Page 62 of Booked for Murder

“I’m listening.”

Ren laughed, got up off the couch, and said, “And I’ll leave you two to discuss guns while I retrieve lunch. If you won’t feed her, I will.”

“I just figured if I waited five minutes you’d solve the problem.”

“Orange chicken for me. Get the pineapple chicken for him and tell them I said to be gentle with him and give me his peppers.”

Ren shot me a glare but sighed. “All right. I’ll go pick up Chinese. Please tell me we’re not going to have Chinese every day.”

“I think we’ll go for Thai tomorrow. It’s too far for me to walk to, and I’m too cheap to order delivery.”

“I’m a little concerned you’re a little too cheap,” Bradley admitted, looking around my apartment. “With the exception of your cat, who is truly pampered and spoiled.”

“I’m leaving now,” Ren announced, heading for the door. “Don’t get into trouble. Exsanguinate anyone who bothers you or him, Janette.”

“But I’ll make a mess in my apartment,” I complained.

“If anyone can clean blood out of the carpet, it’s you.”

Bradley answered the knock at my door, and more of my past walked in through it along with a gentleman I didn’t recognize. When I got my hands on Ren, I’d kill him for hunting down the old fart who’d first taught me how to shoot a gun. “I’m killing Ren for this, Bradley.”

Lenard Theault, who’d beaten good aim and better nerves during combat situations into me, leveled a glare at me. “You won’t because he’ll be spotting you, and you’d never kill your spotter.”

Fuck. “Hello, Lenard. How are you?”

“I’m debating how I’m whipping your pretty ass into shape, so I’m doing pretty good.” He pointed at my foot. “Tell me who hasn’t fixed that yet, and I’ll put them through their paces right along with you.”

“They’re out west, and I’d rather not deal with them, if you please. It’s doing a lot better than it looks.”

“You’re walking, so I’ll buy into that. What’s this about going in for shooter qualifications?”

“It turns out I’m the only librarian in the lot who has any decent skills with a firearm.”

“Decent my ass.” Lenard dragged over a steel case and thumped it onto my coffee table. “So, I’m having dinner with the missus when I get a phone call from Mr. Hampton here that he needs me to bring you some guns and warm you back up for shooter qualifications. What is this all about, missy?”

“Somebody killed one of his friends, and he wants to find the killer. It just happened the freak caught imprints of me because I work at the library Senator Godrin died at, so he realized I was right under his nose. He came over and coerced me. He coerced me, Lenard.”

“Are you coercing the missy here, Hampton?”

“Absolutely.”

“Good. She’ll need you feisty to keep her on her toes. All right. I have some new friends for you, Janette. I have your old records, and I have the other paperwork to smooth this out for you. The first step is legalizing your pseudonym. Fortunately for you, after speaking with Hampton here, I was able to get the correct supporting documentation to support your amnesia claim. That was disgustingly clever, and if I wasn’t so proud of you for pulling it off, I’d be having your daddy sending you out to the woods to pick a switch.”

“My daddy taught you rude and bad habits, Lenard.”

“No, I just know how one round with the switch set you straight when you were a little girl, and you’ll never be too big for your daddy to set you straight if you need it.”

My father really would if he thought I needed it. “Tell me about the documentation, pretty please.”

“It’s simple. I got Hampton here to pull down your medical records, then I had him send them over to a brain doc in town and ask what the probability of trauma-induced amnesia would be. Your paperwork puts you at high odds of it, so when you showed up for licensing with that claim, it was a matter of pulling that paperwork, sending it to the doc, and inquiring. He even gave us a plausible condition for why your rating came out at a mere 17.2%. Well done, by the way. That is an incredible feat for your actual rating, and if I wasn’t so proud of you for pulling it off, I’d be running you through your paces for doing something that foolishly dangerous.”

“There’s a condition for that?”

“Trauma-induced repression. Essentially, you unconsciously shy away from anything that would make you remember the accident. As even your magic rating would be a possible trigger, you would unconsciously suppress it. You probably remember most of the accident, but clinically, you would have been severely compromised, and it is not unreasonable for you to start a new life. So, amnesia and trauma will support your new documents, and there will be a note that your real identity is sealed by court order. Hampton’s mother secured the court order this morning.”

“Bradley, what has your mother been doing?”

“Playing lawyer, because she is a lawyer. You gave her power of attorney when you signed the for life contract, Janette.”