I started down the hall.
The gargoyle clattered behind me.
“You stay here.”
He tipped his head and lost both pillows. He took a step toward me, on all fours this time, silent.
“Stay.”
He held still, waiting for me to turn, then took another step. Okay, fine. It was crazy to think he would understand me and do what he was told. He wasn’t a dog. He was a statue, for cripes’ sake.
The door to the bathroom was open. I looked in. Nothing.
The door to my bedroom was also open, and I could feel the cold night air stronger here.
I turned on the light and walked into the room. The window was open, my curtains fluttering in the breeze. My bed was unmade, but I think I’d left it that way this morning. I looked around the bed, under the bed. I even looked in the closet. No one else was there.
Meanwhile the gargoyle had decided it was some sort of game. He followed behind me, mimicking everything I did. He looked out the window, looked under the bed, even looked in the closet. Having human hands meant doors were not a problem for him.
Yes, that worried me.
“Did you open the windows?” I asked.
He stopped in front of me, crouched, wings spread, round eyes waiting for me to do something. Like cast magic. He stretched his neck out a little more, offering an ear for scratching.
“This?” I pointed at the open window.
He looked at it. Clattered at it, then waddled on two legs over to the window. He stuck his head and shoulders out the window, his wings tight against his back so he could fit his barrel chest in the space. His face was inked by the blue of night, only the barest brush of yellow from the light in my room outlining his comical features. He could crawl out through that space, I realized. Just the way he had probably crawled in through it. All on his own.
Even though I was on the third floor.
Holy shit.
He blinked his big round eyes and crooned into the night-the strange vacuum cleaner pipe organ in B flat. Pigeons startled and flew off the roof. The muscles down his back bunched as if he too wanted to take wing. I wondered, as he hung there, more out the window than in, if his wings were big enough and strong enough that he could fly, or if he’d drop like a rock.
He’s just a statue
, I told myself.
Statues can’t fly.
He pulled his head back in the window, and used those very human hands to pull the window shut, careful not to catch the curtain. Then he turned and made himself busy with the things on top of my dresser.
Statues can’t fly, can’t walk, can’t make noise, and can’t stack loose change on people’s dresser tops.
And statues did not dig through your underwear drawer.
“Stop it.” I yanked one of my favorite camisoles off his head before he pulled it the rest of the way over his snout and stretched it out. “Out.” I pointed to the open door. He looked at the door, clacked. Then he went down on all fours and trotted out of the room.
Sweet hells. What was I supposed to do with this thing?
Technically, he was not my property. I hadn’t stolen him or anything, but I had sort of broken him and set him free. I wondered if the restaurant had a you-break-it-you-have-a-new-roommate policy.
The water in the bathroom sink turned on and off. I strolled down the hall and leaned in to watch him.
He turned the water on, watched it drain down the sink, turned it off. The pipe gurgled. He clacked at it, and turned the water on again. Turned it off. Pipes gurgled. He clacked at the pipes and turned the water back on, childlike and content.
I should call the restaurant. Tell them their statue was messing around with my plumbing.
Sweet hells. I pressed my fingers against my eyes. They’d have me committed.
What I needed was coffee. Then I’d be able to think.
“Don’t break anything,” I said to Pet Rock Extreme.
In the kitchen, I found the note Nola had left for me on the coffeepot.
It said she and Stotts were working on the Cody case and not to wait up for her. The little smiley face made me think it was more than just a business appointment.
Well, good for her. Maybe one of us could have a normal date with a normal person and not have to come home to overzealous architecture messing up the place.
I started the coffee, putting a little extra grounds in, because I had a feeling I was going to need it. While the coffee brewed, I put the stacked coffee cups back in the cupboard, closed all the doors, and made myself busy cleaning.
When the coffee was done and the already clean kitchen even cleaner, I poured myself a cup and took it out into the living room.
The gargoyle was there, standing very still in the corner of the room. He had piled the curtains and vines on his head. They were still attached to the curtain rods, so it just looked like he’d stepped into a waterfall of fabric. I guess it looked a little like the waterfall stuff at the restaurant, though he had been crouched beneath a bush when I found him. Who knew? Maybe gargoyles liked being half hidden by falling water.
Or cheap curtains.
I picked the cushions off the floor and put them back on the couch. Then sat down.
“What am I going to do with you?” I asked. “Do you have a name? Fido? Rock? Quasimodo? Stone?”
He tipped his head and cooed.
“You like that? Stone?”
He clacked, walked toward me, the curtains stretching out behind him, over his thick shoulders, catching on the arc of his wings, then down his broad back and haunches, flowing away to pool against the wall. He stopped next to the couch, sniffed at me again, then lowered himself at my feet like a huge coffee table. He rested his head on his crossed arms and stared, unblinkingly, straight ahead.
He didn’t close his eyes, and he didn’t move. I put the toe of my boot against his side, and he didn’t seem to mind.
I drank coffee, while the gargoyle sat there like a gargoyle.
Gargoyles are not real. If I remembered the stories right, gargoyles were alive at night, and sunlight turned them back to stone every day.
Well, Stone was already made out of rock. I didn’t know how much more stone he could get. Maybe the sun made it so he couldn’t move. Put him to sleep or something.
I’d only ever seen Stone at night, at the restaurant and now. Maybe he lost all his magical locomotion once dawn rolled around. Maybe that’s why the restaurant had him chained down in the first place; otherwise he would have wandered off and messed with their sprinklers or something.
And if he did turn into a statue-an unmoving statue-in the morning, it might be easier to get him back out to the restaurant that way.
Except they were going to think I stole him.
Hells, I had money. I had my dad’s whole company. I could buy the statue from them. Tell them it was a misunderstanding and throw enough money at them until they saw it my way. I’d seen my father use that tactic more than once.
Speaking of which, I needed to call Violet about our dinner plans.
I stepped over Stone, who watched me cross the room but did not follow.
I picked up the phone-a landline and therefore less inclined to die on me-and dialed Violet.
“Beckstrom residence,” a man, Kevin, said.
“Hi, Kevin. This is Allie. Is Violet available?”
“Let me check. Just a second.” He put me on hold and I got the soft strains of one of Bach’s symphonies. My dad had a thing for Bach, and it sounded like Violet didn’t mind keeping it on the system.
“Hi, Allie. How are you?”
It still surprised me how young she sounded. It shouldn’t surprise me, since she was younger than me by a couple years, but I still couldn’t understand why she would like my father. And she obviously liked him enough to get pregnant.