Page 7 of Pets in Space 10

Landry exhaled slowly. You’re a grown man, not a hormone-fueled teenager, he scolded himself. Stop ogling the interdimensional librarian.

He cleared his throat. “Okay. Let’s start over. Maybe my brain will start working the second time around.”

She blinked up at him.

“Where — exactly — are you from?” he asked, keeping his voice steady.

She tilted her head. “Zelos, originally. Though I work primarily on Enyo. Both are located outside your planetary system.”

He blinked. “The coffee is helping, but I’m still trying to wrap my head around the idea that you’re really from another world?”

“Yes.”

“Did you come in a spaceship? You know… like ‘beam me up, Scotty’?” he asked.

She gave him a blank stare. “No. I don’t know a Scotty. I created a portal.”

He stared at her for a long beat. Then rubbed his temples.

“Okay. Alright. A portal. Maybe that’s a Dr. Who thing?

Or possibly Stargate? No, no, definitely a Dr. Strange.

Yeah, comic book stuff. I can wrap my head around that,” he mumbled with a frown as he tried to process what she was telling him before he refocused on her face.

“Next question… who and what exactly are you?”

“Harmonia Stormhold,” she said simply. “Mage. Scholar. Sometimes investigator. I work for the Mage Council.”

“And you’re here… for what?”

“There’s an anomaly. A disturbance in the mage lines. I’ve been assigned to identify its source.”

“Mage lines,” he repeated like it was a flavor of herbal tea. “Right. And you believe… magic is real.”

She just raised a brow.

He opened his mouth to argue — then stopped.

Because his shirt re-buttoning itself wasn’t something that was normal.

And as if to drive the point home, Harmonia lifted her hand.

The dishes on the table — plates, forks, mugs — rose into the air with smooth precision. They floated to the sink where the cloth and towel sprang into animated action, scrubbing, rinsing, drying, and stacking each item back in its place like a ghostly housemaid on an espresso bender.

He hissed. “Holy hell.”

“You curse a lot,” Harmonia observed dryly.

“That’s because my life just turned into an animated cartoon,” he shot back.

“I assure you, you’re quite real, and so is magic.”

Landry narrowed his eyes and leaned back in his chair, watching as she adjusted her napkin, her fingers graceful and sure. “So you’re saying… magic is real. And mages like you are real. And you combine magic with science?”

“Exactly. We don’t see them as opposites. They’re complementary forces. Science explains the how. Magic can answer the why.”

He nodded slowly, as if this was the type of conversations he discussed with his colleagues over catfish and beer. “Totally normal conversation. Very grounded. Real National Public Radio kind of stuff.”

Her lips curved in a knowing smile, and damn it, his pulse kicked again.

He scratched at his jaw, searching for the next thread of sanity to cling to. “So what kind of disturbance are we talking about? Electromagnetic? Dimensional rift? Something that makes animals act weird?”

She didn’t answer immediately. Her gaze drifted to his bed.

His eyes followed where she was looking.

Both water dragons had migrated to the sturdy wood frame and comfy mattress.

His, very human, very pitiful-looking bed.

They were curled up like smug, overfed cats in the wreckage of his tangled sheets, Pug stretched out like he owned the damn mattress, Lilypad nestling her head on the pillow and twitching her ears.

Harmonia nodded toward them. “Them.”

His eyebrows lifted. “Them?”

“The rings… the tomes… they’re connected to living magic. The presence of those two here? It wasn’t supposed to happen. And you — ” her gaze flicked to him, “ — you’re the reason I found them.”

He frowned. “Me? Why me?”

“That,” she murmured, “is another puzzle I’m here to solve.”

“You know none of you can tell anyone about this, right? No showing off dragons, or talking interdimensional snakes, magic, or woo-woo stuff. I’m barely hanging on to my sanity. I’m not so sure anyone else would be doing as well.”

Harmonia nodded. “Yes, the fewer humans who know about us the better.”

His mouth opened to comment, but before he could respond, a low hum vibrated through the humid air.

He froze.

The sound of a boat motor, distant but growing, echoed through the open screen door. Slow. Steady.

Someone was coming.

Landry’s body tensed. The lazy morning haze had barely evaporated. He rose from his chair and walked over to the back screen door to peer through it.

“Are you expecting company?” she asked softly from behind him.

He shook his head. “Nah, but it’s not unusual to have folks popping in.”

They locked eyes, the tension between them shifting from heated to electric.

Outside, the motor drew closer.

Inside, magic simmered.

And somewhere between the charged air, the stolen glances, and the mess of fruit peels and floating dishes, Landry realized one terrifying truth.

His life had just been hijacked.

By dragons, magic…

…and one maddeningly beautiful woman he couldn’t stop thinking about.