Page 46 of Deja Who
TWENTY-FOUR
“Hmm. Okay. It’s probably not gonna be Cat.”
“She’s not even poor,” Leah giggled. Somehow they’d ended up prone on the couch, Archer on his back, Leah on his front. This had stemmed in mid-story from her demand to examine his stab wounds, and had progressed to kissing and, of course, the finale of the Tale of Cat.
“No? Really?”
“Boston, right? Most of her family can trace their roots back to Plymouth Rock and she’s got a six-figure trust fund. So she didn’t just quit being mayor; she quit all of it. Corporations and business suits and shaking hands while kissing babies and politics ofanykind and now she sort of pokes around the city and sometimes she sleeps in shelters and sometimes she gets a suite at the Marriott but she always ends up in that park. She must really like the ducks.”
“She really likesyou, dork!” Archer gave her a gentle smackon the forehead with the palm of his hand. “Why does that nevereveroccur to you?”
“Um.” She tipped her head to the side and thought. “Past precedent?”
“Ooooh, I love when you’re a clueless dumbass and then use big words.”
She shifted her weight enough so that an elbow went into his ribs and he groaned. Smiling, she sat up and straightened her skirt. And then her hair. And readjusted her blouse. “Don’t pout.”
“Awwww.”
“That is the exact opposite of ‘don’t pout.’ Besides, I know I was hurting you.”
“Nuh-uh.”
“I was lying on your chest,” she said, exasperated. “So, directly on your stab wounds. You should have prevented that—”
“Fat goddamn chance.”
“—or at least told me I was hurting you.”
“I get off on it.”
“No, you don’t.”
“No, I don’t. But I don’t mind.”
He sat up, shaking his hair out of his eyes. Leah was having a hard time deciding which she liked best: the blue or the green. “Did not mind. Did not care. Still don’t care. You can make me your mattress anytime.”
“Thank you. Do you want to call it a day?” They’d been discussing past lives and possible future murders for hours; the clinic had long since closed. “You understand that because of confidentiality issues I couldn’t exactly hand you a pile of charts and a copy machine and let you have at it.”
“Andyouunderstand that you should wear green all the time.It makes you look like a sexy leprechaun.” At Leah’s snort, he continued. “Besides, we’ve already been over this. I thought maybe we could figure out the type of person this guy or gal could be, and you could watch for them.”
Adorable.“It’s not always someone in my life,” she reminded him. She had a brief flash of someone
(my name is Mary Jane Kelly)
and a sensation of dread and drowning
(the knife like silver fish)
but the memory was gone before she could chase it down.
“Well, it’s something,” Archer was saying. “Better than your Plan A, which was ‘hang around not engaging in a single thing while waiting to be murdered.’”
I haven’t entirely abandoned that one. I’m just hoping to get laid first.
“And then there’s the people you know.”
“Therearethe people I know.”
