Silver Borne (Mercy Thompson #5)(29)
Author: Patricia Briggs

Thomas continued to rule the bathroom, too. A plastic toothbrush holder in the shape of a train sat next to the sink, and a set of towels embroidered with Thomas and his friends hung from towel racks shaped like train tracks.

Kyle opened a cupboard next to the sink to reveal two empty shelves and one filled with towels of various colors.

"Give me that," he said, so I handed him the book.

He knelt on the floor and unfolded the towel, repositioned the book, and folded the towel in the same way as all the other towels. He handed it back to me, and I put it on the bottom of one of the stacks.

Kyle looked at my work and straightened the stack. The book towel looked just like the ones around it.

One thing pretending to be another.

For some reason I thought about the incident with the bounty hunter this morning. The bounty hunter – and the fae armed with a plastic gun loaded with silver bullets just like Kelly Heart’s gun had been. Because he’d been hunting werewolves.

Maybe . . . maybe that was not what the fae had been hunting. Adam had suggested the silver ammunition might have been used only to match Kelly Heart’s, that the shooter might have been after any of us and not just a werewolf. I’d thought he was just trying to draw the spotlight off himself and keep me from worrying about him. But what if he was right? What if the fae had been after me?

I was probably being paranoid. The world didn’t revolve around me, after all. Just because this past year I’d had vampires, fae, and werewolves try to kill me at various times didn’t mean someone was after me at present. The old woman in the bookstore hadn’t known who I was. Surely, if the fae were trying to kill me, she’d have recognized my face. Maybe the fae were willing to kill for the book I’d just hidden in my friend’s home. Warren wasn’t always here, and Kyle was just human. Maybe I shouldn’t leave it here. Maybe I was paranoid and seeing conspiracies where there were none.

"Hey, Kyle?" I said.

He looked at me.

"You don’t risk anything for that book," I told him. "If someone comes and threatens you – just give it to them."

He raised a well-groomed eyebrow. "Why don’t you give it to them? Whoever ‘them’ is."

I sorted through a number of answers, but finally said, "That’s just it. I don’t really know who ‘them’ is or why they want that book. Or really if they want the book." Probably I was overreacting to the whole thing, and Phin would call me in a couple of days and ask for his book back. Probably the bounty-hunter incident was just what everyone thought it was – a publicity-hungry producer. And the armed fae was . . . My imagination failed me. But there could be an explanation that had nothing to do with me or the book.

I couldn’t really see someone just killing me outright like that for the book. Wouldn’t they at least approach me first? Ask me for it? Tell me that if I didn’t give it to them, they’d kill Phin?

Unless they’d already killed Phin.

"You okay, Mercy?" Kyle asked.

"Fine. I’m fine."
* * *

WE WERE ON OUR WAY DOWN THE STAIRS BEFORE I finally gave in to curiosity. "Okay. Who’s the Thomas the Tank Engine fan – you or Warren?"

Kyle threw back his head and laughed. "Maybe we should have hidden it in the bathroom of the Princess room. Then you could have asked which one of us likes to sleep with a pink canopy over his head." The grin died down. "I have guests, Mercy. Mostly divorces are messy and hurtful for everyone involved. All that hurt can explode on the wrong people. Sometimes people need a place to be safe for a while – and if there’s a pool and a hot tub in the backyard, so much the better."

Kyle hid people in his home, children who needed to be safe.

Sam growled.

I reached down and rested my hand on his head, but Kyle didn’t seem to recognize that Sam’s reaction was a little extreme even from a wolf who loved children. No one was being hurt here and now.

"Yes" – Kyle started down the stairs – "I agree, Samuel. Those are the men I really love sticking it to in court." He paused. "And women, too, sometimes. Abuse and violence goes both ways. Did I ever tell you about the client I had who took a contract out on her husband?"

"You mean a killing-for-hire type contract?"

He nodded. "It was a first for me, too. Who’d have thought it would happen in our little town? Killer took him out with a single shot. They’d been married for thirty-two years, and he took up with their grandson’s girlfriend. Apparently she decided divorce and the lovely settlement I’d gotten her weren’t enough. She turned herself in that afternoon. Seemed pretty happy to do so." He paused at the kitchen. "Would you like something to eat?"

"I think I’d better go," I told him. "I’d rather no one realized I stopped by here."

"Weren’t you carrying that walking stick of yours? Did you leave it in the bathroom?"

It was gone. I’d been carrying it, and I hadn’t noticed when it left. "Don’t worry about it," I told him. "It’ll show up again when it wants to."

He gave me a delighted smile. "That’s right. That’s what Warren said. The thing just follows you around like a puppy?"

I shrugged.

"Pretty cool."

At the door, he hugged me and kissed my cheek. Sam gravely raised one paw like a well-trained dog, and Kyle shook the lion-sized foot without flinching.

"You take care of Mercy," he told Sam. "I don’t know what she’s gotten herself into this time – but danger seems to be her new middle name."

"Hey," I objected.

Kyle looked down his nose at me. "Broken arm, concussion, sprained ankle, stitches, kidnapped . . ." He let his voice trail off. "And that’s not the end of the list, is it? You keep Samuel or someone next to you until this blows over. I don’t want to be attending your funeral, darling."

"Fine," I said, hoping that he wasn’t right. "I’ll be careful."

"You just let Warren or me know if we can give you any more help."
* * *

I DROVE TO THE BIG MALL IN KENNEWICK BECAUSE I felt a strong desire not to park somewhere isolated – and I wanted to call Tad. I had to park in Outer Mongolia because on a Saturday, that was the only place with parking spaces. But I was as far from alone as it was possible to be. Then I called Tad.

"Hey, Mercy," he answered. "Dad told me that you were nearly involved in a shoot-out at the OK Corral in East Kennewick this morning."

"That’s right," I told him. "But let me tell you about the whole day and see what you think."

I ran through the whole thing from beginning to end – leaving out only the part where I hid the book.