I nodded, willing to put myself at the woman’s mercy if she gave me coffee like this.

“I’ll have the tomato soup,” Trent said as he slid his menu to her, and the woman made a small sound. Jenks, too, turned to Trent. Ordering tomatoes wasn’t unusual, especially out in the wild where there weren’t many humans, but for Trent it was. He’d been masquerading as a human his entire life. Getting out of Cincy must be a new experience for him. Freeing, perhaps. “That is, if Len makes a good soup,” he added, smiling up at her.

“The best this side of the Mississippi,” she said, tucking the menus under her arm. “You want the spicy or mild?”

“Mild.”

Leaving both carafes, she wandered back to the kitchen. For a moment, silence but for the pinball machine and the comfortable kitchen noises swirled around us as we all lost ourselves in the pleasure of sitting somewhere other than in the car, drinking something that wasn’t coming out of a can or a bottle.

“The best coffee I ever had in a restaurant was in this little place in downtown Cincinnati,” Trent said suddenly, looking like a different person as he set his chipped mug down. The memory of the smile he’d given the woman, genuine and sincere, wouldn’t leave me. “It had pictures on the walls of babies—”

“Dressed like flowers?” I blurted out, and Jenks let a flash of gold dust slip from him.

“You know it?” Trent asked, eyes wide.

“Know it? She’s been banned from it,” Jenks said, laughing.

“Junior’s,” I said over the rim of my coffee, then set the mug down. I could smell pancakes, and my mouth began to water. “Mike’s,” I said, correcting myself. “He banned me when I got shunned. That was the night I tried to arrest the banshee that had been terrorizing the city last New Year’s. Remember the fires at Aston’s roller rink and Fountain Square?”

Depressed, I looked into the depths of my coffee. I’d never gotten any public credit for that one, either.

“His name is Mike?” Trent asked, and my attention came back up at the amazement in his voice, and when I nodded, Trent shook his head. “You know a lot of people.”

I lifted one shoulder and let it fall. “So do you.”

This was kind of freaky. I was sitting with Trent, and neither one of us was baiting the other. Maybe my mom was right. Whenever Robbie and I got on each other’s nerves, she would make us clean the garage or something. My mom had had a very clean garage.

“Food’s here,” Trent said, sounding relieved as he pushed back from the table to make room for his bowl.

“One stack of hotcakes,” the woman said, setting a plate of three very brown pancakes before me. “And a bowl of tomato soup.”

Trent was already reaching for the bowl. “Thank you, ma’am,” he said with such eagerness that she smiled.