Chapter Forty-Nine

Cyrus drove by Nora’s house that morning to check on her. He found her standing in her front yard, looking up at her beaded oak tree. He parked, got out and leaned on her fence. She wore a long swishy witchy black skirt and white tank top. She looked pretty, if a little tired. But they were both tired. It would pass.

“You,” Nora said, acknowledging him without taking her eyes off her tree. “What are you doing here? You should be at honeymoon practice, right?”

“Is that a thing?”

“I just invented it, but it’s a thing now.”

Crazy like a fox.

“What are you doing to that poor tree?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“I asked, didn’t I?”

“Mercedes took a set of my rosary beads, and she took all the sad and bad energy out of me and put them in the beads. Now I’m supposed to find a tree to give the beads to. Trees, she says, breathe out what we breathe in—oxygen, and trees breathe in what we breathe out—nitrogen. So she figures that if we exude bad energy, trees take it and absorb and then release it as good energy. I realize how insane that sounds, but it’s worth a shot, right?”

“That kind of makes sense. You and the Good Witch are getting kinda tight? Something going on there I need to know about?”

“I have two men in my life already.”

“So that’s a maybe?”

Nora only smiled. Good to see her smiling again.

“If all your bad jujus are in your beads,” he said, “maybe you ought to take them far away from your house.”

“I was thinking that, too. Know a good tree that could take some pain?”

“I know the best tree in town. You wanna see it?”

“Definitely.”

“Come with me.”

They drove to the house on the corner of Annunciation and Rose. They didn’t go into the house and they never would again. Time to move on. St. Valentine’s must have thought so, too. There was a For Sale sign in front.

“This way,” he said and pointed down the street. They set out walking.

“How are you handling this?” she asked. “Better than me, I hope.”

“I’m remembering why I swore I’d only work for women and children.” He laughed softly at himself. “But I’m okay. Paulina’s feeling really hurt. Bad.”

“I’m sure she is. Is there any new news coming?”

“Archbishop’s releasing more names of abusers tomorrow. It’s starting to steamroll,” he said. “But no more case talk. What’s goin’ on with you? How’s things with you and the Viking?”

“We’re all right,” she said. “A little shaky, but we’ll make it.”

“That’s good. I like him for you. I’d like him more for you if he wasn’t a priest.”

“Well, you might get your wish. Or not. Still figuring that one out.”

“I need to meet the other one though. Gotta give him my stamp of approval,” he said, punching his fist into his palm.