Page 16 of Bears Behaving Badly
“So you watch movies,” Annette observed, “but you don’t know who Lecter is? Because that’s—” She cut herself off as a long black car suddenly swung out of a spot at the end of the row and arrowed toward them, tires squealing as the driver wrenched the wheel to make the turn. “Oh, wonderful. These are the idiots who cause pileups the first time it snows. And the second time.”
“Aren’t you gonna smile at them?” David asked with a smile of his own. “I thought that was your thing. You grin and it freaks people out.”
“I don’tgrin. You’ve got me confused with a jack-o’-lantern. No, I’m polite, and if thathappensto freak people out, I have no control…over…”—Was the thing speeding up?—“that…uh…”
Over the course of the next three seconds, many things happened. Well, four things happened. (1) Annette clamped down on Dev’s collarbone and yanked, ignoring his yelp as she sent him sailing over her shoulder. (2) The car did an excellent job of trying to cream all three of them. (3) David slammed into her with the finesse of a garbage truck. (4) The car roared past and down the first ramp behind them.
“Oh my God, Net, are you okay?”
“Argh,” Annette groaned. “My skeletal structure…” Then: “Net?”
“Did it hit you?” Dev cried.
“No, that was me,” David said, which was especially startling since his face was less than two inches from hers. In a feat of disastrous timing, she abruptly found she loved his aftershave, which was warm and spicy, like expensive pepper. And his denim-blue eyes, inches from hers, were the sky. Which was a good trick since they were in a parking garage. “Are you okay, hon?”
Hon? Maybe he meant Hun, as in “Attila the.” Have people always had nicknames for me, or is this something new everyone’s trying? I want to put my arms around him. Iwillput my arms around him.
No. From her perspective, that is to say, from beneath him (groan), he was solid, steady warmth. Solid and sky-colored eyes and she wasn’t going to hug her crush while on the floor of a filthy parking garage in the wake of their attempted murder.
Right?
Right.
“Your breath smells like Skittles. That’s not a criticism. And I’m reasonably certain the cardidhit me. Feels like it, anyway,” she groaned, elbowing David off her bones. She looked up and saw Dev had landed with the inherent quickness and grace of his kind
(generalizing’s bad, but truth be told, I’ve never met a clumsy werefox)
and was peering down at them while clinging to the top of a cement pillar. His eyes were so huge they dominated his small, pointed face.
“I’m fine,” she said, gingerly feeling her ribs.
“Jeez, I didn’t mean to hurt you.” David’s expression was still calm, but she could hear his distress.
“Comparatively speaking, you didn’t. Sorry, nearly getting run over wreaks havoc on my manners. Thank you very much, don’t mind my grumbling, I welcome the bruises because the dead don’t bruise, and I am astonished and impressed by your speed.” Then, louder: “Come down, Dev.”
He let go and dropped to the top of a small SUV, so lightly he left no dent and made hardly any sound, then bounded back to her side. She took him by the shoulders, peered into his face, and felt his skull, which he tolerated with a minimum of squirming. “You’re all right?”
“Yeah, yeah.”
“Nothing scraped? Broken? Spindled? Folded?”
“I’m good. You had me flying before I had time to be scared,” he said. “I bet you flipped me ten feet!”
“No betting. And…Net? What was that about?”
He blushed, which was amazing since Dev Devoss was the poster boy for shameless. “S’just somethin’ we call you,” he said in a voice so low she had to bend closer to hear. Under different circumstances she would have followed up, but the child was clearly distressed. Oh, and someone had just tried to kill them.
Or maybe just kill Dev. Which was worse.
She turned to David. “Thank you again.”Now! Hug him now! You’re not on your back anymore. Totally appropriate time and setting!“I should have said that first before talking about your breath.”
“I understand,” he replied, straight-faced.
“I like your aftershave,” she said, because she was a touch-starved moron, apparently.
He smiled a little. “Thanks.”
Dev was staring at them. “You guys wanna get a room?”
