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“How’d you get close enough to Corey Feldman that you know what his breath smells … oh, never mind.” Jolene chuckled.
Jolene was an odd duck. She was beautiful in a fierce, exotic way—auburn hair, flashing green eyes, sharp white smile. Jane told me that she was once bitter about being replaced as Zeb’s “best girl” by someone with a clear genetic advantage … but then she consoled herself with the fact that Jolene’s braying backwoods twang could peel paint. It was a small consolation, especially when she was such a genuinely nice girl.
I opened a copy of Bizarre Botanicals and Their Uses. I muttered, “Devil’s claw. Bloodwort. Marrow root. Why do they insist on giving these plants such scary names?”
Jane shrieked. “Augh!”
“What?”
She shuddered and slammed the book shut. “I just got a look at eyeball plants.”
“Jane has a thing about eyeballs,” Jolene said, rolling hers.
This started a good-natured argument about the group’s various obscure phobias, including Jane’s fear of clowns and puppets. After a few minutes, I narrowed my choices to Imperfections of a Perfect Creature and The Natural Versus the Supernatural, a guide to the plants, metals, and minerals that had physical effects on supernatural creatures. And A Guide to Ancient Poisons.
“You would tell me if you were planning to use something I sold you to kill someone, right?” Jane said, clearing her throat. I waggled my hand as if I might consider it. She threw a novelty voodoo doll at me. At least, I thought it was a novelty doll.
“I’ll take them,” I told her. I pulled out my purse, but Jane snapped it shut and pushed it back into my hands. “Oh, your money is no good here.”
“Jane, one of these books looks like an antique,” I said, holding up Ancient Poisons, with its weathered green cloth cover.
“You helped me survive wedding-dress shopping with my relatives,” Jane countered. “And you managed to distract my mother during my reception so she was unable to force-feed me cake. You don’t pay here, ever.”
“Thanks, Jane,” I said, hugging her.
“So, I was thinking,” Jane said, squeezing me gently, “that we need to go out for drinks sometime. You know, a Girls’ Night Out. I feel like we don’t get to spend enough time with you. With Gigi leaving for school, you need to get used to ‘adult time’ again.”
I narrowed my eyes at her. Sometimes it was a pain in the butt hanging out with a mind reader. She arched an eyebrow at me.
I thought, Heard that, too, huh?
She nodded.
Know-it-all psychic.
She grinned cheekily.
Meanwhile, the spoken conversation around us continued, our companions unaware of Jane’s mental maneuverings.
“I don’t like your Girls’ Nights.” Andrea pouted. “One of us always ends up questioned by the authorities.”
“Well, who told you to dance on that cop car?” Jolene countered.
“You’re the one who dared me to do it!” Andrea snapped.
“It was in motion!”
Andrea cried, “I borrowed Jane’s bad-decision dress. I had no control over my actions!”
“We’re burnin’ that dress,” Jolene muttered.
Jane smiled serenely, as if there wasn’t a live production of Jerry Springer occurring behind her. “So, this friend that you’re doing the research for, how long have you been … seeing each other?” she asked delicately.
I gasped, hoping that Jane hadn’t seen much of Cal inside my head. I doubted that she’d take the information to the Council, but I didn’t want her to get into trouble with Ophelia on my account. The problem with spending time with Jane was that the minute you realized that she could be listening to your thoughts, you automatically started thinking of all of the things that you shouldn’t think about in her presence. When I was embarrassed over a minor account-balance hiccup with the bank three months before, I learned to recite lists of plant identifications in my head when she was around. It took her a week’s contemplation to ask why I was mentally cursing at her in Latin.
“We’re not dating so much as spending a lot of time together.”
Andrea’s lips quirked at my disaffected tone. “And you don’t seem very happy about it.”
