I blinked at her for a minute. "That sounds really boring."
"But scary," Molly said. "Very tense." She took a deep breath and said, "I had to throw up twice, just sitting there, I was so nervous. I don't know if… if I'm going to be cut out for this kind of thing, Harry."
"Thank God," I said. "You're sane." I took a few more bites of food and then said, "But I need to know how much you want to know."
Molly blinked and leaned toward me a little. "What?"
"There's a lot I can tell you," I said. "Some of it is just business. Some of it is going to be dangerous for you to know about. It might even obligate you in ways you wouldn't like very much."
"So you won't tell me that part?" she asked.
"Didn't say that," I said. "I'm willing. But some of this stuff you'd be safer and happier not knowing. I don't want to endanger you or trap you into feeling you have to act without giving you a choice about it."
Molly stared at me for a minute while I gobbled cereal. Then she frowned, looked down at her hands for a minute, and said, "Maybe just tell me what you think is best. For now."
"Good answer," I said quietly.
And I told her about the White Court, about the challenge and the duel, about Vittorio's betrayal and how he gated in the ghouls and how I'd had my own backup standing by in the Nevernever.
"What?" Molly said. "How did you do that?"
"Thomas," I said. "He's a vampire, and they have the ability to cross into the Nevernever at certain places."
"What kind of places?" Molly asked.
"Places that are, ah," I said, "important to them. Relevant to them in a particular way."
"Places of lust, you mean," Molly said.
I coughed and ate more cereal. "Yeah. And places where significant things have happened to them. In Thomas's case, he was nearly sacrificed by a cult of porn-star sorceresses in those caves a few years a—"
"I'm sorry," Molly said, interrupting. "But it sounded like you said 'cult of porn-star sorceresses.'"
"Yeah," I said.
"Oh," she said, giving me a skeptical look. "Sorry, then. Keep going."
"Anyway. He nearly died there, so I knew he could find it again. He led Marcone and Murphy there, and they were camped out, waiting for me to open a gate."
"I see," Molly said. "And you all ganged up on this Vittorio guy and killed him?"
"Not quite," I said, and told her what happened, leaving out any mention of Lasciel or Cowl.
Molly blinked as I finished. "Well. That explains it, then."
"Explains what?"
"There were all kinds of little lights going by the windows all night. They didn't upset Mouse. I thought maybe it was some kind of sending, and figured the wards would keep it out." She shook her head. "It must have been all the little faeries."
"They hang around all the time anyway," I said. "It just takes a lot of them before it's obvious enough to notice." I chewed Cheerios thoughtfully. "More mouths to feed. Guess I'd better call Pizza 'Spress and step up my standing order, or we'll have some kind of teeny faerie clan war over pizza rights on our hands."
I finished breakfast, found my back stiffening again, after sitting still, and was stretching out a little when Murphy arrived. She was still in her party clothes from the night before, complete with a loaded backpack.
After kneeling down to give Mouse his hug, she surprised me. I got one, too. I surprised myself with how hard I hugged back.
Molly occasionally displayed wisdom beyond her years. She did now, taking my car keys, showing them to me, and departing without a word, firmly shutting the door behind her.
"Glad you're okay," I told Murphy.
"Yeah," she said. Her voice shook a little, even on that one word, and she took a deep breath and spoke more clearly. "That was fairly awful. Even by your usual standards. You made it out all right?"
"Nothing I won't get over," I told her. "You had any breakfast?"
"Don't think my stomach is up for much, after all that," she said.
"I have Cheerios," I said, as if I'd been saying "dark chocolate Caramel almond fudge custard."
"Oh, God." Murphy sighed. "How can I resist."
We sat down on the couch, with Murphy's heavy bag on the coffee table. Murphy snacked on dry Cheerios from a bowl with her fingers. "Okay," I told her. "First things first. Where is my gun?"
Murphy snorted and nodded at her bag. I got in and opened it. My .44 was inside. So was Murphy's boxy little submachine gun. I picked it up and eyed it, then lifted it experimentally to my shoulder. "What the hell kind of gun is this?"
"It's a P90," Murphy said.
"See-through plastic?" I asked.
"That's the magazine," she said. "You can always see how many rounds you have left."
I grunted. "It's tiny."
"On a hyperthyroid stork like you, sure," Murphy said.
I frowned and said, "Full automatic. Ah. Is this weapon precisely legal? Even for you?"
She snorted. "No."
"Where'd you get it?" I asked.
"Kincaid," she said. "Last year. Gave it to me in a box of Belgian chocolate."
I took the weapon down from my shoulder, flipped it over, and eyed a little engraved plate on the butt. " 'We'll always have Hawaii,' " I read aloud. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
Murphy's cheeks turned pink. She took the gun from me, put it in the bag, and zipped it firmly closed. "Did we ever decide who blew up my car?"
"Probably Madrigal," I said. "You stood him up for that cup of coffee, remember?"
"Because he was busy kidnapping you and attempting to sell you on eBay," Murphy said.
I shrugged. "Vindictive doesn't equal rational."
Murphy frowned, the suspicious-cop look on her face something I was long used to seeing. "Maybe. But it doesn't feel right. He liked his vengeance personal."
"Who then?" I asked. "Vittorio wasn't interested in drawing out the cops. Neither was Lord Skavis's agent. Lara Raith and Marcone don't do bombs."
"Exactly," Murphy said. "If not Madrigal, then who?"
"Life is a mystery?" I suggested. "It was probably Madrigal. Maybe one of the others had a reason for it that we don't know. Maybe we'll never know."
"Yeah," she said. "I hate that." She shook her head. "Harry, wouldn't a decent human being be inquiring after his wounded friends and allies about now?"
"I assumed if there was bad news, you'd have told me already," I said.
She gave me a steady look. "That," she said, "is so archetypically male."
I grinned. "How is everyone?"
"Ramirez is in the hospital. Same floor as Elaine, actually, and we're watching them both. Unofficially, of course."
We meaning the cops. Murphy. Good people. "How is he?"
"Still had some surgery to go, when I left, but the doctor said his prognosis was excellent, as long as they can avoid infection. He got his guts opened up by that knife. That can always be tricky."
I grunted, and had my suspicions about where Molly had gone when she borrowed my car. "He'll make it. What about that poor no-neck you abused?"
"Mister Hendricks is there with two of those mercenaries. Marcone has some of his people guarding them, too."
"Cops and robbers," I said. "One big, happy family."
"One wonders," Murphy said, "why Marcone agreed to help."
I settled back on the couch and rubbed at the back of my neck Tilth one hand, closing my eyes. "I bribed him."
"With what?" Murphy asked.
"A seat at the table," I said quietly.
"Huh?"
"I offered Marcone a chance to sign on to the Unseelie Accords as a freeholding lord."
Murphy was quiet for a moment, and then she said, "He wants to keep expanding his power." She thought about it a minute more and said, "Or he thinks his power might be threatened from someone on that end."