I cut my eyes to Diesel. “This isn’t going well, is it?”
Diesel blew out a sigh.
A moment later, Shirley marched out of her bedroom with the tent dress billowing around her. She raised her arm and pointed a gun at us.
“Eat poop and clock,” Shirley said.
I spun around and ran for the door, shoving Glo in front of me. Bang, bang, bang. A bullet embedded itself in the wall and a chunk of plaster fell to the floor. We flew flat out, down the stairs, through the small lobby, and across the street with Diesel behind us. We jumped into the SUV, and Diesel wheeled away.
It had all happened so fast. My heart was pounding, and I was scramble-brained. This was the first time I’d ever had a gun aimed at me. And as if it wasn’t awful enough, I’d been shot at by one of my cupcake customers.
Diesel didn’t seem to be overly bothered. He’d been the prime target, bringing up the rear, but he was looking calm behind the wheel.
“Are you okay?” I asked him.
“Yeah. She’s not much of a marksman. And even if she’d tagged me, I’m not easy to kill.”
Okay, I guess that explained his composure. He wasn’t easy to kill. Unlike me. I was a wimpy human held together by skin and dumb luck.
We got halfway down the block, and Glo leaned forward. “Now what?” Glo wanted to know. “Is it still happy hour?”
I stared at Glo. “Happy hour? Are you serious? How could you think about happy hour? We were just shot at. We could have been killed. And we left a woman talking nonsense. And happy hour ended hours ago.”
“I guess that was my bad,” Glo said, “but honestly, I didn’t think yak brain would make a difference.”
CHAPTER SIX
It was way long past happy hour when we left the Golden Dungeon Pub. As a town, Salem is a mixed bag. There are new hotels and office buildings side-by-side with two-hundred-year-old houses, museums reflecting the town’s nautical and heretic history, and shops catering to the weird and the curious.
The Golden Dungeon Pub was four steps down from the sidewalk in a converted basement that had nothing golden but was reminiscent of a dungeon, in a cozy sort of way. Dark wood booths, dark wood floors, dim light, a ghoulish waiter, sixteen taps, and theme-based food.
I’d had a couple Davey Jones crab cake sliders, a lot of bar nuts, and two sips of beer. I’d limited myself to two sips, because it seemed like it wasn’t a good idea to have more than two mouthfuls of alcohol sloshing around in my brain when I was sitting next to a man who smelled like fresh-baked Christmas cookies, looked good enough to eat and bad enough to ruin my life. And it was very possible he wasn’t entirely normal.
Glo hadn’t felt the need for caution, so we dropped her off at her house, and Diesel motored out of Salem and into Marblehead. He parked in front of my house and walked me to my front door.
“Knowing what’s going on in your head isn’t doing much for my ego,” Diesel said. “Most women want me to come in and get friendly. You’re panicked you won’t be able to keep me out.”
“I have to go to work early tomorrow.”
“That’s it?”
“And, you’re scary.”
Diesel pushed my door open and nudged me in. “You’ll get used to it.”
“I don’t want to get used to it!”
Diesel went still for a moment. “Wulf’s been here,” he said.
“Here? You mean in my house? How do you know?”
“I just know.”
I looked around. “Is he still here?”
Diesel slouched into the couch and reached for the television remote. “No. Just you, me, and Cat.”
Cat 7143 was at the edge of the room, watching us. He was back on his haunches with his half-tail curled around himself, seeming not overly upset that Wulf had come and gone.