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“It was an idea,” she said slyly. “If the mood strikes.”
“Good for you,” I said with a smile.
Lulu chucked a big piece of glass into the bin, then used a wet paper towel to clean up the rest of the mess I’d made. And I didn’t care for that metaphor.
Across the room, my screen rang.
Lulu glanced at it. “Are you in for Petra?”
“Sure,” I said, and she tossed over my screen. I managed to catch it, avoiding another round of spilling things across the floor.
“Elisa,” I said, answering it. Her face popped on-screen, her dark hair pulled into a tail. “And you’re on speaker, so be clever enough for a crowd.”
“How about the Grove?” she asked.
Lulu’s brows lifted, then she looked at me with speculation. “The place in the burbs that does outdoor weddings?”
“Yeah. My cousin was married there,” Petra said. “She had eighteen bridesmaids.”
“Who needs eighteen bridesmaids?” I asked. “That’s horrifying.”
“A woman who wants a three-hour wedding ceremony.” Petra sighed hugely. “She organized them like a chorus and made them sing a song for her.”
“No way that happened.”
“Would you like to see the evidence? I can send you pictures. It was a beautiful ceremony... until the lightning storm.” Her voice was mild and pleasant, belied by the glimmer in her eyes.
“You ruined your cousin’s wedding with a lightning storm?” Lulu asked, and even she looked a little impressed.
“I didn’t ruin it,” said the aeromancer. “I just made it shorter.”
“What does the Grove look like?” I asked.
“There’s a pergola for outdoor weddings, a building where receptions are held, and a meadow behind, where brides take pictures with boots on or whatever. It’s atmospheric.”
“Not unlike your cousin’s wedding,” I said.
She grinned. “Yup. The place is yours if you want it. There’s nothing scheduled tonight, and the owner said she owed me one for getting my cousin’s people out of their building. They were ready to clean up and go home after the wedding.”
“Cost?”
“Free,” she said. “Due to that favor. I mean, if you trash the place, you have to clean it up. But otherwise free.”
I seriously hoped “trashing the place” wasn’t on the menu. The AAM couldn’t expect to come to Chicago and pull a stunt like that without consequences.
“I’ll have to get the AAM’s okay,” I said. “But if they’re good with it, it’s fine by me. It’s out of town, there’s open space, and it’s free. Thanks for doing the legwork.”
“You’re welcome,” Petra said. “Now, let’s discuss your entrance music.”
***
Cool as it might have been to walk in to my own theme song, we were trying to avoid attention, not attract it. And while I wasn’t going to kowtow to the AAM, I also wasn’t trying to provoke them further.
When Connor and Alexei gave me the thumbs-up for theGrove, I told the AAM. They agreed. They’d arrive at midnight; we’d arrive at eleven, an hour early.
Lulu came out as I put my screen away, tote bag over her shoulder. “I’m out like skinny jeans.”
“You’re wearing skinny jeans,” I pointed out.
