“You didn’t mention the dog when we talked on the phone,” I pointed out. I had to pee like a cow on a flat rock, but I wasn’t getting down until she either put the demon outside or shot him with a tranquilizer dart. Even then, he’d have to twitch for five minutes before the coast could be considered clear.

“Oops,” Jolie said, with a crooked, twinkly little smile. She gave Brutus a dog biscuit, closed the refrigerator with dispatch and looked up at me. “You can get down now.”

“No way,” I said. “That thing is vicious. He’ll rip my throat out.”

“He’s a pussycat,” Jolie assured me, and bent to pat his head. Her plentitude of tiny braids shimmered as she moved. “I got him at the pound last week. Another day and a half, and they’d have put him to sleep.”

“Timing is everything.”

Jolie laughed. “Get down, Moje. Sweetnik isn’t going to hurt you.”

“Sweetnik?” I peered over the edge, sizing him up. The name didn’t fit; he looked as big and mean as ever.

“Sweetie for short,” Jolie said, eyeing him affectionately and scrabbling in the box for another Milk Bone. “We’ve had some robberies and home invasions in the neighborhood lately, so I thought it made sense to get a dog.”

I eased one foot down as far as the countertop. Sweetie didn’t lunge. He was too busy mauling the second biscuit. I risked the other foot.

Sweetie raised his head and growled.

“Sweetie, shush,” Jolie cooed.

Sweetie shushed.

I got down.

Stretched my cramped muscles with some shoulder rolling and some careful leg shaking. “I don’t think you have to worry about home invasions,” I said.

“I don’t have to worry about you sneaking out of here in the middle of the night without telling me, either,” Jolie quipped. “Sister’s on the move, I’m gonna know it.” She laid her hands on my shoulders and looked me over from head to foot and back again. “When was the last time you had a decent haircut?” she asked.

I sighed. “It’s good to be back in the bosom of my family,” I said.

Jolie grinned. “I’ll pour us some wine, and we’ll have some good ole girl talk,” she responded.

I took a cautious side step in the direction of the hallway. “I’ve been on top of your refrigerator for three and a half hours,” I reminded her. “I need to use the bathroom.”

Sweetie looked up, gave a companionable little snarl.

“You do, too, don’t you, fella?” Jolie asked the dog, taking a leash from a drawer and hooking it to his collar. She met my gaze. “You do your thing, Sweetie will do his, and then we’ll have that wine.”

I nodded.

Dog and woman went out the back door.

I clamped my knees together and hop-sprinted for the john.

Chapter Eight