“He might have saved a lot. It happens. Or family money,” Nora said. “I’ve known men in his position who had access to a lot of family money.”
“We’ll look into it.” Yeah, Cyrus could believe Søren the Well-Groomed Viking came from money. Even the way he talked sounded like money.
“Anything else?” Doc asked. “Please, anything, my Queen. Order me to do anything, and I’m all yours.”
“You gotta stop with the queen stuff,” Cyrus said, trying not to laugh. “The Queen is either Aretha Franklin or the old white lady in the big house in England.”
“Oh, but in our kingdom, Mistress Nora is the Queen.”
Cyrus couldn’t believe it. That man kissed her damn hand again. He was about ready to suture the old boy’s lips himself if he didn’t stop mackin’ on Nora. The girl had a man. Two men.
“Was that all you had for Doc, Cyrus?” Nora’s hand was still clutched tightly in Doc’s paw. “Any other questions?”
“I got one,” Cyrus said. “What’s the appeal?”
“Of what? Kink?” Nora asked. “You got all night?”
“For a man. Submitting to a woman.” He nodded at Doc.
“I should think it was obvious,” Doc said.
“Not to me,” Cyrus said. “I mean, I get a woman submitting to a man. That makes sense.”
“Sexist much?” Nora said.
“You know what I’m saying,” Cyrus told her, suddenly sweating.
“No, what are you saying?” She smiled, batted her eyelashes. Cyrus tensed. He was about to get himself hardcore murdered by a tiny white woman wearing knee-high leather shit-kickers and truck-stop hooker lipstick.
Murdered. To. Death.
“You know, right?” Cyrus said to Doc. His voice had gone a few notes higher. “Don’t you? You get me, right?”
“Correct me if I’m wrong,” Doc began, “but I think what you’re saying, young man, is that you understand why women desire—sometimes, not all the time, and certainly not all women—to submit to a powerful man as it’s so hard to be a woman in a world so hostile to women. The fantasy of having a powerful protector is a potent one when it seems like the threats from dangerous men are everywhere all the time. And, of course, in an ideal world, a woman’s first male love is her father, who was affectionate, adoring, and yet an authority figure. Why wouldn’t a woman desire a man to be—as her father was—her protector, first and foremost, but also a source of unconditional affection as well as an authority figure and disciplinarian? Ergo, your statement that it’s more understandable that women wish to submit to men was simply an acknowledgment of the sexist socialization that women experience in patriarchal cultures.”
“Yeah. That’s exactly what I’m saying. Took the words right outta my mouth, Doc.”
“Good save, Doc,” Nora said. “But can you explain male submission to women that succinctly?”
“Mr. Tremont, have you ever had a pretty girl in a short plaid skirt and white cotton panties stand over your head and piss through them onto your face?”
Cyrus’s eyes went very wide. He couldn’t find the words to even respond to that.
“Not even fantasized about it?” Doc sounded astonished.
“Hell no.”
Doc threw his hands up in defeat. “Well, you can’t say I didn’t try, your majesty.”
“Any other questions, Cy?” Nora asked.
“Not a God damn one?” Cyrus said. “I mean, thanks, Doc. That helps.”
“I’ll go, majesty, but just one order? Please? Before I go? Kiss your boots? Lick the floor? Take a bullet for you right through this old heart?”
He tapped his chest.
“My order is this,” Nora began. “Go and do whatever sick, twisted, demented, perverted, deranged thing your old heart desires. Just don’t hurt anybody in the process. Well, forget that. Just don’t fuck anybody up in the process.”
“Ah, an it harm none, do what thou wilt. You recite the Witch’s Rede, majesty,” Doc said, apparently more enchanted with Nora than ever. “I should have known you had a little magic up your sleeve. You’ve certainly cast a spell on me.”
Cyrus waited for Nora to say something to Doc, tell him off, or send him packing. But she didn’t. Her eyes narrowed, she glanced off to the side.
“Nora?” Cyrus said.
She seemed to suddenly come back to the present.
“Thank you, Doc,” Nora said. “Now get your old ass out of here before I change my mind about putting you in the ER.”
“One of these days, Mistress. I’ll be your slave yet.”
Cyrus shook Doc’s hand again, and the old boy left them alone. Immediately Cyrus transferred from Nora’s chaise to Doc’s empty red armchair.
“That man is nuttier than a fruitcake,” Cyrus said. “Makes you look almost normal, and God damn, that’s saying something, isn’t it?”
“I remembered something.”
She sounded so serious that Cyrus sat up straighter. His heart pounded hard in his chest, the way it always did when he was about to make a break in a case.
“I remember who I gave my business card to down here,” she continued. “That week I was house-hunting. Doc reminded me.”
“Shit, who was it?”
Nora laughed a little.
“A witch.”
Chapter Eighteen
Cyrus stared at her like she’d grown a second head. Then he shrugged.
“New Orleans,” he said. “Shoulda guessed.”
“I can’t believe I’d forgotten it.” Nora remembered it all now. “It was the day my real estate agent was negotiating for my house. I didn’t know if I’d get it since I put in a low-ball bid. I was getting nutty waiting for the phone to ring, so I went for a walk. Stopped in some little stores to shop. One was some kind of witchy store.”
“You remember the name?”
“No,” she said. “I might know it if I saw it, though.”
“Go on.”
“Anyway, there was a woman in the shop, she worked there. She asked if I was there for a reading. I said I hadn’t planned on it, but I had time to kill. The girl said the witch who did the readings—”
“She called her ‘a witch’? Not a psychic?”
“Definitely called her a witch, like it was her job. ‘Our witch is in today, and she does great readings if you want one.’ Obviously, trying to sell me something, but I said okay. Why not, right? Thought it would keep me from checking my phone every ten seconds to see if I had the house or not. I gave the girl at the counter my card. She said she’d call me when it was my turn. I left to walk around some more. I got the call. I went back, had my reading. The psychic, the witch, I mean, she had my card on her little table. I asked her if I’d get the house. She said I would. And I did.”
Of course, there was more to it than that. Nora had received a half-hour tarot card reading. The topics had ranged from her writing career—“continued success”—to her love life—“about to get very complicated.” Both turned out to be true, though Nora knew the statements were purposefully vague enough they could apply to nearly any situation.