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“Change of plans,” he said, but the flush that spread upward from his collar contradicted his nonchalant tone. “It was pretty clear that nothing was going to happen. The meeting wasn’t public enough for a big magical event they could pin on me, there were no media present, and it looked like your sweeps of the surrounding area hadn’t turned up anything. So I figured the meeting was about something else, and we might as well know what it was.”
“And?” I prodded.
“And it wasn’t about anything, at least, not that I could tell. She just wanted to catch up.”
“But I thought you were never friends. What was there to catch up about?”
“We did have some classes together and had mutual friends. We mostly talked about them, where they are, what they’re doing. She asked about the wedding.” He gave a slight smile. “She was rather surprised that I had the nerve to propose to anyone, since I was apparently notorious in school for being too afraid to even ask anyone out.” He started walking, heading back toward the office, and it took me a moment to mentally and physically catch up with him.
“So she really just wanted to talk about old times that you two never actually had?”
“I guess she noticed me more than I realized. Apparently, I was the source of a lot of gossip and speculation. More girls than I realized were interested in me, but they got frustrated when I didn’t catch any of their hints. It seems I could have had a very different social life than I had. But then I probably wouldn’t have done as well in school if I’d been distracted.”
“Really, all she wanted to talk about was how cute you were in school and how surprising it is that you’re getting married now?”
He shrugged. “Maybe she’s changed since then.”
I started to remind him of what we’d learned about Matilda’s family, but that wasn’t something to discuss in public. Was it possible that she really did just want to catch up with an old acquaintance? Something about this struck me as odd, and I doubted it was just insecurity on my part. Unfortunately, it was difficult to dig into it without sounding insecure.
Rod and Trish arrived back at the office not long after we did, running into us while we were still in the lobby. For a moment, I thought Rod was going to tear into Owen about going against the plan, but he stopped himself. “We’ll talk later,” was all he said, though his glare was furious. “Shall we gather at your place tonight to discuss this?”
“I can’t tonight,” I said. “I’ve got something to deal with.”
“There’s nothing to discuss,” Owen said. “Turns out it was a false alarm, just a lunch to catch up.”
“Catch up on what?” Rod asked.
Owen ignored him, saying, “What is it that you need to deal with?” to me.
“There’s another one of those anti-magic rallies, and I ought to check it out. I doubt it’s the big unveiling because it’s not likely to get a lot of attention. Carmen Hernandez didn’t even get a news release about it.”
“We’ll need to stake it out, anyway,” Owen said.
“You’ll go nowhere near it,” Rod said, and I was glad he had so I didn’t have to. “You will stay safely at the office until we give you the all-clear. I don’t even want you going home. I want you here, with witnesses.”
“Yes, sir!” Owen said with a mock salute. “Even though I don’t report to you. At least, not last time I checked.”
“It’s for your own good,” Rod said.
“Or do you want to sit through another interrogation, hmmmm?” I added.
The “hmmm” apparently served as a wakeup call, for he immediately said, “I have some things I want to work on this evening, anyway. The rest of you have fun.”
He headed for the stairs, and Rod turned to me. “What happened today?”
“You probably know more than I do, since you were inside,” I said. “He just told me they chatted about old times and what’s going on with him now. What did happen in there?”
“Nothing that I could tell,” Trish said. “It just looked like a casual lunch. They weren’t overly friendly. He was pretty reserved. She was flirty, but in that way that looks like it’s just her natural way of dealing with people. There was a little battling over the check, and I suspect she used magic to win it. I wasn’t close enough to hear what they said.”
“I was, or I should have been,” Rod said. “But all I heard was a constant murmur, nothing specific. I think they were using a privacy spell. You wouldn’t notice it unless you were trying to eavesdrop on that one particular table. Otherwise, you hear a blur of restaurant sound.”
“Why would they have needed a privacy spell if they were just catching up on old times?” I wondered.
“You don’t think he’s lying about what they discussed, do you?” Trish asked.
I shook my head. “No. He can’t tell a lie to save his life.”
“That’s the truth,” Rod said. “Maybe she’s just automatically paranoid. I do know of magical people who make it a habit to mask their conversations in restaurants. It’s a New York survival strategy.”
