Eleventh Grave in Moonlight (Charley Davidson #11)(26)

“Hey back. So, I was wondering if I could find out who was in charge of the abduction of Dawn Brooks. And if you could get me everything you have on it.”

“I can look into it. What are you doing?”

“Right now?”

“Yes.”

“Heading to class.”

“Class?”

Why was everyone so surprised I was taking a class? “I’ve decided to become an exotic dancer.”

“Sounds good. Do you think you could do me a favor?”

“Anything.”

“Could you, maybe, stay home for a few days?”

I waited for a solid minute for him to clarify and/or explain. When he didn’t, I asked, “Can you tell me why?”

“Oh, you know. Just a lot of crazy in town lately.”

That was so amazingly lame. “That’s the best you got?”

“At the moment, yes.”

“Then, no.”

“I could make you stay home.”

I’d pulled up to a stoplight, and thank goodness I had. His statement stunned me. “What do you mean?”

“I mean I’d like you to stay home for a few days.”

“I’m heading to class.”

“Skip.”

“No.”

“I insist.”

“Then I desist.”

“I don’t think that means what you think it means.”

“Uncle Bob—”

“I could order you to.”

“Well, you’d best be ordering your coffin at the same time.”

“I mean it, Charley.”

“I suggest a nice mahogany.” The car behind me honked before I realized the light had turned green. I pulled into South Lot and shifted Misery into park. “Uncle Bob, until you can give me a legitimate reason—”

“I’ll have you arrested. How’s that for legitimate?”

Boy howdy, did Cookie nail his mood. What the frackin’ hell? “I’m going to pretend you didn’t just threaten me.”

“I’ll have campus police pick you up in ten.”

He hung up before I could gasp in his face. Via an electronic signal transmitted through radio waves. But still.

*

I made it to my classroom on the main UNM campus with few incidents and fewer arrests to speak of. Two men in my life, two of my favorite, were suddenly ordering me around. Like they had the right. Just no. Besides, Ubie had no grounds for an arrest. Not without signing his own warrant as well. He was an accessory to many of my out-of-the-box crime-fighting procedures. If I went down, he went down.

Men.

Our business teacher, a Mr. Hipple, was a fine instructor as instructors went, but he seemed to lack my enthusiasm. My vision. My complexity.

I raised my hand.

He kept talking.

It reminded me of grade school when my PE teacher wanted us to climb a rope and I asked her if she could apply that skill to a real-life situation. You know, so I could understand why I had to climb the rope. I hated the rope. It chafed. And made my arms shaky.

I kept asking Mr. Hipple, a very tan man in the prime of his midlife crisis if the shiny new Corvette he drove were any indication, to apply a broader scope to his principles. Like, say, in a world domination kind of way.

I raised my hand again. Mr. Hipple let loose a loud sigh and said, “Charlotte?”

“Oh, just Charley. Okay, so let’s say the world was headed for another economic crisis and the housing market were to totally crash again—how would, say, a god fix it?”

Mr. Hipple scrubbed his face with his fingers, then pinched the bridge of his nose before replying. I took that as a good sign. Like he was really mulling over how best to answer my question.

“Charley, would you like to ask a question that actually pertains to this class?”

A couple of students snickered, and I folded my arms over Danger and Will and sank down in my seat. What was the point of my taking the class if I couldn’t use the information in the future?

Reyes must have felt the same way. He was still following me. Still incorporeal. Still dark and brooding and hotter than a sidewalk in August. As Reyes’s heat blasted across my skin, his anger at Mr. Hipple’s answer apparent, Mr. Hipple went on with his pointless lecture.

I supposed I couldn’t blame the guy. It was an odd question, but I was beginning to think that taking over the world might not be such a great idea. I knew nothing about management beyond my own PI firm, and Cookie handled most of that. I knew nada about performing miracles or parting seas or calming storms when asked.

I was in way over my head. Mr. Hipple was right. Not that he said that, but I felt it was implied.

Reyes had taken the seat behind mine. They were the kind where the desk folded away to the side if you didn’t need it. As quietly as I could, I folded my desk away in anticipation of our break. Since the class only met once a week, it was almost three hours long, and I’d had a lot of coffee before coming in. My bladder was screaming at me.

No, wait, that was the departed girl who ran up and down the halls screaming for someone to lend her a pencil. I’d had that nightmare a few times myself. She was in a hospital gown, though, so I wasn’t sure why she was haunting the UNM campus instead of, say, a hospital.

She’d rush into the room, scream for someone to lend her a pencil before it was too late, then run back out again, disappearing through the wall in which she came. Poor kid.