Her forehead creased for a moment, and then she shook her head. “No, Johnny just did the spell on it; the painting is David’s. He did another one in the garage. Here, come look.” She broke out in a sudden bright smile: still girlishly in love after twenty-five years.
I followed her back down the stairs to the sitting room just off the foyer; at the side of the room was a door that led to a roomy two-car garage. The Valiant was parked on the far side, but my eye lingered on it only for a moment before sweeping over the murals. Berenbaum had painted the whole place to look like a drive-in burger joint, complete with busty waitress on roller skates waiting expectantly by the Valiant’s driver’s--side door.
Carefully I made my way around Linda’s silver BMW and the long, angular nose of the Valiant to get a closer look at the waitress. She had red hair and a very short skirt. I glanced back at Linda, noting the resemblance, and she gave an embarrassed laugh. “Yeah,” was all she said.
“This stuff is great!”
“He does it when he’s high, usually. You know, off of fairy dust or whatever. He’s impossible to live with when he’s under the influence, so we started these projects to keep him busy when he didn’t have a film to obsess over.” Leaving the door to the house open, she moved absently to the shelving on the wall nearest the door. Various props from David’s films were intermingled modestly there with ordinary garden gloves, bicycle pumps, and other garage trivia.
“This is amazing,” I said. “Thank you for showing me.” I leaned against the wall by waitress-Linda, studying real Linda as she absently tidied things up and looked inside boxes. “I’d really like to see Johnny,” I said.
Her shoulders stiffened. “Can we wait to talk about that until David gets here?”
“I’m not here to send him back to Arcadia. I promise. I just need to talk to him. I need to know he’s okay. I’m kind of—fond of him, to be honest.”
Linda frowned as she continued to open boxes as though looking for something. “I wasn’t aware that the two of you had met.”
“We haven’t exactly. It’s complicated. Sort of a Sleepless in Seattle thing.”
She raised a brow dubiously. “Johnny’s never shown any sign of being interested in humans that way.”
“I’m not your average human.”
“Do you mind if I ask you something personal?” she said, still rummaging gently through the objects on the shelves.
My phone chose that moment to ring. It was an unknown number, but I hadn’t set up voice mail, and I didn’t want to lose someone important. “Hang on,” I said. “It could be David.” I answered the phone in my best casual, not-trespassing sort of voice.
“Oh, hey,” said the voice on the other end of the line. Young, male, not Teo. “Is this Millie?”
“It is,” I said. “What can I do for you?”
“I dunno. You left your number at my work. This is Jeff.”
“Ah! From the sushi place!” The guy Claybriar had apparently interrogated about Rivenholt. I mouthed “Sorry” at Linda and held up a finger. Her frown deepened. I was aware that I was already walking on thin ice, but I wasn’t sure I’d ever catch this guy again, and I really wanted to know exactly what Claybriar thought Rivenholt had done.
“So what’s up?” Jeff said.
“You remember that cop who came in asking about John Riven?” I said, making no effort to keep Linda from hearing. Her irritation quickly turned to intense interest, and I met her eyes, giving her a slow nod.
“Yeah,” said Jeff.
“Is there anything else you can tell me about him, about what he asked you or what he was accusing Mr. Riven of?”
“Nah, sorry. I just remember he had a goatee, asked a bunch of questions about the guy, then ordered an orange soda and sat there taking notes in this big notepad thing for a while.”
“Taking notes on what?” I said.
“I dunno. The two guys making out in the corner, from the look of it.”
The floor under me seemed to tilt a half degree to the left. “Drawing them?”
“Could have been, I guess.”
Claybriar was the artist. God damn.
Johnny had never seen me. Johnny hadn’t painted the walls. Johnny was a nobleman, and noblemen didn’t go around making cheap paper charms.
My hands went cold and sweaty. I remembered the napkin Claybriar had written on at the coffee shop, and the nagging sense of familiarity the COLD IRON drawing had given me. Was it the handwriting? Had he used the same pen?
“Thank you, Jeff,” I said. “You’ve been . . . very helpful.” I ended the call and stuck the phone back in my pocket.
“What’s the matter?” said Linda sharply.
I just looked at her. What was I supposed to say? I came here expecting to meet my soul mate, but instead of the handsome movie star, it’s a surly, thieving, goat-legged agent of the Seelie Queen who got his head bashed to pieces on a railroad track and might be dead now.
“Millie?” said Linda. “Is everything all right?”
“It . . . it really isn’t,” I said. “I need to make another phone call.”
“Don’t,” she said, reaching into the box nearest her to pull out a handgun. She pointed it at me. “I’m sorry,” she said.
37