Double Trouble (Taz Bell Book 5)

by Sharon Green

  "The séance is scheduled for ten tonight," Allison responded, now sounding much happier. "My man's mother will be wearing a tiny camera that also transmits sound, so we'll be able to follow everything that does on. But we'd also like to have an 'expert' there, so if we have to arrest the people behind the séance no one will be able to claim the arrest is an arbitrary value judgment."

  "I wonder if we can ask a favor," Freemont put in kind of quickly. "Amiol and I now have tablets that can link into your system, remember, so I'd like to know if we can follow what's happening too. It would be a shame if we weren't able to watch George doing his thing."

  "I don't see why not," Allison answered slowly, as if checking a mental list of some kind. "You won't be intruding in any way, after all, and you're not likely to warn the séance people… Sure, you can link in and watch what goes on."

  "Thank you, Allison," Freemont said, glancing around to see the interest in all our faces. "If we'd had to wait for George to tell us about what happened, we'd probably get no sleep tonight waiting for the morning when he got around to us."

  "While George spent his time tonight telling his wife how great he was," I put in, making George hide a grin. "We're only his teammates, after all, so he'd think nothing of putting us second on his list."

  "Hey, I'm not that insensitive," George protested with a definite gleam in his eyes. "Instead of waiting for the morning, I'd come back and wake you all up tonight."

  We all made faces at that comment while Allison laughed, and then our official friend broke into the silliness.

  "George, if you'll come to my office by nine-thirty we ought to have all the time we need," Allison said. "My man's mother will have been equipped with the camera by then, and you two will be able to go to the séance together – after we introduce you to her."

  "I'll do that," George agreed, now looking really pleased. "Thank you for asking, Allison."

  "Don't be dumb, George," Allison came back at once. "If you can't be trusted to do this right, no one can. See you later."

  We all exchanged goodbyes, and then I turned off my phone. Oldon had been listening closely while he ate, and now he had nothing but empty plates in front of him as he got to his feet.

  "Since there's going to be action tonight, I'm going up to nap," Oldon announced to us all. "I would have needed a nap anyway after all I ate, and now I have a reason to take the nap. I want to be completely alert when the action starts, so I'll see you all later."

  We all pretended to buy his excuse in spite of the wide grin he showed, so he left the room and went upstairs. I looked at the small amount of coffee left in my cup, finished it, then got to my own feet.

  "I think I'll go upstairs and see about unpacking," I told the others. "It looks like we'll be here for a while at least, so there's no reason to keep living out of my luggage."

  The others all thought that was a good idea, and that included Bari. I thought about taking a fresh cup of coffee up with me, then decided against it. When I finished with the unpacking I'd come down again for more coffee, and then I'd be able to have a bit of lunch. I was already starting to get hungry again, and that after having eaten so much just a little while ago. Ah, well, I'd done a lot of healing, and healing is usually hard work.

  And after lunch I'd think about napping myself…

  Chapter Seventeen

  My clean laundry had been put on my luggage when I'd been put to bed, so I'd been able to put things away without a lot of trouble. When I made it downstairs I went into the kitchen to get a fresh cup of coffee. Jack was there, of course, and so was Bari. She'd just finished filling a cup of her own, and now headed toward the fridge for the cream.

  "You may not want to hear this, Jack, but I'm looking forward to lunch," I said as I walked to the coffee urn. "I know I shouldn't be hungry again yet, but it turns out I am."

  "Then lunch is what you'll get," Jack answered, looking and sounding pleased. "But I'll make it a relatively light meal, since I understand you and the others intend to nap this afternoon."

  "Please do count me in on that," Bari said as she closed the fridge with her shoulder. "I want to see what goes on tonight along with the rest of you – if you don't mind."

  "No reason you shouldn't join us," I agreed, turning from the urn with my cup full. "Let's go and sit down with our coffee, and then we can talk."

  She agreed with a smile, so I followed her into the dining room before we both chose places to sit.

  "I've been curious about you being a locator," I said as I reached for the sugar. Spoons were on the table near the sugar bowl, which made things a lot easier. "Can you tell me something about how that works?"

  "Sure," she agreed, her smile still clear as she reached for her own spoon. "As I think I told you, I hire out to people who want to locate different things, from water and gas pipes to raw minerals. I do have to know what I'm looking for before I can find it, and usually the thing has to be specific rather than general."

  "Specific rather than general," I echoed, paying more attention to the conversation than to fixing my coffee. "Can you explain what that means?"

  "I think it will help if I give you an example," she said, also giving our talk most of her attention. "Not long after I decided to become a locator, I was called in by a company – along with three other locators. We were taken out into some empty landscape, and the man who had greeted us and come along with us on the ride told us what he wanted. We were asked to find gold."

  "Well, that's certainly specific," I said, then shook my head. "But it can also be general, can't it?"

  "Exactly," she agreed, her smile back. "But 'general' wasn't the way the other three took the request. One of them had these fancy things, metal L's in loose metal … sleeves, I guess you can call them, sleeves that the man held to and which let the L's slide around. The second guy had a wire coat hanger bent into the usual Y shape, and the third one had a wooden dowsing rod like mine. Ours were in the shape of a Y also, of course."

  I nodded to show I understood. That Y shape, I'd read a long time ago, was the traditional shape used for dowsing.

  "Well, once we were told what the company man was after, we all … went on point, so to speak," she continued. "I could feel a fairly large amount of gold off to our left, and the others turned in the same direction and began to walk over there. But that was when my suspicious nature began to flex with a strange question. Why would we have been asked to find something so … obvious, at least to us? If this was supposed to be a test, why wasn't it harder?"

  "Interesting question," I agreed, distantly amused to find that she was almost as paranoid as I was.

  "I suddenly got the feeling I knew the answer to the question, so I turned to the right instead," she said with a more amused smile. "I raised my rod and … searched for gold in that direction instead, and sure enough I got a hit. The hit wasn't as strong as the one I'd gotten from the left, but it was very definitely the gold I was after. So I followed my rod over to where the smaller amount of gold was, then just stood and waited.

  "The company man had been watching all of us, and when he saw where I'd gone he smiled and then turned to the men. 'Thank you for your time, gentlemen,' he said to them. 'We'll get you back to where we all came from, and then you're free to leave.'

  "'But what about the offer of a job?' one of the men, the one with the sliding metal L's, protested. 'You asked me to find gold and I did.'

  "'But you didn't find the right gold,' the company man responded. 'You went to the strongest source of gold, not to the … unfinished product, so to speak. That young woman did find the right gold, so the job offer will go to her.'"

  "The guys must have loved that," I said with my own smile. "But it serves them right for not thinking before dowsing. The company people must have buried some gold for them to find, but it was processed gold. What you found wasn't processed, was it?"

  "Nope, it wasn't," she confirmed after sipping at her coffee. "And that, of course, was what the company w
anted, someone who could find the raw ore. And someone able to think, I believe. Sometimes, when you're dowsing for things, you have to get creative if you really want to find those things. But I'd like to ask: how in hell do you find a harpy? I saw the news coverage when your team did the finding."

  "That find has to be chalked up to my partner Freemont," I answered with amusement. "He – felt where the harpy was, then was able to narrow the location down to about a five mile radius. That was when my other partner George went to check out the area. He can move a lot faster than the rest of us, which means he was right there when the harpy and her human friend got back to their house."

  "Incredible," she said, shaking her head with near disbelief. "I might have been able to find the same thing, but not without my dowsing rod. I've come to believe that the rod shape is a … circuit of some kind that lets us use the dowsing ability. Without the rod we're as blind as everyone else."

  I was about to say I knew what she meant about being blind to things like that when my phone rang. I took the phone out of my pocket and looked at the caller ID, then pressed the answer button.

  "Hi, Rolfe, how's it going?" I said in greeting. "Are you calling to tell us about some great new stuff you just got in?"

  "Not even close," Rolfe answered, and his voice sounded very unhappy. "My friend Cal just called and he gave me the bad news. Roland Helms, the man who tried to buy this building, was arrested, but then they had to let him go."

  "Unfortunately I know all about that," I said, immediately sharing his unhappiness. "My team and I had a … brush with the shifter Helms was using to chase away your customers, but the shifter was killed so he can't testify against Helms. Without another witness, it turned out that the matter became my word against Helms'. We're already looking around to see what can be done about that, but so far we haven't found anything."

  "So you're right in the middle of the mess, and only because you patronized my shop," Rolfe said, and anger had begun to creep into his voice. "Well, that's about to change, Taz. I want to hire your team to work on this mess, and Cal has agreed to pay your fees."

  "Rolfe, we don't come cheap unless we're in the middle of the mess the way we are in another matter," I said slowly while trying to decide how to put things. "Since we're in the same position with your problem, you and your friend might want to just sit back while we work things out."

  "I can't see doing it that way," Rolfe stated, still more than a little unhappy. "You would not be involved if you hadn't come to my shop, so you can say I'm directly responsible for what happened. How much of a retainer do you need?"

  "If you want to talk money, you'll have to do it with my partner Freemont," I said with a sigh, giving up on trying to talk him out of his intentions. "I'm just the pretty face in the group, so… Do you want his cell phone number? He's in his apartment right now."

  "Yes, please," Rolfe answered, so I gave him Freemont's number. I could hear writing sounds, and then Rolfe thanked me and hung up.

  "So you're nothing but another pretty face," Bari said with a grin when I turned off my phone. "Could have fooled me. Is that why I got a bargain deal from Freemont? Because you guys are involved with the people trying to kidnap me?"

  "I don't know what kind of deal you got from my partner, but if it was less than ten thousand dollars you were given a bargain," I said, doing nothing to avoid her gaze. "And yes, we are involved with those fools who think they're the only ones who should be allowed to live. They may want to hire you, but an ending is all they want to give us."

  "Wow, ten thousand dollars," she echoed, no longer grinning. "And yes, I'm paying a lot less than that. "It's a good thing those fools started up with you before they tried to kidnap me… Oh, look, our lunch is on the way."

  Turning my head showed me Jack coming out of the kitchen, his hands holding a large tray. On the tray were a number of things, including two plates and two forks for Bari and me.

  "Here's your lunch, ladies," Jack said as he placed the tray on the table before off-loading the platters and things. "If any of the others come down wanting their share, just tell them to come to the kitchen door."

  "It may be me who comes to the door, looking for seconds," I said as I uncovered the platter holding what looked like stuffed shells – and smelled amazing. "And thank you for including that cream soda."

  "Oh, I love cream soda," Bari exclaimed as she looked at everything the tray contained. "Is there a bottle of it for me, too?"

  Jack agreed there was another bottle with Bari's name on it, asking her to wait a moment before he headed back to the kitchen. By that time I'd taken a large helping of the shells, and after tasting the first of them I just sat with my eyes closed in enjoyment. Bari helped herself to the shells, and a moment later she was making sounds to match what I felt.

  "What's in these things?" she asked then, probably noticing that I was in the process of swallowing down everything I'd taken. "They're absolutely delicious."

  "Spinach and garlic, along with another thing or two," Jack's voice supplied as he came back out of the kitchen with Bari's soda. "I'm glad you like it."

  "Like it?" I echoed with a snort of ridicule. "I don't know if I've ever tasted anything this good. And I hope you have a lot more of them in the kitchen. This current batch isn't going to last very long."

  Bari made a sound of agreement, actual words being beyond her as she ate her share of the food. Jack just laughed and headed out of the room again, hopefully going for more of our "light lunch." I intended to eat until I couldn't hold any more, and Bari seemed to have come to the same decision.

  Jack brought out another plate of the shells, and by that time Bari and I were ready for them. We divided the contents of the plate in half, and by the time I finished my share I knew I'd have trouble moving.

  "I wonder if Jack or Shell would be willing to roll me back to my apartment," Bari said after putting down her fork on her emptied plate. "I'm going to try to walk, but I don't know if I'll get anywhere."

  "I've just been thinking how great it would be to be able to teleport," I agreed with a small laugh. "If I could move myself with my mind…"

  "Right," Bari agreed, reaching for the small amount of soda left in her glass. "Me, too."

  I'd already finished my soda, so I told Bari I'd see her later and forced myself to my feet. Moving and walking was hard, but since it wasn't impossible I headed to the stairs and up them to my apartment. I could hear Bari moving in the same direction behind me, but I made it into my apartment before she reached the second floor. Closing my door let me head to the bed, where I sat down before stretching out.

  It didn't take long before I was asleep, and when I woke up again I felt rested and happy. A glance at the clock said I even had time before dinner would be announced, but then I stopped to consider an odd feeling I had. No one was in my apartment, of course, but I had the definite impression that I'd had company while I napped. It felt as if a large, warm body had pressed against mine while I slept, joining my nap rather than disturbing it.

  But that was only an impression, so I decided not to worry about whether or not I was imagining things. Or to consider what would happen if I ever managed to find a way to be in bed with company. Borrowing trouble really is a bad habit to get into.

  I freshened up and even changed my clothes, then went downstairs to see if any of the team was in the gathering room. I found that everyone but Oldon was there, and that included Bari.

  "Taz, we need to hear from you," Freemont said with Amiol right by his side. "Bari tells us that you and she had an incredibly good lunch, and we're starting to get jealous. If you say the same thing, Amiol and I are going to start regretting being online with friends instead of down here and eating."

  "Sorry, partner, but regret is your only option," I said with a wide smile. "Those stuffed shells were out of this world, and from the smirk Eric is trying to hide I'd guess he made it down here after Bari and I went upstairs."

  "I'm sorry, too, Freemont
, Amiol," Eric admitted once our teammates switched their stares to him. "I did get to taste the shells and they were every bit as good as the ladies said. I wasn't going to say anything to keep from making you two feel bad, but since Taz outed me…"

  "We're going to have to remember this, Freemont," Amiol said sourly as my partner sighed and shook his head. "No getting online until after lunch, not if we don't want to miss out on the good stuff."

  Freemont nodded to agree with the decision, but then Jack appeared to tell us that supper was ready to be served. It had only been a few hours since I'd stuffed myself so full, but that didn't keep me from heading to the dining room along with everyone else. Oldon came down the stairs while we were on the way, so by the time we took chairs in the dining room we were a complete team. Only without my other partner, who had a job to do tonight. It looked like George had left early to confer with Allison and her people.

  The meal Jack and Shell brought out was Swedish meatballs and buttered noodles, but the two halves of the meal hadn't been mixed together. We all took turns with the heaping platters of noodles first, and only then did we help ourselves to the meatballs and the gravy they lay in. I suddenly felt as if I hadn't eaten in a week, and once I tasted what I'd helped myself to I knew I'd definitely go for seconds. From the sounds the rest of the team – and Bari - made, they would be doing the same.

  We barely noticed that we'd all been given our chosen drinks to go with the meal, and Oldon had been served a cup of blood as well as a slice of Boast and a bowl of Whippe. Our vampire associate made his own sounds of intense enjoyment as he ate, which meant there was no conversation at the table. We were all too busy chewing and swallowing to waste time with making words.

  Every plate and platter on the table was emptied before we sat back with what was left of our drinks. At some point Jack had brought out buttered rolls, and they had disappeared along with everything else. For the second time that day I wasn't sure I could move, and that made me think.