Henri elbows me, and I realize I’m supposed to say something.
Like I’m supposed to know anything about her vampire novels.
Shit.
I’m going to have to read them.
Dammit.
She elbows me again, and my brain cells finally click together. “Henri’s Nora Dawn,” I announce.
She beams, which means I got it right.
Thank fuck.
But then she elbows me a third time.
Shit. Dammit. I have to do something boyfriend-ish.
Right.
Sell it. If I can’t sell it to these bozos, how am I going to sell it to Nonna?
I wrap an arm around her, and in the process I accidentally tip the towel tower.
It tilts to the right.
Her head goes with it.
I try to grab it and accidentally punch it instead, which makes her jerk sideways into Mackenzie’s wall of bobbleheads.
They all start clacking together—the ones not squished by the towel—and it startles her practically-dead cat, which yowls and leaps.
Right into Francisco’s jewels.
Mackenzie’s gasping. Like, she gasps, then we move, and she gasps again as we assault more of her bobbleheads.
Dogzilla the cat has suddenly realized it’s in clothing, and it doesn’t like it, and it’s chasing its tail while Coco Puff barks and tries to escape Mackenzie’s arms.
Every time Coco Puff barks, his collar yells.
I love you!
You’re the best!
Believe it and you can achieve it!
“Make it stop!” Mackenzie shrieks while Coco Puff leaps out of her arms, onto the couch, and then to the ground, where he starts chasing the cat.
I’m trying to pull Henri off the bobbleheads, but every time I try, the pink-and-green striped beach towel grows arms and bats at me.
Swear it does, because why else can’t I get a grip on the damn towel?
“I got it!” Henri yells while she swats my hands away.
“Demon cat!” Lopez yells back.
“Turn more to your right!” Cooper orders. “I need your face on this video!”
Brooks dives for the animals. Dogzilla dodges him and dives under the couch. Coco Puff tries to follow, but he’s big enough that he can’t reach, and he has this weird jaw issue that makes his tongue hang out, so he’s like a deranged happy dog that would probably make a good partner to the demon cat.
I try one more time to grab the towel, and I end up poking Henri in the eye instead.
“Ow!”
“Whoa.”
“Shit!”
“Demon cat!”
Francisco has a point. The cat’s banging the underside of the couch and it sounds like there’s an unholy orgy going on down there.
I grab Henri’s face and tilt it up so I can look at her eye. “Are you okay?”
“I think so.” She’s blinking funny and the eyeball I poked is red and watery, but it’s not bleeding, and she can open her eyelid all the way, so I didn’t do any irreparable damage.
I hope.
At least, not to her eyeball.
Brooks’s apartment may be another story.
The towel finally slides off, and all her short, curly hair springs to its natural form, though greasier than you’d expect, except—
“Demon girlfriend!”
Fuck me.
She has horns.
I rear back.
“Holy shit,” Cooper whispers as he drops his phone.
Francisco makes the sign of the cross.
Coco Puff yelps and runs for the bedroom.
And Henri sighs. “I told you the towel was a better look.”
She leans over, grabs it, and in three seconds, she’s whipped it back around her crazy curls, which aren’t real demon horns, but rather a haircut gone wrong. Then she carefully balances as she lowers herself to the ground, makes that clicking noise with her tongue, and coaxes Dogzilla the demon cat out from beneath the couch.
My teammates and Mackenzie are all gaping at her, which turns to them staring at me in disbelief.
Like there’s something wrong with both of us, and like Henri will drag me down to the pits of hell with her.
And that pisses me off.
So she’s having a bad night. I made her come to a party, in her pajamas and a beach towel, and she didn’t argue.
She simply went with it, diving right in to meeting a group of people who were going to naturally be suspicious of her, and she didn’t blink.
Hell, she charged in here with more enthusiasm than the damn puppy.
“You all got a problem with my girlfriend?” I growl.
My “girlfriend,” who’s currently having to pull her cat out from under the couch, because the demon has left its body and returned it to a lump of rags, though a lump of rags now missing its shower cap and with its pajama shirt shredded like it’s going to a metal rock concert next.
Max goes stone-faced silent. Francisco is still wide-eyed, but he shakes his head. Cooper’s eyes dart between me and Henri’s ass, which is enough to make me want to take a swing at him, but I still want to make the playoffs, and the fucker’s a damn good second baseman, so for tonight, I’ll let him live.
Brooks is sucking his lips in like this is funny, and Mackenzie’s gnawing on her own knuckle as she stares at the floor. Her chest keeps spasming like she’s trying not to laugh.
“Good kitty,” Henri croons.
She must do yoga or something, because she rises elegantly with the limp, lazy cat back in her arms, towel perfectly balanced on her head.
She looks around the room, and then her brown eyes settle on me. “You okay?”
Is she serious?
She’s standing there with a red eye, her cat traumatized, one of her slippers torn, with everyone knowing about her demon hair under that towel, and she’s asking if I’m okay.
She’s either a martyr of the highest degree, or she’s a psycho.
Or possibly she’s the best kind of human, the ones who’ll do anything for their friends, and are as likely to yell an enthusiastic yes! to a Saturday afternoon playing Scrabble as she would be to leap into action if someone suggested sky diving.
Mental note: Do not suggest sky diving to Henrietta Bacon.
“We’re going home,” I tell her.
“But I was just getting to like your friends!”
“Dogzilla needs to rest.”
Mackenzie leaps forward and hugs her. “Good to meet you, Henri. Have Luca give you my number. We’ll do lunch. The Lady Fireballs need all the help, and I need to know when we’re getting more Confucius.”
She turns and hugs me too, but instead of gushing, she whispers softly, “You’re in so much trouble, dude. This is gonna be fun.”
Know what that means?
That means I’m fucked.
12
Henri
It’s a dark, quiet ride back to Luca’s house. I want to say something like that went well, except it didn’t, and I probably need to send Mackenzie a fruit basket and her dog a biscuit basket.
I let Luca drive, since he seems to like to be in charge and also, I don’t want to wait the seventeen minutes it would take to move the driver’s seat back into the short person position.
Plus, I can’t drive with Dogzilla in my lap.
Not when there’s someone else in the car who would judge me for it.