Hexed

and rabbi came in again. «
    » They did? « I frowned. » What did they want? «
    » They asked me to open the rare-book case. I told them I couldn’t. «
    » Right, because you can’t. «
    » Right. They looked pretty pissed. And then they asked all these questions about you. Religious stuff, like whether you were a Christian or a Jew or a pagan, and whether you practiced your religion faithfully. «
    » What did you tell them? «
    » I said those were questions better answered by yourself. They wanted to know when you’d be back, and I had to tell them I really didn’t know. «
    » Well, hopefully I’ll be in before the day is through. Can Perry and Rebecca run things tomorrow? «
    » Sure. What do you want me to do? «
    » Latin, of course, and get your job back at Rúla Búla. «
    » Already got it. All it took was a phone call and some groveling to Liam. «
    » Excellent! I want you to come over in the morning so I can see about doing something for your personal protection. I haven’t done a divination recently, but I’m getting one of those hunches. «
    » The paranoid kind? «
    » What other kind is there? Hey, « I said, my voice dropping and lilting with dulcet, honey-bunny tones, » can I tell you one of the many reasons I love you? « This wasn’t an abrupt flowering of love between us. It was a code phrase, one that Granuaile herself had suggested.
    » Look, sensei, « she’d said upon her return from North Carolina. » I don’t know if things are going to get crazy again like they did with Aenghus Óg, but if they do, we need a way to communicate alibis successfully over the phone. You can’t just send your lawyer over every time you need to work something out. You might not always have time. The cops might get to me before he does. I might be out of town when you need me. And that whole business was so messy, so much could have gone wrong. So we should plan ahead and Be Prepared, you know, like the Boy Scouts. «
    » Fuck the Boy Scouts, « I’d said. » Be Prepared was my motto before there were any streets to help little old ladies across. «
    » Oh. Right. « Granuaile had paused, and when I failed to fill the silence, she asked, » Does that mean you already have a plan, sensei? «
    » No, I’m just establishing my primacy over the Boy Scouts. «
    Granuaile’s lips quirked upward. » Duly noted. I have a plan, sensei, if you’d like to hear it. «
    » Of course I would. Thinking ahead like this is why you’ll make a good Druid. Seriously, « I added, because we were still too unfamiliar with each other for her to see through my customary curtain of wit.
    » Thank you. « Her cheeks had colored faintly at the praise. » Well, you have to assume these days that all your cell-phone calls are being listened to, and maybe your home and business phones too. That means you have to say what you mean in code. But if the code is too obscure or in a foreign language, they’ll flag your ass for suspicious activity and put you on a no-fly list— «
    » Beg your pardon, « I interrupted. » Who are they ? «
    » The government. The cops. The Men in Black. Maybe even the Boy Scouts. Them. «
    » Ah. Please continue. «
    » So we need a simple code, and I was thinking that since we’ve already pretended that we’re romantically involved in one alibi, we should stick with that concept in future situations. «
    » We should, eh? « The beginnings of a smile played at the corners of my mouth.
    » Just pretending, « she’d emphasized, her cheeks flushing more hotly. » Then we can call each other as necessary, throw out a code phrase, and then lay the alibi down. «
    » What’s the code phrase? «
    » Oh. Um. Well, it’s a question in keeping with the pretense of our relationship. It’s ‘Can I tell you one of the many reasons I love you?’ And then the other person says, ‘Sure,’ and then you just explain what we did last night and where and so on, putting in something cute or lovey-dovey for verisimilitude, and bam! You’ve slipped an alibi right past the ears of the military-industrial-authoritarian-douche-canoe complex. «
    I had raised my eyebrows and nodded appreciatively. » Hey, that’s not bad, « I told her. » It’s even a turnoff to eavesdroppers when you get all sickeningly sweet with your voice. Listening to other people be ooey-gooey with each other is a guaranteed recipe for nausea. So let’s call it a plan and hope we never have to use it. «
    Now that we had to use