“I do not like him,” Zav stated.
“He’s a vampire. I think most people feel that way.”
He shifted his gaze back to me, letting his fingers stroke me a few more times. I almost suggested that Zoltan could wait a few hours, but Zav sighed and stepped back.
“The sooner we are able to act, the better. Shaygorthian will assume that you will tell me everything, and he may already be making plans to reinforce the facility.” Zav’s tone grew grim. “Or kill my kin so I won’t have a chance to rescue them.”
That bleak thought put thoughts of sex out of my mind, at least for the moment. If we somehow managed to succeed at this, I planned to kick everyone out of the house for the weekend and make the walls and floors shake with the vigor of our lovemaking.
Zav stepped toward the basement door, but he paused and looked over his shoulder. “You will not pay him for this. It is his honor to serve a dragon.”
“Right.” I was sure there would be an invoice on my desk in the morning.
19
Work on the armored display cases in the shop was going slowly. I was distracted thinking of Zav back at home with Zoltan, letting the vampire experiment on him. I understood why Zav was willing to turn himself into a guinea pig to help his family—and I’d encouraged it—but it scared me. If the formula that had worked on Ti didn’t work on him, and Zav ended up dying of some horrible bacterial infection, then what?
Dimitri caught my hand as I was about to swing my hammer. “You’re supposed to hit that nail—” he pointed at the head of the nail I was holding, “—not that one.” He pointed to the side of my swollen thumbnail, which I’d already hit once and had been about to clobber again.
“I knew I was doing something wrong.”
“I assumed your half-elven agility would make you good at home improvements, but I guess it’s only useful for slaying enemies.”
“Ha ha. I’m distracted.”
“You’re lucky you heal fast.”
“I know.” I focused on the nail and hammered it in quickly. As quickly as I wished Zoltan’s refining of the formula was going.
I’d hoped Zoltan would figure something out in a few hours the night before, but when I’d suggested that, he’d rolled his eyes and pointed out that the bacteria would take time to multiply in Zav’s system and be substantial enough to register on his tests. There was no point to injecting the formula until then.
It was just as well that we had some time. I wanted to see Amber before I left, and say something pithy and wise to her, in case I didn’t make it back. I wondered what she would think if I tried to impart everything I knew to her in two hours and then hugged her and cried in her hair before I left. She would probably flee to her room and bolt the door.
“You think these new cases will really keep ogres from trashing your breakables?” I asked.
“Once I magic them up, yes.” Dimitri looked toward the full tables in the seating area. Nobody larger than a werewolf shifter chatting up a half-orc female was here now. The area was busy, though, with more than a few goblins—where did goblins get so much money for coffee?—mingling with kobolds and humans with mixed blood. People didn’t seem to care that they had to stand or take their drinks outside where a few benches had been added around the side of the building. “I’m thinking of adding an electric buzz to deter anyone from touching them.”
“I hear there’s nothing better than a zap from a high-voltage current to excite someone about buying stuff.”
“I’ll put a sign on the cases, saying they need to get a manager to see them.” Dimitri pointed a thumb at his chest.
“Why don’t you sell LEGOs?” a young voice asked from the espresso stand.
It belonged to a scruffy troll kid with so much mud dried in his white hair that it appeared brown. His clothes were torn and grimy, and he was barefoot. It took me a moment to recognize him as the son of the deceased Rupert, the kid who’d wanted me to kill the dark elves who’d killed his father. Nin had said he’d stopped by the food truck a few weeks earlier looking for me, and she’d filled him in on the dark-elf story—as much of it as I’d told her—but I hadn’t seen him again since then.
“We sell coffee and alchemy potions and yard art,” Tam, the barista, said as she worked on orders, the steamer wand hissing.
“That’s not an answer. LEGOs are better than any of those things.”
As I walked over, I wondered what it meant that goblins and trolls and elves all liked the plastic building blocks. Probably that the manufacturer needed to expand to other planets.
“Do you have milkshakes?” the kid asked.
“I can make a Frappuccino,” Tam said.
“What’s that?”
“A milkshake with espresso in it.”
“I don’t think you’re allowed to give eight-year-olds espresso,” I said, coming up beside the blue-skinned troll kid. What was his name? Reb. He was even gaunter than the last time I’d seen him with his cheekbones far too prominent. I was positive all of his ribs would be visible if he took off that tattered shirt. “Better make him one without it.”
I laid five dollars on the counter.
Reb gave me a mulish look, and I thought he might slink off, but the whir of the blender kept him in place as he alternated looking at that and the snacks on the shelf.
“I’m nine now,” he said.
“Happy birthday.” I grabbed a selection of nuts and string cheese that looked like something a kid might eat and that would be vaguely healthy—though he would probably eat anything right now—and set them on the counter for Tam to ring up. “How’re you doing? You living on the streets?”
“Nah.”
“Your people are taking care of you?” I couldn’t keep the skepticism out of my voice. “Relatives of your father?”
Reb shrugged. “I’m staying with some other trolls in town, yeah. You have to scrounge and fight to get any food. It’s okay. It’s how it is when you’re the littlest.”
If he’d been a human kid, I would have tossed him in the Jeep and taken him to Child Protective Services, but they didn’t acknowledge that trolls existed, much less find foster homes for them.
“You need a place to stay?” The idea of taking him home—the house was already weird and crowded enough—was horrifying, but maybe we could make it work until we found an appropriate troll who would take care of him. Who would take care of him and actually feed him.
He hesitated but shook his head. “Nah.”
“You want a job?”
Tam placed a large milkshake on the counter in front of him, and his eyes grew wide with delight as he grabbed it.
“Am I supposed to charge you?” Tam whispered as she rang up the snacks.
“Oh, yes. Nin told me owners don’t get special treatment and that we can only take out money—or coffee—after all the expenses have been calculated and we know there’s a profit. Even then, we should roll the money back into the business.” I was quoting her almost verbatim. Dimitri was lucky she’d approved a modest salary for him.
“She’s a good business owner,” Tam said.
“Yeah, I don’t think we’ll ever see her on any of those reality shows where gurus fix failing businesses. She could be the guru someday.” I’d suggested that she take some time off and show Ti around Seattle. Instead, they were working together at her food truck today, crafting weapons and armor and whatever else excited gnome tinkerers.
I paid for the snacks and stuck them in Reb’s soundest baggy pocket while he gulped from the milkshake glass.
“You want a job, Reb?” I repeated.
He eyed me warily over the glass, beige ice cream smeared all over his upper lip. “What kind of job?”
“Val?” Dimitri waved his hammer from across the room. “A word?”
“Picking up trash outside and cleaning up in here. Doing whatever grunt work Dimitri says to do. An hour or two a day when you can make it.” Did trolls have the equivalent of school? I had no idea.
“You’d pay me in cash? Not those dumb pieces of paper?”
“Val?” Dimitri waved the hammer more vigorously, trying to summon me over.
I held up a finger.
“Cash,” I told Reb, imagining he would get an odd look from a bank teller if he walked in and tried to cash a check.
“Can I start now?”
“Yeah. Finish up your drink, and then clean up the mess Dimitri and I are making building those display cases.”
“Okay.”
Slurping his milkshake, Reb wandered off to watch a group of goblins refining their dice launcher before their next game.
I dug into the cash I had left from my bodyguard gig and pushed some across the counter to Tam. “Stash that somewhere, please, and use it to feed him whenever he comes to work.”
Tam nodded. “I would guess that Nin would be willing to send some extra meals over for us to keep in the fridge for him.”
“Good. Thanks.”
By the time I returned to Dimitri, his beefy arms were crossed over his chest and he was glowering.
“You can’t hire people without asking me,” he said. “Especially not people I’ll end up having to babysit.”
“I’ll pay him on the side for his help.”
“Help? You think a troll kid is going to be help?” Dimitri pointed his hammer at Reb. “The last trolls that were in here competed with the last ogres to see who could break the most stuff.”
“Then it’s a good thing we’re beefing up the display cases. If he isn’t useful, let me know, and I’ll find something else for him to do.”
Maybe he could pull weeds at the house. Though I didn’t particularly want the troll community to know where I lived now.
“I’m glad I get to vet him.”
“You’re so grumpy. Do you need a Frappuccino?”