Page 89 of Want Me, Take Me, Haunt Me, Make Me

This time, Hazel didn’t invite him to join her in the shower. “I’ll be done when the food gets here,” she said by way of explanation. “I just need to scrub myself before I can eat anything.”

“An unpleasant day, then.”

“I succeeded, so it wasn’t too bad, but—yeah, ‘unpleasant’ is probably the right word. I can go into detailafterwe eat. Make yourself at home meanwhile.”

Her instructions left Maxwell slightly aimless, pacing from the living room down to the front door and back, then grabbing the book on which he’d been taking notes before and giving it another try. The second attempt was going somewhat more successfully when Hazel returned, clad in a fluffy yellow chenille robe with her hair wet and combed back from her face.

“Very glamorous, I know,” she said with a sheepish little smile, “but I couldn’tquitejustify breaking out the cocktail dress. Another time.”

“I do hope so,” said Maxwell, and not only out of the certainty that she’d be stunning in formal dress. Another time meantmoretime for her.

He doubted he’d be there. Destroying Perthrux’s anchor would most likely send all of the demon’s servants back into Hell with it, and Maxwell’s bonds, light as they now were, meant he counted. Hazel might have known that and simply been speaking bravely; if she didn’t, he had no intention of telling her.

“You’re fantastic,” she said, and at first Maxwell wondered if she’d picked up on his thoughts. Then he realized that Hazel was looking at the notes he’d been taking. “Do you mind going on until dinner?”

“Not at all.”

Maxwell had forgotten how it felt to work in comfortable silence with another person, or perhaps the silence had simply never been as comfortable with anybody else. Hazel sat across the table from him, at first completing a few more tasks on her phone, then getting herown notes and book. Once in a while Maxwell would lift his head to clear his vision, and the sight of her dark head bent over her work always made his research seem easier.

It would have been nice to spend more evenings that way, he thought, though hopefully with less urgent business to occupy them both. He’d been alone too much in his time to share that sort of peace with anybody he fancied, and the rules of that time had been too strict.

His bargain had been foolish. Many of the errands he’d carried out for Perthrux had been vile. For his family’s sake, though, Maxwell had never quite regretted the deal—and with Hazel as a wholly unexpected silver lining, he could lament the bargain even less.

* * *

Over nachos, Hazel told Maxwell about the ghosts.

She didn’t talk about the basement. The memory didn’t kill her appetite—she’d learned to compartmentalize, and magic took enough out of her that she probably could have eaten in the basement itself—but she had no urge to put it into words.

The ghosts deserved a story, though. “They were magnificent,” she said, dunking a chip in her salsa. “Scary, but if Chapman had killed me, I hope I’d be just as terrifying if I got a chance at him.”

“You would be,” said Maxwell. When Hazel blinked at the certainty in his voice, he smiled. “I’ve seen you fight. You weren’t even a vengeful spirit then.”

“Spirit, no. Vengeful…probably, if I’d had time to feel it. Making me spend time in that room was enough cause for revenge.”

She hadn’t really talked about her job with anybody in a long time—maybe ever, really. Summer had swapped tales with her a few times, almost always well after the fact except when she’d gone to him for help. She’d given Tiffany some brief outlines once in a while, and she’d tried to talk about it with Brandon in college. Hazel couldn’tremember ever getting to lay out what she’d done and what had happened, relatively at leisure, to a person who’d understand and appreciate what it meant.

She wished the business she was talking about could be slightly less dire, or that she didn’t have to get back into investigation mode so soon, but wishes and horses and so on. “Speaking of Chapman, was he the one who ratted you out, or does your boss have another spy?”

“Yes and no.” Maxwell turned a menacing look on his perfectly innocent enchiladas. “Your reporter told him.”

“My—” When Hazel caught on, she set down her chip hard enough to crack it in half. “That littlebastard. I was feeling sorry for him too.”

“I could almost pity him more now, knowing what he’s thrown his lot in with.Almost.” Maxwell pronounced the last word very tightly, with thin lips.

She glanced toward the door outside, where the trunk of her car, a box, and the iron jar imprisoned Chapman’s spirit. “Do you think he’s still skulking around?”

“He wasn’t when we came inside. He might have returned since then, but I doubt he can come in the house now that you’ve renewed the wards—and you’ve deprived him of a patron.”

“I probably shouldn’t feel smug about that, should I?”

“No,” said Maxwell, and leaned over the table, lowering his voice. “You should feelextremelysmug.”

* * *

Hazel started yawning about halfway through dinner. By the time she’d eaten the last of her nachos and Maxwell had devoured a series of chicken enchiladas, she was slumped back in her chair, seemingly unable to open her eyelids more than halfway. “Sorry,” she said, in the middle of another yawn. “Probably won’t be much more use tonight.”

“I’m not here to use you,” said Maxwell.