Agon (2 page)

“
Do I even want to
know?”

She shrugged again. What did she care
if the woman had let the man fuck her for a freebie and had come to
collect?

“
What can you tell me
about the male? Is he old, young? Maybe even a little bit, like if
you know his name?”

“
I don’t know any of that,
but he’s killed before but not fingered by you guys. Also, the
female is an unknown as yet for you. But you’ll see more of her in
the coming weeks if you don’t catch her—”

“
What the fuck is she
doing here?”

Judith didn’t turn to look at the man
who had come into the room bellowing as if no one in the room could
hear him. Benny stood to stand behind her, to protect her she
supposed, but she didn’t need him to. Judith had been caring for
herself longer than anyone else had.

“
She was called in to
identify the body.” Sort of true, but she didn’t correct Benny when
he spoke to the other man. Denis Pallor hated her with a passion
and would steamroll anyone that tried to gainsay him. And Benny was
forever pissing the commissioner off.

“
I guess she just happened
to be in the neighborhood again.” Judith stood and turned to look
at the man. He took several steps back from her and she smiled. Her
height made men uncomfortable, and she loved rubbing it in this
man’s face that she was a great deal taller than him.

“
Commissioner? How’s it
hanging?”

He sputtered for a few seconds before
he turned back to Benny. She decided it was time for her to go.
Benny would come by later if he needed anything else from her. That
was the way they worked.

Judith was home nearly an hour when
she heard someone knocking on her door. She looked at the monitor
on her counter and smiled at the woman standing there. Lily
Anderson was Benny’s wife, and when he was being watched, she’d
come to get whatever it was Judith had found out. Judith moved
through her small apartment to the front of her shop door and
thought of the years she’d known these two.

Had it not been for Benny she might
well have been as dead as the man she’d just helped him with. But
he’d seen something in her abilities that no one else had seen.
He’d given her a means to use them for something other than causing
pain, and she’d been at his beck and call since. Lily smiled at her
when she opened the door.

“
He’s in a meeting and
sent me to pick up some tea for him.” Judith handed her a file and
a thermos of hot tea. “I had a favor to ask you as well. I was
wondering if you’d come to a friend of mine’s house and identify a
few plants. She is trying to fix the herb garden that came with the
house, and we can’t find some of the plants in a book we got. It’s
an old garden, but it’s in poor shape.”

“
Sure.” Judith sat down
behind the counter after pulling a few of her favorite books out
from under it. When Lily sat down as well and leaned back on her
couch, Judith pulled out her freshest jam and some scones she’d
made the day before. The hot tea was sitting on the small oak table
she’d picked up at an auction a few days ago. “I would like to have
a few cuttings if they’re something I don’t have. Is that
okay?”

“
I told her you might and
she said it would be fine. You’ll like her. Her name is Kala
Trainer. She and her husband bought the Carpenter house.” Judith
knew the place but had never been there. Lily told her that it was
being renovated now. “They should have most of the bedrooms done in
a few days, and the furniture has been in storage. I thought we
could go out today. Now if you’re not busy.”

Judith didn’t answer her but got up to
get a couple more books that she was going to take with her. Her
intentions were to veg out in front of the television that night,
but Benny had called and she’d changed her mind, along with what
she was having for dinner. The steak no longer appealed to
her.

“
Does she…have you spoken
to her about me? I mean, I don’t care for people. You know that.”
Lily took two of the scones, and Judith ate three before she
continued. “Can’t you just bring me a cutting and I’ll tell you
what I think they are?”

“
I could, but I’d rather
you came out to the house with me. It’s just Kala and I for now.
The men are working at the other end of the property and won’t be
back for a long time. I want to make sure that the ones we’ve
marked are what we think they are.”

Judith heard the timer in the kitchen
and nearly let the thing go, but knew that she’d have a mess in her
kitchen if she did. Having very little choice, she got up to see to
the pots she had there. Lily, of course, followed.

“
I don’t want to leave
here.” Lily sat at the counter while Judith poured the hot mixture
into little jars. When she was putting the lids on the fresh jams,
she realized that Lily hadn’t said anything. She looked at Lily
with a raised brow.

“
You’re finished then?”
Judith nodded before she could think that she shouldn’t. “My car is
out front. We should hurry so that we can get you back here before
you turn into a pumpkin.”

It was an old joke between them…at
least it was a joke to Lily and Benny. They both would bully her
into things she would never do on her own. It mattered little to
either of them that she didn’t want to do whatever it was, so long
as she did what they wanted. Today wasn’t going to be any
different.

Grabbing her jacket, she locked up her
house and shop and moved out the door, setting the alarms as she
left. She wasn’t going to take a chance on anyone coming in except
the people who knew just how to get in. And they were very few.
Turning, she looked at Lily as she stood on the sidewalk, and
Judith had an overwhelming urge to touch her hand.

Instead of acting on what would no
doubt be horrific, Judith shoved her hands into her pockets and got
into the car. She never touched until she had to.

~~~

Kala wrote as fast as she could but
knew she was missing things. Looking over at Alison, her cook, she
wondered why she wasn’t making notes. Of course, the woman could
cook anything without looking at a recipe a thousand times, and was
more than likely remembering every little detail. Kala looked at
the woman who had gotten out of the car only an hour
ago.

To say she was pretty would have been
an understatement. She was more than that. Her looks—porcelain
skin, dark hair and eyes—made Kala think of exotic dancers she’d
seen on television once. The kind that did things with their hips
that she had always envied. Kala realized that she was speaking to
her when Lily nudged her from behind.

“
You do go off into your
own world, don’t you?” Kala smiled rather than get angry. Valyn
told her the same thing when he caught her thinking hard. “I asked
if you were okay with me taking some of these pieces with
me.”

“
Of course.” Judith knelt
down and started digging at the root of the pink delphinium that
had been deemed a weed until Judith had told them what it was. She
said that she could use the pink color for things. “What is it you
do with this stuff? If you tell me you make the most scrumptious
cookies with them, I might kidnap you to bake for me.”

Her slight pause had Kala looking at
Lily. There was something there, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted
to know. When Judith continued digging in the garden at the other
herbs she’d identified for her, Kala started to ask again. But
Judith spoke first.

“
I make jellies and jams.
Sometimes soaps and teas, depending on what I have in stock from my
own garden. I have a shop in the front of my place that is open
most days, but I don’t do tricks.” Her statement had Kala looking
at Lily as Judith set the tiny plants in the crockery pots she’d
brought with her and continued. “What did you really want to know,
Mrs. Trainer? I mean, Lily said you knew that I helped Benny. Did
you want me to answer some age old question for you?”

Her tone led Kala to believe that the
woman was pissed off at her and her anger surged forward. “No. If I
wanted answers I would ask for them right out. I was simply asking
you what you’d need herbs for if, as you said when you got here you
didn’t cook all that much. There is no reason for you to take that
sort of attitude with me. I’m not usually a person who beats around
the bush, and I like my information that way as well. Suck it up,
Judith, no one here wants you to perform for them like a
bear.”

Judith stood up and seemed to tower
over her for several seconds before she took a step back. When she
did, Kala had a feeling she’d passed some test and wanted to ask
her what it was. But the look in the other woman’s eyes had her
staring back at her.

“
You’re having sons. Four
of them.” Kala put her hand over her small mound and nodded.
“They’re…I don’t think you’re human. Are you?”

“
No. I’m not.” She had no
idea why it seemed important not to lie to this woman, but Kala
didn’t. “Most of the people here aren’t, but I’m sure you already
knew that, didn’t you?”

“
I did.” Judith picked up
her five little pots and moved toward the car. Kala wanted to ask
her what she was but wasn’t sure if she really wanted to know. At
least not yet, at any rate. The woman wasn’t scary or anything like
that, but she was….

“
Who hurt her?” Lily only
shook her head when she asked her. “Someone did. She has no trust
whatsoever, does she?”

“
No. It took Benny years
to get her to trust him. And longer still for me to be able to come
to her house and not get tossed out on my bottom. What else have
you noticed about her?”

Kala looked at Judith again and tried
to think what it was about her that had seemed so wrong when Kala
had first seen her. There was something so very…then it hit her.
She looked at Lily.

“
She has no protector.”
Lily shook her head and Kala wondered how the hell that had
happened and asked.

“
I don’t know. I asked
Boss about it and He just smiled at me. You know how He is. If He
wants you to know, He’ll tell you, but mostly you have to work it
out on your own.” Yeah, Kala knew that.

Boss had been to her house a lot in
the past few months since she and Riss had married. Mostly it was
to argue with her, but sometimes they’d have a good laugh or two.
She really enjoyed the man but this wasn’t right. She decided to
get to the bottom of it as soon as she could.

All in good
time
. Kala nearly screamed when Boss spoke
to her through her mind. She hated when He did that, and He knew
it.
I have a plan for every creature. Did
you not know that by now? Even you have a greater purpose than
being the mother of the first children born of protectors, and even
more than being Riss’s wife. You are very…curious, are you
not?

She decided to ignore His
comment about her plans.
And what of her
plans?
Who will take care of her when she
needs it? Who gives her encouragement when she feels like she is
failing?
He didn’t answer her as she made
her way to the car. Lily told her that she had to get Judith back
before it got too much later.

She is…I have tried to
give her protectors but she runs them off with her temper. I have
never met…she is more stubborn than you are at times. And this
child is like that all the time. But I will tell you that I have
been watching her, but from afar.

Kala sat on the porch when the car was
out of sight, and Boss appeared beside her. He sat down and looked
out over the yards before He continued. “Judith has a gift. Not
unlike a protector’s gift in that they can see each other, but hers
is deeper, stronger than some. I have had Benny and Lily watching
her for years. I’m sure she is aware of them and why they come to
her, but she does help them, too. It is a love-hate relationship, I
believe. But she does help them and for now, that is
enough.”

“
Lily said she helped
Benny solve murders, but I’m betting it’s more than that. He said
that she can see things on a body that modern science cannot. And
know things about a death that he’d never know without her help.”
He nodded but said nothing. “Why? Is it a gift as you called it, or
did something happen to her to give her this?”

His laughter made her look at Him.
Boss always seemed so tired to her, and she wondered if He was
resting. Without voicing her question to Him, she knew what He
would say. He was getting enough. How much, to the man who watched
everyone all the time, was enough? she wondered.

“
It was forced upon her by
an accident at birth. My fault, if you wish to lay blame.” When He
said no more, she wondered what might befall her own unborn
children. “They will be fine, my dear. As will our girl. I have
great plans for her. You’ll see.”

“
Another protector is
going to meet his match, I take it.” His smile had her wondering
which man would find as much happiness as she and Riss had. “I
suppose if I asked you’d not tell me.”

“
I would not. But I am
glad that you have not thought it wrong of Me to do this.” He
leaned back in His seat and grinned. “I will tell you that she will
not come into this happily. I’m sure you will agree with Me when I
tell you she is a little on the stubborn side.”