Chapter Fifteen – Hunter

 

Thirty minutes later, we were pulling into Kris’s neighborhood. Maybe it was our mutual exhaustion, or because we were too busy sorting out our own thoughts, but neither of us spoke as we drove, except for Kris to give me the occasional direction to her home. It wasn’t for lack of topics to speak about, that much was for certain. If anything, we should have both been loquacious without parallel as we tried to sort out what little Tabitha had been able to inform us about.

But, for all the cud I’d been given to chew, I still couldn’t get a single thought out of my mind: I still didn’t know why I’d opened the door for her. I could have just let her order up a car. I could have been in bed by now.

We cruised through her neighborhood at a sedate pace, the ranch-style homes with plenty of side yards and small privacy fences between them slowly creeping by as I wove in and out of the turns.

“Nice neighborhood,” I opined.

She grunted noncommittally in reply. “Taxes are fucking killer, but it’s at least quiet.”

Idly, I thought about what kinds of gardens and landscaping these people had, with their broad green lawns and occasional large tree sprouting from the front yards. I never understood the newer developments humans crammed themselves into, with no yard, no space for living growth. Just box after box after box, of neighbor after neighbor after neighbor you would hardly ever speak to. For what? More home? Humans, as much as dragons, are creatures of the natural world, not just of civilization.

Kris leaned forward a little, craning her neck to the left as she pointed to a little brick home that sat at the top of a small hill. “This one up here.”

If anything, it looked like she was competing with Tabitha over the title of Craziest Neighborhood Witch. A large tree drooped almost fatally over the front of the home, coming down like the claw of a dark and foreboding god of yesteryear, and the lawn was yellow and overgrown with months of neglect. Certainly not the lair of the great and powerful Coal.

Of course, it wasn’t like I was in much better straits on that front. My warehouse was expansive, but it was still just a warehouse.

I slowed and turned into her drive, the underside of my car scraping on the dip where her concrete strip met the asphalt of the neighborhood road. I pulled up nearly all the way as she unhooked her safety belt.

“Thanks for the ride,” she said, reaching down between her legs to grab up her pack.

“Don’t mention it,” I said, stifling a yawn. “See you tomorrow morning?”

She shook her head. “I’ll just take a cab in, or something. No big deal.”

“Bright and early?”

“Bright and early.” Kris opened the car door, pushed it farther open, and went to get out. She paused, one foot down on the driveway, and turned back to me. Uncertainty shone in her eyes for a brief moment before she spoke. “Care to come in for a drink, or something? I’ve got a good bourbon Fitzgerald gave me.”

I grinned. “What was the occasion?”

She smiled right back. “Me not firing his ass for insubordination last year when he brought Faith home.”

I laughed quietly, almost said yes. But then the thought of my own bed entered my mind, and I realized just how deeply the exhaustion had penetrated into my skeleton. It was as if my muscles were held to my bones by wet paper mâché, rather than real tendons and sinew, and my brain were wrapped in compressive bandages meant only for sprains and twists of ankles.

“While I appreciate the offer, I probably shouldn’t.”

As I spoke, the timid look on her face morphed into something approaching sadness, or even rejection. After all, when was the last time she’d invited someone into her home, let alone had that invitation rejected nearly out of hand?

A stab in my chest, and I hurried to soften the blow. “I’m afraid I’d just end up curled on your couch like a hoard. I’m exhausted, Kris, that’s all. I can hardly believe we started out the day in Alaska.”

Her face returned to the general tiredness that had been there before, and she nodded. “Yeah. Sure.”

“Rain check for tomorrow after work?”

She smiled, more broadly than before, and nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, that’d be good.”

“See you tomorrow, then,” I said as she went to close the door.

“Yeah. Good night.” She caught the door just before it closed and stuck her head back inside, a tired smile painted on her lips. “And thanks for the ride.”

“Think nothing of it,” I replied. “Now get some sleep.”

As her hand touched the front door of her house, my own was shifting gears into reverse.

Maybe it was the exhaustion, or the invitation Kris had just broached, but my mind was entirely elsewhere as I pulled out from the drive. I backed up exactly along the path I’d taken in, came to a brief halt, put the car in reverse, and drove farther down the opposite way.

Realizing my mistake when I was already four or five houses down the road, and just passing a dark sedan parked in front of a neighbor’s, I slowed the BMW to a stop. As I glanced in my rearview to see the best way to reverse, movement in the front seats of the sedan caught my eye. Two heads. One looking out at the side mirror at my taillights, and a stubby, short antenna poking up just into view over the top of the passenger seat.

A flash of Kris’s face entered my mind as, as if from a thousand miles away, I heard a distant voice: “She’s inside. Move.”

Someone was calling an op in on Kris.

Adrenaline spiked as my instincts kicked in.

No time to call. No time to go back. No time to call for reinforcements.

I threw the car into reverse, spinning the steering wheel to angle my wheels left.

“What’s he doing back—”

I slammed on the gas.