Page 36 of Pot Shot
“Filled with weed, sir,” Eve blurts, rushing to pull the platter back and behind the counter. She smiles hastily. “Can’t get intoxicated when you’re pursuing uh, zoning justice.”
The detective looks at us with shocked outrage, then pulls out a notepad from his belt. With giant, petty flourishes, he jots down what must be very thorough notes because this goes on for a while. We stand around in increasing discomfort until he finishes.
“I’ll be back, and in the meantime, you’re officially prohibited from conducting any marijuana business on this property.” He takes one last look at the scones, scowls, then strides out the door.
As soon as he’s gone, Graham and Eve descend on me like seagulls on pizza.
“A zoning complaint?” Eve plucks the envelope from my hands and dumps the contents on the counter. “What even is that?”
I hoist myself up on the stool next to Graham and groan. “Every part of town is zoned for a specific use. Commercial, residential, industrial, designations like that. If you try to operate a business in an area that’s not zoned for that kind of business, you can get investigated, penalized, fined, even forced to move.”
Graham frowns. “I don’t understand. Who told on you?”
“All you need to know isright here.” Eve points at the signature at the bottom.
“Julian?!” Rage kindles inside of me, blazing to life. “That absolute dickhead!” I push off the counter and stomp toward the door.
“Where is he?!” I bellow two minutes later at the bored teenage boy manning Dr. Appa’s reception desk. He takes in my crazed eyes, bandana askew, sweat-damp tank, and the fire of holy fury burning me alive. He’s only slightly interested.
“You must be looking for Dr. D’Angelo,” the bored teen says, not a question. How many furious people does this kid field each day because of Julian? With a sigh, he closes his graphic novel, its cover all in Japanese with badass girls in prim school uniforms throat-punching businessmen. God, when did the youth get so cool? I was reading the novelizations of my favorite CW shows at that age. Without missing a beat, the teen airdrops a note to my phone, which buzzes in my pocket. I glance in surprise between it and his bored face, then open it tentatively. You can’t tell with these Gen Alpha teens.
“This is Julian’s—address?” I stare at the kid. “You’re giving angry people his home address?”
The teen nods, and a small, sly smile flickers on his face before the apathy wipes the slate clean again. “You asked where he is.”
I make a mental note not to fuck with this kid. “Thank you… Khalil,” I finish, finding his name tag. “I’m going to go yell at Julian now.”
“Bet.” Khalil reopens his novel.
I’ve been dismissed.
It takes all of five minutes to reach Julian’s place, a sunny little beach cottage with no beach in sight. It’s painted pale blue with cream-colored shutters, the sweet porch out front decorated in country chic. I close the door to my car, feeling the rage ebb and replaced by unease as I take inlegitflower boxes, their greenery and lush summer blooms spilling out of them.
Maybe it’s an Airbnb? A suspiciously well-kept rental?
I bang the heel of my fist against the door. He won’t mistakemefor a gentle, kind Jehovah’s Witness or a well-meaning but deluded college student canvassing for the Green Party.
Nobody answers, but he’s definitely home—his Volvo’s parked in the driveway. I screech against the curved windowpane at the top of the door. “Answer the door, you asshole!”
I’m halfway through another set of pounding knocks when the door opens. Julian’s black waves are sleep-mussed, and the shadow across his face foretells an aggressively masculine beard pattern with full-growth potential should he wait three days’ max to shave. His eyes seem weirdly small, and then I realize they’re barely open.
This asshole’s beensleeping? His soft, gray T-shirt is too small to be decent. Thick straps of triceps peek from the sleeves, his muscular arms as curvaceous as a 1940s starlet, though one is still wrapped in a soft cast. And the sweatpants,oh ho, slung so low around his hips, I have to witness a solid inch of black waistband fitting snugly beneath?
Infuriating.
“Nomi?” the idiot mumbles. “Wha—”
I place a full palm against the flat of his sternum, enraged at the rise of chest muscles on either side, and drive him backward, inside, where I can yell at him properly. He may be sleep-dumb, but he has the good sense to look terrified as I slam the door behind me like a thunderclap.
I wave the manila envelope in the air hard enough to take down a hornet. “You filed azoning complaint?!”
The evidence of his assholery works like a beacon, summoning the tiny, nefarious demon ruling Julian’s brain to repossess its bumbling human host. I watch it bodily re-inhabit him, his spine straightening,shoulders rotating back, eyes cranked all the way open now. The fuzzy quality of sleep that made him so soft and dammit,inviting, has burned away. His armpits look like terrible cuddle zones now.
“I did, because it’s valid, Nomi. You can’t open your little weed bordello—”
“Bordello?Do you hear yourself, Julian?”
“—next door to a family medical practice! What message would it send our children?”
