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Lee Nicholas had a face that had been plastered all over the world.
Alright, exaggeration: he had a face which had appeared more than twice in the tabloids Vicki passed in the supermarket where she occasionally went, because while she might not have to eat, Mike did, and so he sometimes required food. Also things like toilet paper, and—especially on nights when they were working—bleach.
And also, unfortunately, refills for their heavily-used first aid kit.
At any rate, Lee Nicholas had a face, and it was one Vicki had seen before. She had watched every episode of North America's most popular syndicated vampire detective series, in part out of loyalty—she would do worse things for Tony Foster, although towards the end of season six she had started wondering how much worse it could really get— and in part because, as irritating as it was to say it, the show actually was relevant to her cases. Not because the writers got anything right—ever—but because both the people who hired her to defend them and the people they wanted her to defend them from frequently found their inspiration there. Less art imitating life than the other way around, but just as irritating regardless.
So Vicki had seen quite a lot of Lee Nicholas—although not the famous nipple ring which had had to be removed for the topless scene in season three, episode six—and she was fairly confident going into the airport that she and Mike would be able to recognize him when they saw him.
They did not. Mike was looking at his watch when they came up the elevator, but she had no excuse: she scanned the Arrivals gate twice before she realized exactly who the man with the green duffel slung over his shoulder was.
He looked almost nothing like his depiction on-screen. Taller, for one thing: Lee's James Taylor Grant was playing second-fiddle to Mason Reed's Raymond Dark, and generally the shooting made Lee Nicholas look... not small, exactly, but a bit less tall and broad than he actually was.
Mostly, though, the difference was in how Nicholas carried himself. He looked very normal, standing there in the train station. He wasn't wearing one of James Taylor Grant's preppie-dangerous ensembles, but rather jeans and a hoodie—a Leafs hoodie, no less, which made him pathetic enough for anyone's eye to pass over. He wasn't standing straight up and eager in what Vicki had mentally dubbed Grant's "police puppy pose," after a half-remembered long-ago week she had spent trying not to coo at the adorable German Shepherds being trained for drug-sniffing; he was relaxed, carrying his duffel easily, and chatting animatedly with the lean young man behind him—
—who was Tony, Vicki realized with a shock. Jesus. She hadn't recognized him, either, but that was because the last time he’d been this skinny, he'd been high on heroin for the fifth visit in a row and she'd been seriously considering having him tossed in the tank just to sober him up. It was only the certain knowledge that that wouldn't work that had stayed her hand.
No wonder Henry sent him to me. He's skin and bones! Vicki considered herself approximately the least maternal woman in Toronto, but even she was seized with the urge to put on a pot of chicken soup.
She smacked Mike on the arm then moved out of the shadows and waved, catching the eyes of both boys. No, she corrected herself, men: knowing Tony when he was a kid didn't mean he still was one, and he hadn't exactly been a childish kid even way back then.
"Over here," she called in case they couldn't see them standing together in the darkness. (Both men jumped, which meant Lee hadn't seen them, and Tony either hadn't seen or hadn't been paying attention. It could go either way.) "You have any other luggage?"
"Just these," Tony said, schlepping his oversized backpack over to her. He held up a fist and she pounded it, although not before giving him a dry look that said she wasn't in the least fooled. He grinned, irrepressible as ever, and when she stopped flashing back to a decade ago she turned and led their little parade toward the glass doors of the exit.
Tony was different now; he had always been a little bit anxious, but now he had an air of carried worry that was more mature, and less fixable, than it had been before. But for all the changes, he was still the same smart, unbeatable kid she’d always known, and he was—deliberately, she suspected—showing that.
"Thanks for putting us up sir, ma'am."
“No problem.” Mike had given Lee the hairy eyeball of his professional evaluation when Vicki called the boys over; it took him approximately half a second, and by the time it was over Lee Nicholas had officially been judged and found worthy. Vicki had let it happen, because Mike was his own person—but so was she, and she’d judge for herself.
Vicki caught Lee's eye as they both passed under the security mirror. "Call me ma'am again and see how long it lasts," she said, not joking. "It’s Vicki. But you're welcome; Tony's an old friend of ours, we’re happy to help out."
Old friend—that was one way of putting it. But she didn't exactly feel like going into depth about the complicated relationship she and Tony had: not the origins of it, and not the way it had mutated after she had introduced Tony to their mutual inhuman lover.
"Well, it's kind of you anyway," Lee Nicholas said earnestly. She narrowed her eyes: was that a little too earnestly? "The tabloids have been damned shitty about this whole thing, and there's a real chance they're going to land on you."
...If he was playing up the aw-shucks, he was doing it with a deft enough hand she couldn't quite catch him at it. Vicki shrugged it off and bared her teeth—some of her teeth, anyway—instead. "They can try," she said firmly, gesturing the men towards the parking garage and avoiding Mike’s raised eyebrow behind her back.
Lee and Tony had weathered four full seasons in the public eye together with not a single squeak from the paparazzi about their relationship—good or bad, since Lee had neither been outed nor voluntarily outed himself. But Darkest Night was over now—thank God—and Lee had been cast as a war hero in an upcoming HBO drama, instead. He was one of about three main characters, and the budget for the miniseries was pretty much the same as a blockbuster. Increased scrutiny had inevitably followed, and some observant fellow had caught Lee and Tony laughing into each others eyes with the telephoto lens.
Asshole. As someone who regularly used a telephoto lens in her own work, Vicki had pretty strong feelings about what should and shouldn’t be considered private. The balcony of Nicholas’s fifth-floor apartment on one of the boys’ few mutual days off was pretty firmly in the should category—but then, it was a bit much to expect a paparazzo to have a conscience.
Regardless, the pictures had been clear enough for Lee to be effectively outed. He (and his agent) had made a statement, but declined to do a full Q&A—which, since the subject of that Q&A would have been his very private life, struck Vicki as being pretty good sense. In the interest of getting him out of the public eye, though, Lee’s agent had suggested he leave town. Lee’s family was all in either Vancouver or London—England, not Ontario—so Tony had suggested they visit his family, instead.
Which was convenient, since his brief rise to prominence had given Tony another good reason to be in town.
Vicki and Mike took the boys home with them. Mike crashed early; he had work in the morning, and—more worryingly—he tended to need more sleep these days. Vicki showed them the guest room, which wasn’t so much a guest room as “territory temporarily reclaimed from her office,” but Mike had bought an antique bedframe and a brand-new mattress for it, so either the boys could like it or they could find someplace else.
And there are only three conventions in town, so that should even be pretty feasible!
The boys declared themselves thrilled, though, so they must not have minded the hulking form of her desk lurking in the corner too much. They tossed their bags on either side of the bed without discussion of who got which side, and with identical motions. Vicki tried not to find it adorable, and failed.
“Thanks again, m-Vicki.”
Lee Nicholas was a quick learner: no ma’am this time.
“You’re welcome, again. You two have any plans for this week?”
“Try not to get caught up in the end of the world,” Lee said immediately, very dryly.
Tony cracked a grin, breaking out of the distracted funk that had surrounded him like smog on a wet day. “Dude, that happened, like, once.”
“Excuse me?” Lee Nicholas raised one dark, elegant eyebrow. “How many times?”
“Only once while we were on vacation—hey, no, not the pillows—!”
Tony defended himself from the improvised club Lee was wielding with two hands braced between the oncoming pillow and his face. Lee’s arms were long, but the pillow wasn’t, and even a full-sized mattress put enough bed between them that there wasn’t any risk it would connect. Still, Tony was laughing, and that counted for a lot. Not enough for Vicki to replace the pillow, but enough that she wouldn’t yell if it ripped.
"We were also going to check out some old buildings," Tony said, catching the pillow on the backswing and confiscating it, turning to face her in the same motion. "There's a bunch of old theaters in Toronto, and some of them are even still operational. A lot of the rest are historic sites—there's even a tour. We were going to watch some movies in the ones that still work, take pictures of the lobby and discuss the shows..."
Vicki considered that, then snorted. "Nerd."
Tony grinned, the too-bright sunshine smile that had kept him going all those long years before. "Never claimed otherwise!"
"Mm,” Vicki said, not an agreement, before changing the subject. “When are you going to meet her?"
She leaned casually against the doorframe like it would take some of the weight out of the question. It didn't work, but it made her feel less shitty about asking—and she did need to know.
Tony's brush with fame really was a brush; he was only showing up in a few tabloids, and only as the love interest of an actor most people still didn't really care about. But it was still enough for him to have received a letter from a woman claiming to be his sister—which made her the only member of his family to say a single word to him almost two decades.
Tony had been kicked out of his house at a too-young age, and his life as a teenager on the streets hadn't been easy. His father had been the main villain of that particular melodrama, but the rest of his family—mother and sister—had both been silent accomplices. "In my sister's defense," Tony had said when he explained to Vicki over the phone, "she was only eleven at the time. She didn't exactly have the resources to help me out, even if she had been able to get in touch with me—which Dad definitely wouldn’t’ve allowed."
His mother, on the other hand...
Vicki had checked into Tony's family, both when she first met him and now, when he got the letter from Brittany. Tony's father was dead; he’d had a heart attack five years ago, young for it but no foul play suspected on account of his "lifestyle" (if you asked the coroner) and "general douchiness" (per the neighbor Vicki had interviewed). In the seventeen years since Tony had left home, his father apparently hadn't mellowed at all.
But Tony’s mother had been a receptionist, and actually still was a receptionist. She had changed firms twice since the death of Tony’s father, upgrading both times. She worked now for a financial firm in one of the big all-glass buildings downtown, and she definitely had the resources to have looked for Tony. She had had the resources, all along.
She hadn’t done it.
Tony’s sister...
Brittany Foster got some help from her mother; they did regular lunches together downtown which were followed by equally-regular visits to the Brittany’s bank with a check. She had graduated from college with an English degree, but still waited tables at cheesy chain restaurants. She'd been at the current restaurant—a TGI Fridays—for three years, and at an all-night diner before that.
Vicki had sent Mike out in a not-quite-surveillance operation; "Britt" was not particularly good at her job, but seemed nice enough. A bit tired, according to a coworker. "She looks like Tony," Mike had said. "That was the only really notable thing. Same pale eyes, skinny frame, mouth like a slash. Also a space cadet like Tony; forgot my drink order three times in a row. I know, you're shocked."
She wasn't married, didn't have kids—although she did have a roommate, who may or may not have been dating her; people at her work didn't seem to know, and their body language—in public, at least—was ambivalent. But she also didn't seem to have hobbies: no clubbing, no sports events, she didn't go out to the movies much. She had only a small circle of friends according to her coworkers, and she wasn't particularly open about herself. A loner, one of them said, only to be contradicted by another: "No, she's just kind of... weird?"
So that was Brittany. She'd had seventeen years since Tony left home to track him down, and she hadn't done it. Eleven years since Tony got off the street, six since Tony started working for CB Productions... It had also been six years since Brittany graduated college, thereby freeing her from the last conventional hold her parents had over her. And five years since Stephen Foster passed away, come to that.
But it was only now that Brittany was reaching out.
Could be that she just didn't realize it was possible until now. Could be that she hadn't realized her brother was even still alive. She definitely didn't have the financial resources to hire a private detective; both "Tony" and "Foster" were common names, and Vicki knew exactly what she would have charged to sort through the thousands of potential matches in North America to find the right one. It wasn't something a waitress could afford.
But Brittany Foster hadn't tried to contact her brother until he became at least a little famous, and Vicki was way too cynical to find that anything but suspicious.
The smile had dropped off of Tony's face. "Tomorrow night," he said, "over dinner. Lee's going to stay here on standby, and if it gets weird I can text him to pull me out."
Unstated that sunset tomorrow was at 8:13, too late for Vicki to be any use at all for a dinner meeting.
Vicki scowled, acknowledging her limits but not accepting them. "You want any moral support?"
Tony's shoulders relaxed slightly. "You already checked her out, I think that's plenty." His words said no, but his tone said thank you. Vicki nodded to acknowledge both sentiments.
"I'll be here," she promised. Unstated that if it went bad, she’d kick Brittany’s ass. She was pretty sure Tony knew anyway.
She said goodnight to both boys—no, men, she reminded herself—and Lee Nicholas came within a breath of calling her ma'am again before she managed to leave the house. Tony might be visiting for the first time in ages, but he and Nicholas would both be exhausted from the flight, and she had a client to meet. They would have time to catch up over the next week.
Vicki woke up with her hair plastered to the side of her head and the sound of someone pacing in the kitchen. The hair was what she got for going to bed immediately after showering, although it hadn't really been much of an option; she had spent far too much time both digging and rolling in dirt last night to pass. Why does it always come back to digging?
The pacing, though...
Large shoes, but not the familiar heavy tread of a cop, and the body was lighter than Celluci's, too. He moved like a dancer.
Lee.
Which meant Tony wasn't back from the meet-and-eat with his sister yet.
Vicki scowled and swung out of bed, throwing clothes on and popping out of her safe-room. "What have we heard?" she barked, coming into the kitchen.
Lee Nicholas jumped, then immediately looked guilty. "Nothing," he said. "He texted that he's okay, but..."
"A text isn't a call," Vicki agreed. "When was that?"
It was 8:17 now—and Mike was still gone, the apartment still and empty without his familiar heartbeat, which meant she didn't have a car. If she wanted to ride to the rescue, she'd have to take the bus.
"About half an hour ago." Lee Nicholas turned once more as if to pace, then apparently thought better of it and approached the microwave, which was blinking a silent done in the corner of the kitchen. He popped the door and pulled out a mug; the sweet rich scent of chocolate hit Vicki a moment later, and she put it together: hot cocoa.
Nerves food. Not a bad idea, really.
Vicki moved toward the coffeepot and started cleaning it out. She wasn't supposed to drink it anymore—the caffeine was about as bad for her as it was for most dogs—but decaf, although a total abomination and utterly disgusting, was still better than nothing. The smell at least would calm her down. "He say how long he was going to be?"
Lee shrugged sourly he sat down on one of Vicki’s counter stools. "He thought maybe nine tonight—said it was going well, but they were ‘talking,’ and ‘might be a while.’" He flawlessly articulated the air quotes then wrinkled his nose, somehow making the expression look handsome.
Vicki watched him from the corner of her eye, but didn't actually turn away from the steady stream of cold water into the now-clean glass pot. "What does 'a while' mean, when you haven't seen each other for seventeen years?"
"Good. Question." Lee was looking at his cocoa, his expression about three steps removed from a glare. Actor, she remembered, used to controlling his emotions.
So there was a good chance he was actually pretty worried.
So was she. This was Tony, after all...
A familiar brisk knock rapped against the apartment door, one-two, and then without pause a key turned in the lock. Vicki poured the grounds into the machine quickly, then closed the green plastic tub and shut it back in the cabinet before Celluci made it through the door. If he didn’t know the coffee was decaf he might drink it and then actually get some rest tonight. He kept needing more sleep, these days...
She heard the plasticky rustle of waterproofed fabric, the scuff of shoes in the mat and heavy tread through the hardwood living room, and then Celluci was there, grayed and thickened with age but still the man she loved so much it made her throat hurt. His hair was wet, black and curling from the rain, and his collar was damp where the neck of the rain slicker had gaped. He looked generally grumpy—so, normal—but his eyes lightened when he saw her. I know exactly how that feels . She smiled to herself and crossed the kitchen to reach him, brushing at his damp cheeks with her thumbs. "Rain bad?"
"Disgusting," he murmured, ducking his head forward to kiss her. "Drizzles, more than drips." His mouth met hers, warm and familiar, and for one second she didn't think about anything else.
The kiss wasn't deep, but it was slow, a long perfect hello of a kiss, and they clung even as they drew back from it, their lips lingering together as the kiss ended.
Vicki indulged herself for a moment, letting herself rest against his chest. She could feel the strength in his limbs, the warmth of his blood. It sang a soft song on the edge of her hunger, but she had fed well before they picked the boys up at the airport the previous night; she could wait. She leaned into his embrace and asked in a murmur, "Did you get him?"
Mike had had an early call, and left at five in the morning. Judging by the exhaustion riding him now, he had just finished up the same case. His arms tightened around her at the question, and his breath ruffled past her ear, his voice just as quiet. "Hell yeah."
She smiled at his pride and kissed his jaw, then pulled away for real. "Coffee?"
Mike frowned. "At this time of night?" He sniffed the air, then went closer to the pot an sniffed again. "Is this decaf?"
Vicki snorted, pretending she hadn’t been caught. "I made it for me; yes, it's decaf." Damn it!
"You know, I'm pretty sure tea is cheaper, if you're trying to turn into my grandmother," Celluci snarked. "I’ll pick you some up; you want chamomile, or peppermint?"
"Kiss my ass."
A loud snort from the table reminded them both that Lee was there, and they turned, caught in the middle of being embarrassingly domestic. "You drinking this swill?" Mike demanded of him.
Lee held up his hot chocolate mug defensively and told him what was in it, adding, "It’s just a snack while we wait for Tony to get back."
"Yeah? He the one that got you started on that crap?" Mike rummaged in the cupboard, bringing out two mugs. He snagged the pot from under the stream, ignoring the hiss and burned smell as two stray drops hit the hot plate. "You know Vicki made a special trip to the store just to pick that shit up?"
Mike didn't drink hot chocolate, and Vicki didn't drink much of anything except the obvious. But Tony used to love the stuff—sweet, hot, and portable, all crucial attributes to him once upon a time—and she used to keep a couple packets in her purse just for him.
"Kind of you." Lee was hiding his smile behind his mug. It wasn’t anything close to effective.
Vicki accepted her own cup of decaf from Mike, changing the topic before Lee could decide they were any cuter. "Lee and I were going to ambush Tony and his so-called sister. You coming?"
"We were?"
"Weren't we?" Vicki raised both eyebrows, and after a second Lee tipped his head to the side in acknowledgement: Yes, alright, I was worried too.
Celluci drained half his coffee in one long swallow, then set the cup down on the counter. "That shit is disgusting," he said, shuddering. "I’ll drive. Just let me change into dry shoes."
Tony and Brittany Foster had agreed to meet at a twee, hipsterish coffeeshop called Brewnicorn Choux, located just close enough to the center of town that Tony could take a bus there. If it had been an attempt to avoid the exorbitant prices fashionable idiots paid for a cup of joe these days, it had failed; there weren’t more than three drinks on the hand-written chalkboard menu that were under five dollars, and most of the food was over ten.
On the other hand, their website said they had free wireless.
What Vicki hadn’t expected was the comfort of it. Overpriced, yes, but not a turn-and-burn: the tables were too large, the chairs too padded. This was an establishment where you were meant to sit, meant to stay and be warm and be family. Vicki was surprised by that, and it took a moment to remember why: the location had been Brittany’s suggestion. Hmm...
It certainly had served its purpose well; Brittany and Tony had apparently been talking here for over three hours. A pair of abandoned plates sat on the edge of the table, the traces of food past cold and into congealed. The barista—thirty-five-ish, androgynous, black hair, septum piercing, punky hoodie and too-tight jeans, although what jeans weren’t too tight these days—was watching Brittany and Tony, not as if worried and not as if pissed off, but as if...
...as if Brittany had asked to meet a near-stranger in a public place and the barista was pretty sure it was going well, but was keeping an eye on her to be safe.
Smart, Vicki reluctantly admitted.
She approached the table, trailed by Lee and Mike. The latter caught the barista’s eye and requested “a cup of coffee, black—fresh, I know it’s late, don’t care—a bottle of water, two hot chocolates, and throw a few of those pastry things you places always have in a case somewhere.” Vicki kept the smile purely mental and left him to it, although if he thought he was allowed to eat more than one of the “pastry things” after his last visit to the cardiologist he had another think coming. She pulled out a chair—Tony glared, she ignored him—turned it around, and sat.
“So.” She gestured to the table. “What’s all this?”
There were cards spread across it, a smidge larger than normal playing cards. The edges were just the tiniest ratty, as if the deck was on the older side but had been well-cared for; the backs were gray with two white-pencil drawings of eyes on them. Vicki’s first guess when she’d seen them across the shop had been that Tony and Brittany had gotten out a deck of cards to ease some of the awkwardness while they reconnected.
Given that the card currently sitting face-up next to her elbow was the Hierophant, that first guess was almost certainly wrong.
Tony rolled his eyes. “So, Britt, this is Victory Nelson and Detective Mike Celluci. They’re friends of mine, from—the last time I lived in Toronto.” The hesitation was barely noticeable, but Britt looked like she wouldn’t have noticed anyway.
Britt Foster had the same pale blue eyes Tony did, and probably—beneath the obvious black dye—the same blond hair, too. Her skin was pale enough for it, anyway, and her brows were several shades lighter than her messy ponytail. She and Tony were wearing matching hoodies—actually, Tony was wearing Lee’s Leafs hoodie, which Vicki was definitely too old to think was adorable. Britt’s hoodie had some kind of cartoon character on it—Vicki had no idea which one—and was a darker shade of blue, almost navy. She had five piercings in her right ear, three in her left, nose ring, lip ring, at least one necklace and three rings, and her lips had the bright pink shine of cheap gloss, although she wasn’t wearing any other makeup. Other than those differences, though, she and Tony were dressed identically—another thing Vicki wasn’t inclined to find cute.
Brittany Foster was frozen in place like a rabbit, her eyes wide, her pulse racing. She stank of terror, and it was fresh from the time they had walked in.
She was staring at Vicki.
“...And this is Lee,” Tony finished.
Lee Nicholas leaned forward, giving her a charming smile. “A pleasure.” He had the kind of voice that could sound good reading a cereal box, but he looked like he meant it.
Britt didn’t look like she even knew he was there.
Tony huffed out an irritated breath and turned to Vicki. “Britt,” he said pointedly, “is a seer. That means she sees things—like when people have certain special traits and abilities.”
Vicki raised one eyebrow, looking at Britt more intently.
“Stop that,” Tony hissed.
“Stop what,” Vicki asked lightly. Britt shoved herself back in her seat at the words, her hoodie all but merging with the pillowy back of the bench. Her eyes rolled in her head as she desperately scanned the coffeeshop for an exit.
“Vicki,” Mike said, voice low, and Vicki’s eyes snapped up. He was watching something over her shoulder—the barista, Vicki realized, who had stopped approaching from behind about six steps before they reached her.
Vicki took a deep breath—the shop stank of terror—and forced herself to relax. Alright, fine.
She smiled, carefully not showing too much of her teeth. “It’s nice to meet you—finally.”
“Vicki!”
The name had come from two throats at once, thankfully neither of them in a shout. She rolled her eyes. “I'm trying to be friendly,” she informed them. “Tony, you could’ve warned me about this.”
“Well, I was planning to before I introduced you two,” Tony said, with maybe understandable levels of sarcasm.
Britt’s gaze snapped over to him, clearly saying in silent words six feet high that he was insane to be talking to the—well, to Vicki—like that.
Tony sighed. “Victory’s an old friend,” he repeated. He didn’t sound soothing so much as unimpressed with anyone’s bullshit. “She and I’ve known each other for years—since before she was... like this, and before I was... also like this.” So Britt had in fact figured out that he was a wizard, then. “She’s fine.”
Britt look highly dubious about this, but swung her gaze back to Vicki, the panic in her eyes slowly banking itself. “She—”
The word caught, squeaking on a dry throat, and Britt bent over under the onslaught of the coughing fit followed. When it had passed, she tried again. “She’s a friend. Okay. You, uh...” Her eyes widened, her voice pitching upward again. “You know what she is?”
Tony frowned and leaned forward, dropping his voice to speak low into her ear—unfortunately audible to Vicki. “You want me to re-enact that scene from Twilight with you?”
“Ew, no!” Britt jerked away from him and shrieked, and that did it. The tension snapped, pushed a little too far into the ridiculous. Britt was suddenly just a girl again, oversized anime hoodie and all. “Ugh, ugh, ugh, that movie was terrible!”
“I mean, I’ll do it! Hang on, maybe there’s some cling wrap in the kitchen, we can paint it blue!”
“You are the worst, oh my God...” Britt put her hand to her head and rubbed hard at her forehead with the heel of her palm. She snuck another look at Vicki and squinted, then took a deep breath and addressed her. “So you’re a friend?”
Vicki crossed her arms and leaned comfortably into her chair. “Of Tony’s? Yes, I am. Tony used to keep his ears open for me, back when I used to be a cop. And I still try to be one of the good guys,” she added. She fished out a card and set it carefully on the table, then pushed it towards Britt.
Britt didn’t reach out to pick it up until Vicki’s hand was all the back on the chair. She read it—read it again—and then stuck it in her pocket and didn’t comment. Her eyes flicked from one side of Vicki to the other—from Mike to Lee, it had to be. Deciding which one to address first.
Behind Vicki, the barista had started moving again. None of them jumped when he—she? They?—set down the tray on the table. “Water, coffee, assorted pastries. Two hot chocolates will be a minute.” They looked directly across at Britt, ignoring everyone else. “You want anything?”
Britt smiled, a little trembly but real. “I’m fine,” she promised. “Thank, El.”
El nodded gravely and retreated, and Lee Nicholas, on Vicki’s left, leaned in again, his voice coming out smooth as velvet and effortlessly warm. Although probably not actually all that effortlessly, come to think of it. “I’m guessing these are your cards? Were you doing a reading?”
Britt looked at him, then snorted in exasperation. “Okay, you’re cute—good taste, FC—but you have a giant-ass hole in your aura, so you are maybe not as charming as you think.” She raised a shaky hand to push back a hunk of hair that had fallen out of her ponytail. “I was, uh, actually just explaining how it works... Tony was interested.”
“I am, too,” Lee said brightly, and on Vicki’s other side Celluci was leaning in for the coffee, polite inquiry on his face like he used with witnesses who were neither suspects nor assholes. Vicki settled further into her chair, smiled with her lips closed, and listened.
Tony met her eyes, and a series of unspoken messages flashed between them. Thank you for backing off; I like her. I like you. Thank you for being worried about me.
Thank you for coming when you were worried.
Next time, wait for me to fucking call you!
Vicki snorted and crossed her eyes at him; he rolled his at her.
Ah, fuck it. Vicki’d opened and closed a case last night, and Mike had done the same thing today. Despite the rain drizzling down outside, the air in coffeeshop was plenty warm. Her chair was well-padded, the light was low enough to be bearable, and Celluci’s coffee smelled fucking delicious. Around the table, Britt was leaning forward to show her brother—and Lee Nicholas, who based on the ring box he was fiddling with in his pocket was planning to become her brother-in-law—how she laid out the cards for her usual spread.
Mike, sitting on chair pulled up close beside her, leaned over to nudge her with his shoulder. When she looked over, he smiled.
Vicki smiled back.