Morningstar Manor

Bea was sipping coffee at a table by the window, wearing a necklace she thought was just gaudy enough to be awesome on a Monday afternoon and a red dress, giggling at the newest Sassy Gay Friend video she'd called up on her iPhone. There was work to be done and puppies to walk, but Bea was feeling particularly lazy and figured she wouldn't be much good to anyone without caffeine.

*

Niles was sprawled out on the couch in his usual position, blatantly taking up the whole thing as he flipped through a stack of magazines that had come in the mail that morning. There were copies of Esquire, Tattoo magazine, Maxim, and Time, but he was currently flipping holding the Spring 2011 Ikea catalog. What? He needed a new lamp.

*

Granger had taken the day off, which left him feeling a little out of sorts, but that was okay. He sat in a corner table by himself with a cup of plain black coffee and a donut he'd picked up at the Krispy Kreme on his way home from the grocery store, looking around at the people in the Mocha in between bites. He needed to spend time somewhere besides the bureau and the station, he decided somewhat distractedly.

*

Rhiannon sat at a table ignoring the cup of still-steaming coffee in front of her in favor of the little bundle of Sophie in her arms. She wasn't crying or anything and in fact was alert and awake and even attempting to smile, but that could've just been gas. Likely gas, actually, but it was still cute.

Kenny O'Bannon never knew what hit him. He was chatting to his girlfriend on the phone, making the appropriate noises while listening to her woes about her sister, her mother, her aunt and her entire extended female family. He'd have asked her to marry him months ago if he weren't slightly scared of the entire matriarchal tribe she was going to bring --

"OUCH!!"

"What's the matter?" she was asking on the phone.

"Something bit me," he said. "Fuck, it's far too early in the year for the real big monsters."

He touched his neck where the sharp little pain had been, and his finger came away with a drop of glistening blood, which he licked off.

Then, Shawna hung up, he had reached his 'workshop' in the basement, and opened the door.

And keeled over dead, his besneakered feet sticking out into the evening sun.

To be honest, licking the blood had been harmless. The poison didn't survive digestive juices. In the bloodstream, however, it was immediately fatal in small doses.

On the roof, a quite satisfied contract killer crept away quietly. Not only had he got revenge for the Harley (and the attempt at murdering him), he had also proven that killing somebody with a blow-dart made of ice laced with classic blow-dart poison was quite feasible.

That way, killing Kenny had even been useful.