“Obviously I’m worthless without one.”
“Obviously.” Another yawn, and this time she didn’t try to fight it. “Except you’re warm. And surprisingly cuddly, for a big mean council member.”
“That’s exactly what it says on my business cards.”
Chapter Eight
If there was one thing Andrew had never expected Alec Jacobson to master, it was videoconferencing.
The man avoided technological advances with singular dedication.
Still, necessity compelled even the most drastic changes, and it looked like it had dragged Alec into the twenty-first century. At least, it seemed so until the blurry picture on the laptop screen slid into sharp focus to reveal not only Alec, but his smiling wife as well. “There,” Carmen said. “I think that should work.”
Alec made an annoyed face, his lips tugged down and his eyebrows pulled tight together. “I gave up ten minutes of my life so Andrew could see how pissy I am over the fact that I can’t just use a fucking telephone. How is this progress?”
“Don’t be grumpy.” Carmen waved. “Hi, Andrew.”
He waved back. “Is this a bad time?”
“Not at all.” She kissed Alec’s cheek as she rose, and paused to smooth the frown from between his brows. “I’m going to make French toast for breakfast. Don’t forget we have that thing this morning.”
When she was gone, Alec sighed. “She’s bribing me so I don’t choke anyone at our ten o’clock meeting.”
“Must be damn good French toast.”
“Not that good.” Alec ran his hand over his disheveled hair and shook his head. “It is not a good time up here. John Peyton’s got some upstart on his council poking at him, and things are…unsettled.”
Knowing Alec, it was the understatement of the decade. “I wouldn’t have bothered you, but I ran into trouble in Alabama. Car chase that ended badly for the other guy, but someone might have gotten a license plate. I thought maybe you could call McNeely—”
“Hold up.” Alec ducked out of view and reappeared a moment later with his cell phone in hand. “I thought I gave you McNeely’s number. Maybe Julio has it.”
“Well, I have it, but…” But he wasn’t really in charge, wasn’t the one with the authority to call up a lieutenant in the New Orleans Police Department and ask for favors.
“Oh Jesus, kid.” Alec leaned forward until his face all but filled the screen. “Okay, listen to me. I’ve been letting this slide because you need to find your footing, and we’ve been between crises. But shit’s liable to hit the fan any day now, so the training wheels are coming off. You know what to do, and you need to start doing it without checking with me first.”
Andrew choked back a growl. “It might be that simple for you, Alec, but my situation’s a little more complicated.”
“Yeah, on the subject of complicated, have you heard from Derek this week?”
“No.” Andrew tensed. If he’d somehow heard what happened to Kat…
Alec sighed again, something that was starting to sound like a nervous tic. “Great. Okay, I’m telling you this because the rumor’s spreading so fast you’re probably going to hear it before he calms down enough to call you. Nicole’s pregnant.”
“Holy shit.” It seemed like the sort of thing Derek would want to shout from the rooftops, and the fact that he hadn’t made Andrew’s hands clench into fists. “Is something wrong?”
“Nothing life-threatening, but Nick’s not feeling well. Sicker than usual, I guess. Carmen’s tried to tell him it’s all manageable, but Derek watched his wife’s twin sister go through a miserable pregnancy and premature labor, so panic has set in pretty hard. He’s calling Carmen at all hours, damn near every time Nick twitches a toe.”
They were going to have a baby. “He hasn’t told Kat yet, either. She’d have mentioned it.”
Alec’s eyebrows climbed up. “I thought you and Kat weren’t talking.”
It was stupid to feel as though he’d gotten caught smoking under the bleachers. “That was the situation.
I was helping Kat with some stuff about her mom.”
“Uh-huh.” Alec scrubbed his hand over his hair again, leaving it half sticking up this time. He looked ragged around the edges in general, as if it’d been a few days since his last shave—or his last full night of sleep. “Shit. Okay, you’ve got to handle this, Andrew. Derek can barely handle himself and his wife, and John Peyton’s got a daughter to worry about and that cagey little shit on his council who’s stirring up trouble. Can you and Julio keep Kat safe and get this shit done?”
“Yeah, I’ll get it done.” For the first time, Andrew caught a gleam in Alec’s eyes, a satisfaction that belied his apparent frustration. For all his exasperation, he was in his element. “This thing with Kat’s mom might be big, Alec.”
“I don’t doubt that. I know Derek’s never thought her mother’s death was really an accident. Is she digging around again? She was obsessed with it for a few months when she was nineteen and had just gotten access to our list of contacts at the detective agency.”
“Yeah, she was digging.” And she just might have broken the whole thing wide open. “What do you usually buy McNeely to say thanks when he’s just saved your ass? Scotch?”
“Not anymore. McNeely’s on the wagon. Get him some music. A CD or two.”
“Done. Thanks, Alec.”
“Hey. If shit gets so bad you can’t figure out your next move…call me. But if you know the next move, take it. You’ve got the instincts, kid. Time to start trusting them.”
“Right.” Julio had undoubtedly already been taking care of business while Andrew kept his head in the sand, but that was going to change. “I’ll keep you posted.”
“You do that.” Alec paused. Frowned. “Tell me one thing. Are you tangled up because it’s Kat?”
“Yes,” he replied readily. “And also because her contact was looking for protection from the Southeast council. It had to be me or Julio, and Julio wasn’t touching it.”
“No, I didn’t mean—” He made an amused noise. “Is your head tangled up? And your instincts? That girl has never made it easy for you to think.”
“My brain’s working fine, Alec.” It was even mostly true.
“Uh-huh. It’s the rest of you working just fine that I’m worried about.”
Andrew couldn’t resist an arrogant grin. “That’s working all right too.”
Six months in New York had perfected Alec’s exasperated peevishness. “God help us all. Don’t be an idiot.”
“No more than usual, you have my word on that.”
“Good.” Alec’s finger rushed toward the screen, diverting at the last moment to crash into the keyboard, judging by the sound. He looked back up at Andrew, cursed, then pounded another key before bellowing, “Carmen, how the fuck do I turn this thing off?”
The call dropped, and Andrew muffled a snort as he closed the laptop. Things may have changed a hell of a lot over the last year, but some things never would. It was comforting, in a way.
Not that he had time to sit around and ponder it. He had to get on the phone with McNeely and clean up his mess, and then he had to figure out what to tell Kat about her cousin’s impending fatherhood—and what it could mean if she chose to pursue her investigation.
Dixie John’s was the sort of restaurant tourists would have driven miles out of their way to visit, if they’d had any way of knowing the place was there. Once in a while, a tourist wandered in and enjoyed a meal, utterly oblivious to the fact that they were surrounded by witches and priestesses or psychics and shapeshifters.