Chapter 15
CHRIS HAD an alibi for the time period wherein Heim had been harmed. He had been spending that time with Lila. Mostly, he admitted to me, trying to talk Lila out of enacting petty revenge against Heim. He assured me her plans involved egging his house, or putting sugar in his gas tank, or welding his crab traps shut, not clubbing him over the head and kicking him into the sea.
She had certainly looked torn up about his death. I just hoped she wasn’t faking it.
“She’s not faking it,” Jean said as she and I took a seat at a table close to the front door of Jump Off Jack’s. Jean had ordered us iced tea and cheese bread.
“Late lunch or early dinner?” I asked.
“Both. You’re too thin. We’re on our break.” She tore off a piece of bread and took a big bite.
I pulled a piece of bread my way and dug in. It was delicious, the cheese from local farms in Hebo, the bread fresh, with just a bite of heat in it. Jalapeno, I thought.
“Get anything useful from the sisters?”
Jean didn’t look over at Margot and Lila, who stood at the table, saying their goodbyes to Chris.
“Not really. Lila’s reeling from his death. She had plans, things she wanted to do to him to make him pay for breaking up with her. She wanted a chance at making his life miserable. She didn’t want him dead. I think she’s truly sorry that he is.”
It was a backward kind of logic, but I could understand it. The heart, even the jilted heart—maybe especially the jilted heart—wanted what it wanted.
“You think she’s upset she didn’t get a chance at revenge?”
“No. I think…” She popped another bite of bread in her mouth. “If he were still alive, she’d be buying rotten potatoes to hide in the walls of his house. Now that he’s gone, she’s mourning him. Thinking of all the great times they’d had together. She’s sad.”
“She was never really over him, was she?”
Jean tipped her head a bit. “He was a god. There’s a certain…I don’t know, tingle about them, you know? Even though they’re temporarily mortal, there’s something really attractive about them. When I was little I had the biggest crush on Shiva, remember?”
I smiled. “I’d forgotten about that. Dad thought it was cute.”
“Dad did. Mom didn’t. She sat me down and made me promise I wouldn’t run away to go live with him in the junkyard.”
“You wouldn’t have run away.”
“Oh, yes, I would. I had my suitcase packed. But she explained it was the god stuff that drew me, like a magnet to a refrigerator. And then she made Dad take me out to Gaia’s place so I could see all the god powers she was keeping that year.”
“When did this happen?” I asked. “Where was I?”
“Worrying about if Ryder would like your hair in braids or in a ponytail.”
I grimaced. “Middle school?” I’d worn a braid on one side and a ponytail on the other for a week, to try and figure out which one he liked more. He was more interested in Sheila Guberman’s rainbow braces.
I gave up and wore my hair long, tucked behind my ears.
Jean took half the remaining bread and pushed the plate my way with one finger.
“Did seeing the powers make a difference?” I asked.
“I was hypnotized by it. I think I cried, out of joy or wonder, or…I don’t know. It was a lot for a nine-year-old to see all that power, that magic right there in a hollowed old log.”
“Is that where she kept it?”
Jean nodded. “It was absolutely wonderful. And then when I looked at Shiva, he seemed less wonderful. Still…intriguing, but I could tell that the thing about him that I’d found so amazing was the echo of his power.”
“And then what happened?”
“I went back to playing video games, happily ever after. Haven’t you ever felt it? That draw to the deities?”
I shook my head. “I’m immune to it, I guess. I can tell when they’re being god-ish, even when they aren’t carrying power, but it’s not hypnotizing, doesn’t draw me in.”
“Not even now?”
I shook my head again. “That… Okay, I’m not going to lie. It’s weird to have a power stuck in my head. It’s loud and…thrashy. But it doesn’t make me feel any differently. Does the power in me make me look like a god?”
Yeah, it was a weird question. But this was Ordinary, after all. Weird was our second cousin.
“I don’t see it in you at all. If it’s in there, it’s behind a lead blanket.”
“What did you just call me?”
She grinned. “You look normal. Be happy about that. Any idea who you’re going to offload that crazy shit onto?”
“No.”
“Are you worried?”
“Should I be?”
She took a drink of her iced tea and tipped her head a little. “I don’t get…that feeling of imminent doom about it.”
“The one you had yesterday?”
“Gone as soon as I heard Heim’s body had washed ashore.”
I studied her a second. “You think you were picking up on his death?”
“Either that, or the fact that it wasn’t accidental. Like maybe I was picking up on someone wanting him dead?”
Since Jean didn’t usually talk about these things, I wasn’t sure how much experimenting she’d done to see if she could control her talent.
“I don’t suppose you picked up any clue as to who that might be?”
“Would I be driving around with you questioning suspects if I did?”
“Point taken. I don’t think Chris did it. They were friends. He has Lila as an alibi. Plus, he said a couple of his crew saw him in and out of the restaurant last night. We can check with them.”
“Lila mentioned she and Chris talked last night too.”
“What about Margot?”
“She said she was out at the casino.”
“Do we have any corroboration on that?”
“Nope, but we can look into it tomorrow. Do you know why Chris is getting all the mortals out of here?” she asked.
I glanced around the restaurant. A few of the tables that had been full minutes ago were empty, dishes removed. The remaining people in the restaurant besides the wait staff, who Chris was even now sending out the door with a wave, were gods.
Not all of the gods in town, but a good dozen or more filled the booths and a few of the tables. They were all, of course, drinking beer.
“Do you know what’s going on?” I asked.
“Nope.”
I wished Myra was here.
And then, of course, she walked in through the front door, Death gliding in behind her.
Chris moved behind Myra, locked the door, and turned off the neon sign in the window.
She frowned at him, then scanned the room and walked over to Jean and me.
“What’s going on?” she asked.
“Have no idea,” I said.
Chris strolled to the center of the room, positioning himself between the bar and the restaurant. “I’ve locked the doors for the night,” he announced. All the voices in the room silenced.
“Let this be the beginning of celebrating our fallen,” he said in that lilt that carried soft melancholy. “Let this be the beginning of recognizing the long and good life of our friend, Heimdall, who was once the mortal Ephram Dalton. May he drink deeply in the great halls of Valhalla while we drink deeply in this humble hall in his honor. First round is on me.”
A low hum rose to a shout that ended with “Heimdall!” chanted in a cascade of voices reaching the peak at different times. It was beautiful. Moving. A kind of vocal fireworks.
Chris strode around behind the bar and began filling glasses with beer, whiskey, and wine as if this night would never end.