Page 7 of Never Been Gargoyled (Harmony Glen #4)

Dazy

T he rag in my hand smelled like lemon-scented ambition when the knock came.

I froze mid-swipe on a window in Helga’s library, a bottle of cleaner dangling from my other hand, the window half-smeared, half-smudged, just like my life.

The tick of the old grandfather clock filled the silence around me.

I wasn’t expecting anyone. I’d only met Ogram and Dorvak, unless you counted the surly gargoyle who haunted my roof like it was his personal castle.

Oh, wait. It must be the welcome committee. The troll farmer told me someone would stop by with a basket of goodies. Please, let there be eclairs in the basket.

“Coming!” I called, a big smile blooming on my face. I tossed the rag onto the sill and stepped lightly across the hall, my sneakers squeaking on the wooden floorboards. I passed the coat rack where Helga hung her sunhat I planned to use myself when I tackled the gardens.

When I opened the door, the air smelled of freshly mowed grass, lilacs, and rain-soaked dirt.

The woman on the porch looked like she lived in a house with no natural light. Vampire-pale skin. Mid-fifties. Gray hair tugged back in a bun tight enough to give her a free brow lift.

No basket. And I’d bet my new inheritance she wasn’t bringing me eclairs.

She wore a tailored navy pantsuit pressed within an inch of its life. Her mouth was pressed into a flat line, and her eyes weren’t even curious, just professional and flinty.

“Dazy Osborne?” she asked, her voice clipped and equally precise.

“Uh. Yes?”

She thrust a manila envelope into my hands. “You’ve been served. This pertains to a claim filed against the estate.”

I blinked. “I—I’m sorry, what does that?—?”

She was already turning. My question barely made it past my lips before she lifted one hand like a signal to cease and desist rather than wave goodbye. I stood in the open doorway, envelope in hand, and watched her stride down the path toward her beige sedan. Gravel crunched beneath her heels.

A breeze stirred the ivy climbing the porch rail, but I barely noticed .

She started the vehicle and turned, taking it back onto the main road.

Staring down at the envelope, I shut the door.

The envelope was warm from her hand and slick with humidity.

It made a faint crinkle when I adjusted my grip.

My legs limp, I wandered into the parlor as if someone had unplugged me.

The cleaner bottle thudded when I set it down on the coffee table.

My body moved without consulting my brain, taking me to sit on the couch in front of the fireplace, where I balanced the envelope on my knees.

As if he lived here, and I supposed he kind of did, Feydin strode into the room wearing snug jeans that outlined his thick thighs, and a t-shirt that outlined his chest and arm muscles.

Normally, yum.

Right now?

Okay, still yum, but this envelope felt scary. People weren’t “served” letters inviting them to the local church social, only bad news.

What had the woman said? I couldn’t remember, though I’d bet what I’d find inside would repeat it in succinct ways.

Feydin, stone sentinel and my latest buzzkill, had folded his wings against his back, and his faintly glowing, piercing gray eyes locked onto me like he could already sense incoming damage.

Standing near the fireplace, his growl ripped out. “Who hurt you?” he thundered. “I will kill them!”

I blinked up at him. “That escalated quickly. ”

“You’re distressed.” He took a step closer, looming in carved lines and possibly malicious intent, if his statement was anything to go by.

“You’re hovering.”

“I’m well aware,” he said gruffly. “Tell me.”

Oddly, his protective demeanor didn’t bother me. Not with the envelope in my lap and my stomach threatening to roll over. The fact that someone noticed I was upset, that someone cared, stirred me in an appealing way.

“No one has hurt me—yet.” I took a breath and opened the envelope. The paper inside was thick and textured, the kind that whispered money. The letterhead made my pulse spike: Bland, Kingsley & Franks, LLP.

“Sounds fake but okay,” I said, and began reading aloud. “Notice of Intent to Challenge Probate.” I skimmed. “A client asserting legal heirship to the Winterbourne Estate…” I swallowed but it refused to go down. My arm holding the letter did, however, flopping on my lap. “Wait—what?”

The rest of it blurred together. Helga having a daughter no one had mentioned. A secret child. A birth certificate proving parentage. A petition to reopen the estate. Words like asserted legal heir and rightful claim to full ownership cut deeply.

“She’s saying she’s Helga’s daughter,” I said, unable to drag my gaze from the letter. “She wants everything. The whole estate.”

A low, guttural growl ripped up Feydin’s throat. His wings twitched, flaring outward before smoothing onto his back.

I looked up, the letter trembling in my grip. “What does it mean?”

“Someone has made a grave mistake, and I will kill them.”

“Well, no, you can’t do something like that.” Why was hysterical laughter bubbling up in my throat? I swallowed it back down. “We don’t randomly kill people.”

“I do.”

I cocked my head his way. “You really kill people?”

“I will if they hurt you.”

“That’s sweet and all and… Okay, that’s sweet.”

“I’m not sweet.”

“I think you are.” I looked down at the letter. “What in the world am I going to do?”

Feydin stepped closer. Some might call it looming, but him standing nearby, his wings slightly flared, felt comforting. I liked it. I liked his grumpy, stoic demeanor, too.

“I’m trained in law,” he said.

I blinked up at him. “You… What?”

“It was part of my role here,” he said, watching me carefully. “When Helga owned the estate. I protected her, yes, but also her legal interests. The building. The grounds. Whatever contracts she put into place, though I will point out that I was assigned this estate only twenty-five years ago.”

“You were a child gargoyle then?”

He scowled. “Gargoyles don’t age when they take stone form. For all intents and purposes, I’m thirty-two.”

“Alright.” I blinked slowly. “If you handled her legal affairs, you must know about her will naming me. Did you know about her daughter?”

He shook his head. “She didn’t share those details with me.

I was away for a bit during the time she created her will.

My brother… He lives in France. He needed me, and I went.

” He said it simply, but I suspected it was anything but.

“As for a possible daughter, she didn’t mention the possibility.

She may have kept it secret, or it might not even be true. ”

“People forge birth certificates?”

He shrugged. “When money’s involved, people will do anything.”

Very true.

The letter rustled as I stared at it, before looking back up at him. “You’re really a lawyer?”

“Yes. I’m offering to represent you if you want me to.”

“Why?”

“Because you own the estate.”

I lifted the paper, rattling it in the air. “According to this, I don’t.”

“If I represent you, I’ll look into this. Handle any correspondence. Work with you to make an offer to buy her out if she is, in fact, Helga’s true daughter.”

“I don’t have a lot of money.” And that sucked. I mean, I had enough to make sure the house didn’t crumble around me and purchase tools and what I’d need to restore the grounds, but pay someone off? Nope .

“We’ll worry about that if it comes to it.”

My brain scrambled for a response. Somewhere in the back of my mind, a snarky comment about gargoyle night school tried to form, but it couldn’t quite fight its way through.

I was holding an envelope that might cost me everything, and he was offering to stand between me and the storm.

It was hard to joke in a situation like that.

“Okay,” I said. “Yes. Please represent me.” My voice came out limp, but I’d been wrung out and left to dry. “I appreciate it. I don’t know what to do. Who to turn to.” Would my dad have offered to help? He wasn’t a lawyer, but he was savvy enough in his own way.

Probably or perhaps not. He’d offer sympathy, but he was irritated Helga hadn’t left the estate to him, though he would’ve promptly sold it. Helga gave it to me because she thought I’d love it as much as she had. Why hadn’t she mentioned she had a daughter who might insist the property was hers?

“I’m here to help you,” Feydin said. “What you can do now is trust me. Leave this to me. Let me make this easier for you.” He gave me a curt nod. “I’ll return shortly.” He strode from the parlor and the front door thudded shut not long after.

I looked down at the letter again and reread the first paragraph.

Then the second.

Then the whole thing, one line at a time, trying to make it mean something else. But no matter how many times I skimmed, the words stayed the same .

Intent to obtain a temporary injunction on property modification…

DNA verification pending …

My stomach churned. I’d spent the morning cleaning. Planning. Dreaming. Now those dreams were shot. I’d just gotten used to the idea of maybe calling this place home.

And a stranger was trying to yank it out from underneath me.

My eyes burned.

I stared at a bookshelf and an old glass vase in deep pink that had belonged to Helga. Not the most attractive thing, but she must’ve loved it.

Had she really had a child and never told anyone?

All the time she’d shared about traveling alone, her love of solitude, and having no true family but me may have just been stories.

I felt like a fraud, like I’d walked into someone else’s life and started rearranging the furniture.

The silence in the room felt heavier without Feydin. The building creaked and sighed like me. None of this made sense anymore.

I stared at the letter again. And then gazed around the parlor, taking in the mismatched cushions, the brass lamp that had to be an antique, the blanket still folded and laid across the back of a chair as if my aunt was planning to sit and cover her lap with it at any moment.

It had all been hers, and I’d started to treasure each piece already. They’d been a bridge to the woman I’d loved who’d died of a horrible disease .

Now these things—her precious possessions—might never be mine.

I sighed and got up. Dusting cloth and spray bottle in hand, I made myself get back to work. But it was hard to clean one piece of furniture after another now. Earlier, I’d paused to grin and admire each one, a touch of happy possession growing deep inside.

An hour or so later, while I was cleaning out the inside of the kitchen cupboards while suds sloshed in the dishwasher, the front door creaked open and boomed shut. Footsteps thudded down the hall and Feydin appeared in the open kitchen doorway.

He stopped, scowling at me on my knees. “What are you doing?”

“Um, cleaning cupboards.”

“Why?”

“Because they’re dirty. Dusty. I swear there are mouse droppings in here, and I’ll have to look online to find out how to sanitize the wood because there’s no way I’m putting food in here if mice have been running around and pooping.”

“There are no mice inside this building.” He sounded scandalized at the thought.

“You’re sure?”

“I’m the house gargoyle. Of course I’m sure.” And he sounded equally appalled at the thought I might not believe him.

“I’ll take your word for it.” Rising, I shoved hair off my face that had come out of my braid. “What did you discover? ”

“I spoke with the sheriff. He’s lived here all his life. If Helga had a daughter, she kept the pregnancy and delivery a complete secret.”