Faith stared at Nicole through the car window. The younger Slayer had her head back and her eyes closed. For an instant, Faith felt the old urges begin to take over. Her hands clenched into fists and rage swept through her. Almost high on the energy and the need for a fight, Faith took a few steps toward the closed rear door. Nicole needed to remember who she was.
Her right hand lifted. It touched the door handle.
Suddenly, the car engine fired up, shocking Faith out of her anger.
Stepping back, she spun away from the car. What the fuck was she thinking? As pedestrians flowed in increasing numbers around her, Faith realized that she wasn't thinking. That had always been her problem. She'd always specialized in: act, screw up, and then think.
The anger began to drain away. Shaking now, from lack of sleep and shame, Faith slowly faced the car a second time. She opened the passenger-side front door and climbed in. "Thought you were gonna leave me behind for a second, Red." No way did she want either of the other women to know how close to the edge she'd just come. There were enough problems for them all to deal with right now.
"Then you shouldn't pout on the sidewalk." Willow grinned impishly and pulled out into traffic. Horns blared all around them, and a few drivers showed off their New York hospitality with raised fingers and curses yelled out of open windows.
The grin was infectious. Faith's lips twitched. She fought hard…and lost. "I'm a Slayer, Red," she said as her dimples made an appearance. "We don't pout. We scowl."
"Right. That's why you looked like Nicole kicked your puppy. You were scowling." Willow stepped on the brakes to avoid running a red light and then turned to face Faith. "I'll have to write that down. Webster's must have the definition of 'scowl' wrong."
The last of the anger and fear from earlier faded away at the teasing. Settling back and relaxing in the seat, Faith reached out and poked Willow's shoulder. "I'm gonna have to keep an eye on you, ain't I? You're slipping. First there's this thing with the vamps and Lake, and now you can't remember what words mean."
They shared a chuckle and then Willow sobered. "As soon as we get back to the hotel, I'll give Giles a call. I think it's time we had a real conference call - all of the Council researchers on this project and all of the Juniors here in town, too."
Willow was right. Faith turned her head to look at Nicole.
Looking tired but alert, Nicole stared back. "What do you need me to do?" she asked.
"Get the minis on the line. Tell 'em they all need to be at the hotel in an hour." Faith thought fast. That was going to be far more people than they could squeeze into their room. "Red, that dump of a hotel's got a conference room, right?"
Willow nodded. "Yes, but I don't know that we can get one without a reservation. This is New York, not Sunnydale."
"Do whatever ya' have to. We're looking at twenty Slayers being in the same place. Unless you want 'em sitting in each others' laps and getting crumbs on your side of the bed, we need another room." Faith stretched out her legs. "I'll give Tweed a call while you call the hotel." She smirked. "Don't think the phone bill's gonna be small this month." Nicole was on her phone in the back seat as Faith reached for the one stuffed in her back pocket. Willow already had hers pressed to her ear.
***
Taking Olivia at her word, Chelsea moved into a defensive stance and rested her hand on the butt of her gun. Muscles tensed, she listened to footfalls inside the house.
"Who is it?" a woman's voice called out.
Olivia didn't say anything. Instead, she smirked at Chelsea and cocked her head at the door.
"NYPD, ma'am," Chelsea called out. She glared at a silently laughing Olivia. "We need to talk to you about your ex-husband."
The door wrenched open. "Are you people deaf or just stupid?" Dressed in a robe and nightgown, Mrs. McLaren glared at them through the screen door. "I have nothing to say to you, and if you come back again, I'll file harassment charges. Charlie's been dead for years. If you don't know whatever it is by now, it ain't important."
The door slammed so hard the screen door slipped from the latch and bounced against the frame.
Fin had been right about the Widow McLaren. She definitely didn't like the police. Oh, well. Stepping up to the house, Chelsea opened the screen door wide and pounded on the heavy wood door. "Open up, ma'am. There's been some new information about Mr. McLaren. We need to talk to you."
Her fist swung at empty space as the door unexpectedly ripped open again.
Chelsea staggered forward from the momentum. She managed to sidestep Mrs. McLaren and ended up in the shabby entry hall.
"Get out of my house!" Mrs. McLaren demanded.
"Ma'am…" Chelsea turned slowly to face the other woman, just in case Olivia hadn't been joking about the shotgun. She relaxed only slightly when the weapon of choice appeared to be a Louisville Slugger and not the barrel of a Remington pump-action.
Mrs. McLaren advanced with the bat raised to shoulder level. "I told you people to stay the hell away from me."
"And we told you we might have more questions." Olivia had followed Chelsea into the house. Standing behind Mrs. McLaren, she watched the older woman closely. "Put the bat down before I have to arrest you for threatening a police officer."
It was a nice try. It didn't work, though.
Inching away from the bat, Chelsea saw Mrs. McLaren's eyes narrow. "You can't arrest me. I haven't hit anyone yet."
Chelsea moved another step away at that "yet."
"Besides, you came into my house uninvited and without a warrant. I'm entitled to defend my home – even from the cops." The bat lowered, though, and Mrs. McLaren sighed. "Look, what's it gonna take to get you to leave me alone? I ain't seen Charlie since two…three years before he died. I don't know anything."
It was the perfect opening. Praying that she didn't spook Mrs. McLaren, Chelsea sidled past her. "My partner has an order for your ex-husband's exhumation, ma'am. If you don't mind signing it, we'll be out of your hair." She smiled as charmingly as she could while Olivia fished the document out of her pocket.
The bat dropped further until the head rested on the floor. "Well, I…I suppose I could do that," Mrs. McLaren said. Holding out her hand, she asked, "You'll pay to put him back in the ground, though, right? I can't afford to bury him a second time. Those coffins are expensive."
"The city will pay for it, Mrs. McLaren." Olivia wiggled the paper a little. "All we need is your signature."
"Fine." Snatching the form from Olivia's hand, Mrs. McLaren turned to a battered table and scrounged through the contents of its single drawer until she found a pen. Seconds later, she shoved the document back at Olivia. "I'm holding you to your promise. Don't come back. I've got a friend in the Brooklyn DA's office, and he said I can sue the city if you harass me."
Olivia took the form and returned it to her pocket. "That's all we need, Mrs. McLaren." She backed toward the door with her hands raised.
Following quickly, Chelsea fled the house, too.
The door slammed behind them, and Olivia pumped a fist. "Yes!" When Chelsea looked at her in confusion, Olivia explained. "When he heard about the exhumation request, Fin bet me two tickets to the Knicks. Half court, fifth row up."
***
By the time they walked into the hotel lobby, the conference room had been booked for their use. Faith watched uniformed hotel employees buzzing around the large room, wheeling in steaming carts of food and setting up the teleconference equipment.
"Yeah, Tweed. Red's sitting on the head guy's shoulder right now, making sure the equipment's just right. We ain't got no Juniors, though. Gonna take 'em a few with all the traffic and shit," she said into her phone. The connection was bad, and the static made her head hurt.
She still managed to pick up his pained sigh. "Yes, I understand that, Faith. However, can you fill me in on what Willow found out about Detective Lake's past? I'm afraid without that, we have very little to go on and nothing new to report."
"Giles," Faith was tired enough to drop her usual nickname for him, "you ain't listening. This meeting ain't about you telling us what you got. It's so Red can tell you what she knows and then for all of us to figure out what the fuck we're gonna do. The plan we got now sucks, and I ain't sending no more minis out to trail Lake again. We got away with one today. They catch another tail, and they ain't letting her go without a shitload more explanation than we gave 'em this morning."
A wave caught her attention. "Looks like some of the kids are here." Faith walked toward Nicole. "I'm gonna let you go while we get everybody sittin' down."
"Yes. Yes, all right, my dear. I'll do a little of that myself. I daresay this will be a lengthy meeting," Giles replied, and the phone went dead in Faith's hand.
Shoving the phone into her back pocket, Faith strode up to Nicole. "How are we doin' on the rest of the kids?"
"Cam and Jessie are here. They hopped a cab from that diner across from the police station. The rest of the gang's stuck in traffic." Nicole smirked. "I think I'm going to ask Juanita to teach me Spanish. I want to know what some of those words she used meant."
Faith chuckled. "It ain't the meaning that's important, Nic. It's whether or not you can actually do them." Scanning the activity in the room again, she realized that most of the employees were gone. "Grab some breakfast before everyone shows up and beats you to it. I gotta check in with Red." She clapped a hand on Nicole's shoulder and went back across the room.
"We're ready, Faith," Willow called out when she saw her approach. "Did you talk to Giles?"
"Yeah, he's having a fit of them vapors about the meeting. You know he hates not being Answer Guy." Faith sat on a table and planted her boots in a chair. "You need anything from me?"
Biting her lip, Willow shook her head. "Not…not really," she mumbled. From the way she bounced on her toes and avoided Faith's eyes, though, it was clear she was lying.
Faith slid to the floor and walked over to Willow. "Hey," she said softly. "What's wrong, Red?"
"Nothing." Willow wrung her hands. "Really, I…"
Taking the twitching hands between her own, Faith shook her head. "I ain't buying it, Red." She pulled Willow over to a chair and pushed her into it. "Tell me what you need. I wanna help."
Willow bit her lip some more before reaching for her computer bag. "I had this faxed to the hotel. One of the desk clerks brought in a few minutes ago." She pulled out an envelope stuffed with paper and held it out. "We need to talk about what's in here…"