My mouth watered so hard I had to swallow.
‘‘Anything else?’’ the waitress asked as she put down the soup, bread basket, and two sets of napkin-rolled cutlery.
‘‘Some water,’’ Zayvion said. ‘‘For both of us, please.’’
She left and I stared down at my soup like I’d never seen food before.
‘‘It’s soup,’’ Zayvion said. ‘‘Beef and vegetable. Oh. You’re not a vegetarian, are you?’’
‘‘I love soup.’’ Then I remembered he probably already knew that. He’d been working for my father and following me around for I didn’t know how long. He probably knew a lot of things about me. Probably even knew what kind of underwear I wore.
Which begged the question. Was he a boxer or brief kind of guy?
Come on, Allie,
I thought.
Stop being such a sap-head.
This wasn’t a date. Zayvion wasn’t a friendly neighbor. He was someone to dig information out of. Information about the hit on Boy. Information about why my dad was suddenly so interested in pulling me back into the company and under his control.
I sat up a little straighter and unrolled the napkin and spoon. Zayvion might be a liar, a snitch, a stalker—whatever. I wasn’t going to turn down a free meal or a chance to find out what he knew.
‘‘How long have you been following me?’’ I said it as if the meeting had just been called to order and his sales performance were under review.
He already had his spoon in his hand and had taken a big bite of soup. He left the spoon in his soup, reached for the sourdough, broke off a fist-sized section, then dipped it in the broth. So he liked his bread without butter. Not really the kind of information I had hoped to get out of him.
‘‘About two weeks.’’
Better.
I thought back on what had happened in the last two weeks and scooped broth in my mouth. Oh, good loves. It was perfect, salted and thickened with tomato and hints of basil and peppers. I wanted to lick the spoon, lick my fingers, then dive in face-first and lap up the entire bowl. Zayvion did not appear to be watching me. He was already through his first piece of sourdough and moving fast for a second.
I reached over for the bread, got there just before he did, and pulled the soft and warm center piece out of the loaf.
‘‘Ha!’’ I held up the chunk of bread with the tips of my fingers. ‘‘Still warm.’’ I snatched up a foiled pat of butter and spread it over the bread with my finger.
He didn’t look concerned at my victory. ‘‘Only half a loaf left? I suppose we could split it. Oh, wait.’’ He took the remaining bread, dropped it in his soup, and smiled. ‘‘Maybe I’ll just eat your share.’’
‘‘What, no more Mr. Nice Guy?’’
‘‘Nobody gets between me and fresh sourdough.’’
‘‘Bread fetish?’’
‘‘How about less talking, more eating?’’ He didn’t wait for my reply before digging into his soup.
I took a bite of the buttered bread and then I didn’t care what Zayvion did so long as he didn’t get between me and the soup and bread. I put my spoon into action and devoured the soup. Hounding always makes me hungry—using any kind of magic usually makes me hungry—and I’d been cutting it pretty tight on grocery money lately. Actually, now that I thought about it, this was the first meal I’d had in the last month that wasn’t a cold sandwich, cold cereal, or cold microwaved pizza.
But even hungry, I kept an eye on the door, and the people who came in and out of the deli in a steady stream. I didn’t think my dad would go so far as to send the police to haul me in, but I wouldn’t put it past him.
The waitress came with our water, refilled our coffee, and dropped another basket of bread on the table.
‘‘Thank you,’’ Zayvion said. I nodded my thanks. I would have said something, but my mouth was full of hot vegetables. I tore into the bread loaf, thought about keeping it all for myself, and knew I’d be sorry and probably asleep if I ate too much too quickly. I split the bread in two, handed half to Zayvion, and got busy buttering my portion.
‘‘Why did my dad hire you?’’ I asked. ‘‘What did he want you to find out about me?’’
Zayvion had finished his soup and sat back, coffee in his hand. I watched him change from a flirty sourdough aficionado into a calm, expressionless man. Interesting. So the Zen bit was his professional mode. It made me wonder what line of business—besides poker—required that strong a poker face.
I took the last chunk of bread and ran it around the inside of the bowl to get any bits of soup I’d missed, sopped up the broth at the bottom, then popped the bite in my mouth.
The deli was getting crowded, full of lunchgoers content to stand and eat if it meant dodging the rain. With the growing noise and heat, my head and body aches were coming back.
Zayvion sipped coffee and watched me with that cool expression. I planted my elbows on either side of my bowl and laced my fingers under my chin. ‘‘What?’’ I said, pitching my voice so he alone could hear me over the crowd. ‘‘No quick answers? Talk to me, Zayvion Jones.’’
‘‘About what? Weren’t you the one who was telling me business matters are confidential? How would breaking that confidence be good for my reputation?’’
‘‘You have a reputation?’’
He shrugged one shoulder. ‘‘I make a living.’’
‘‘Stalking?’’
‘‘Not much money in stalking.’’
‘‘So you’re what, a detective? An economic spy? Why would my father hire an economic spy?’’
‘‘The only reason your father had one of his men approach me was because I know the neighborhoods in North Portland and he knew you had done some Hounding jobs there.’’ He went back to staring out the window and drinking coffee.
He was lying. I could smell the sour tang of it on his skin. Plus, I knew my dad wouldn’t do anything, not in his personal life, not in his business life, not in any other part of his life, so haphazardly. He didn’t even choose his socks so casually.
Any sane woman would have cut her losses and called it a day. But it intrigued me that he would tell such an obvious lie, and then look away like he was sort of sorry when he did it. He didn’t strike me as a stupid man. As a matter of fact, I was sure the harmless-tramp bit was a ruse. He had to know I was familiar with my father’s fastidious attention to detail in all matters of business. So why lie?
‘‘How many years have you been working for him?’’
Zayvion did me the favor of eye contact. Then, quietly, ‘‘Four.’’
That smelled closer to the truth. I nodded. ‘‘Just me?’’
He shook his head.
‘‘Gonna tell me who else you tailed?’’
He took a drink of coffee. ‘‘Buy you dessert?’’
Back to avoidance mode. ‘‘How sweet. Tell me about the hit on Boy.’’
‘‘What makes you think I know anything about Boy? You Hounded the hit. You tell me.’’ Those eyes were all brown and fool’s gold, and my stomach flipped.
Sweet loves, he was good-looking.
It would be so easy to put some Influence behind my questions and pry the truth out of him. Well, except I hurt, and was fatigued from using magic. I’d probably blow a vein if I tried to use any kind of magic, even the easy stuff that was most natural for me.
I rubbed my hand over my lips, which were still swollen.
‘‘Listen,’’ I said, changing tactics. ‘‘I’m tired. I want to go home and get some sleep. I’m not going to be able to do that knowing that a five-year-old child is dying because my father decided to Offload magic on the poor kid. You’ve been following me around. If you’re any good at what you do, you know I think Mama is a decent human being. You know how I feel about Boy, and you probably even know exactly how I feel about my father and his business practices.’’
‘‘Everyone knows how you feel about your father and his business, Allie. Dropping out of college, publicly disowning any contact with him, then going into hiding for the last few years paints a pretty clear picture.’’
Like I needed to be reminded of any of that. Still, it prickled. I just sat there, wondering how he could get under my skin so fast.
‘‘So there’s no mystery about how much I hate my dad.’’ I smiled and told myself he didn’t know, could never know, what it was like growing up under my father’s Influence. There was a reason my mother changed her name and lived overseas, and hadn’t ever tried to contact me. There was a reason he’d married and divorced four times since then. People in my father’s life were commodities to be consumed and discarded. And I, his only child, was tired of being recyclable goods.
‘‘Since you just quit your job and no longer work for Beckstrom Enterprises, I don’t see any reason why you shouldn’t tell me what you know about the hit. Why they did it and why Boy was the target.’’
He frowned and looked down at his hands.
‘‘Zayvion,’’ I said, ‘‘I don’t want the kid to die. I’d like to think you’re the kind of person who wouldn’t want a little kid to die either.’’
‘‘You Hounded the hit,’’ he said. ‘‘Are you sure it was your father’s signature?’’
‘‘Yes.’’
He looked back up and there was a fierceness in his eyes. ‘‘Do you think it could have been a forgery? Or someone else’s signature? Something magically forged?’’
‘‘I know my father’s mark intimately.’’ End of discussion.
Zayvion glanced back out the window again, and I wondered if he were watching for someone, or maybe if he thought he was being watched by someone. Economics, my ass. This man was either a PI or an undercover cop.
‘‘I don’t know what to say,’’ he said. ‘‘I have no idea why your father would Offload illegally. It seems like there would be too high a risk that he would be found out. He’s a careful man.’’
That was an understatement.
‘‘You know him better than I do.’’ He looked back at me. ‘‘Why would your father do such a thing?’’
And hearing someone else ask it brought a dozen answers to my mind. Maybe he knew I’d been nice to Mama and wanted to hurt me through her. Maybe Mama was indebted to him and had agreed to let him do it. Maybe he thought hurting the kid would get me storming into his office after seven years of avoiding him.
Maybe he’d done it for no reason at all.
I wanted to take the easy way and just believe my father was thoughtless in his cruelty, but I knew that wasn’t true. He wouldn’t have put a hit on Boy without weighing the risks and deciding the odds were on his side. And there was no way it could have been a random mistake—he was not that sloppy.
But what did he have to gain from Boy dying?
I shook my head, frustrated. ‘‘Do you think I’d be sitting here having lunch with you if I knew the answer to that?’’
Zayvion’s expression went carefully blank. ‘‘No,’’ he said, ‘‘I don’t suppose you would.’’
I rubbed at my eyes and regretted it because they started to water. My head was pounding.