Chronicles Of The Keeper - Summon The Keeper Part 97

"I have no idea, but Austin stayed with her so we'll soon find out."

"Austin?"

"Why not. She's tired and vulnerable..."

Dean nodded, understanding. "He'll be a nonjudgmental comfort to her."

"No, he'll take advantage of it. He's a cat, not Mother Theresa." Claire poured herself a bowl of cereal and sat down. "It shouldn't be much longer."

On cue, Austin jumped up onto the counter. "All right; bacon." Glancing over at Claire, he added, "Which I, of course, can't eat even though I've been gathering vital information about the young woman in room three."

Claire sighed. "One small piece."

"Two."

"One and the dregs of milk from my cereal."

"Not if it's bran; last time I was in the litter box all morning."

"It's not."

"Deal."

They waited more-or-less patiently while he ate and not at all patiently while he washed his whiskers.

"First of all," he said, at last, "it's not what you think. Her name is Faith Dunlop..."

"She told a cat her name?"

"Don't be ridiculous; I hooked her ID out of her pocket when she fell asleep." He snorted. "Who tells a cat their name?"

"Just get on with it."

"Who hit her?" Dean demanded.

"No one. She walked into a door. Our little Faith was leaving in a hurry because she'd just helped her boyfriend rip off a convenience store out on North Montreal Street. When they split up to throw off pursuit, she had the bag of loot. Unfortunately, she left it on a bus and now she's afraid to go home because this is the second time something like this has happened and the boyfriend is going to be very unhappy."

Claire stared at Austin in astonishment. "This is the second time she's left the loot on a bus?"

"If I understood her correctly, and between the sobbing and the gum she wasn't very coherent, the last time she left it in the women's washroom at a fast food restaurant but essentially the same scenario, yes."

"She's afraid of her boyfriend?" Dean growled. Behind his gla.s.ses, his eyes narrowed to a line of blazing blue. "Oh, I get it; first off, he forces her into a life of crime and then, when she can't perform to his satisfaction, he beats her."

"She walked into a door," Austin protested.

"Sure. This time. But what'll happen when she gets home? She's terrified of him, or she wouldn't have been out all night, forced to throw herself on the kindness of strangers."

Claire sighed. She'd just discovered two things about Dean. The first, which was hardly unexpected considering the rest of his personality, involved taking the side of the weak against the strong. The second, that at some point in his scholastic career he'd been forced to read A Streetcar Named Desire. "You don't know any of that for certain."

He folded his arms across his chest. "I know what I see in front of my face."

"I don't know how you can see anything with your eyes slitted closed like that."

"It's obvious what happened!" His jaw thrust slightly forward.

"It's never that obvious." Pouring herself a cup of coffee, she asked Austin if he'd got a look at Faith's home address when he snagged her ID. When he admitted that he had, she headed for the phone.

Hurriedly picking up the empty cereal bowl and putting it in the sink. Dean followed. "What are you doing?"

"Calling Faith's apartment and telling the boyfriend where she is. Once he's here, I can protect her, but until I hear the whole story, I can't help her."

"You're after helping her right into the hospital!" Rus.h.i.+ng forward. Dean put himself between Claire and the phone. "Look, you can put yourself into whatever weird relations.h.i.+ps you want, but you can't make those kind of choices for Faith."

"Weird relations.h.i.+ps?"

"Uh, oh." Ears close to his head, Austin ducked under the desk.

Claire's nostrils flared. "I thought you said you were okay with it?"

"Well, what else was I supposed to say? You're the Keeper; you always know what you're doing, and you never listen to me. I can't even get you to put your dirty dishes in the sink!"

He was right about the dishes. Claire took a deep breath and forced it out through clenched teeth. "Move away from the phone, Dean. I know what I'm doing."

"And I don't?"

"I didn't say that."

"But you're always implying it. After all, I'm just the bystander and all this lineage stuff is way over my head. Okay. Maybe it is. But this," he stabbed a finger toward room three, "this is people stuff, and I know people stuff better than you."

"The moment Faith entered this hotel, she became lineage stuff."

They locked eyes for a long moment. Finally, Dean jerked away from the phone. "Okay. Fine. If you're not after listening to me, I'll go and do the dishes. That seems to be all I'm good for around here."

"Dean..."

"You know where to find me if you want something unimportant taken care of." Heels denting the floor, he stomped back to the kitchen.

"I told you so," Austin muttered, still safely hidden under the desk.

"Told me what?" Claire asked, fingers white around the receiver.

"That Dean's all bent out of shape about you pounding the mattress with Jacques."

"Jacques wasn't even mentioned!"

He stuck his head out and stared up at her in disbelief. "You really aren't any good at this people stuff, are you?"

Just after ten. Professor Jackson checked out. He paid in cash and, although a number of smaller things had been broken the night before, he made no mention of them. Since, technically, Claire had broken them, she let it slide.