Page 9

9

T ess

When I almost tripped over a tiger on the rug next to the bed, I didn’t pay much attention. Sometimes, after Jack patrolled, he liked to curl up and go to sleep in his big cat form so as not to disturb me. (I’m a sprawler when I sleep.)

But when I stumbled to the kitchen in search of much-needed coffee, I glanced out at the family room and saw another tiger, this one draped over the couch. Priorities firm, I continued on to the coffeepot.

A few minutes later, mug in hand, I wandered out toward the couch and looked down at my small cat sleeping on top of an enormous cat.

“Oh, hi, Grandpa Jed. I thought you were leaving for Orlando this morning.”

One eye opened, and he made a chuffing noise. Then he rolled over—no easy feat for a quarter-ton tiger on my couch—and went back to sleep.

Okay. I’d ask the other shapeshifter in the house.

“Hey, Jack. What’s going on?”

Jack opened his gorgeous amber-gold eyes, yawned, and stretched. Then the almost-invisible sparkles of his magic surrounded him, and the tiger turned into the man, who was fully dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt.

Jack’s magic was rare in that he was one of the few shifters who pulled clothes into the shift with him. Most had to undress first or face awkwardly struggling out of their human clothes while in their animal form, and then, when they shifted back, they were naked. This could cause uncomfortable situations, as I’d discovered when an eagle shifter came to town.

Jack without clothes was even more spectacular than Jack with clothes, so maybe … I felt my cheeks heat and hid my face behind my mug.

Jack noticed, though. He always noticed. His grin was as sexy as the rest of him, which was so unfair, considering I woke up looking like I’d been racing through sticker bushes, head first.

“Good morning, beautiful,” I said. “Why is Grandpa Jed in the living room? Oh, no! Did he and Millie break up?”

He raised an eyebrow. “What? How did you get that? No. He came over to patrol with me. I felt better having the two of us here after what happened. And ‘good morning, beautiful’ is my line.”

Then he took my mug out of my hands, set it down on the dresser, and kissed the stuffing out of me until I pushed him away, laughing.

“Back, fiend! I have to get ready for church.”

“Bet if Jed weren’t here, I could convince you to be late,” he said smugly.

I bet he could, too, but I wasn’t going to tell him that, so I just shook my head. “Coffee’s made. Do you want to start breakfast and feed Lou? And are you still going with me?”

Jack had recently started attending church with me. He still wasn’t sure about his relationship with God, after things he saw in the war, but he loved me, and church was part of my life, so he came with me most of the time. Sometimes on Sunday, though, one of the swamp commandos—my name for his ex-Special Forces buddies who lived out by the swamp and owned and ran Swamp Commandos Airboat Rides—had a rough day, because of the PTSD many of them suffered. Jack was always available to lend an ear on days like that. He’d take coffee and donuts and spend the day on the water, talking things out or sharing the silence.

Jack never told me much about those days, but I respected their privacy. Some things you had to experience to fully understand. I contributed whatever pies or other baked goods I had on hand, which he said were always appreciated.

Breakfast with two shapeshifters mainly consisted of trying to snatch a piece of bacon from the literal jaws of defeat.

“Hey!” I smacked Jed’s hand. “I only had one piece, and you had half a pound. Back off, Grandpa, and nobody gets hurt.”

He laughed at me, but let me have the last piece. “Never let it be said I caused my … dear Tess to starve.”

I looked a question at him over the weird pause before “dear,” but he didn’t meet my gaze, just went on shoveling eggs, ham, and toast into his mouth.

“What’s sad is how the two of you can eat like that and stay in such good shape.” I sighed. My nice sky-blue church dress felt snug around the waist. I needed to lay off the donuts, or I’d have to go shopping for new clothes.

And I hated shopping.

Jack patted his flat stomach. “Gotta love that shapeshifter metabolism.”

“Yes, except for the grocery bills,” Jed said. “We spent eight hundred dollars last week and only bought forty pounds of steak!”

“Only? Was there anything else in your cart?”

He waved a hand. “Vegetables, fruit, stuff like that. Laundry soap. Who knows? Millie gave me a list. I bought what was on the list.”

“Huh. And, besides the steak, was there other meat?”

“Maybe a little.”

“Define little.”

“A dozen chickens, maybe? A few pounds of ham. Pork roasts. Hamburger. Sausage was on sale, so?—”

I waved the white napkin of surrender. “Stop, already. Do you see why you spent eight hundred dollars? I’m surprised it wasn’t more.”

He shrugged. “I put the apples back.”

Poor Millie. Maybe I should call her. She might be in shock about the reality of living with a shifter. On the other hand, she’d been traveling with him for quite a while. Also, he had quite a lot of money from the settlement the Fae queen gave him after he got out of that statue.

Speaking of that …

“I still need to get that Fae gold valued,” I told Jack. “The queen refused to take it back, so I guess it’s mine. It might be a nice nest egg or help me make a house payment or two.”

Jack choked on his biscuit. “A house payment or two? Tess, that was Fae gold. And in the amount she gave you, it’s more likely you can pay off your entire house with it.”

I froze, my fork in mid-air. My entire house?

Nope.

I can’t think about that right now.

“If that’s true, I have a lot to give thanks for in church this morning,” I said lightly, pushing dollar signs and shock out of my mind. “What’s the plan? Are you still going to Orlando, Jed?”

He shook his head. “No. Millie is heading out to California to deal with the apartment we rented and all that, but I’m staying right here until this situation with NACOS is resolved.”

“That may take longer than a week,” Jack said grimly. “But we can figure out who killed Quark and left him here last night, and I intend to do so as soon as possible. By the way, Tess, do you want to tell me why Carlos called me at three in the morning asking why you thought you had to defend him from an accusation of murder?”

I shrugged. “I texted him. Of course he didn’t do it.”

“Yes, but you might have given me a heads up. Or explained more to Carlos, who was understandably concerned.” Jack sighed, probably wondering how his life got so complicated.

“I was tired, so I didn’t think about all that,” I admitted. “Okay. Let’s clean this up. If you’re going to church with me, we need to leave soon.”

Jed offered to clean the kitchen for us, so I kissed his cheek and went to brush my teeth. Jack changed into a nice green shirt I gave him for Christmas and a pair of black pants.

“Gosh, you clean up nice.” It was almost embarrassing how much I loved looking at him.

“So do you. We could skip church, throw my granddad out, and explore how nice we look at length.” He stalked toward me, exactly as I imagined his tiger shape stalked prey, and I laughed and dodged.

“Not today, buddy. I’m in charge of the bake sale committee this summer, and I intend to do a good job.”

“Maybe ask Mrs. Frost for the recipe for her walnut-chocolate-chip cookies.”

We had a moment of silence for the awesomeness that was Mrs. Frost’s cookies, and then I kissed Lou’s head. “Bye, sweetie. It’s Sunday, so I’ll be home with you most of the day.”

She purred and then rolled over and went back to sleep. The life of a cat who lives in my house is a pretty good one. I’m occasionally envious.

“I’ll try, but Mrs. Frost never gives anybody her recipes. She might bake a few dozen for the sale, though. Especially if you ask her.”

Jed was waiting for us by the front door. “I’m going to head home and do some things around the house. Let me know what our next steps are, Jack. Tess, you’re lovely, as always.”

He patted my arm and headed for his truck. Jack and I followed him down the driveway, and we chatted about everything except dead bodies and evil consortiums on the way to church.

Earlier that year, I’d had a magically instilled moment of beautiful singing, and a few of my fellow churchgoers still hoped it would happen again. More of them, though, flinched when they saw me pick up the hymnal.

Mr. Russell, as usual, made a point of looking at me and turning his hearing aid off.

I just grinned at him and made my joyous noise unto the Lord.

It was an odd morning, though. Every time I turned around, people were staring at Jack with big grins on their faces. When they caught me watching them, they hastily looked away and became fascinated with their keys or phones or hymnals.

“Jack,” I whispered during a lull where the pastor was changing places with one of the lay ministers. “Why is everybody staring at you?”

“I have no idea.” But then he aimed a narrow-eyed stare at Mrs. Frost, who beamed beatifically back at him.

Something was going on, for sure. But I didn’t have the brain capacity for minor stuff. I had a magic mirror to figure out, and I knew just the guy to help me do it.

When services were over, we thanked Pastor Nash, a nice guy who never made me feel bad about my horrible singing. Then we chatted with Uncle Mike and Aunt Ruby for a few minutes, since we’d arrived too late to sit by them. When Shelley raced out of Sunday School, she ran over to Jack and grabbed his hand.

“Did you ask her yet?” She whispered loudly.

Jack groaned and walked off toward the parking lot, pulling my new sister along with him.

“What was that about? And why was everybody giving Jack weird looks in church?”

Aunt Ruby gave me a shocked look. “Tess Callahan! How am I supposed to know everything that goes on in this town?”

Uncle Mike and I exchanged wry glances. She was supposed to know everything because she always had, even before the town elected her as mayor.

“How’s the plumbing?” Uncle Mike asked, probably to change the subject before we had to listen to Aunt Ruby tell us mayor stuff. I loved my aunt, but town politics bored the stuffing out of me. She hadn’t said a word about Quark, so Susan must not have reported it yet.

I certainly wasn’t going to tell her.

“Plumbing’s fine, but I’m having an issue with the electric,” I told my uncle, allowing his distraction to work because I really had been having an electrical issue. “The breaker for the kitchen keeps going off if I try to use the mixer and another small appliance at the same time. Maybe the circuit breaker can’t carry the load. Jack’s not good with electrical stuff, and neither am I.”

He held up a hand and flashed a grin. “Say no more. The boy can’t help it if he’s not as good at me at, well, pretty much everything. Do you have frayed wires? Do the outlets feel hot? Any sparking or burning smells?”

I shook my head. “No, Uncle Mike, I know the danger signs. You taught me enough when I was growing up. Still, something’s up.”

Suddenly, I realized I didn’t want him coming out to my house until the situation with NACOS and Quark was resolved. “Maybe you can stop by … sometime next week.”

“Why not today?”

“Oh, I’m busy with a new item at the shop today, and I want to be home to learn when you fix it, so I know what to look for next time.” I kissed his cheek and hugged Aunt Ruby, and we said our goodbyes just as Jack and Shelley returned.

“Lunch?” Jack asked as we drove out of the church parking lot.

“No, we just ate breakfast,” I said absently, texting. “Okay, great! We need to go to the shop.”

“Why? It’s Sunday.”

“Because Phin’s going to help us figure out what to do about that magic mirror.”

T urned out, Phin didn’t have a clue, either, but he was willing to help.

After church, we stopped by Jack’s house to get his truck and then went to the shop, where Phin was waiting for us. Phineas Hunter went to high school with me. After graduation, he moved away, went to art school and vet tech school, and now he was home in Dead End, working at our new vet clinic and doing art on the side. He’d always been fascinated with old mirrors and magic, so I hoped he’d have thoughts.

“I have no thoughts.” He stared down at the cloudy mirror, his warm brown eyes serious. “Are you sure there’s a person in there?”

“Well, no,” I said, frustrated. “I’m sure there’s something in there. Jack saw him, too. But is it a magical construct? A function of an ancient spell? Or a real person who somehow got trapped inside the mirror?”

“You could have just asked me, girlie,” the mirror shouted at me.

Actually, Horatio shouted at me, as we saw when he stomped forward from wherever he went.

“I’m sorry. I’ve been so busy, and I meant to?—”

“You meant to,” he sneered. “People always mean to help, and then they?—”

“Somebody killed a man at her house last night,” Jack said flatly. “Maybe give her a break, or I’ll go get that hammer.”

Horatio’s eyes widened, and then I saw what looked like regret in his eyes. That might just have been the cloudiness of the mirror, though.

“I’m sorry, Tess. Are you okay?”

“Thank you. I’m not great, but let’s focus on helping you.”

Phin folded his arms. “Not another word about mirrors until you tell me what’s going on.”

Jack and I gave them both—because Horatio was avidly listening—a quick and very incomplete version of what had happened the night before.

“We’ll let you know what Susan finds out, but let’s get back to this mirror,” I said. “Oh! Aunt Ruby would be so disappointed in me. Mr. Horatio Mercury, please meet Phineas Hunter.”

“Nice to meet you. Call me Phin.”

“Horatio.”

“What can you tell us about what happened to you, Horatio?” I touched the corner of the mirror, half afraid it would suck me into it.

Stranger things have happened in Dead End Pawn.

“That’s the worst part. I don’t know.” Tiny Mr. Mercury started pacing back and forth behind the glass. “I don’t remember anything of my life before this.”

“Is it possible you’re not actually human, but a spell turned sentient?” Phin wondered.

I winced. Phin, the past president of the Dead End High Science Club, didn’t always think about feelings.

But the little man didn’t seem offended. “I don’t know. I thought of that, too. Had a lot of time to think of theories. But I just don’t know.”

Phin nodded slowly. “Okay. I know some people. Tess, is it okay if I take the mirror home with me? It would be good if I had it—him—nearby to test things out as I learn them.”

“You won’t hurt him, will you?” I suddenly felt anxious. Buying a mirror didn’t give me the right to harm the person or being who lived on the other side of the glass.

For the first time, we saw Mr. Mercury smile. “You are a kind young woman. Let Phineas take me home. The sooner we figure this out, the sooner I can find out who I really am and what the rest of my life is going to be. I can’t keep on like this.”

I felt tears threatening, so I quickly nodded and turned away. “Let me get a blanket to protect the mirror in your car.”

Before we wrapped it up, I leaned down to say goodbye. “Mr. Mercury, I wish I could be part of solving your mystery, but I know if anybody can, Phin can. Good luck, and I’ll come over the minute you two learn something.”

“Thank you, Tess. I hope we’ll talk soon.”

Jack helped Phin carry the bulky mirror to his car, and I locked up. I was just stepping off the porch when I heard loud polka music start up inside the shop.

“ Y ellow Rose of Texas ?”

Jack walked over to meet me. “Hey, that’s Willie Nelson.”

“Willie Nelson sang polka?”

Jack looked horrified. “Polka?”

“It’s the disco ball,” I said grimly, pulling my keys out of my purse.

“Oh, no. We can’t fall for its tricks. The next thing you know, we’ll be dancing the polka all day long.”

I shuddered and put my keys away. “Beau’s for lunch?”

On the way to Beau’s, I caught myself humming about the yellow rose of Texas and realized I’d been ear wormed.

Jack had to stop me from banging my head against the dash.