The shot rang out so loudly I jumped, a dullring resounding in my ears as soon as the gun recoiled. I smelled the sharp sulfuric pungency of gunpowder in the air and watched in what felt like slow motion as a bag of Doritos on a shelf halfway between Smash-Nose and the Neanderthal blasted apart in an explosion of orange chips.
“That was a warning shot! Next time, I aim for you!” Mrs. Patel yelled, her arm steady as asniper’s as she held the gun on their retreating backs while they ran for the exit.
“Don’t come back!” Mrs. Patel called, as the door swung closed behind them.
Once they were gone, a moment of total silence fell. I stared at Mrs. Patel in shock, unable to process what had just happened but knowing, without a doubt, that I owed this ornery old woman my life.
“You saved me,” I breathed, limping around the counter toward her.
Mrs. Patel exhaled deeply, dropped the gun on the countertop, and collapsed back into her armchair. When I reached her side, I placed one hand on her arm. “Are you okay?” I asked.
She tilted her weathered face up to look at me, her brown eyes shining with exhilaration even as her weak legs shook with overexertion. “I could use a scotch.”
I laughed lightly, reaching beneath the counter as I’d seen her do once before and pulling out a bottle and two short glass tumblers. Unscrewing the cap, I poured out two dollops of amber liquid, passed one glass to her, and clinked mine against it.
“Cheers,” I said. “To you, Mrs. Patel. You saved my life.”
“And to you, Miss Lux,” she muttered. “You always keep things interesting around here.”
We both smiled — well, I beamed and she kind of smirked, but I was still counting it — before sipping our scotch. As we set our empty glasses down on the countertop, the sound of approaching sirensbecame audible.
Hopefully, it wasn’t Officer Santos, reporting for duty. That would just be the cherry on top of a fantastic morning.
Not that it had all been bad.
Before my near-abduction, I’d been incandescent — practically levitating off the ground with sheer lightness of being. Waking up wrapped in the arms of the man you love will do that to you, I suppose. Even after he’d left for the office and I’d headed back to my apartment, in need of fresh clothes for work, my happy mood had lingered. In fact, I’d been in such a good mood, I’d decided only one thing could make it better: ice cream. Who cared that it was only seven in the morning?
Life was good.
I had a feeling my day was about to take a turn for the worse as soon as the door flung open and uniformed officers poured through the entryway, their guns drawn and their expressions solemn. I sighed and looked at Mrs. Patel — who’d just finished stashing the scotch back beneath the counter — as the officer in charge approached and asked if we were okay.
Bash was going to flip his lid when I told him about this.
***
Thankfully, the police interrogation was relatively brief. The officers were all extremely polite and efficient as they took our information, asking several times if I needed medical attention for my scraped knees. They confiscated the VHS tape recording from the store’s security camera and promised to be in touch soon with any leads, climbing back into their squad cars and vanishing into the flow of traffic within an hour.
I was just happy I hadn’t had to make a trip to the station. Bumping into Santos at the water cooler wouldn’t exactly help matters.
It had taken a huge amount of self-containment not to spill the beans about the fact that I knew exactly who my attackers had been. They weren’t random street thugs looking for cash, as I’d led the officers to believe — they were pawns in an organization far more deadly than any city gang. But I’d given my trust to Agent Gallagher and, for the time being, I’d have to leave my life in his hands. Getting the NYPD involved in an FBI investigation would only complicate matters. Not to mention the fact that these same officers possibly worked alongside Santos. The last thing I wanted to do was tip him off, if he wasn’t already aware of my trip toLabyrinth.
As soon as the police left, I called Ravi and made sure someone would come relieve Mrs. Patel of her duties for the day. My next call was to Conor.
“Gallagher,” he clipped, answering on the first ring.
“It’s me. Lux.”
“I got the pictures by email this morning. You didn’t need to follow up.” His voice was terse.
“It’s not about that.” I sighed. Fae was right — he really was grumpy all the time. “I had a visit this morning.”
“What?”
“Smash-Nose and the Neanderthal came to see me.”
“Who?”
“The brewery thugs.”