never heard from him.
“She gets it, okay?” Mary Alice plonked down behind her desk. “You’re willing to sacrifice your life for hers. Blah, blah, romantic sentiments, blah, blah, death wish, blah. We got it.” Her scowl carved her wrinkles even deeper. “Take care of yourself. Don’t make me give up your chair, okay?”
“I earned that chair.” Lips twitching, he cut his eyes to her. “I don’t want anyone else using it until I get back.”
Mary Alice grunted and settled in to start filing her nails. “Every day it sits empty is a day I lose money.”
Linus studied the ceiling like he might find patience there. “We’ll talk about my return later.”
“If there is a later,” she grumbled, dismissing us.
Linus helped me to my feet then showed me through the emergency exit into the alley that ran behind the building. The air stank of old cigarettes, and I wondered why no one had suggested Mary Alice switch to vaping since the hookah-smoking caterpillar was an iconic Alice character.
We started walking toward a parking deck a block down, our footsteps the only sounds. The booth was unmanned at this hour, our trek up the incline to the second level uncontested. Flickering lights gave the concrete tomb an eerie effect, and I stuck close to Linus as we searched the short row of marked spaces labeled for Tatter employees.
A throaty rumble echoed through the deck, reverberating in my bones, and my ankle buckled. Tiny hairs lifted down my nape in a warning prickle, the skin between my shoulder blades itching as I regained my balance. “You heard that too, right?”
“Keep walking,” he said, soft and calm. “Pretend nothing is wrong.”
Clicking sounds, like claws on concrete, came from all directions.
“Where’s Cletus?” I scanned the cavernous space for wisps of black more alert than all the rest.
“The garage is warded.” Linus held his laser focus. “I can break them, but it takes time we don’t have. I keep them muted while I’m home, but I didn’t bother for such a short trip.”
“Okay.” So, we were on our own.
“Mary Alice drives a silver Dodge Grand Caravan,” Linus said, attempting to distract me. “There are stickers all over the back from her grandkids’ schools and activities.”
“Okay.” The row assigned to Tatter employees wasn’t that long, and I wasn’t seeing any van, but I was hearing steady panting. “Any local warg packs?”
“Yes.” Reaching back, he took my hand and hauled me behind him. “Three, actually.”
“Okay.” Me and my big mouth. “New topic.”
He cast a glance back at me, an unreadable expression sharpening his features, but then he set his jaw.
Woof.
The single huff got picked up into a song that echoed all around, converging on our location.
“We’re not going to make it,” I said, jerking on his hand. There was no point in pretending. “We need to lock ourselves in a warded circle and find out what we’re up against.”
“We don’t have time for that.” Linus scowled at the rows of vehicles fanning in all directions, none of them the silver van we had been promised. “They’ll be on us the second we stop moving.”
“I used a protective sigil on Oscar that night aboard the Cora Ann. It held the dybbuk at bay. Would that work?” I started fishing in my bag for my pen. “We could swipe those on and then risk stopping to draw a circle?”
“It’s worth a try.” He angled us toward a covered stairwell. “This ought to hold them long enough to give us a fighting chance.”
No hands meant they either had to shift to open the door or smash it down with brute strength.
Three heartbeats later, Linus and I stood on the third-floor landing, and the dull thud of flesh against metal told us which option our pursuers had chosen. I wasted no time drawing the rune on top of his hand. Once I finished with him, I did the same for myself.
The wards we’d used to trap the dybbuk had been his work, and I wasn’t certain I could replicate those from memory, but I had a brush and ink. I could follow his lead. We could tag team again. He could start the wards while I acted as a distraction.
“Keep moving.” He led me out into the parking deck once more. “We don’t want to get trapped in the stairwell if they break through before we can finish.” He froze when I pressed my ink pot, made with Maud’s blood, and a brush into his hands. “What are you—?”
“You need time. Find an out-of-the-way corner and start working. I’ll jog around the first two rows and lay a false scent trail to distract them when they get up here.”
Linus strained forward, the urge to snatch me back to him twitching in his fingers, but he forced a nod, his knuckles tightening around the supplies I’d given him. “Be quick, and be careful.”