Excerpt: Touching Cold Fingers

In the end, she had to get the address from the guy at the counter. Apparently she was in Winnettka and she was damn grateful that Keira was tech enough to get directions off Mapquest. She waited in the White Hen until the guy (apologetically, to be fair) kicked her out. “If you aren’t buying anything…” he pointed out, and she bought a little more time for herself by spending her last $1.61 on a bottled water, which she drank very slowly. She considered trying to give some to the animal, but couldn’t figure out a way to do it without taking the animal out, and the guy kept glancing at the bulge in her coat nervously, like it might be a bomb instead of a furry animal.

Once she was kicked out, of course, she was free to let it out. It climbed on her lap as she sat on a parking barrier and made meeping noises. It also peed on her lap, which made it significantly less endearing, but it had- as a whole- been amazingly well behaved.

Finally, Keira pulled up in her shiny blue Oldsmobile sedan with the plastic over the rear headlight and the carseat in the back. Lorna climbed in gratefully, smiling at Melony/Melody who was bellowing for attention. Keira’s expression went through permutations of annoyed, reproving, concerned, and confused. She settled on this last as Lorna buckled herself in. “Why are you carrying a chinchilla?” she asked.

It actually took Lorna a moment to realize that “chinchilla” was a kind of animal and therefore probably what you were supposed to call the furry grey thing. She’d never actually seen one before. “It was there when I woke up this morning,” she admitted.

Keira scowled. “I swear I’m going to sign you up for AA. How did you end up in Winettka?”

Lorna winced. “It was there when I woke up, too. Can you take me home. Please? I’ve had a rough morning.”

Keira gave her a dark look and turned on the CD player. The Wiggles were not a good balm for the hung over.