Silver Basilisk - Zoe Chant Page 0,26
now, when we’ve finally reconnected. I’m so glad you’re alive, though I can’t even begin to understand what any of this means. I have a thousand questions, and I bet you do, too. But I can see how tired you are, and it’s got to be one a.m. back there right now.”
“I was up all last night,” Alejo admitted. “Couldn’t sleep. And work starts early. Mom, I’m so glad Dad found you!”
Rigo watched Godiva press her lips firmly again, but her spine was as straight as it had been when she faced down drunken, rowdy customers when she was eighteen. “Well, now I know you’re okay. The rest can wait until tomorrow. Right now I . . . need to hear some stuff from . . . your dad.”
“Right. Got it. Good night, Mom. I love you.”
“Love you, too,” Godiva whispered, and handed the phone back.
It was warm from her fingers. Rigo’s chest ached with the need to take her in his arms, but he kept himself still. He would have to earn his way back into her trust, a step at a time.
He was about to speak when her phone rang. She started, then pulled it out of her purse, and hit the speaker button. “Doris?”
“Just wanted to know if you’re okay, or if I should call out the Mounties.”
“Naw, I’m fine,” Godiva said. “Thanks for checking in.” She thumbed the phone off.
Rigo said, “Would you prefer to sit in a coffee shop? There’s a nice one on Pacific Coast Highway that I sampled my first night out here. Best coffee I ever had in my life.”
“Yeah. Do that,” she said gruffly.
He drove in silence, keeping the speed low and steady in case she began to feel unsafe. But when he stopped at a red light and risked a glance her way, her gaze had gone so inward he wondered if she’d forgotten that she was entirely alone with him.
The light changed. He pulled into the parking lot of the all-night coffee shop, stopped the car, and shut off the engine. Before he could open the door, she turned to him. “You said. That night. The last time we saw each other. That that was the first time you . . . did that.”
“Shifted,” he said.
“Shifted. Shifter. Shapeshifter, that’s what it’s from, right? Then werewolves are real?”
“Yes.”
She let out a sigh. “Maybe it’s just me being old, but I’m trying to get my head around the fact that the world is a whole lot weirder than I thought.”
“It’s a human thing,” he said. “Believing only what we see. So . . . I showed you. I’m sorry if it was too much at once.”
She tipped her head, then said in that small, gruff voice, “You sprang it on me because I wasn’t going to believe a word you said otherwise.”
“Well, you had reason,” he returned. “I know that. I’ve known that from the moment I walked away from your door that night. Don’t think I haven’t replayed that conversation a thousand times ever since, wishing I could hire someone to kick me for making all the wrong choices. Here, let’s go inside. They get their coffee from a farm on one of the Hawaiian islands, and it’s fresh-ground every day.”
They walked in the door. The place was plain, even dumpy on the outside but the inside was nicely decorated, with real wood, tiffany lamps glowing like jewels, and lots of ferny things. She looked around and smiled. Maybe it was a bit seventies, but he’d always liked that look—and it seemed she did as well.
They headed for one of the comfortable booths. No plastic or glaring fluorescent lighting here. Godiva sniffed appreciatively, then said with an expression of wonder, “I don’t understand why this place isn’t packed to the rafters around the clock.”
“Because most of the customers are shifters,” Rigo said. “I was given the address before I came west. We can talk safely here.”
They sat across from each other in a booth. A young man ambled up and handed them a menu. After they ordered, Godiva looked across the table at Rigo, then said, “I still don’t get why you didn’t say anything. Was it because you thought I couldn’t handle it?”
“It was because I couldn’t handle it. Because I’d just turned three men to stone when their eyes met mine. Three very bad men, you could even say evil. Erich, Tonio, and Gravas. But I had no idea it was going to happen until I did it,”