No Quest for the Wicked (28 page)

She nodded. “Yes, I should do that.” Then she frowned at me. “What on earth happened to you? You look awful. Come on, you should come back to the museum with me. You both look like you could use a drink.”

Now I was suspicious. Mimi was never this nice. She’d been bearable when she was in shock after the gargoyle attack, but she still hadn’t really been nice to me. When I worked for her, I could have come to work missing a hand and she’d have criticized my typing speed. Not to mention the fact that she didn’t seem to have noticed what a mess she was. This was a woman who practically had to be tranquilized when she snagged her tights. Something was definitely wrong.

“No, thanks,” I said, taking a big step backward and pulling Owen with me. “We’re on our way home so we can relax. We’re not really up to a party right now.” And that was the absolute truth. I wanted nothing more than to take a long, hot bath, put on my pajamas, get in bed, pull the covers over my head, and stay there for about a week.

“You’re probably right,” Mimi said.

I turned to walk away, talking to her over my shoulder. “Well, it was great running into you again. Good luck with your party!”

I didn’t think it would be so easy to escape from her, and I was right. Even though she talked about going back to the museum, she came after us—in the opposite direction from the museum. I was also right that it was weird for her to be so nice to me. The Eye must have been telling her what to say so it could get back into the hands of someone who would use it. Now she had that scary gleam in her eyes, and I knew that reasoning with her wouldn’t work. She lunged at me, clawing at my clothes. “Where is it? Give it to me! I know you have it!” she shouted.

I tried to fight her off, resorting to the usual chick fight moves of hair pulling, kicking, and scratching. Owen wrapped his arm around her neck to try to pull her off me, and then she screamed, “Help! Police! I’m being attacked!”

“
You’re
attacking
me
!” I protested.

“Because you stole my brooch!”

“You’re wearing your brooch!”

“This isn’t the real one!”

“Take it to a jeweler, he’ll tell you it’s real.” At least, I suspected he would. I didn’t think the gnomes would have tried to make the switch on the elves unless they had something that would stand up to appraisal. Not that it mattered, since she wasn’t listening to reason. She could feel the difference, and that sense of power had become a need, a hunger.

With either uncanny knowledge or extreme luck, she lashed out with her high heel and caught Owen’s injured leg. He blurted something that I suspected was a naughty word in some ancient, esoteric language. In his moment of shock, she broke free from him, knocked him down, and lunged at me again. There was a horrible tearing sound, and then she gave a cry of triumph. She had the brooch.

She held it above her head, cackling like a mad scientist in an old B movie. “Hey!” I cried out as I jumped to grab the brooch from Mimi, ignoring the torn lining hanging out of my skirt pocket.

“You did take it!” she shouted, holding the brooch out of my reach. “I knew it! I’m not insane! I
was
missing my brooch!” She pinned it on her dress, next to the fake brooch, then stepped to the curb to hail a cab.

“Don’t let her go!” Owen warned. He was still struggling to get to his feet, but he waved my help away.

I rushed to stand beside Mimi, hoping that my bedraggled appearance might be enough to scare away cabs, even if she did now have the power of the Eye and could probably summon them. “Go away!” she said to me, a ring of command in her voice.

“No!” I said cheerfully. “I don’t think so.”

She turned to look me in the eye. “I don’t need you now that I have my brooch back, so
go away
,” she said, emphasizing each word.

“What was that? I didn’t hear you.”

Owen limped over to join me. “Let’s herd her away from the street,” he whispered. I looked at him and could tell from his slight smile that he had a plan.

“Hey, Mimi,” I said, taking a step toward her. “Did I ever tell you what it was like to work for you?”

When I was nearly toe-to-toe with her, she took a reluctant step backward. “Get away from me,” she said, reaching up to rub the brooch.

Owen moved around me to stand in front of the curb, and then stepped up onto the sidewalk, forcing her back another step. “I hear you weren’t a very nice boss,” he said.

She backed away, frantically rubbing the brooch, like she expected a genie to come out of it and help her. “I said, get away from me.”

“I told you there was nothing in that brooch to give you power,” I said, enjoying this way too much. “You only imagined it. You’re still as weak as ever.”

“No, no!” she sputtered, missing her footing as she backed away and nearly falling. Her voice rose shrilly as she cried, “Get away from me! That’s an order!” When we didn’t relent, she turned and ran toward the park entrance we’d so recently left.

“Keep her in sight,” Owen said, speeding his pace in spite of his limp. I took his arm to support him, and the two of us went after her, running like contestants in a three-legged race.

“I’m assuming you’ve got a plan,” I said as we ran, “because in case you didn’t notice, we lost the brooch. We were supposed to get and
keep
the brooch, not lose it. We’re back to square three!”

“Square three?”

“Well, we know who has it and we know where it is, so we’re not on squares one or two. But the important part is that
we don’t have it anymore
!”

He must have gotten a better second wind than I did, because he managed to outline his plan while running and without panting. “The Knot doesn’t offer either of us any protection. Anyone could have eventually stolen it from us. But it does protect her.
We’re
the only ones who can take it from her. So, let her carry it for a while, just as long as we keep her away from the magical puritans and any power brokers who’d cause problems in its presence. Then when we get the box, we take the brooch back from her and immediately put it away for safekeeping.”

“Wow, you
are
brilliant, but if we want to keep her away from the puritans, we’re driving her in the wrong direction.”

He pulled his arm from around my shoulders. “Then get in front of her. Drive her into the city. I suspect it would go to her head if the park people worshipped her.”

“Oh, you have no idea.”

I sprinted in front of Mimi, blocking her approach to the park. We were a little too close for my comfort, considering I could still hear the scuffle inside the park. Pretty soon, they were sure to sense the proximity of the Eye and come looking for it. It might take them a while to figure out it had a new owner. They’d go after me before they discovered Mimi, and she might get away while I was defending myself.

I was lucky that Mimi had no desire to go into the park, after all. She headed toward the museum. All I had to do was hurry her along to get her past the danger zone. That wasn’t too difficult. Convinced that I was chasing her to get the brooch back, Mimi jogged in a mincing trot, hampered by her heels and her long, slim skirt. “Stop following me!” she snapped at me. “You can’t have the brooch back.”

“I’m not following you. I just happen to be heading uptown,” I said, trying not to grin from the sheer joy of irritating Mimi.

While I wrangled Mimi, I heard Owen behind me on his phone, saying, “Sam, we could use some air support out here.” Soon, there was a faint stirring of air above me.

It was just in time, because a spectacularly well-dressed crowd was coming down the sidewalk from the museum. The power-hungry gala patrons must have been drawn by the brooch, and we were about to be menaced by a mob in formal wear. It looked like what would happen if a riot broke out at the Oscars.

“Oh, look, my party came to find me!” Mimi said. “They love me so much.”

We couldn’t let that bunch get near the brooch or we’d have another melee. “Sam!” I shouted.

“I’ve got ’em, doll,” the gargoyle said. Then he called out, “Rocky! Rollo! You deal with the crowd.” To me he added, “Let’s get her away from here.”

There was a traffic light with a crosswalk nearby, and I dragged Mimi toward it. When the “walk” light came on, Sam dropped out of the sky and said, “Hey, sweetheart!”

Mimi gave a piercing, panicked shriek and ran out into the street. Owen and I followed her, Sam flying above. When we reached the opposite sidewalk, I turned back to see that the park gang had come out, and the museum party mob had nearly reached the intersection. We ducked around the nearest corner as the light changed and cars started moving past us again.

“Do you think they saw us?” I asked Owen.

“My guys set up a veil,” Sam said. “The gang from the museum may have caught a glimpse, but they didn’t see where you went, and that bunch of fanatics shouldn’t have seen anything.”

“They’ll sense the stone, though,” Owen said. “They’ll find us eventually.”

“But if they can’t see us, it might take them longer to find us,” I said, desperately hoping I was right. It was the only hope I had to hold on to.

I was surprised by how long Mimi was able to keep running, even in a tight dress and high heels. Then again, she never missed a spin class, so she probably had enviable stamina. I was running out of steam, and Owen, with his bad leg, trailed behind me. Only Sam kept an easy pace, staying just above her. Come to think of it, that probably had as much to do with her stamina as her time in the gym. If I didn’t know Sam, a gargoyle chasing me would give me plenty of incentive to run until I keeled over.

Fortunately, this part of town was relatively quiet at this time of night. It was mostly residential, with doctors’ offices on the ground floors of the swanky apartment buildings. The street was nearly deserted. If the people in the apartments above were affected by the proximity of the Eye and driven to come after it, then we’d be long past by the time they made it down in the elevator. Luckily, Mimi was too focused on running to remember to scream for help.

She slowed as we neared Madison Avenue. The window of a designer boutique distracted her. If the shop had been open, I was sure she’d have gone in and demanded that they give her everything she wanted. As it was, her eyes grew wide and she practically drooled with her face pressed against the glass like a kid perusing the thirty-one flavors in an ice cream parlor.

I was immensely grateful for the opportunity to stop and catch my breath. Being the chaser instead of the chased wasn’t any easier. It still had the same effect on my heart, lungs, and muscles. Sam perched in a nearby tree and Owen and I hung back while Mimi window-shopped. She seemed to have forgotten we were there.

The respite gave our pursuers time to catch up, though. The sound of running footsteps approached, and Owen and I ducked into the shadow of a spindly sidewalk tree. A moment later, I saw that it was Rod and Granny, but without the puritans.

Owen gestured for Sam to keep an eye on Mimi, then we stepped out of the shadows to meet Rod and Granny. “What happened with the others?” Owen whispered.

“They’re confused, wandering around like they’re looking for something,” Rod said.

“What about the museum party people? Did you see them?”

“They were milling aimlessly. It may take them a while to get a fix, since they don’t know what they’re looking for.” Then he frowned and stared at me. “You don’t have the brooch anymore. What happened?”

I gestured over my shoulder at Mimi. “She got it back.”

“Damn! I guess there’s not much we can do to help.”

“I might be able to talk her out of it this time,” Granny said.

“No, don’t!” Owen hurried to say. “We’re keeping an eye on her, but it’s probably better for now if she has it.”

“We’re using her as a brooch mule,” I explained. “Since it works on her, nobody but us can take it from her, and that means they’re not attacking us. Which, believe me, is a really nice change of pace.”

“We’ll get it back when it’s time,” Owen said. “We just have to keep her away from anything that would stir up problems.”

Rod nodded. “I see. That’s actually pretty clever.”

“I wish I could say we planned it,” I said, “but we’re making the best of a bad situation.”

“Hey, gang!” Sam called out softly, “She’s on the move.” He stayed hidden in the trees to avoid panicking her again.

Mimi, tiring of the sights in that window, moved on to another one. We followed from a safe distance, like wildlife experts on a nature show, tracking a skittish animal through its native habitat.

Just then, Mimi shrieked, even though Sam was nowhere in sight. She’d come to the intersection with Madison Avenue and had run smack into the ragged remnants of the group of puritans that had attacked us in the park. Her ex-minion was front and center, with the mad professor standing beside him. They must have circled around on the adjacent street to cut us off.

With Mimi wearing both brooches, we couldn’t throw them off the trail by staying nearby and pretending to have it. For the first time in my life, I hoped that Mimi retained her essential Mimi-ness and could keep these guys at bay.

“I fired you legitimately!” Mimi said to her ex-minion. “That’s no reason for you to go get your cronies and stalk me. You’ll get paid for the hours you worked, but I’m not giving you your job back.”

“It’s not a job I want,” he said. “I want that brooch.”

She put her hands on her hips. “You’ve got some nerve! What is this, a holdup?”

He gambled on the possibility that she didn’t know that the brooch made her invulnerable and pulled a gun on her—apparently our gargoyles hadn’t disarmed all of them. “As a matter of fact, it is,” the ex-minion said. “Now, hand over the brooch and I won’t shoot.”

I held my breath, wondering what we should do. Should we intervene? The last thing we needed was the puritans getting the brooch. Next to them, Mimi was little more than a controlling bitch.

But the Eye’s hold on Mimi was too strong. She put her hand up to the brooch, cupping it protectively, and shook her head as she backed away. “No. It’s mine. You can’t have it. You can’t take it from me.” Her voice grew shriller as she shouted.