A Local Habitation

“Oh,” he said. He didn’t sound disappointed; in fact, he sounded pleased. Not a good sign.

The hotel was coming into view up ahead, and I turned toward it, angling toward the promise of material comfort. The idea of a bed—any bed—was suddenly compelling.

“I am so ready for bed,” I muttered.

Quentin glanced at me. “The Duchess asked me to pass you a message.”

“Oh? What’s that?”

“She says, ‘try to get some sleep, and have anything you want off the room service menu if it means you’ll actually eat.’ ”

That was Luna, all right. I grinned. Sometimes having a collection of surrogate mothers can come in handy—between Luna, Lily, and Stacy, I was almost starting to eat regularly.

“Cool,” I said. “You need anything before bed?”

“No. Wait—what time is it? I promised Katie I’d call.”

“Almost nine. Calling Katie, huh? You sure you’re not going to call Terrie instead?”

Even in the dim light of the car, I saw him redden. “Katie’s my girlfriend.”

“So you were flirting with Terrie, why?”

“I . . . I don’t know. She was cute, and I was bored.” His blush got worse. “It didn’t mean anything.”

“Uh-huh.” I busied myself with pulling into the hotel parking lot and looking for a space.

Unbidden, another fact rose to my mind: Alex was definitely cute. I paused. That wasn’t a thought I needed to have, especially not when I’d just been scolding Quentin for thinking the same about Alex’s sister. But it was also a thought that didn’t involve Connor, or Cliff, and I needed to move on to someone who was neither married nor mortal. Really, who was it hurting? I scolded Quentin because of the age difference. Alex and I didn’t have that problem, unless he was a lot older than he looked.

I don’t usually move that fast. Devin was my first lover, and I was with him for years before I left him for Cliff. The only person I’d so much as looked at since then was Connor, and he and I started flirting when I was still living under Amandine’s roof. I don’t get crushes. It’s not my style. Still, it could be time for a change—and something was telling me Alex would be the perfect change of pace. So what if it was unexpected? That made it more appropriate. Out with the old, in with the new.

Quentin was silent, lost in his own thoughts. Probably thinking about how he was going to explain his sudden absence to Katie. Maybe we’d get lucky, and the only thing wrong at ALH would turn out to be some sort of computer error . . . but somehow, I didn’t think so.

Whatever it was, I had to hope it was something we could handle on our own. Sylvester would never have sent me with nothing but a half-grown fosterling for reinforcements if he thought we’d be in any real danger. Right?





SEVEN



MELLY ANSWERED ON THE THIRD RING. “Shadowed Hills, how can I help you?” Her voice was broad, accented with the sort of jolly American drawl that thrived in the middle of the country about two hundred years ago. I’ve known Melly since I was a kid—she’s Kerry’s mother, and she used to sneak us sweets from the kitchen at Shadowed Hills—and just the sound of her was enough to relax me.

“Hey, Melly. Sylvester around?”

“Toby! How are you, darling? Did Himself really ship you off to Tamed Lightning with naught but a foster to keep you company?”

“Quentin’s not so bad.” Quentin was presently being “not so bad” in his own room, where he was hopefully going to get some sleep. ALH seemed to operate on a diurnal schedule, and we were going to be clocking a lot of daylight hours before we went home. “Put the boss on? I’ve got an update for him.”

“You’ll visit soon?”

“I will.”

“All right, then. Hold on a second.”