Small Favor

"Something like that," Thomas said. "And don’t forget that Murphy and the police aren’t going to be thrilled with a ‘Save the Kingpin’ campaign."

"I know," I said, "and I’d love to stand back and see what happens. But this isn’t about Marcone anymore."

"Then what is it about?"

"Mab skinning me alive if I don’t give her what she wants."

"Come on, Harry," Thomas said. "You can’t really think that Mab’s motives and plans are that direct, that cut-and-dried." He adjusted the setting of the Hummer’s wipers. "She wants Marcone for a reason. You might not be doing him any favors by saving him on Mab’s behalf."

I scowled out at the night.

He held up a hand, ticking off fingers. "And that’s assuming that, one, he’s alive at all right now. Two, that you can find him. Three, that you can get him out alive. And four, that the opposition doesn’t cripple or kill you."

"What’s your point?" I asked.

"That you’re playing against a stacked deck, and that you have no idea if Mab is going to be there to cover your bets when the bad guys call." He shook his head. "It would be smarter for you to skip town. Go someplace warm for a few weeks."

"Mab might take that kinda personal," I said.

"Mab’s a businesswoman," Thomas said. "Creepy and weird, but she’s cold, too. Calculating. As long as you still represent a potential recruit to her, I doubt she’d elect to depreciate your value prematurely."

"Depreciate. I like that. You might be right-unless, to return to the original metaphor, Mab isn’t playing with a full deck. Which the evidence of recent years seems to imply with increasing frequency." I nodded out the window. "And I’ve got a feeling that I’d have had even more trouble with the gruffs I’ve seen so far if we weren’t in the middle of a freaking blizzard. If I waltz off to Miami or somewhere warm, I’ll be putting myself that much nearer to the agents of Summer-who are also planning my murder."

Thomas frowned and said nothing.

"I could run, but I couldn’t hide," I said. "Better to face it here, on my home ground, while I’m still relatively rested"-I let out a huge and genuine yawn-"instead of waiting for faerie goons from one Court or the other to, ah, depreciate me by surprise after I’ve been on the run for a few weeks."

"What about the Council?" Thomas demanded. "You’ve been wearing the grey cloak for how long, now? And you’ve fought for them how many times?"

I shook my head. "Right now the Council is still stretched to the limit. We might not be in open battle with the Red Court at the moment, but the Council and the Wardens have got years of catch-up work to do." I felt my jaw tighten. "Lot of warlocks have come up in the past few years. The Wardens are working overtime to get them under control."

"You mean kill them," Thomas said.

"I mean kill them. Most of them teenagers, man." I shook my head. "Luccio knows my feelings on the matter. She refuses to assign any of it to me. Which means that other Wardens are forced to pick up the slack. I’m not going to add to their workload by dragging them into this mess."

"You don’t seem to mind adding to mine," Thomas noted.

I snorted. "That’s because I respect them."

"So long as we have that clear," he said.

We drove past a city snowplow. It had foundered in a deep drift, like some kind of metallic Ice Age beast trapped in a tar pit. I watched it with bemusement as Thomas’s truck crunched slowly, steadily on by.

"By the way," he asked, "where do you want to go?"

"First things first," I said. "I need food."

"You need sleep."

"Tick-tock. Food will do for now." I pointed. "There, an IHOP."

He hauled the big truck into a slow, steady turn. "Then what?"

"I ask people impertinent questions," I said. "Hopefully turning up pertinent answers."

"Assuming someone doesn’t kill you while you do."

"That’s why I’m bringing my very own vampire bodyguard."

Thomas parked across three spaces in the tiny, otherwise unoccupied lot of an International House of Pancakes.

"I like the scarf," I said. I leaned over and inhaled through my nose as best I could. It stung, but I detected a faint whiff of vanilla and strawberries. "She make it for you?"

Thomas nodded without saying anything. The leather-gloved fingers of one hand traced over the soft, simple yarn. He looked quietly sad. I felt bad for mentioning Justine, my brother’s lost lover. Then I understood why he wore the gloves: If she’d made it for him, a token of her love, he didn’t dare touch it with his skin. It would sear him like a hot skillet. So he kept it close enough for him to smell her touch upon it, but he didn’t dare let it brush against him.

Every time I think my romantic life is a wasteland, I look at my brother and see how much worse it could be.

Thomas shook his head and killed the engine and we sat for a moment in silence.

So I clearly heard a deep male voice outside the truck say, "Don’t either of you move." There was the distinct click-clack of a shotgun’s pump working. "Or I will kill you."

Chapter Nine

W hen there’s a gun pointed at you, you’ve got two options: Either you move, fast and unexpectedly, and hope that you get lucky, or you freeze and try to talk your way clear. Given that I had really limited room in which to attempt to dodge or run, I went with option B: I held still.

"I don’t suppose," I asked hopefully, "that this is the full military model?"

"It has individually heated seats and a six-disk CD changer," Thomas said.

I scowled. "Uh-huh. Those are way cooler than silly features like armor and bulletproof glass."

"Hey," Thomas said, "it’s not my fault you have special needs."

"Harry," said the man with the shotgun, "hold up your right hand, please."

I arched an eyebrow at that. Typically the vocabulary of thugs holding guns to your head ran a little light on courtesy phrases like please.

"You want me to kill him?" Thomas murmured, barely audible.

I twitched my head in a tiny negative motion. Then I lifted up my right hand, fingers spread.

"Turn it around," said the man outside. "Let me see the inside of your wrist."

I did.

"Oh, thank God," breathed the voice.

I’d finally placed it. I turned my head to one side and said through the glass, "Hey, there, Fix. Is that a shotgun you’re holding to my head, or are you just glad to see me?"