Lulu had discovered colcannon at Temple Bar, the officialCadogan House watering hole. It also served Irish pub food, including the mashed potato–cabbage combination I didn’t understand.
My lip curled involuntarily. “Colcannon is disgusting, and I’m not buying it. But I’ll buy you a Guinness.”
“Deal.”
“This looks amazing,” I said, hoping to change the subject from cabbage, and gestured at the mural.
She walked closer, flicked at a smudge. “It’s not bad. Still a lot of work to go, but it’s not bad. You want to help?”
“You know I can’t draw my way out of a paper bag.”
“I know. I was kidding. I love you, but I don’t want you touching this.”
I took a step closer, tilted my head at the four women, whose skin tones ranged from milky white to dark brown. Their limbs—some bent and some outstretched—flowed together like they were reaching for each other.
“What’s the story?”
Lulu picked up the discarded pencil. “What do you think it is?”
Analyzing art wasn’t my thing. But I stepped up, took a swing, and gestured to the woman on the far left. “Maybe something about women sharing their knowledge, their experiences?” I pointed to a swath of golden paint. “And how that helps them grow, enriches their communities.”
She grinned. “That’s not bad, Sullivan. Dead wrong, but not bad.”
I was more disappointed than I should have been. “Then what is it?”
She lifted a shoulder. “Sexy hotness. The Pack wanted naked ladies, so I gave them naked ladies. Gorgeous, curvy, mostly naked ladies in a rainbow of shades and textures, and not a nipple in sight.”
“Because a woman has to draw a damn line.”
“Damn straight,” she said, and made a small adjustment to one of the new lines. “They argued about this building, the plans, the design, for nearly a year before they finally broke ground. Ended up having to build the bar first, the rest of the building over it. It was a whole thing.”
“Drama or not, it turned out pretty well.”
“Yeah, it did.” Lip between her teeth, she made another adjustment. “How was the shindig?”
“The reception was weird,” I said, thinking of Ruadan. “I took some video to show Seri. We can watch it when you have time. The talks were a mess. The fairies interrupted, and it was a whole thing.”
She glanced back. “The fairies? Interesting.”
“They threw a fit about not being included, and then they were included, and vampires were still vampires.”
“So, arrogance and arguing?”
“Pretty much. How’s the family?” I asked carefully.
Lulu’s mother, Mallory, had taken an evil turn before we’d been born. She’d gotten addicted to dark magic and wreaked her own havoc on Chicago. If my parents were seen as the saviors of Chicago, Lulu’s mom was the sorceress who’d tried to bring it down. That she’d later helped save the city apparently wasn’t nearly as sexy a memory, and people seemed to have forgotten it.
Lulu had her own guilt about what her mother had done, and it hadn’t helped that she’d been teased and bullied by humans as a kid. They’d called her mother the devil or worse, and Lulu had wanted nothing more than distance from the magical.
“Dad is still bitching about ‘all the weirdos,’” she said, “which makes me wonder why he agreed to move to Portland in the first place. Probably at least in part so he’d have something to bitch about. Mom’s one hundred percent in her element. She’s teaching classes, hosting ‘Magic-Ins’ for Wiccans. I think it was a goodchange for them. She’d wanted to start over. Even years after, she felt like she couldn’t move on in Chicago.”
I nodded. “Since I’ve been in Paris for four years, I can’t really argue with that.”
She snorted a laugh, glanced back at me. “For two people with pretty good childhoods, we’re pretty screwed up about it.”
I couldn’t argue with that, either.
“How’s the Mayor of Vampireville?” she asked.