Under Wraps

Chapter Seventeen

The light was fading in the conference room where Parker and I had the contents of the evidence boxes spread out between us. Well, the contents of the evidence boxes, two empty bags of peanut M&M’s, the remains of an Ali Babba falafel platter, and two frozen mocha lattes melting in Styrofoam cups. I rubbed my eyes and blinked out the big glass window into the police station vestibule.

“Looks pretty dead out there,” I muttered.

“Pretty dead in here,” Parker said, pushing the latest heap of crime-scene photos out of his way. “There’s no rhyme or reason to this. Maybe we should just call it a night.”

I glanced at my watch. “Ooh, I almost forgot. I have a Tupperware party over at Lorraine’s in half an hour.”

Parker’s nostrils flared. “What do witches need Tupperware for?”

I stood up, gathering my sweater. “I don’t know. To keep their eye of newt fresh?”

Parker grinned. “At least you have a sense of humor about your weird life.”

I paused. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means that you have a weird life. And that you have a sense of humor about it. Face it, Lawson, as far as normalcy goes, you’re zero for zero.”

I put my hands on my hips, my eyes raking over the grisly selection of crime-scene photographs that Parker was shoving into his briefcase. “And I suppose you’re as normal as they come?”

Parker nodded. “Heading out to grab a beer, then picking up my date, probably getting a bite to eat and then a little—”

I raised a hand, stop-sign style. “Don’t,” I started. “I don’t want to hear about your big-breasted concubines.”

Parker’s face split into that half grin, which tonight I found grating. “How’d you know she’s big-breasted?”

“You’re right. I might be abnormal, but you’re down right stereotypical. Give Bambi my best.” I snatched the manila file folder that Parker held out to me and stuffed it into my shoulder bag. “See you tomorrow.”

I was fuming when I pushed through the double doors of the police station and into the cold night air. I gulped heavily and then blinked, surprised by the moist trails on my cheeks.

Was I crying?

I sniffed angrily, then wiped my nose on my sweater sleeve, rubbing the tears away with my fists. I would not cry over Parker Hayes. I would not cry over that demon-hating asshole. I was just tired.

And completely normal.

I speed-dialed Lorraine on my cell phone and let her know that I wouldn’t be able to make it to her party tonight. “But put me down for a juicer and a salad spinner,” I said before hanging up. Normal people juiced fruit and spun salads, right?

Stupid Parker Hayes.

I drove home with my radio blaring, trying to quell the hot anger that roiled in my stomach, but with every turn I saw Parker, saw that stupid half grin and heard his comments about my abnormal life roll through my head.

Normalcy had always been a problem for me—not that I didn’t try. Like every other eight-year-old girl I wanted a princess party. I remembered how Grandmother swathed the house with white twinkle lights and countless yards of pale pink tulle. She set out glittery crowns and little paper cups filled with pink M&M’s, but where most little girls would have been okay with a paper cutout of a fire-breathing dragon in front of their Crayola castle, Grandmother figured, why bother with fake when she knew a perfectly good dragon who lived in the Sunset and owed her a favor? The party was going well until Nelia Henderson (yes, that Mrs. Henderson—fresh from the UDA) lumbered in, forked tongue flicking, tendrils of smoke curling up from her nostrils.

At first my party guests were thrilled—even the uber-popular Allison Baker (my wildcard invitation and whose friendship, I prayed, would vault me into normal social standing) squealed with delight. It was controlled chaos until Mrs. Henderson downed a bottle of grape soda and then burped fruit-scented fire right down the center of my pretty pink princess table. Allison Baker never spoke to me again—not even after her singed eyebrows grew back.

School wasn’t any better. I despised Mother and Father’s Day, when my teachers would look at me with those stupidly sad expressions and suggest that I make cards for my grandmother instead. My grandmother, who would show up for parents night dressed in a ridiculous array of rainbow-colored scarves and tinkling gold jewelry and stand alongside all the other little girls’ mothers, who were dressed in pastel twin sets and elegant pearl studs, their slim, un-wrinkled throats wrapped with dainty pearl rope necklaces. Grandmother would always talk too loud or laugh too loud, and I was labeled the girl with the weird grandma—and the girl with no parents. It was Cathy Stevens in the seventh grade who dubbed me “Special Sophie”—said with a snicker and a wave of her Barbie-blond hair.

By high school I had tested into an exclusive private school where the girls on the brochure had waist-length, stick-straight hair and wore cardigan sweaters and pleated skirts. I thought it was my Special Sophie escape. Chelsea, the twelfth-grader who led the Mercy High tour, talked about how all the girls in the school were like sisters, and I had visions of sleepovers and field trips and normal best friends with pink skin and heartbeats. I kept up my “normal” façade through spring semester by having the carpool drop me off in a slice of suburbia nine blocks away from Grandmother’s house with the blinking neon eye in the window. My normal façade was effectively shattered when a group of popular girls thought it would be a hoot to have their palms read—and walked right into my living room. My school pictures hung on the wall between pictures of Grandmother hugging a warlock and shaking hands with a centaur, so my plan to act as a curious patron was dashed. I finished out my high school life as Loser Lawson, and the moronic monikers and life abnormalities just went on from there. Now I was nearly thirty-three years old, living with a vampire, being hunted by something else, and being hounded by an obnoxious but blindingly hot cop.

“Yeah,” I snorted, “I can do normal.”

By the time I got home I was spitting mad. I kicked open my front door and tossed my shoulder bag onto the floor, the manila file folder tumbling out, splaying crime-scene photos all over the hallway floor.

“Ugh!” I said, tossing my jacket over the heap and heading for the kitchen.

“That’s it,” I said, banging open cupboard doors and yanking out pots and pans. “Normal. I want normal. No werewolves, no demons, no murders, and certainly no Parker Hayes.”

I pulled open the freezer door and narrowed my eyes, scrutinizing the frosty contents: veggie dogs. Skinny cows. A frozen gun. Two paper-wrapped packages from the Ferry Market Butchers.

“I want pot roast,” I said, reaching into the freezer. “Normal, human dinner.” I took out one of the paper-wrapped packages and dumped the frozen hunk of meat on the counter. “And peas.” I snatched a bag out and sailed it over my shoulder, hearing it land with a satisfying thud in the sink. “And potatoes.” I stood in the center of the kitchen, hands on hips, frowning at my bare countertops. “Okay, so no potatoes.”

I tossed the frozen pot roast into the microwave and set it to defrost, then sat down with a sleeve of Ritz crackers and some cream cheese. A nice, normal snack, for a nice, normal girl.

Parker Hayes didn’t know what he was missing.

I was halfway through my second sleeve of crackers and nearing the end of a bottle of St. Supery Sauvignon Blanc that I was saving for a special occasion when my cell phone chirped. I glared at the readout and tossed it on to the counter, then poked the pot roast as it spun in the microwave. It was effectively leathery on the outside but frozen solid on the inside, so I dumped a bottle of A1 over it and set the microwave to thirty minutes, then pre-heated the oven. My mouth watered thinking about the juicy, tender pot roast that Grandma would make on Sundays, and I frowned, thinking of poor Alfred Sherman and his disastrous fate.

“Normal,” I reminded myself while the pot roast spun.

I heard the deafening pop of the gunshot a millisecond before I felt the searing pain at the side of my head. My stomach lurched angrily, and I shakily touched the open wound, my fingertips immediately mingling with oozing blood.

“Oh my God,” I whispered. “Oh my God—I’m going to die!”

I crumpled to the floor, the pain at my temple hot and thundering, my warm blood rushing in rivulets to my ears. I felt the lump grow in my throat, felt the tears wash over my cheeks as I reached for the cell phone, then rested my throbbing head against the cool linoleum floor. “Nina,” I whispered to the empty kitchen. “Help me.”

When I woke up I was staring at my kitchen ceiling with Parker’s concerned face looming over me.

“Lawson? Lawson?” I could hear his voice, but it sounded foggy, a million miles away.

I tried to move, but everything hurt. My stomach was churning, my head felt as if it weighed a thousand pounds, and everywhere around me was the stench of burning, of wounded flesh.

“How bad is it?” I murmured.

I saw Parker look around, his blue eyes big and wondering. “It’s pretty bad,” he said solemnly. “It’s a mess in here.”

I felt the lump forming in my throat, and before I could stop it, my eyes went moist again and I could feel the hot tears as they trailed down my cheeks for the second time this evening. “Am I going to die?” I whispered.

Parker bit his lip and then—smiled?

“From pot roast? I doubt it.”

I blinked. “Pot roast?” I sat up on my elbows and looked around my kitchen. The exploded, smoky remains of my pot roast was everywhere. I touched the wound on my head and came away with a handful of shredded meat and sticky A1 sauce.

“Ugh!” I dropped my head back with a thunk on the linoleum floor. “God, I can’t even do normal right!”

Parker leaned over and waved the empty wine bottle in front of me. “As a matter of fact, I think you do normal quite well.”

“I didn’t drink all that.”

“Then you exploded a defenseless pot roast just for the hell of it?”

“What are you doing over here anyway?” I asked, picking a piece of gristle out of my hair. “Aren’t you supposed to be out with Boobarilla?”

Parker eyed my forehead and avoided my gaze. “Took her home early. And I’d appreciate it if you stopped talking about my baby niece’s breasts.”

“You were out with your niece?”

Parker shrugged, his cheeks a pale pink. “We have a date once a month. Her parents are divorced, and my brother’s kind of an ass.”

“So Uncle Parker to the rescue? Why didn’t you tell me that?”

“You were awfully busy storming out. Besides, I wouldn’t want to stand in the way of a woman and her Tupperware. How was that, by the way?”

I raised one eyebrow suspiciously. “Why are you here again?”

“I was passing by on my way home and saw your light on.” He shrugged. “Wanted to make sure everything was okay.”

“Well, aren’t you the Boy Scout?”

Parker grinned and offered me a hand. I tried to stand but slid on some exploded meat. Parker’s arms were around me in a flash, holding me steady.

“And aren’t you the lucky one?”

“Yeah,” I said, tossing my arms around Parker’s neck, liking the woozy feeling in my head. “Aren’t I?”

Parker grinned down at me and I noticed how perfect and white his teeth were. I brushed his lips with my fingertips, and he caught my hand, gently kissing my palm. The touch of his lips sent a little quiver down low in my belly.

“I like you, Parker Hayes,” I said, working hard to lock my eyes to his. Parker brushed his hand over my hair, shaking a few strands of charred pot roast off his sleeve.

“You’re all right, too, Lawson.”

I was leaning heavily against Parker, loving the feel of his warm, muscular pectoral muscle against my cheek and maybe drooling just the smallest bit when Nina walked in.

“Nina!” I wailed, throwing my arms around her and stiffening against her chilled skin. “I have been looking everywhere for you. Do you know Parker Hayes?”

Nina wriggled out of my embrace and narrowed her eyes at Parker. I had never seen that smoldering look, and I slumped down, sitting hard on a kitchen chair. “Are you mad?”

“What did you do to her?” Nina ignored me, her words sharp and directed at Parker.

“Me?” Parker wagged the bottle in front of Nina’s nose. “Don’t ask me, ask Robert Mondavi.”

Even in my less than optimal state I could feel the heat as Nina’s eyes raked over me.

“It was St. Supery,” I whispered.

“She’s had a little too much to drink,” Parker explained in a low voice.

Nina’s dark eyes slid to the ceiling.

“And an issue with the microwave.”

“I made pot roast!” I said brightly. I looked at Nina’s white fangs and frowned. “It’s too bad you don’t eat.”

“No, it isn’t,” Parker and Nina said in unison.

“This is nice,” I said, pulling my legs up onto the chair and curling my arms around them. “It’s like we’re all having a dinner party. A nice, normal dinner party.”

The last splat of pot roast peeled off the ceiling and hit Nina right between the eyes.

“Come on, Lawson,” Parker said, tugging on my arm. “Let’s get you into bed.”

“Let’s!” I said, standing up quickly.

Nina grabbed my arm. “That’s fine. I think you’ve done enough, Detective Hayes. I can get my roommate to bed.”

I linked an arm around each of them, feeling lighter than air as they dragged me into the living room. “My friends,” I said, happily.

Nina stepped away from me and stooped, her dark eyes focused on the scatter of crime-scene photos I had left on the floor.

“Are these from the murders?” she asked, her head cocked.

“Yeah,” Parker said. And then, to me, “They were supposed to be confidential.”

“Whoops!” I sang. “They must have fallen out of my safe.”

“We know the first one is Alfred Sherman—”

“Sophie’s attorney friend,” Nina supplied.

“Right. The second was a vagrant. Forensics just came back with an ID. Dauber. Dauber Sawyer.”

Nina leaned down, her bare feet making no indentation on the soft-pile carpet. “Dauber Sawyer is no vagrant.” Her eyes were wide, matter-of-fact. “He’s the general manager of Dirt. He went missing over a week ago.”

“He went dead about a week ago,” Parker said, straightening up.

Nina’s eyebrows went up. “How dead?”

My stomach gurgled. “How dead is there? Isn’t there just dead and”—I looked at Nina—“undead?”

“Really dead,” Parker finished. “Was Sawyer a demon? How well did you know him?”

Nina shrugged. “He wasn’t a demon. He was a seer.”

I felt the saliva go hot and metallic in my mouth. “A seer?” I whispered.

Parker looked hard at me. “A seer whose eyeballs had been gouged out.”

“I think I’m going to be sick,” I said, weaving my way toward the bathroom.