Driving Needs, part fourteen

"Cleanup crew's here," said Captain Saintcrow. "I think it's safe for you three to take off."

Antoinette nodded. "What's the final count? What the hell actually happened here?"

"Not sure," she answered. "We won't know until all reports are filed, and even then we might get something wrong. But I've got at least four magi who got together to summon a skin-stealer from the Grey, and a fifth who they apparently sacrificed so it could wear his skin. The skin-stealer then managed to shoot all four of them, dumped the weapon somewhere, and cozied up to a businessman whom it promptly skinned in his own hotel room. He managed to fling himself off the balcony, possibly with its help, and you and your wolf caught up with it before it could finish getting whatever it wanted from me. Meanwhile, your other wolf found the dead magi, allowing us to keep that from becoming public knowledge... all in all, I'd say all three of you have done some really good work today. Tom's people seem to agree."

"All right," said Antoinette. "You've got my number. Ping me if you need anything else."

Chris nodded, because as one of the Ministry's ROs that was what he was supposed to be doing at this point. He was still thinking about the fox, and his feelings were ambivalent: he wanted her to want him; he wanted her far, far away. 

He followed Antoinette back to the car, still distracted, then forced himself to focus and unlocked the doors. 

When they were inside and pulling away, Antoinette said: "So... Elyssa and I have a bet. Neither of us has really seen you scared, and, well, given some of the situations we've been in that just seems wrong. So we have a couple of challenges for you, beyond just driving the car."

"Driving the car isn't--" Chris cut himself off. "All right. What did you have in mind?" Whatever this was, he would go with it.

"Ice skating," said Elyssa.

"Ice skating?" 

"Ice skating," Antoinette told him.

Chris forced his jaw to unclench. "All right. Ice skating."