Page 28

CHAPTER 28

T he next morning, less than ten minutes after Max and I got out of the Pathfinder and walked in the back door of Oddities, before Max even had a chance to shower and invite me in, someone was pounding on the front door of the shop. Maggs had ambled down the stairs to make sure we weren’t a threat and to get a treat. She was alert, but she didn’t seem particularly perturbed about whoever was banging on the door. I guess she figured Max was there and he’d let her know if he needed her.

Max grumbled something and drew his pistol, which pretty much said “Do not fuck with me.” He was definitely tired because I’d woken to an empty bed and Max sitting in the rocking chair, gun in his lap, staring into space, cold and exhausted. Which made me less inclined to sleep in the cottage again until it was finished. If Max thought there was that much danger in the woods, there was that much danger in the woods.

The door-banger was Dmitri, bundled up against the cold, and Max reluctantly unlocked the door and let him in, along with a blast of cold air.

Dmitri was beaming. “Good morning, lovely people. The sun is shining and it is a great day to go into the forest, yes?”

“No.” Max looked back at me. “Go have breakfast. I’ll take care of this outside.”

He kissed me—which was always good, I loved it that he’d think to do that—and then took Dmitri outside, and I closed the door behind them to keep the cold and the Russians out.

I knew Max was preventing Dmitri from inviting himself in for eggs and bacon, and I knew Dmitri was manipulating Max into looking for treasure in exchange for some kind of information, but I wasn’t sure that Dmitri had useful info about anything in Rocky Start. I mean, Max had to find out what he knew, but I wasn’t optimistic about their outdoor chat.

Of course, it could just be that Max wanted to be outdoors and would agree to look for treasure with a wily Russian so he could walk through woods in freezing temperatures and fall into the Little Melvin again. His idea of a good time was not always mine.

My idea of a good time was collage masks. I remembered the fake-leather red fox mask that Ozzie had labeled “Lian,” and that one was going to be an easy one, just the black lace mask, and something that said “lawyer” and something that said “hot woman,” so I headed for the counter to start work and saw Poppy coming down the stairs, yawning.

“Where’s Max?” she asked, around another yawn, looking as tired as he had.

“With Dmitri, talking treasure,” I said. “I gather you’re not going to school today?”

“I called in sick.”

“I’m the one who has to do that,” I said.

Poppy shrugged. “Well, I called in that Poppy Malone was sick, but since nobody can tell our voices apart, they just assumed it was you.”

I thought about being the Iron Mother and making her go to school, but it was two weeks before Christmas and they weren’t doing anything anyway. Plus, she’d negotiated all her coursework and rarely had to show up. Also, I liked having her with me. She was growing up—nineteen next month—and my days with her were growing short. I knew the healthy mother thing was to let her go, but that didn’t mean I had to like it. So I was holding on for a little bit longer.

We went into the kitchen and I thought about breakfast. “It’s really not an overnight oats kind of morning,” I began and then I stopped as Maggs got to her feet and lightly growled at the back door, more letting me know someone was there a second before they knocked. My theory was that she was more protective when Max was gone, but maybe she’d just smelled Dmitri and knew he was familiar.

I got close enough to see in the dim light of early winter dawn and recognized Lian. “Easy, Maggs, it’s one of us,” I said and opened the door.

She came into the kitchen, looking serious and miserable.

“Where’s Max?” Lian asked.

“Talking about treasure hunting with Russians,” I said. “You just missed him going out the front door. Hey, I’m making you a mask. Any requests for things to put on it?”

Lian shook her head and sat down at the table, slumping into her chair.

Something was really wrong.

“Should I leave?” Poppy said, making no move to leave.

Lian shook her head. “Rowan wants us to get out of town; he says it’s not safe here, what with people gunning for Coral and, you know, the whole Geoffrey serial killer thing before that. And Serena before that. He thinks we’ll be safer in New York City. And Mei wants to go.”

“How does he think he’ll keep you safe in New York?” I asked, thinking about Herc and how, according to Max, his tentacles were everywhere.

“Living in the public eye,” Lian said. “Rowan is well known in the city. He thinks Herc would hold off doing anything that might draw unwanted attention.”

Poppy was nodding, and I thought Rowan was probably right. She would be safer in Manhattan than here in Rocky Start. Hell, given the last few weeks, just about any place would be safer than Rocky Start.

Lian went on. “But Christmas is coming, and Mei only has another six months before she graduates from high school, and I think?—”

“You should leave,” Poppy said, and we both looked at her, startled.

“Poppy,” Lian said, “everything I’ve worked for for nineteen years is here, everything Mei has worked for. She’s probably going to be valedictorian. We can’t just pick up and?—”

Poppy cut her off. “Whatever her dad wants Mei for, he hasn’t given up.”

“But—” Lian began, but Poppy kept talking. “Mei’s getting phone calls from an anonymous caller that she thinks is him. He’s still after her. She wants to leave. You have to get her out of here.”

“What?” Lian was startled. “He’s been calling her?”

Poppy nodded. “She really wants to go.”

I sided with Poppy. “Lian, if something happens to you, Mei is left vulnerable.”

Lian shook her head. “Rowan would protect?—”

“He can’t, not here,” I said. “He’s an Outsider. Look, something is going on. Something bigger than we think. Serena killed people and died, Geoffrey killed and died, and now that random woman came for Coral and died. Two contractors went after Max on the Trail and died. It’s too much death, and sooner or later, one of those killers is going to succeed and not die and one of us will. Somebody is willing to spend multiple lives to get what they want here in Rocky Start, and we don’t have a clue about what they want. This place is not safe even if Herc isn’t gunning for you. Get out of here.”

Lian swallowed and nodded. “Okay. Okay then. Tomorrow night. There are things I have to do. Things to pack, but really I don’t want to take much. Rowan says he can hire a van under an assumed name because we can’t take my car; Herc’ll track that. We’ve got a lot of stuff packed already because Rowan insisted, and I can get the rest of the important things packed by tonight; we just need to load the van in back of the office where Herc doesn’t have a feed, and then tomorrow we can go.” She blinked at me. “I mean, I had planned all of that, but I thought we’d have more time. You and me, I mean. To say goodbye. And have Christmas together one more time.”

I blinked, too, feeling the tears start, and went around the table to hug her, and she met me halfway, like always.

“I’m going to miss you so much,” Lian said, tears in her voice.

I went right into Cheery Boost. “Are you kidding? You’re going to live someplace fancy in New York with your rich journalist lover, and you’ll forget me in a nanosecond. So I’ll visit to remind you.”

But even as I said it, I knew it wasn’t true. This was an ending. Nineteen years we’d been friends, and now?—

I think when I was trying to convince Lian to go, I’d forgotten what that would mean to Poppy and me. Especially to me. I almost said “Maybe day after tomorrow,” but Poppy spoke first.

“Go now,” she said. “Don’t hesitate. Mei really wants to get out of here and . . . and I’m afraid for you both.” She stopped. “I’m afraid for everybody. Somebody came for Coral. That’s like trying to kill a bunny.”

A well-armed bunny, I thought, but Coral had been an adopted grandmother to Poppy her whole life, she couldn’t see Coral as the tough woman she was, even in her seventies.

“We could take you, too,” Lian said to her. “If you’re scared, come with us.”

“No,” Poppy said. “I’m staying. This is my town. Tell Mei I’ll get a burner phone so her dad can’t listen in and call her.”

I nodded and turned back to Lian. “Take everything you can get in the van. We’ll pack up the rest and send it after you.”

Lian said, “Okay,” and hugged me again and left, crying, and Poppy went upstairs, probably to text Mei, and I sat down again, hard. I think my knees gave way for the last couple of inches. Too much change, too much loss. The Rocky Start I had lived in for almost twenty years was done. That third act of my life, following Ozzie around, raising Poppy, laughing with Lian, was really over now.

I had no idea what my new fourth act would be. It had definitely started—Max, a cottage in the woods, Ozzie and Lian gone—but I was still just reacting again, just like my first three life acts.

I had no idea why any of the horrors of the past month were happening.

I had no idea of how to stop them.

I had no idea of how to even start.

So I sat there for a moment, frozen in incapacity. Waiting for Max to come back and tell me what to do.

But this was Act Four, this was the new Rose, and the more I thought about it, the surer I became. If anybody came for my kid, my lover, my friends, my town, I would level buildings and burn forests to stop them. Nobody was going to fuck with the people I love again. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do, but I was sure as hell going to do something.

And I did not need to be rescued by Max. From now on, people needed to be rescued from me.

I went back out to the store counter and pulled out the mask Ozzie had set aside for Lian and began to work on it, and while I was doing that, I thought about whatever that person working in the dark, hiding in the background, was doing. What he or she wanted. What was the point of all the death?

It had to be something big.

Which meant I would have to be bigger. Stronger. No more waiting for rescue.

No more waiting for anything.