Maybe she should check to see if hell had frozen over.
Instead, she pocketed her keycard, spun on one toe, and walked out of the room. She stopped at the only room beside it, the one with the same number she’d been using when she called him back, and knocked. (There actually was a doorbell beside the door, but she was too scared to use it.)
For a moment, she was afraid that she had the wrong room or that no one had heard her. She raised her fist to knock again when the door swept open.
A tall, willowy blonde answered. She was stunningly beautiful, with delicate little features that formed the most perfect face. She wore a pink negligee and a matching robe with feathers trimming the sleeves and hem.
She was everything that Megan was not—slender, gorgeous, perfect, tall—the kind of woman guaranteed to make Megan even more nervous than she already was.
“I must have the wrong room,” Megan said.
“Nonsense.” Even the woman’s voice was feminine—light and floaty with just a hint of dumb blond. “You’re Travers’ sister, aren’t you? Come on in.”
The woman stepped aside. Her negligee flowed around her as if she were on stage. Megan walked in, peering around the corner for Kyle.
She didn’t see him, but she did see a pristine comic book on one of the end tables. He was here somewhere.
This room was a suite, too, only it was filthy. Two other women sat on the couch—a brunette with a petite skinniness that made her look athletic and breakable at the same time, and a redhead who was as heavy as Megan. Only that redhead—whose hair really was flaming Vegas red, not the auburn that Megan was blessed with—had her curves in all the right places.
She wore a green negligee, while the brunette wore a white one. They were eating popcorn and staring at the big screen TV, their mule-covered feet resting on the coffee table.
At that moment, Megan realized she had seen them before. The three women had been at Vivian’s wedding less than a month ago. Megan hadn’t had a chance to talk to them, though, because every time she glanced at them, they seemed to be talking to one another.
The blonde walked over and shut the television off. The redhead looked up grumpily. “It’s the best part.”
“We have to know if the nassty shadowy creaturesss are going to get the hobbitsses,” the brunette said.
“We’ve seen it already.” The blond sounded grumpy. “Besides, Travers’ sister is here.”
The redhead stood and extended her hand. She was tall, too. No wonder her curves worked. “You’re Megan? I’m Lachesis.”
“I’m Atropos,” said the brunette.
“And I’m Clotho,” said the blonde.
“Sure you are,” Megan said. “It’s late, but it’s not that late. And if you ladies are the Fates of Greek Mythology, I’m going to eat my shorts.”
“Please don’t,” said the redhead.
“You’re not wearing shorts, are you?” asked the brunette.
“I think she means underwear,” the blonde said.
Megan wanted to slap herself again. This was worse than a falconer in the desert.
“And we are the Fates, I’m afraid,” the redhead said. “Or at least—”
“We used to be,” the brunette said.
“We’re trying to get our job back,” said the blonde.
At the mention of a job, Megan felt a little calmer. They were some kind of Las Vegas lounge act, and they’d hired Travers to help them.
“Travers is good with money and accounting,” Megan said. “I’m sure with his business savvy, he’ll get the casino to rehire you.”
“We’re not looking for a casino hire,” the redhead—Lachesis?—said.
“But close enough for the moment.” The brunette—Atropos?—glanced at the other two. “Right?”
The blonde, Clotho, nodded. “Because that’s where he is right now. Getting our—ahem—job back.”
Megan’s head ached. She rubbed her nose with her thumb and forefinger, getting a sense she wouldn’t understand what was going on if she tried.
“Where’s Kyle?” she asked.
All three women smiled. Lachesis nodded toward the nearest bedroom, Atropos pointed, and Clotho indicated it with her hand.
“In there,” they said in unison.
This day was getting stranger by the minute. Megan excused herself and walked to the door. She put her hand on the knob, then held a finger to her lips, indicating that the three strange women remain quiet.
She opened the door. The familiar scents of Gatorade, peanut butter, and little boy reached her. She smiled in spite of herself and closed the door behind her.
A night-light gave the room a faint illumination. Bottles, a Spider-Man thermos, and some wrappers littered a bedside table. Kyle was sprawled on the bed, his bare feet sticking out of the covers, his round little face looking naked without his glasses.
Kyle looked just like Travers had at that age, or like Travers would have if he had preferred computers to basketball and comic books to track. They shared a heart-shaped face and blond hair with the same cowlick right in the center of the forehead.
Travers had gotten the classic good looks in the family—not that the family had been doling out looks. All three children had been adopted. Vivian was slight and dark with the curliest hair any woman had ever had; Travers was tall and blond—the male equivalent of Clotho, if the truth be told; and Megan was small and round, “round” being the operative word.
Her parents had never said anything about it, preferring to love their children as they were. If Megan commented on her weight, her mother would smile and say that Megan would grow out of it.
At twenty-five, she was still waiting for that miracle to happen.
She approached the bed. Her nephew looked so vulnerable there, his hand curled beneath his chin. She reached for the sheet to pull it over his shoulders when something growled at her.
She leapt backward in complete fright, her heart pounding. She hadn’t seen anything, but she had heard it. She knew she had.
A growl.
Wasn’t it?
Or maybe it was some weird noise that Kyle had made in his sleep.
She walked back to the bed and heard it again. A huge growl. She was shaking. She had been attacked by a dog when she was little—a German Shepherd that had knocked her to the ground and bit her and growled when her father pulled it off, wrestled it off, really—and she hadn’t liked dogs ever since.
But she didn’t see a dog.
Was she losing her mind? First the falconer on the highway (and the lights going out. What was that?), then the Fates (had they really said that? Or had she imagined it?), and now this imaginary dog.
She steeled herself and reached for the sheet again, only to hear a half-bark and feel the snap of teeth as they closed near her hand.
She yanked it back so quickly that she nearly hurt herself. The side of her palm was wet. Drool? Slobber? She couldn’t tell.
“Aunt Megan?” Kyle was looking up at her, his adorable face mashed together in a squint. “You’re here.”
“Indeed I am, boyo,” she said and went to ruffle his hair, then thought better of it. “Everything’s gonna be okay now.”
He smiled, snuggled deeper into the pillow, and sighed. Something moved across his shoulder. The something was black and long and never-ending.
Megan squealed.
Kyle raised his head. “It’s just Fang, Aunt Megan.”
“Fang?”
He reached over and snapped on the light beside the bed. An obese dachshund guarded the space between Kyle’s chest and Megan, its black eyes glittery and fierce.
“Fang,” Kyle said. “He’s my dad’s familiar, but really, he’s my dog.”
She hadn’t heard that right. “He’s a what?”
“Oh, yeah.” Kyle rubbed his eyes. “Nobody told you.”
“Told me what?”
“About the magic.”
She’d wandered into a Twilight Zone episode, only life hadn’t become black
and white. Maybe it was an episode of Punk’d, and Ashton Kutcher would reveal himself at any moment.
That wouldn’t be so bad, right?
The dog was still staring at her.
“Does it bite?” Megan asked, nodding toward the dog.
Kyle put his hand on the dog’s back and pressed it toward the sheets. “That’s my Aunt Megan,” he said as if the dog could understand him. “She’s one of the good guys.”
The dog lay down and then sighed, as if a huge burden had been lifted off it.
“You still didn’t answer me,” she said. “Does it bite?”
“No, he doesn’t,” Kyle said, “unless you’re like totally evil. Or incompetent.”
She blinked, trying to make sense out of all this. The women in the next room had been watching one of the Lord of the Rings movies. Maybe they’d let Kyle watch it before he went to sleep. Maybe he was still half asleep, which was why he was talking so oddly.
“If he doesn’t bite,” she said, being careful with the pronoun, “why did you name him Fang?”
“Because he told me that was his name. His previous owner called him Bartholomew, which Fang thinks is stupid, but he doesn’t mind it when Zoe calls him Bartholomew Fang.”
“Zoe? Is she one of the women outside?”
“Nope. She’s a detective. She thinks my dad doesn’t like her because she’s too old, but he doesn’t care. And she doesn’t look that old anyway.”
Megan had to be in a Twilight Zone episode. This conversation was too complicated for Punk’d.
“A detective?” Megan pushed her hair away from her face. “What’s going on? Is your dad in trouble?”
“No.” Kyle shoved his pillow against the back of the bed, picked up the obese dog, and moved it—him—to one side. Then he patted the space where the dog had been, like he thought Megan should sit in it, doggy smell and all.
She gave the blanket a sideways look, squared her shoulders, and then sat down. It was still warm from that dog body. The dog watched her, but didn’t growl any more.
“It’s okay, Fang, really,” Kyle said to the dog. “She’s just cautious because some big old dog tried to kill her once.”
That was as blunt as anyone had ever put it. She’d never told a soul about her fears. Even her father had said the dog wasn’t trying to hurt her—all the way to the hospital, where they’d given her rabies shots and five stitches in the bite on her shoulder.
“Fang says that other dog was stupid, and he’d only have hurt you if you’d have hurt me.” Kyle still had his hand on the dog’s neck.
The dog was looking at Megan as if indeed it—he—had said those words. In fact, it—he—had that expression people got when they expected an answer.
Kyle’s expression mirrored it.
“Thanks, Fang,” Megan said as sincerely as she could. “I’ll work on the trust issues.”
The dog nodded—or it seemed to nod—then it (he, dang it!) circled three times and lay down beside Kyle.
“You’re cool, Aunt Megan,” Kyle said. “I didn’t know how much dogs scared you till just then.”
Uncanny. She always forgot how uncanny this kid was, how supernaturally intuitive. Just like Vivian when she was little. Everyone was convinced Viv was psychic. Megan had learned in all her psych courses and her subsequent work that there was no such thing as psychic. But there were amazingly in-tune people who could read signals better than most. Vivian had that skill, and somehow, Kyle had acquired it too.
Kyle’s cheeks were red, as if what he had just said had embarrassed him. He plucked at the blanket.
Megan tried to get the conversation back on track. “If your dad isn’t in trouble, what’s he doing with a detective?”
“Besides kissing her?” Kyle asked.
It was Megan’s turn to blush. She hadn’t seen Travers with a woman since Cheryl had left him and baby Kyle over nine years ago.
“Yeah, I guess,” Megan said.
“They’re trying to rescue some spinning wheel for the Fates,” Kyle said.
“Excuse me?” Megan asked.
Kyle hit his forehead with the heel of his hand. “I keep forgetting that you haven’t been here the whole time. You always know what’s going on and this time it’s been kinda weird.”
“Just tell me,” Megan said.
And so he did.
* * *
Even if Megan believed in magic and fate and all that mumbo jumbo, she still wasn’t sure if this story could be true. It sounded like Kyle had recounted a dream. Still, her profession had taught her the importance of dreams—in them lurked the subconscious, with its wants, desires, and knowledge—so she struggled to pay attention.
What she finally understood was this: the women in the living room of the suite truly believed they were the Greek Fates who had ruled over mankind for centuries. They had been all-powerful until Zeus had initiated a coup and instituted his daughters as new Fates.
This, however, was a problem as the Fates administered more than life and death. They kept alive all the rules that created true love.
Zeus, for grown-up reasons that Kyle didn’t really want to understand, wanted to destroy true love. In order to destroy true love, Zeus had had to get rid of the Fates, which he had done, even tricking them into giving up their magical powers.
The Fates needed to get their magic back. To do that, they needed their old spinning wheel. It could restore their powers ten thousand times over.
The problem was that the spinning wheel had been stolen by the Faerie Kings, who had needed the magic to start their rival magical kingdom. They had hidden the wheel, and now the Fates had to find it.
Which was why they needed a detective. That was Zoe.
So Travers was helping Zoe find a magic spinning wheel. And, oh, by the way, the reason Travers had always been so good with money was because he was magical, too. Just like Zoe, who was over a hundred years old.
Megan wasn’t sure she had gotten it all, but she clung to this: the Fates had magic once, but they didn’t any longer. Her stolid brother, who didn’t even like fiction about magic, was really a magician, and he had fallen in love with a woman who was at least seventy years older than he was—a woman who was both detective and magician.
It was, if Megan did say so herself, one of the most inventive stories a kid had ever told her. And she had heard some doozies over the years.
“And I should probably say one more thing.” Kyle was watching her as she absorbed the information.
“What’s that, hon?” she asked.
“The reason I’m so ‘intuitive’ all the time is that I can read minds.”
She stared at him. He actually believed that part of it. Was it a defense mechanism? Some way to cope with being off-the-charts brilliant and so incredibly precocious as a result? Not many eleven-year-olds had the vocabulary he did, the maturity he did, and the sensitivity he did.
His shoulders wilted in the face of her silence.
“It’s okay,” he said quietly. “You don’t have to believe me.”
She took his warm little hand in hers. “I do, Kyle,” she said, telling herself she wasn’t really lying. She believed that he believed all of this.
“You’ll see,” he said, slipping grumpily under his blankets. “This is all true. You won’t be able to explain it away, Aunt Meg. If Dad can come around, you can too.”
She bent over, kissed his forehead, and tucked the sheet around him. Then she shut off the light.
“I’m sure I can, kiddo,” she said quietly. “I’m sure I can.”
Four
The Fate women were crowded around the bedroom door, apparently attempting to eavesdrop. Megan nearly knocked two of them over as she pushed the door outward. They scrambled backward and didn’t even try to apologize.
Megan had learned over the years that rudeness was something she couldn’t abide. It was, according to her own counselor (all therapists had to have a therapist during their educational phase. It was a requireme
nt for the advanced degree), part of being the youngest child in a chaotic household.
The Fate women watched her as if they could divine her reaction.
She wasn’t going to let them know how much her conversation with Kyle had disturbed her.
“You want to tell me where my brother is?” she asked.
The women looked at each other, obviously surprised. That pleased her. Keeping others off balance was always good. It kept everyone from concentrating on her.
“Well?” she asked, a little too loudly, to drown her own thoughts.
“He’s probably in Faerie by now,” Clotho said.
“Although he might not be,” Lachesis said.
“He might be out,” Atropos said.
“If we still had magic, we could find out for you,” Clotho said.
“Alas, we do not,” Lachesis said.
The “alas” was the last straw.
“You women are the ones who are screwing up my nephew, aren’t you?” Megan snapped. Part of her was startled at herself. She never snapped at people. She always took a reasonable tone of voice, always counted to ten before she spoke, always made sure she had thought through everything she had to say.
But the last twelve hours had strained her. She had rearranged her schedule, worried about her brother, driven here much too late — saw that falconer (he was cute too) — and watched the lights go out on the interstate, and then came here to three weird women, a dog, and a nephew who was convinced he was psychic.
“Screwing up?” Atropos asked. “Young Kyle is the sanest person we know.”
“Which doesn’t say much for the people you know,” Megan said. “Why did my brother leave Kyle in your custody?”
“Custody,” Clotho whispered to Lachesis. “She uses police talk.”
“You didn’t tell us you were a police officer,” Lachesis said to Megan.
“I’m not,” Megan said, wondering how they could think such a thing and why it mattered. “I’m a child psychologist, and I’m now convinced you people are poisoning my nephew’s mind.”
“Ooooooh,” Atropos said. “You’re a scientist.”
As if that were a bad thing.
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