tomorrow,” Trent said, and Jenks dramatically rolled his eyes. “I spent the afternoon with Mac, recording a spot for his show.” Trent wrangled his phone from a back pocket and set it on the table with a sigh of relief.
“You’re on the night show?” Jenks asked. “Damn. Who’d they bump for that?”
“No one.” Trent’s attention was on the big plate-glass windows looking out onto a narrow Cincinnati street. “It won’t be aired until sometime next week.”
“Even so, that was fast,” Jenks said.
Trent scratched his jawline in a show of unease. “Actually, it’s way overdue. Thank you for pulling my head out of the sand.”
His hand found mine under the table, and I gave it a squeeze. “You’re welcome.”
“I think you mean out of your ass, shoemaker,” Jenks smart-mouthed, and I hit the bottom of the table with my knee to make him dart up from Glenn’s coffee.
“After this, we should get something to eat,” Trent continued as if nothing had happened. “I need to sit somewhere and have people bring me food.” He slid his phone closer and brought it awake. “What sounds good?”
Jenks slurped his coffee, and his sparkles shifted to an almost blinding white in the sudden caffeine buzz. “You gave Maggie the night off, didn’t you.”
“I gave her the entire weekend,” Trent admitted. “It’s not that I can’t cook—”
“But that you don’t want to. I get it,” I said. “How about we grab a burger at that bowling alley downtown?” I suggested.
“Awww, man-n-n-n . . . ,” Jenks drawled. “Bowling alleys don’t have no decent honey.”
But Trent’s eyes had lit up, and he put his phone away. “Burgers and fries. Deal.”
“Deal.” I licked my thumb and held it out to make the pact official, and while Jenks sulkily sifted a dark blue dust into Glenn’s coffee, Trent licked his thumb and we pressed them together as if we were kids making promises. A flash of memory took me when I wiped my thumb dry on my pants, something about Lee and a hole in the ground. . . .
“Ah, Trent?” I said softly. “Did I help you shove Lee into the well at camp?”
Trent’s head snapped up, his green eyes wide. “Uh, maybe?” he said, looking at his thumb, and I smirked. It wouldn’t have surprised me. There’d been memory blockers in the camp’s water. That both of us were now able to circumvent anyone trying to rub out hours or even weeks didn’t erase past damage. But things surfaced occasionally.
I thought it funny as hell that Lee and Trent had been forced to spend their summers together in an attempt to ease the tension between the East and West Coast drug cartel families. It had worked to a point. The rivalry was now friendly if still deadly serious. Stuffing Lee into a well for three days had gotten better results, though I hadn’t remembered until now that I’d been there.
“No wonder Lee doesn’t like me,” I grumped, and Trent tugged me close, amused.
“Lee likes you. He only tried to kill you the one time, and he thought you were Ku’Sox.”
“Two if you count the boat,” I said.
“Okay. Two. But he apologized,” Trent countered.
Jenks sat on the rim of Glenn’s coffee and kicked the cup with his heels. “You two are sweeter than a newling’s barf.”
“Salted caramel grande, no whip, with a cookie,” Mark said loudly, and Trent stood.
“You sure you don’t want anything else?” he asked, and I shook my head, my fingers trailing from his as he moved away.
“Excuse me,” Jenks said, rising up to follow. “I bet Mark has some honey. It’s colder than troll shit in April in here.”
“Nice, Jenks,” I said, but my shoulders eased when he and Trent began talking to Mark and the kid began searching under the counter. Smiling, I watched the parking lot for Glenn. It had gone dusky in the twilight, and again, I wished we’d gotten to the museum. An evening looking at ancient elven artifacts might not sound exciting, but most of them were thinly disguised weapons of war, and I was never one to turn down the chance to look at elven “guns.”
“Thanks, Mark,” Jenks said brightly, and my attention returned to Trent and Jenks. A small cup of something was wedged between Trent’s cup and cookie. It wasn’t honey, and I eyed it, curious, when Trent set it down and Jenks commandeered it. “Mark is thinking about catering to pixies next spring,” Jenks said as he took his chopsticks from his back pocket