I reached behind his neck and pulled his mouth down to mine again and lost myself in his kiss.
I often feel small. My life constantly reminds me of how insignificant I am. I can barely go a day without some reminder of the fact that my problems don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy mixed-up world. So it was no surprise that I felt small when pulled against the broad chest of this golden warrior of a man. The surprise was that I felt so incredibly safe.
Until something pulled at my pant leg.
I glanced down and caught a glimpse of a tail as something darted into my apartment.
Ted shifted against me and my attention veered back to him. Maybe I hadn’t really seen what I thought I’d seen. Maybe it had been a figment of my imagination. I hadn’t felt the buzz of a supernatural being nearby, but of course, that could have been masked by the fact that my entire body was buzzing with an entirely different sensation at the moment, one that was one hundred percent human.
It pulled at my pant leg again. Damn. It was still there and it was an imp. There are few things peskier than an imp, and I grew up with a younger brother, so I know about pesky.
I slid my hand down and held up one finger, trying to communicate to give me a minute.
Apparently, imps don’t understand sign language. He pulled on my pants again. Too many more tugs and I was going to end up dropping trou right there in the hallway. I kicked at him. Not a hard kick, just a little let-me-go kick.
The little bastard bit me.
I squeaked. It wasn’t a hard bite. It was like being nipped by a kitten with those tiny needle-sharp teeth, but it was enough to let me know he was going nowhere. It was also enough to make Ted straighten up.
“Are you okay?”
“I . . . uh . . . I just . . .” I just have an imp gnawing at my ankle and probably really need to see what he wants. There was no way I was telling him that.
Ted moved away from me and I felt suddenly cold, not so easy on a warm summer morning in Sacramento. He raised his hands. “I know.”
“You do?” Had he seen the imp? Most people couldn’t. Had I managed to stumble on another human being that saw what I saw, but had managed to not be sucked into doing the bidding of whatever supernatural force happened to drop by? How cool would that be?
“I do, Melina. I don’t want to rush this anymore than you do. You’re right. I’ll go now.” He caressed my cheek.
That was so not what I wanted, but considering the mischievous little fairy that had darted back into my apartment, it was probably the right thing to do. I hated doing the right thing.
Ted’s hands were back in his pockets. He looked bashful again. “I’ll call you later, okay?”
“Okay,” I managed to squeak out as he walked down the stairs. I waited until I heard the front door open and close. Then I walked into my apartment and hissed, “What the hell do you want?”
THE IMP HELD UP A FLUTE. “COULD YOU TAKE THIS TO SOMEONE for me?” he asked, his voice squeakier than mine had been out in the hallway right before Ted kissed me.
Oh yeah, Ted had kissed me. Wow. I’d kissed a cop. Of all the weird things I’d done in my short time on earth, that might have been the weirdest. Cop kissing. What would be next? Lawyer licking? Was it really alliterative if the first letters just sounded the same?
“Listen, you,” I started to scold and then realized I didn’t know the thing’s name. I hated when creatures called me “woman” or “girl” or just “human.” It felt disrespectful. I didn’t like to make anything else feel the same way. Damn my mother and those early Golden Rule lessons. “What’s your name anyway?”
The imp smiled a crooked little close-mouthed smile. “You can call me Joe.”
“Joe the Imp? Seriously? Are you on the campaign trail?” That’s just what the Republican Party needed. Actual hell creatures making their party platform.
Joe rolled his eyes. I mean that literally. He could really makes his eyes do total circles in their sockets. That totally skeeved me out. “You wouldn’t be able to pronounce my real name.”
“Try me.” I was so sick of things patronizing me. Enough already.
“Fine, then.” He then emitted a series of whistles and clicks and grunts.
I conceded defeat. “Joe it is.”
He made a little bow.
I suppressed the urge to curtsey. “Listen, Joe, I was in the middle of a moment back there and I kind of resent the interruption. Could you not wait just a minute or two? I’m sure you’ve heard that patience is a virtue.”
“A moment? Is that what you humans are calling it these days? I remember when it was just referred to as fornication. You certainly have come a long way, baby.” He chuckled, which came out like a bad George Bush imitation. It was very unpleasant.
I took the flute from the imp and turned it over in my hands. It wasn’t anything fancy. A person could walk right by it on a shelf in a thrift store, but this flute would never end up at a thrift store. I recognized this flute. “How’d you end up with Kokopelli’s flute?” I turned it over again, wondering why it didn’t give off any sign of being an instrument of power. Maybe sometimes a flute was just a flute.
The imp shrugged its bony shoulders, making his leathery wings stretch a little as he did so. “I borrowed it for a little while. I thought he might want it back.”
I nodded. “So you stole it and you want it returned before he finds you and beats the snot out of you.”
Joe drew himself up to his full height, which was only about three feet, if that. “My dear lady, how dare you suggest that I came about this flute through dishonest means?”
I waved away his protests. “Save it for someone who cares, bat breath. I’ll take it. Can it wait until tonight?”
“Probably.” He inspected his fingernails.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Probably sooner would be better than later.”
“He’s looking for you already?”
The imp’s wings sagged. “Pretty much.”
I was tired. I’d kissed a cop. My grandmother’s tai chi instructor was lying maimed in a hospital bed. I wasn’t anxious to be caught up in some imp’s drama. “Where is he?” I asked.
The imp gave me some general directions that would take me toward Amador County. I’d gone worse places on less sleep. I sighed. A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do, and apparently this girl’s gotta take musical instruments to Native American deities on this particular day.
I opened the window to usher out the imp. I wasn’t sure how he got in, and sometimes it was best not to ask questions like that. I sure as snot wasn’t walking him out the front door of the apartment building, though. The imp had wings. He could use them.
“Why’d you take it?” I asked as Joe hopped up onto the windowsill, curiosity getting the better of me.
He smiled up at me. Not a pretty sight. He had sharp little teeth and a lipless mouth and the smile looked more like a grimace on his nasty little face than an expression of anything nice. “It was shiny,” he said and flew away.
’Nough said.
12
I WASHED MY FACE, BRUSHED MY TEETH AND GAVE GRANDMA Rosie a call. If there’s anything her people—and by her people I meant senior Americans—knew how to do, it was to help out someone in the hospital. I knew that by noon there’d be an entire brigade assembled to send cards, deliver flowers and visit when Frank Liu was ready.
“I think I need to get my hearing aids checked,” she said. “I could have sworn you said someone attacked him with a machete.”
“No problem with the hearing aids, Grandma. That’s what I said.” Which was a good thing, because the last time I’d taken her for a hearing-aid check, I’d almost gone insane in that little booth at the Costco. The hearing-aid dude there is seriously strange, and he doesn’t have anything supernatural to blame it on.
Grandma muttered, “What is this world coming to?”
I didn’t have an answer, or at least not one that I was prepared to share with my grandmother. I sometimes wondered what would happen if I just blurted out that Chinese vampires living under the streets of Old Sacramento were being used to attack gang members or something like that. I was taking no chances of ending up back in the little hearing-aid booth at Costco, though, so I kept my big trap shut.
Then I got back into her Buick. Amador wasn’t far and the route was scenic, but I wasn’t looking forward to the drive or the company I was going to keep. I might as well get it over with.
If all you know about Kokopelli is the cute little flute player from the T-shirts and key chains everyone brings back from their vacations in Scottsdale, the real deal can be quite a surprise. I’d crossed paths with the flute player before, so I knew what I was getting into this time.
I wondered what had brought him so far north, although if he was going to be this far north I supposed Amador County with its acres of chaparral made sense. At least he’d be at home in the landscape. Plus, the name Amador supposedly means “one who loves.” What could be more perfect for a fertility god? The general answer for what brought Kokopelli anywhere was, however, usually a girl and not the beauties of the countryside. He was a major horn dog, perhaps the biggest horn dog I had met personally. It was wise for a young woman to keep her distance from him unless she wanted to end up knocked up. I hoped to hell it wasn’t some nice Miwok girl he was after. The tribes had enough trouble as it was.
I looked at the flute sitting on the seat next to me seeming all innocent and inanimate and everything and wondered if I should just toss it out the window and go home. It was tempting, but I knew I wouldn’t do it. I don’t know what the adult equivalent of getting a huge zit on the end of your nose is, but I really don’t want to find out either.
I’d gotten to the general area that the imp had sent me to and the nonfat latte I’d gotten at the drive-thru Starbucks on my way out of town was beginning to have an uncomfortable effect on me. There was nothing around but chaparral. I pulled off the road, figuring I could relieve myself behind some handy bush and then resume searching for my Anasazi friend.
This was how a lot of my deliveries went. Not necessarily the plein air peeing part, but the not-knowing-exactly-where-I-was-going part. Sometimes I got specific instructions like Alex’s request to take that blasted envelope to Aldo’s house. More often, though, it was like this. Some little creature would give me some little items that it wanted to go somewhere. I’d show up in the general area and somehow the thing I was delivering to would find me. It was time-consuming and sometimes boring, and I pretty much always had a paperback book in the Buick to while away time during long waits.
I found a likely pull-off area and a likely bush. When I came out from behind the bush, still putting myself back together, Kokopelli was leaning against my car with a lazy grin across his face.
“Don’t bother buttoning up for me, sweetheart,” he said. He wasn’t exactly handsome. His face was too craggy for that, but there was something about him. He had a certain charisma that was hard to deny. He also had a beautiful head of thick dark hair brushed off his high forehead and a profile so sharp you could cut glass with it.
I finished zipping up anyway. “I’ve got something for you.”
“And I have something for you, darling.” He grabbed at his crotch. I know, real smooth, right? Sadly, it probably worked for him nine times out of ten. I was happy, however, to be the tenth. I so did not want to get near this guy. One of the things a person wouldn’t know about Kokopelli if all they knew was the sanitized version popular at tourist traps, is that he is hung like a celestial stallion. Seriously, I’m surprised he can find pants with enough room for that thing. Check out all the old petroglyphs of him. He’s had a serious
schwanzstucker
since forever.
I ignored the comment and his outrageous bulge. “It’s in the car,” I said.
He smiled wider. “So come and get it.”
I shook my head. I wasn’t getting that close to him, that damn pack on his back or his crazy knob. Whatever seeds he wanted to sow could land in someone else’s fertile plains. A baby was about the last thing I needed at this point in my life. “I’ll come and get it as soon as you move away from the car.”
“Don’t do me like that. Come give this weary old traveler a hug.” He spread his arms wide, the bulge in his pants twitching as if it had a life of its own.
“Not in a million years. If you want the flute, you’ll step away from the Buick.” I crossed my arms across my chest, feeling naked under his gaze anyway.
He brushed his long hair back from his forehead. “All right, then. I need the flute and there’s always pussy somewhere,” he said and walked several yards away from my car.
I considered whacking him over the head with the damn thing for that last comment, but I knew it was as much about pride as insulting me. Kokopelli didn’t get turned down much. So instead I put the flute on a rock halfway between us and then backed away.
As I did, he cocked his head and gave me a strange look. “So that’s how it is.”
“How what is?” I asked, happy to have the solid bulk of the Buick behind me.
“You’re in love. You should have told me,
Guapa
. I wouldn’t have been so mean.” He grinned. “I love love.”
I could feel my face getting hot. “Who said I was in love?”
“No one had to say it. I can smell it on you.” He smacked his lips. “It’s strong, too. I’m surprised you don’t have packs of dogs after you.”
Now there was a charming thought. “You’re making this up. So I turned you down. Get over yourself.”
