“No?”

“Arawn was careless, reckless, and impulsive. Petty and self-absorbed. He couldn’t stand to lose Matilda to Gwynn and that was about him, not what was best for her, which ultimately would have been best for him, to let Gwynn have her as his wife and keep them both as friends.”

“Oh, you are clever. Far too clever for a biker.”

“No, just clever enough to be a good biker.”

She snorted a laugh. “All right, boy. But you’re too hard on Arawn. He was young. The young make foolish mistakes for foolish reasons, like a girl they can’t live without. You might seem young, too, but you’re not. It’s the part of you that is him that sees his folly, like an old man looking back on his youth.”

“So you think I was lured out by someone trying to get to me, not Liv?”

“Clever boy.”

“Then the upshot is that I need to learn from that. Don’t go chasing yowling cats in the night. Question everything that could be luring me into trouble.”

She chuckled. “You are indeed Arawn. Good. This will make things very interesting.”

“Not sure I want to know what you mean by that.”

She reached to squeeze his arm. “I mean that you are not a child, easily led from the path by those who wish to harm you. You are Arawn. Lord of the Otherworld.”

“Thanks. I think.” He glanced at the apartment door.

“Yes, yes. Your girl waits. But before you go, you said you won’t make Arawn’s mistake. What do you think that was?”

He told her.

She studied him. “And you think you can avoid that? That when the time comes, you’ll be able to do it?”

“I’ll have to, won’t I?”

She nodded and let him go into the apartment.

CHAPTER NINE

The next morning, after I’d enjoyed a very pleasant wake-up, Ricky told me about his night’s adventure.

“I hate to give you an extra reason to worry about me,” he said. “But I figure you’d want to know.”

“You figured right.” I stretched and rolled out of bed. “Let’s continue this conversation in the kitchen, with caffeine.”

“Actually, I was going to suggest we head someplace that has the caffeine premade. Breakfast at the diner?”

“So if any of the elders were behind last night’s stunt, they’ll see you’re well rested and unrattled? Good plan.”

“Well, no, I thought you could use a good breakfast before a day of investigating.” He pulled on his jeans. “But that’s a good idea, too. Though I sometimes wonder if you aren’t the one who should be aiming for bike gang leader. You’re much better at figuring out the devious angles.”

“I take that as a compliment.”

“It is.”

None of the elders were at the diner, so we had a fine and undisturbed breakfast. Back at my place, we hoped to check out that first-floor apartment, but Grace was already on the porch and followed us inside.

Gabriel arrived at ten. To give Ricky some quiet study time, Gabriel and I walked to the park and sat down to talk. Gabriel’s mood from the night before hadn’t changed, and finally I had to say, “You don’t need to help me with this, Gabriel. Ricky hasn’t been charged, so at this point I can dig around on my own. Which is my job.” And you clearly have other places you want to be, I was tempted to add. That sounded pissy. I felt pissy, though. On Friday he’d wanted me to spend the night working on this together, and not even two days later it felt like discussing the same case was a huge imposition.

“You obviously have other things on your mind,” I said.

He blinked hard, as if shaking off sleep. “No, I—Yes, something came up, in regards to …”

When he didn’t finish, I said, “Something personal. Okay. I won’t pry. But if you need to go, I understand.”

“Personal?” He frowned, as if not recognizing the word. “No, I was going to say it was in regards to Todd’s case. It’s a legal matter, nothing to be concerned about, simply something I was working through. We can talk about it later.” He pulled off his shades, letting them rest on his knee. “I’m fully engaged in this, and I apologize if it seemed as if I wasn’t.”

I was about to respond when someone hailed us.

Gabriel rose, murmuring, “I’ll handle this. You can head back to the apartment.”

“No, we’ll get it over with,” I said. “Hello, Ida. Walter.” They’d heard about the lamiae deaths and wanted me to stop investigating. Immediately. Which might sound suspicious, but their reasoning was exactly what I’d expect: this didn’t concern me, so I shouldn’t waste my time with it. I listened, I thanked them for their input, and Gabriel extricated me from the situation as soon as possible.

Back at the apartment, Gabriel fixed coffee and brought a plate of cookies from my freezer. They were Rose’s cookies. She liked baking and liked sharing what she baked, handing me a box every other week, without a word, the first time having said only, “I have extra. They freeze well.”

Gabriel didn’t say, “Hey, do you want me to make a plate of those cookies you have in the freezer?” No more than he said, “Hey, do you guys want coffee?” Like Rose wordlessly handing me those boxes of cookies, this was Gabriel being thoughtful.

We did our research next. I tackled the obvious angle: the murders. According to Ioan, Halloran had killed two lamiae. That meant two teen prostitutes were dead, and I was surprised I hadn’t heard about it. Working for years in shelters hadn’t turned me into an activist, but it did raise my overall awareness, which means I tend to notice those articles. After an hour of searching, I realized I hadn’t missed anything. The bodies apparently hadn’t been found.