Six Times a Charm

by Deanna Chase

  He nibbled at my neck again and I laughed. “You’re such a politician.”

  “Public servant,” he shot back. He grinned, then, his mouth lifting with his own private joke.

  “What?” I said, amused.

  “Nothing.” His smile broadened. “Let’s just say I had a shot of confidence last night.”

  “The party? It did go pretty well, all things considered.”

  “The party,” he confirmed, “and …”

  “What?”

  He shifted, raising one shoulder in a slight shrug as he trailed his fingertip up and down my arm. “Nothing important. Let’s just say I found a new perspective on things. I’m thinking positively, and I’m positive that this election is all locked up.” He pushed a strand of hair behind my ear. “You’re looking at the next county attorney, sweetheart. I’m sure of it.”

  “Well, I never doubted you for a minute. I mean, why would the voters want anyone else? You’re the perfect candidate.”

  “A man for the people,” he said. His eyes roamed over me, his expression shifting from amused to heated. “A man for one woman …”

  He kissed me then, slow and long, and I tried to get my head around the fact that my rush-out-the-door-to-work husband wanted morning sex. (He also had morning breath, which is unusual for Stuart, but I chalked it up to too much party food.) Any potential for an amorous morning adventure, however, fizzled when Timmy’s cries of “Momma, Momma, Momma. Where you at, Momma?” blared from the baby monitor perched on the dresser.

  “He’ll be fine for a few minutes,” Stuart murmured, the invitation clear in his voice.

  “MOMMA!”

  “He sounds pretty determined,” I said. And (true confessions moment here) I was secretly glad. Not only was my entire body sore and achy, but my mind was already spinning with all the stuff I had to do, all the little details that had to be handled in order to keep my dual life running (somewhat) smoothly. “I should probably get him.”

  Stuart muttered something incoherent, but rolled back so that I could sit up. I swung my legs over the side of the bed as I reached for a pair of sweats, then dragged myself down the hall to my howling offspring.

  It took me a good twenty minutes to get the munchkin up and dressed and myself decked out in jeans and a San Diablo Junior High PTA T-shirt. By the time I got to the kitchen, Stuart was already dressed, his hair damp from the shower, the scent of aftershave clinging to him in a way I found both familiar and slightly erotic. I pushed away a twang of regret for not taking him up on his suggestion of a morning tryst.

  Allie barreled into the room, as much as one can barrel in spiked-heel slides and skin-tight jeans. I glanced pointedly at her shoes, then up at her face. “Oh, Mom,” she said. “Jenny Marston wears heels to school.”

  There were a lot of things about Jenny Marston I didn’t want Allie emulating. Now I had shoes to add to the list. I pointed toward the stairs. “Go,” I said. “Change.”

  She exhaled so loudly that Timmy looked up, pointed, and starting puffing up his cheeks and blowing air out with a whoosh, whoosh.

  “Allie,” I said, injecting a warning note into my voice.

  “Mind your mother,” Stuart added, from somewhere behind the morning paper.

  “Fine. Whatever,” she said, then huffed back upstairs.

  I looked at Timmy. “Shoes, at least, are a problem we’ll never have with you,” I said.

  “Not until he wants some cool celebrity sneaker, anyway,” Stuart said.

  I grimaced, imagining a future where I’d gone undefeated against demons, but had been laid flat by my own children’s insidious shoe demands. Not a pretty picture.

  After two more cups of coffee Stuart kissed me and Timmy, called a good-bye up the stairs to Allie, then headed into the garage. A few moments later I heard the garage door begin its slow, creaky climb. I yelled at Allie to hurry or else she’d miss her car pool. She clattered back down the stairs and screeched to a halt in front of the refrigerator, this time in neon-pink high-top sneakers and a matching T-shirt. As my daughter would say, whatever.

  “Lunch or money?” she said.

  Since I’d gone on a wild-demon chase last night instead of staying home to care for my family like I should have done (guilt, guilt, guilt), I hadn’t fixed her a lunch. I found my purse, rummaged until I came up with a twenty, and handed it to her. Her eyes widened, but she was smart enough not to say anything.

  She planted a quick kiss on my cheek, then raced out the front door, just as Emily’s mom tooted her horn. As the door banged shut, I remembered what I’d forgotten, but by the time I reached the end of the sidewalk, the car was already gone. Well, damn.

  I’d completely forgotten to tell Allie that we had our first class with Cutter Wednesday afternoon, and to not sign up for any extracurriculars. Now I was going to have to call the school and leave a message for her. The process had been a huge hassle in junior high, and I didn’t anticipate it getting any easier now. Allie’s voice seemed to whisper in my ear—Mo-om…just get me a cell phone!

  Fine, I said to the voice. I’ll get one today.

  I’m not normally in the habit of succumbing to the will of voices in my head, but the cell phone thing had been one of Allie’s most persistent battles, with her adamant that she needed one, and me just as adamant that she didn’t. Now that I knew there were demons roaming the town, though, my perspective had shifted one hundred and eighty degrees. Anything to keep my baby safer, and if that meant slapping a cell phone into her hot little hand so she could dial 911 at the drop of a hat, well, so be it.

  “Allie go to work?” Timmy asked as I came back inside and took a seat at the table next to him. He held a spoon in one chubby fist, and was sticking it repeatedly into a cup of peach yogurt.

  “Allie went to school,” I said. “Daddy went to work.”

  “Mommy go to work?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes.” I took the spoon (amazed that this didn’t prompt a huge tantrum) and aimed a bite of yogurt toward his mouth. “Does Timmy want to go to school like Allie?”

  “No,” he said, giving me the puppy-dog eyes and shaking his head hard enough that there was no way the yogurt was going to make it inside. “No school.” A little-boy-lost whine had crept into his voice, and my heart twisted in my chest. Stay firm, I told myself. It’s only temporary. Thousands of kids are in day care every day without detriment to the kid or the parent.

  Still …

  I kept a perky smile plastered on my face. “No school?” I asked, feigning amazement. “But school is great! You’ll get to play with messy things like paint, and you’ll make all sorts of friends. And songs,” I said, pulling out all the stops. “I bet they sing ‘Happy and You Know It’ at school all the time.”

  “No, Momma,” he said. He shook his head once more. “You go to school.”

  “Wish that I could, kiddo.” I fed him the last spoonful of yogurt, then got a paper towel to wipe the bulk of his breakfast off his chin, the table, and the floor. “Would you give it a shot?” I asked. “For Mommy? School sounds pretty exciting to me. Lots of fun, and you get to play games.”

  Since I had the spoon, he stabbed his finger into the yogurt, then proceeded to draw a line of goop on the tabletop. Come on, Tim, I mentally urged. Say yes and make Mommy feel less guilty.

  “Buddy?” I asked. “What do you say?”

  “Okay, Mommy.” He sounded much perkier than he had only moments before, and I wondered if in his little two-year-old brain, he was already off on some other topic. I wasn’t about to ask, though. His blessing (such that it was) assuaged my guilt, and I headed into the living room to pack up our things.

  Tim was his typical cheery self the entire ride to the day care center. I plastered on a happy face, told him this was his school, then proceeded to list off all the wonderful and exciting things he’d do that day. He eyed me warily, my only clue that he might be less than keen on this plan the thumb that went automatically into his mouth.
r />   I got out and walked around the car to let him out. He was sitting there, quietly sucking away, when I slid the door open. “You’re going to have so much fun at school,” I said. “Aren’t you, buddy?”

  The thumb emerged, followed by a brief nod and an “Okay, Mommy.” I called that a victory, then proceeded to unstrap him from the car seat. I helped him down, then held his hand as we walked inside. So far, all was well.

  I found Nadine behind a reception counter. I’d called her from the road and begged to start Timmy today instead of tomorrow. She promised to arrange it all, and sure enough, as soon as I arrived, she passed me a variety of papers to sign and asked for the balance due on the month’s tuition. Timmy behaved throughout this entire process. But the moment I handed over the check, he started to howl. It may have taken him a while to figure out exactly what was going on here, but now that he’d clued in, he was having none of it.

  “No,” he howled. “No school. No, no school. Go home. Go. Home” Big tears rolled down his cheeks, and I tried to get a grip, reminding myself that this was for his own good—without day care, demons might take over the town, and then where would we be?

  I felt my cheeks flame, embarrassment battling with an almost physical need to pick up my child and cuddle him. Nadine, of course, had seen this before, and she passed Tim a toy truck from her desk, at the same time offering me a reassuring smile. “He’ll be in the Explorers classroom with Miss Sally. They’re on the playground right now. I bet that will help Tim get over his first-day jitters.”

  As it turned out, she was right. After a few more minutes of clinging and shouting “No, Momma, no!” at the top of his lungs, Tim discovered the sandbox and soon settled in to shovel a beach worth’s of sand next to a little boy in Bob the Builder overalls.

  Nadine tapped my arm. “We should head back inside while he’s occupied.” I nodded, but didn’t move. My heart was all twisted in my chest, and my stomach hurt. How could I leave? What kind of a mother was I?

  A mother who needs to stop a High Demon from raising an army and killing off the population of San Diablo, I answered myself.

  At the moment, though, as I left my baby in the care of strangers, that really didn’t seem good enough.

  ***

  I worked off my guilt sparring with Cutter. We started with a few basic stretches, but quickly moved on to the full meal deal, focusing on jabs and crosses, parrying kicks and quartering, and my favorite—spinning back kicks.

  This time Cutter was ready for me, and I had to work my tail off just to keep from getting pummeled. I still fully intended to nail him. I just needed to find the right opportunity.

  “You’re good,” I said, parrying an expertly executed cross-behind side kick. “I came to the right place.”

  “I’m motivated,” he said. “Can’t get shown up by a skirt twice.”

  “A skirt? Who are you, Phillip Marlowe?”

  “Think of me as your worst nightmare, sweetheart,” he said, in a full-on Humphrey Bogart voice. I laughed, and he used my distraction to lash out and send me sprawling. “Concentration, Connor. Gotta work on concentration.”

  I glared at him from my ignominious position on the mat. “I’ll keep that in mind,” I said. I reached a hand up, and he took it, more than happy to help me to my feet. Sucker. I yanked him down, leaping up as he took my place on the floor.

  “Not bad,” he said from his new perspective.

  “I’ve still got a few tricks.”

  He climbed to his feet and looked me up and down. “Yeah, I think you do.”

  I tried to stand there under his scrutiny without wincing. Not easy. I’m pretty sure every inch of my body was bruised (all the more reason to avoid romantic encounters with my husband, at least during the daylight hours) and I hated feeling on display. “We’ve still got a good forty-five minutes,” I said. “You aren’t quitting on me yet, are you?”

  His grin was slow and confident “You’re not getting off that easy, Connor.” He held his arm out, wrist bent as he waggled his fingers, Matrix style. “You ready?”

  “Always,” I said.

  We covered the basic territory for the rest of the hour, giving me the chance to practice a variety of moves, both offensive and defensive. By the time we finished, I was wishing I’d let Stuart talk me into putting a hot tub in our backyard. But sore as I was, I felt pretty damn cocky. Even after all these years I still had some pretty good moves.

  Breathless, I dug a towel out of my duffel bag and draped it around my neck.

  “You done good,” Cutter said. “I guess I’ll see you and your kid tomorrow.” He took a gulp of Gatorade and wiped his mouth. “It’ll be a trip showing the class what you’ve got.”

  I shook my head. “Tomorrow, you’re going to find a significantly less skilled Kate. Blow my cover, and I promise you’ll pay for it the next morning.”

  “I consider myself warned.” He stared at me for a moment and in his eyes I saw a hint of the naval officer he used to be. “You ever going to tell me your story?” he asked.

  “Don’t hold your breath,” I said. And when he smiled, I knew that Cutter wouldn’t hold my secrets against me. I also knew that he’d keep trying to figure me out.

  ***

  The idea of sitting in the cathedral basement with hundreds of pages still to review lacked appeal, but I knew I had to do it. At the same time, I was curious about Eddie, even though Larson had assured me the retired Hunter wouldn’t be an asset. In the end, procrastination and curiosity won out over bugs and responsibility, and I called Larson’s chambers from the car to let him know I was coming. Since his clerk told me he’d be on the bench for at least another hour, I decided to use that time to run errands, pretending all the while that my life was just as normal and mundane as it had always been. I hit the dry cleaners, bank, and post office, then decided to go ahead and buy Allie’s cell phone before heading toward the government complex.

  By the time I parked, I felt good. Centered. My Hunter life had snuck back up on me, true, but that didn’t mean my family wouldn’t have cash, stamps, or freshly pressed clothes.

  I’ve been to the complex dozens of times to meet Stuart for lunch, but he worked in the county attorney’s office, and Judge Larson was in the courthouse. I got a bit turned around, and ended up in Stuart’s part of the complex.

  I was just about to pop my head into an office and ask directions when I heard Stuart’s voice. I froze.

  “I have the proposed zoning changes on my desk,” he was saying, his voice growing louder as he approached the corner. I darted into the first office I saw, my heart pounding wildly. I had no reason to be down here. What would I tell Stuart if I saw him? I hadn’t even told him about Timmy’s day care yet. I could hardly explain a lunchtime encounter with Judge Larson.

  I kept my ear pressed to the closed door, listening as footsteps approached, then receded. Only when I could hear nothing did I let myself breathe again.

  “Excuse me?” a voice behind me asked. “May I help you?”

  I spun around, feeling incredibly foolish, even more so when I saw the woman behind the reception desk staring at me, concern all over her face.

  “Are you okay?” From her tone, I think she thought I was running from a deranged killer. Either that, or I was the deranged killer and I was running from the cops.

  “Sorry,” I said. “My boss. I’m not supposed to be taking a break. I didn’t want him to see me.”

  Considering I was hardly dressed for the office, I’m surprised this approach worked. The girl didn’t question me, though (perhaps she simply wanted me gone), and I slipped back out the door and into the hall. It was only after I’d gone five paces that I realized I still had no idea where to find Larson.

  After a few more false starts, I found someone to ask, and arrived at Larson’s courtroom just as he was finishing up a bunch of pretrial rigmarole. I went and sat on the wooden seats in the galley, watching him rule on the various motions and objections. Hard to believe
the same man was my alimentatore. That just last night he’d destroyed a demon.

  The last pair of attorneys finished battling it out (metaphorically speaking), and the bailiff did the “all rise” thing. I caught Larson’s eye as he stood to leave, and he nodded at me, the movement almost imperceptible. As soon as he’d disappeared into his chamber, I approached the bailiff. Less than a minute later I was escorted back into the hallway.

  Compared to the pristine, awe-inspiring federal courtroom, the backroom area was downright bland. Larson’s office kicked it up a notch—a huge mahogany desk, matching credenza, framed gold photos, and a Waterford dish filled with hard candy—but even that room was so piled with papers and briefs that he had to clear a chair off just so I had someplace to sit. At least now I knew why he had no time to schlep through buggy boxes with me.

  “You want to know more about Eddie,” he said, a small smile playing around his mouth.

  I shrugged. “What can I say? I’m persistent.”

  “One of your finest qualities,” he said. “I told you he was infirm, but the more I think about it, the more I think you may as well talk to him. It certainly can’t hurt, and you being a Hunter might bring him out of his funk.” He spread his hands. “Perhaps Eddie will have insight, perhaps he won’t. But it can’t hurt to try, right?”

  “Sure,” I said. From the way he described the old man, I wasn’t going to get my hopes up.

  Larson moved around his desk to lean against it in front of me, his forehead creased. “By the way, how is Stuart?”

  “He’s fine. Wasn’t crazy about being nursemaided to death, but he’ll survive. Once I washed away all the dried blood, there really wasn’t much under there except a few nicks and scratches.”

  “When he drove up, you were on the verge of telling me what you’d discovered in the archives.”

  I stifled a snort of derisive laughter. “You mean what I didn’t find. There are eighty million boxes down there, all crammed full of paper and uncataloged gifts. There’s a tiny bit of organization, but it’s going to take me a while to get my bearings.” I gave him the rundown of what I’d done so far, such that it was. I almost told him I was going to let Laura help me out, too, but in the end I held my tongue. I’d broken rules by dragging her in, and I didn’t really want to admit my guilt. If Laura discovered something amazing, then I’d tell him. In the meantime, I figured ignorance was bliss.