Page 26 of Possessed By Shadows

He nodded, still paging through the schedule app on his phone. “I posted a picture in the craft group and we’ve had almost thirty people interested. Which means I’d have to do several sets of classes, as they are broken up over four weeks. No need to overwhelm anyone. But it will be hard to schedule around the tours once they restart next month.”

“What if we only keep the basics? The kids tour, and maybe the Saturday night tour? Will the classes make up enough revenue?”

“We’re doing fine,” Micah promised. “The shop, the online store, the classes, and a few tours? We’re well in the black.”

“Even if we have to hire more people?”

“Even if,” Micah agreed. He finally looked up and seemed to find something on my face that amused him. “How much did you hear of what I just said?”

“Everything. In the black, hiring people good.”

“Mhmm,” he said, like he was on to me, studying his face rather than actually worried about a schedule and money. “Do you want to sleep already?” It was barely ten.

“No.”

“Sex or sewing?”

“Sewing and then sex?” I offered.

Micah grinned and got up from the table taking both our plates to the sink.

“Not that I don’t find you sexier than sewing…” My head was really loud. Hadn’t realized what that meant until Micah had explained. It was those distracting inner voices that drown out everything else.

“How about we finish your baby alien wallet?”

I hadn’t even started it.

“I cut out all the pieces in group, did half the sewing already. We only have to put it together. Short and simple. Easier design, but I didn’t think you need all the pockets and space of the clutch.”

I got up and made my way to him, wrapping my arms around him to hold him tight before delving in for a long kiss. “Thanks for getting me,” I said, after breaking the kiss to stare into those amazing eyes of his.

He grinned. “Ditto. Let’s finish your wallet and then bed, yeah?”

I let him tug me over to the machine and we laid out the pieces, my grin wide at the combo he’d chosen for the outside vinyl and the one inside pocket to go with my little green friend. He was so much better with color pops than I was. It was actually only three pieces, raw edges of a black crocodile type vinyl with card slots sewn in on one side, a zipper pocket in the middle, and the other side a slip pocket my phone snapped into. The card slot area had a large flip tab over it that not only helped hold stuff in place, it hid the cards when snapped.

We worked on it together, sharing the machine, clipping, and trimming threads. Each part of it brought my heart rate down, easing the anxiety and the long list of worries that had been building all day. I could feel the tension seep out of me as I top-stitched the last edges, marveling how straight my lines had gotten. When I snapped it shut and held it up, I felt accomplished, relaxed, and able to breathe again.

“Amazing work,” Micah said. “You are a pro at this now. We should start taking orders.”

“Right, ‘cause we have so much time for that.” I took out my old wallet, which was some Walmart bulk-bin thing, and began unloading it to put it all in my new one. I squeezed what little I had into it, and snapped it shut, proud of my work. “My fancy, and mostly empty wallet,” I grinned.

“Uniquely yours,” Micah agreed. He glanced at the clock. “It’s barely after eleven, how about you come shower with me. Let me mess with your hair a bit and we’ll head to bed?”

“It’s my hair you want to mess with?” I teased.

He grinned wickedly. “I didn’t say the hair on your head.”

I followed him to the bathroom shedding clothing on the way. Hopefully Sky wouldn’t show up any time soon. Because sometimes I had to pin my boyfriend to the wall in the bathroom shower and show him how fucking amazing he was.

We’d gone to bed, relaxed and satiated, wrapped up in a blanket, tucked in our tiny loft fort, with Jet taking over Micah’s pillow, and him sharing mine. So the dance music didn’t make sense. Night screaming, that would have almost been normal, but “Catch a Grenade for You” by Bruno Mars, not so much. I grumbled and rolled over, reaching for my wallet, struggling for a minute because it was new and snaps were hard to operate in the dark and half asleep.

It stopped ringing by the time I got my phone out, then started again. It was after three in the morning. And the screen said it was Lukas. “What the fuck?” I answered, thinking not only better he be dying for not calling all day, but also for interrupting my sleep. “Where the fuck have you been?” Okay so my language needed work this late at night.

“I need you to take care of some stuff for me,” he said.

“Uh…like the fact you forgot to pick up Dad from the airport? Or eventell mehe was coming?”

“I’m working on something. I need a few days. Did you review the rest of the footage?” Lukas asked.