Simply Irresistible Part 24

*Chapter Sixteen*

Eris sat in the center of Quixotic, nursing a vodka martini. What an interesting hour she'd had. Dexter Grant popping into the middle of the room like a mage newly introduced to his powers, and his startlingly prepossessed statement about Buckingham Palace, proving that he'd made this mistake before. The man could get careless when his mind was on other things.

And Eris had a guess what other things had preoccupied him. Those Fates, of course, and that pretty little psychic who seemed to think she had more power than she did.

Vivian Kineally was prettier in person than she had seemed from Eris's magical glimpses of her. Theoretically, the girl shouldn't have been attractive at all. Her hair was too curly, her features too delicate. But that dark skin and those intelligent eyes made up for a lot. With the right makeup, the right clothes, and the right pair of contact lenses, Vivian Kineally would be a stunner.

Grant had taste.

Eris grabbed the plastic sword that held her olive and swirled it in her gla.s.s, pretending to listen to Sturgis, Kronski, and Suzanne discuss the day's news stories. In the back, she could sense the group gathered in Blackstone's office.

Blackstone himself was furious at Grant for taking control of the Fates. Blackstone's little friend, Sancho, who apparently wasn't so little any more, was amused by the turn of events. And Blackstone's wife was trying to placate her husband, her feeble not-yet-developed power glimmering off her like reflected sunlight. The other woman, Sancho's wife, wasn't worth Eris's time or attention.

No, what interested Eris were Grant and Kineally, who had just popped out of the back office on their way to a new adventure. Off to search for Eris, who, unbeknownst to all of them, was sitting front and center in their little restaurant She had given Kineally a chance to recognize her. Their gazes had met, and she had felt Kineally's mind probe hers. Of course, Eris wasn't going to open her thoughts to just anyone, particularly not a little not-yet-magical talent whom everyone treated as more important than she was.

That little trick Eris pulled, in fact, proved that Kineally wasn't the talent Eugenia had thought she was. Not that Eugenia had been right about many things.

Eris smiled at the memory, although her smile must have been inappropriate for the conversation. Sturgis glared at her as if she had burped at the table. She let her smile fade, nodded once as if she were paying attention to his prattle, and listened instead to the discussion in the back.

Not that it was much more interesting than the one in the front. The little group of rescuers had no idea she was here. No mage could sense her powers when she used her blocking magic--a series of spells she had devised while undergoing her torture from the Fates. As the blocking spells became more and more successful, she gained some respite from the pain those three harpies had inflicted on her, until, in the end, she felt no pain at all.

They thought their little creative methods of justice worked. All those harpies had really managed to do--at least in Eris's case--was make her even more determined to have her revenge.

And she 'would' have her revenge. She was sick of the Powers That Be, and the Fairy Circle, who thought they knew even more than the Powers, had taken self-righteousness to a new art. That didn't even include all the other, tinier groups of magical rulers who thought they had a corner on right, might, and power.

All of them would learn they knew nothing about governing, about control, about the way the world worked. They would learn who was really in charge when Eris's plan hit its final stages.

Getting rid of the Fates and replacing them with those marvelously imbecilic children was simply one of the middle steps along the road to success.

". . . do you, Erika?"

Eris blinked at Sturgis, who was still glaring at her. He knew she hadn't been listening. No sense in pretending she had been.

"I'm sorry," she said, pulling the olive out of her gla.s.s and tapping the plastic sword against the rim. "I seem to have lost the thread of the conversation."

Sturgis picked up the tray of spinach-stuffed mushroom caps and scooped the last onto his gla.s.s appetizer plate. "Kronski, here, believes we should put some of our science reporters on this, to see if they can figure out what happened to that building this morning. I think this story's run its course, and it's time to leave Oregon for someplace that has real news. Don't you, Erika?"

She set her olive on the bread plate to her right-- his bread plate, not hers, but if he challenged her on it, she could lie and say she always got confused by bread plate placement. He was irritating her. It was clear he had repeated his question verbatim after he had given her Kronski's argument.

Kronski had just finished his fourth raw oyster. Who he thought he would bed in the afternoon, of all things, with that scruffy blond hair and poorly shaven face, she had no idea. But his entire meal seemed geared toward aphrodisiacs--oysters, oysters, and more oysters. Too bad she hadn't paid attention to his order for the main course. She had a hunch it had oysters in it as well.

"Science reporters?" she said to Kronski. "You actually believe there's a story here?"

Kronski pushed away his appetizer plate, then grabbed his linen napkin and wiped his hands. "Buildings don't flash in and out, at least not in real life. I wasn't so much thinking about making this story into an evergreen as I was thinking of it as a CYA story."

"Why do we need our a.s.ses covered?" Eris asked.

"Because someone could--and I'm sure someone will--accuse us of using CGI to make a slow news day into a real story."

"Nonsense," Sturgis boomed, and half the restaurant looked at him, surrept.i.tiously, of course. He was the famous one at the table--or at least he was the modern famous one. At times in her very long life, Eris had been much more famous than he ever was.

With a slight movement of her left hand, she ordered him to lower his voice.

"Why would anyone think we had to make up a story?" Sturgis asked. "We're not tabloid television. I have the awards to prove it."

'I' not 'we'. That ego. Eris would have to crush it, and soon.

"The print people love to trip us up," said Suzanne. "They think we wouldn't know real news if it dropped in our laps."

Leave it to Suzanne to state the obvious. But her point was an interesting one. Eris's first inclination had been to send the entire team back to New York and say she'd be meeting with stockholders. But if the team stayed, no one would think twice about her presence.

"You're scheming," Sturgis said.

'Yes, idiot, but not about you or your paltry news career'. Eris smiled at him and finished her martini. Then she set the gla.s.s down. She took a warm slice of bread from the basket in front of her.

"Let her think," Kronski said.

As if they ever interfered. Eris poured some olive oil in the provided dish, then dipped her bread in it and chewed, surprised at the richness and freshness of the oil. Blackstone was living up to his mortal reputation. He had found olive oil that actually tasted like the kinds she had as a girl in what was now Greece.

Kronski, of course, had asked the wrong question--not that, as a limited mortal, he would know the right question to ask. No one cared, in the long term scheme of things, if KAHS was a tabloid news network or a real news network. h.e.l.l, the definition of what was real news changed every few decades anyway.

No. The important issue was how she could use their stay in Portland and surrounding environs to further her goal of disseminating the right kind of information to create even more chaos around her.

When she was partic.i.p.ating, each story had to further that goal. Of course, KAHS covered a lot of stories that meant nothing in Eris's scheme of things. But here in the heart of happy mage country, where Blackstone had his friends and his restaurant, where Dexter Grant, that good-hearted do-gooder, had settled, and where the late Eugenia Kineally practiced her particularly offensive brand of niceness . . . well, this would be the best place to dismantle some magical systems that had gotten way out of line.

The fact that the Fates had chosen to hide here, cowards that they were, was simply gravy.

"Erika?" Sturgis asked.

She could tell from his tone of voice that he expected her to agree with him.

"I think we should stay here," she said, setting down the crust of her oil-saturated bread. "We haven't done any live reporting from the Northwest in a while, preferring to rely on our affiliates--and, as we all know, their reporting is beyond wretched. Who cares about trees, anyway--old growth or otherwise? There have to be other stories in this part of the country, right?"

Sturgis was staring at her as if she had grown a new head. Kronski had a grin on his face that he was trying--and failing--to suppress.

"I don't think this is a good idea," Sturgis said. "There's no news here. This is the a.s.s end of nowhere."

His voice carried, like usual, and the patrons of the restaurant looked at him. Half of them seemed offended. Locals, probably. The C-team news crews who had been covering the weird building all morning gave him a sympathetic smile.

"Maybe there's the perception of no news," Eris said, "because no one pays attention to this part of the country. We might break a few stories. Have you thought of that?"

"I've been hoping to check out some of the fringe political movements here," Suzanne said, her voice breathy and timid, as usual.

Fringe political movements. Eris sighed. As if that story hadn't been done to death.

Kronski saw her expression. "I'm sure there are other stories too."

"Like a scientific investigation of the Great Disappearing Building." Sturgis crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, tilting it on two legs. He nearly collided with the waiter, who was bringing their lunch.

The food was fragrant and simple. Eris had ordered a rabbit stew and found it to be old-fas.h.i.+oned--as in positively medieval--and for a moment she toyed with leaving Blackstone alone to ply his craft. No one made food like this any more and, contrary to what she would have said half an hour earlier, she found she actually missed it.

"Give my compliments to the chef," she said to the waiter, allowing the twinkle in her eye to show.

"Yes, ma'am," he said, bowing to her with a formality she hadn't expected.

Eris smiled and turned to her stew. Staying here wouldn't be as difficult as she thought. She'd even eat most of her meals here, not just to keep her eye on Blackstone but to give herself a treat.

"I think pursuing the science angle might be one small story we could do," Eris said, looking at her small team. "But I'm sure we'll find something else as well. Just give me a little time. I'll come up with a story that will make everyone from ABC to CNN to 'Time' to the 'New York Times' pay attention."

"You'd better," Sturgis muttered.

Maybe she'd take that deep voice away from him, and make him sound like he was on helium all the time. That would upset him, perhaps permanently.

But not yet. She still needed him.

For now.

However, when that changed . . .

"You're scheming again," Sturgis said.

"Yes." Eris smiled at him. She had a wonderful afternoon planned. Grant and Kineally had gone to Grant's house, where Eris would soon join them, proving to Grant just how meager his powers were and to Kineally how fragile a psychic's mind could be.

Then Eris would go get the Fates and dispose of them. She might even finish her tasks in time to have dinner at Quixotic.

"What are you thinking about?" Kronski asked, which was a much better question than the implied questions in Sturgis's scheming comments.

"I'm thinking that with a few changes, I could grow to like this place," Eris said.

"This restaurant or the Northwest?"

"All of it," Eris said. Her mood was so much better than it been in the morning. Of course, Strife was off on some unimportant mission, so she didn't have him to worry about anymore. "I really think that this little burg will provide the turning point for everyone here."

Everyone, including the mortals surrounding her and the mages who were discussing the "evil mage and his plan" in the kitchen.

Eris smiled again. It felt good to taunt the enemy--even when he had no idea she was doing so. She knew, and that was all that mattered.

Vivian and Dex arrived in his backyard seconds later. His house wasn't a palace by any stretch, and that embarra.s.sed him. He knew the theory, heard it expressed by longer-lived mages than he was: that any mage who had lived at least a hundred years and hadn't become rich was a failure.

He wasn't rich. He wasn't even close. He'd never been interested in earning money. After the Fates had chewed him out, he had disappeared into public service. Then, when he had enough money saved, he opened his own pet store. Nothing he'd done had been a moneymaking enterprise. In fact, he'd come close a number of times to losing everything.

The fact that his business was marginal and his house had been outdated thirty years ago normally did not bother him. But he wanted to impress Vivian. And even though she professed to know nothing of the magical world, she wasn't shocked by most of the things she'd seen.

Maybe she'd even heard that old chestnut about a mage, his money, and failure.

The backyard was fenced in, with tall trees in the corners, the branches hanging over the fence, the roots pus.h.i.+ng up beneath. Fuchsia baskets hung from the top of the fence, and along the sides, hydrangeas grew in a variety of colors. No one could see in, and he couldn't see out. It was his little haven in what had once been the countryside between Tigard and Newberg.

Now the area was all built up. When he'd had enough money to buy his neighbors' lots, he hadn't thought it necessary. By the time he realized it was, he no longer had the funds--at least not without selling one of his hideaways. So he lost his view and some of his privacy. But he didn't care. This little patch of land was his, just like the store was his. Just like the cave was his.

Sadie, his familiar, didn't even raise her head. She was used to Dex popping in and out. She was lying in a patch of sunlight near the back door.

Her eyes flicked open briefly, and he could tell she was angry.

He'd left for the store early that morning--Sadie was not an early riser--and he'd promised her that he'd send for her in time for lunch. Instead he'd been all over the city, using magic, and revealing their special places.

And now he'd brought a woman home with him.

"Where are we?" Vivian asked.

"My place," Dex said. "Technically, we're in Tigard."

"Technically?"

"When I bought the place it was so far out in the country, the real estate agent thought I was nuts."

Vivian looked at his house. It was one of the first ranch houses ever built in Portland. It had even been written up in the 'Oregonian' --how the modern new styles were finally coming into the old city. Even though he had a new roof and aluminum siding put on two years ago, the house's age still showed.

"Come on," he said. "Let's go in."

He walked around Sadie and headed toward the back door. Two of his cats popped out of the nearby shrubbery and ran for the front of the building. Another slid through the cat door, off to hide from the newcomer.

Vivian frowned, then focused on Sadie. Sadie raised her head and tilted it to one side. Vivian walked toward her, hand outstretched, and Sadie watched as if she'd never seen a human before.

Then Vivian crouched in front of Sadie. Sadie sat up and put her paw in Vivian's hand, something Dex had never seen before. Vivian smiled at Sadie, shook the paw, and then stood, without petting Sadie's head, which was something Sadie despised.

"Did you hear that?" Vivian asked as she returned to Dex's side.

"Hear what?" he asked.

"I was afraid of that." Vivian shook her head. "I've had a long day."

"Did Sadie say something to you?"

"She talks?"

Dex shrugged. "She's my familiar. She has skills that regular dogs don't have."

"Oh." Vivian gave Sadie another glance. The wolfhound's tail thumped against the gra.s.s.

That answered Dex's question. Sadie didn't mind Vivian. Maybe Sadie didn't see her as compet.i.tion for his affections. After all, Sadie took care of all the strays he constantly brought home. There was no reason Sadie would reject a human just because Dex was attracted to her.

The thought sent a s.h.i.+ver of fear through him. Maybe life would have been easier if Sadie had gone after Vivian. Then Dex could let her slip out of his life like he'd let so many other people do. He always felt that he couldn't share himself, that he couldn't take care of them in the way he wanted, and so he faded away, letting them think he was no longer interested, or he had something better to do.