Page 98 of Hounded

I stayed on the ground, folded up and holding onto my bent leg while Indy glowered at me.

“Is that it?” he asked. “You’re just gonna sit there?”

My mind churned through responses, grinding them into meaningless mush and holding me prisoner to silence.

Indy shook his head so hard his curls swished. “Fine,” he said. “ThenI’mleavingyouthis time.”

This was new. I didn’t like new. It confused me, frightened me. The sight of his turned back was poignantly painful, and I realized he’d seen entirely too much of that from me in the past few weeks.

I stood, bracing on the wall as I called after him. “Where are you going?”

He was at the threshold of the unit door when I said his name. When he looked back, his expression was impossibly severe.

“You’re a dog, right?” he asked.

I nodded, and Indy nodded, too.

“Then stay,” he said.

I didn’t have to obey him; that wasn’t how it worked. But I stood there anyway while his footsteps echoed down the hallway. I waited after I heard the exit door open and shut. I stayed, and I wondered why I didn’t chase him, throw myself at him.

By the time I thought to move, he was long gone.

35

Indy

I could have goneto the trailer park, but Loren would look for me there. At least, he would if he got his dander up enough to face me. I had the feeling his request for me to talk had not gone the way he’d expected. Seeing him cowed on the floor of the storage unit put a damper on my righteous indignation. His shock and sorrow were barbs of their own, biting at me while he stayed maddeningly quiet.

I’d wanted to yell. Throw things. Break shit.

If I’d had a knife, I would have cut through the canvases that stirred such mixed feelings in me. They were almost like the drugs, lighting bits of memory like tiny explosions in my brain. But they didn’t last.

And Loren just sat there. He explained a lot but not nearly enough. It should have been harder to believe than it was. Phoenixes, hellhounds and, apparently, a witch. The witch I was currently on my way to see, hoping she would fill the blanks in Loren’s summation of my life.

After the taxi dropped me off outside the Urban Easel gallery, I barged inside. I didn’t want to cause a sceneduring business hours, but this couldn’t wait. It had already been waiting for months and, if I tamped down the questions and the confusion for even one more day, I was convinced I would turn into a volcano and erupt.

There were no customers in sight as I wove between partition walls hung with framed canvases. All had been put back to normal since Joss Foster’s exhibition, and Sully must have been up till the wee hours rearranging. It was dizzying to think about how much had changed in such a short time, both inside and outside of the art gallery.

I found Sully in the back, enjoying a belated breakfast of wine and leftover hors d’oeuvres. After watching Loren make half-assed charcuterie while detailing information about my life, this encounter already seemed similar and equally casual.

I didn’t feel casual at all.

Sully turned toward my approach. She wore a sage green romper and had a coordinating bandana tied around her dreads. Her brown leather sandals showed toes adorned with gold rings.

I wondered what a toe ring would look like on me, then brushed the thought aside as I snatched the plate from her hands and announced, “Loren’s been lying to me.”

Sully paused with a cooked shrimp hovering near her mouth. Swallowing, she set the uneaten food on the plate I now held, then wiped her hand on her romper.

“I think his crime is more one of omission than anything.” Her expression relaxed into one of quiet knowing, like she’d been expecting this, and that riled meup even more. “What did he say?” she asked.

“Whatdidn’the say?” I fired back.

Chuckling, she folded her arms over the strands of beads hanging down her chest. “Oh no,” she shook her head, “I know entrapment when I see it. Lore asked me to stay out of this, and I’m not trying to piss him off.”

I frowned. “Are you scared of him or something?”

While Sully’s earlier laugh had been subdued, this one found a full voice. “No,” she replied. “No, not in the least. And you shouldn’t be, either.”

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