“Thanks for not talking with your fists,” I said. I have a little sister, and I’m not sure I’d be as understanding with any of her boyfriends.“I’ve seen you fight,” he said, turning. “It would’ve been a terribly short conversation.”

“Hi, my name is Ashley, and I’ll be your Harbinger today. I will be acting as an interim instructor for all your necromancy needs.” She flashed her best stewardess smile and gave a little Vanna wave.“Ashley, as delighted as I am to meet you, don’t you think it might be hard to teach me? I’m in a cage that you can’t get into. Oh, and—” I grabbed the bars with both hands, “I’m a little distracted right now by the fact that I’m being held by a psychotic killer.”Ashley cocked a single eyebrow, a look of mild amusement on her face. “Geez,” she said, looking at Brid. “Is he always this big of a drama queen?”

“You want waffles?” I tried to keep the skepticism from my voice. “No firstborn or a pot of gold?”“I’m not a leprechaun, Sam. And what would I do with a baby?” Her eyebrow shot back up, and she crossed her arms. “I want waffles. Take it or leave it.”I glanced at Brid, who was staring at Ashley shrewdly.“Let’s talk numbers,” she said. “Are we talking, like, twenty waffles all at once? Or a waffle a week for six months? What?”“Every day for two years,” Ashley said.“That’s outrageous,” Brid sputtered.”

“When you break up with someone, and I’m not talking casual breakups here, it’s hard to take the sudden absence of such an important person in your life. It reminded me of when I’d stopped going to school and the weird uneasy feeling I’d gotten afterward, like I was forgetting to do something. My life until that point had pivoted around some form of education, and all of a sudden, it was gone. Homework, classes, running around, and then – bam – nothing but a life of work stretching out before you. No one prepares you for that feeling or even mentions it. You just suddenly have a gap and have to decide how to fill it. A break up is like that gap, only much, much more painful. One day the person you talked to constantly or did stuff with is just absent. Gone. Poof. And even though I’m not one of those people who has to be in a relationship all the time, I was feeling at a loss.”

“Essentially, the whole time I’d been here, the security staff hadn’t been paid. I would have been harassing the management too, though I probably would have started with a discussion and not so much jumping straight to peeing on someone’s bed. You have to work up to that sort of thing. Still, I had essentially staged a hostile takeover, which did kind of explain why they’d been going on the offensive.”

“Are we going where I think we are?” he asked.“Hell, yeah,” I told him, turning the key in the ignition. I steered the car toward the highway that would take us to my mother’s house. “And I hope she’s got a few good answers.”“I hope,” Ramon said, “that she’s made cookies.”I glared at him.“Don’t look at me like that. If we were going to interrogate my poor mother for whatever, you’d be secretly hoping she’d made you tamales. I’m just honest enough to admit it.”

“Arriving on Bainbridge Island is the opposite of arriving in Seattle. When you got in your car and waited to unload off the ferry in Seattle, you saw the Space Needle, cars, and a mound of urban construction. Once you exit the ferry terminal on Bainbridge, however, it’s mostly trees. Pine as far as the eye can see. Well, pines, firework and coffee stands, and eventually a casino. You drive through the Port Madison Indian Reservation when you leave the island. I couldn’t help but smile as I went past the casino. I didn’t really get gambling, since I’d never had money to throw away, but as I passed through all the beautiful countryside that I’m sure once belonged to the tribe, I sort of hoped they would rob the white man blind. Perhaps not politically correct, but the feeling was there all the same.”