21

April 17, 2004

T horn paused as he saw Simi sitting at the bar inside Sanctuary, nose deep in hot sauce-covered chocolate ice cream. For the first time in his memory, she wasn’t laughing or happy.

Fury went through him. He’d tear the head off whoever daunted her feelings.

Forgetting about his errand, he headed straight for her.

“Hey, pretty demon. What has you down in your ice cream?”

Simi sighed heavily. “You ain’t even gonna believe this, Thorny-man. Artemis done gone and saved the Simi’s life.”

Was she serious? “Do what?”

Sighing heavily, she looked up at him with eyes full of conflicted misery. “Don’t get the Simi wrong, I still hate the heifer goddess. But the Simi cannot make peace in her noggin why the heifer goddess would do such a thing?”

“I do, Sim. In her own twisted way, Artie loves Acheron and doesn’t know how to show it. She saved you because he loves you. It was the least she could do.”

Simi looked up and scowled at him. “How you know about akri and the heifer?”

Thorn silently cursed as he realized what he’d just let slip. “Acheron isn’t as good at keeping secrets as he thinks. I have a lot of friends in low places.”

“You mean akri-Shadow?”

He laughed that she’d caught on so fast. “Among others.”

“I see.”

An adorable blond human waitress came over to them. “You need anything, Simi?”

“No, Ms. Cherise. Simi’s all good for now. Twelve scoops seems to be my limit.”

Cherise smiled, then looked at Thorn. “What about you, sweetie? You need anything?”

“I’m good. I actually came to meet another friend. But thank you, Cherise.”

“Let me know if you change your minds.” She wandered off.

“You know about Cherise?” Simi asked.

“Know what about her?”

Simi bit her lip as she debated if she should tell akri-Thorn what she knew. Cherise’s son, Nick Gautier, was the Malachai they were all looking for.

Only Nick’s granddaddy had restricted his powers and shushed his memories and replaced them with others. Nick had no idea who or what he was.

At least not yet.

No one was exactly sure how Nick would react once his memories came back, either. They were hoping for the best. But when dealing with a Malachai …

Sometimes things went wonky.

“What about her, Simi?”

“She the mother of Kyrian’s Squire, Nick.”

“Oh … no, I had no idea. Really?”

Simi glanced over to where Cherise was talking to a couple in a booth, then whispered, “But she don’t know about us. Shh!” She placed her finger to her lips. “Nicky don’t want anyone to tell her about our world.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks for the warning.” He patted her on the arm and walked off to keep his meeting.

Simi watched Thorny go until she saw Nick playing pool in the back with the tigerwere … Wren. They did that a lot. Mostly ’cause Wren didn’t interact with anyone other than the monkey, Marvin, that was sitting on Wren’s shoulder while he played.

It kind of hurt her tender feelings that Nick didn’t remember their friendship. But she understood. Sometimes it was necessary to put the welfare of others above even the Simi’s.

She also caught sight of Nicky’s granddaddy, Xev, in the shadows were he and his brother Caleb kept watch over their charge to make sure no one unwrapped their bindings on Nick’s Malachai powers. Though that sounded quite painful to the Simi. She wouldn’t want anyone to keep those kinds of secrets from her.

Or to restrict her powers.

They’d all gone through a lot together. The only thing that made it worthwhile was that she knew they’d be together again.

The whole merry fun crew.

She couldn’t wait for that day. Because honestly, she missed her friends, and she would love to have them back.