"I read a chapter of the book you gave Olivia. I believe, wherever that trait came from, it was clearly an outside influence."
"Ouch." A moment of silence as they watched the dryads slip through a broken window. "So the book...Paranormal fiction isn't your kind of thing?"
"My tastes are eclectic. I would not dismiss a novel simply because I haven't read that genre before."
"Double ouch."
"That wasn't intended as an insult. I simply discovered that reading a book you'd written was not a properly immersive entertainment experience. I hear your voice, which hardly allows me to fall into the world of your female, human narrator."
"Okay. I'll take that." Patrick looked at the school. "So, the dryads are leading us into a trap. Unfortunately, being dryads, they've done a very poor--and obvious--job of it."
"Yes."
"You're not going to tell me it's actually a good thing we've seen the trap?"
"No."
Patrick grinned. "Because that makes it less of a challenge. See, this is why we work together so well. I was hoping you'd call me in when Liv was gone this fall."
"Call you in?"
"The last time Liv was away, you called me to help on a case."
"No, you gave me a case. And tried to insist we work it together."
"Same thing."
"Not even a little."
"You've been hanging with Liv too much. You're becoming a smart-ass."
"I always was. You just never had enough interaction with me to realize it. Now, are we going to sit here and talk until they have the trap set?"
"That'd be more fun."
Gabriel opened the car door and climbed out.
--
The dryads had entered through a window that, upon closer inspection, was not merely broken but boarded. The boards, however, were only partly nailed and could be swung aside. Once they were through, Gabriel took out his cell, turned on the light, looked around, and saw a problem. Possibly a significant one.
It looked as if some effort at reconstruction had been made years ago, the drywall torn out and the flooring removed, leaving wooden studded walls and bare underlay floor.
Wood. Lots of wood. Which dryads used for camouflage. As Gabriel recalled, though, it worked better in the forest, against uneven surfaces. He continued into the hall and then paused as light footfalls sounded overhead.
"Time to find a way up," Patrick whispered. "I vote..." He looked both ways. "Left."
"It's right," Gabriel said, and started walking.
"Are you just being contrary? Because--"
Gabriel pointed to the floor, where dusty footsteps led right. He followed them down two corridors to where stairs had been torn out, possibly to keep squatters from accessing the upper floors.
"That's inconvenient," Patrick said.
Gabriel ignored him. Presumably, dryads could not fly. Therefore they'd gone another
way. He picked through the debris until he found the dryads' footprints, which led to a service elevator. The doors stood open, the car stopped eight feet off the ground.