Page 102 of Reluctant Rogue

Beth looked at Remi curiously. “I hadn’t met a Djinn before, I didn’t even know they were real until Naomi told me last week.”

“You know what else is real?” Naomi still had a hard time believing it herself. “Vampires!”

Beth stared at her, mouth agape. “No!”

“Apparently so. I just learned it now, from Remi.”

Beth’s gaze went instantly to Remi. He frowned back at them.

“You two are shapeshifters, right? I saw you shift,” he looked at Naomi rather accusingly.

“Yes, we are,” Naomi assured him.

“Well, then, how come you didn’t know already about Djinn, and vampires?”

“Oh, that.” Naomi wrinkled her nose, just as Beth did the same, and together they giggled. Naomi returned her attention to the boy, and sobered. “We can tell you another time. It’s long story, and not a fun one. Let’s not go into it right now.”

“Okay,” Remi said, apparently willing to go with the flow. He wandered over to the buffet, and snagged a cookie.

“Mmm, this is really good,” he mumbled around a mouthful.

The next minute, he was gone. Disappeared, no flash, no sparkly lights or magical mist, just… gone.

Naomi found she was staring at the spot where he’d stood, her mouth hanging open.

“Okay, so. I guess that was a thing?”

Beth looked just as bewildered. “I guess so? Do you think he’s coming back?”

“No clue.” She shook her head. “Okay, so, it’s the middle of the night. How about we switch to cocoa, and go back upstairs and see if we can get back to sleep?”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” said Beth, nabbing a handful of cookies on her way. She grinned. “Gotta have cookies with cocoa.”

“You’ll never sleep with all the sugar from the cookies,” Naomi scolded.

Beth just shrugged, grinning as she poured hot water into a thermal mug, and dumped in instant cocoa mix. “I don’t have to get up in the morning.” She raised her mug. “Cheers!”

Naomi rolled her eyes, giggling, as she stirred her own mug of cocoa. “Good grief. Come on, let’s get to bed, Sis.”

Chapter29

Frowning,Naomi studied the board on the table, and the letter rack in front of her.

“Hah!” Grinning, she chose some of her letter tiles and placed them on the Scrabble board. “Equal.”

“Dang, that’s good,” Beth approved, studying her own letters. “I can make something with that Q. There… Aqua.”

Naomi stuck her tongue out at her sister.

“And I can do llama from the L.” Liam placed four of his tiles on the board.

It had been two days since Lady Flora had declared them not to be Rogues, and Naomi and Beth were still reeling a little. But Beth was looking better, although she said she’d slept most of the day while Naomi was at work. Liam had taken them both out to dinner. When they had returned, Beth pointed out the shelves in the lounge that had, amongst a jumble of books and magazines, a number of board games. After some friendly squabbling, they’d decided on Scrabble, and settled on the comfortable furniture in the lounge to play.

The scrunch of wheels on gravel announced someone’s arrival at the inn, and Naomi craned her neck to look out the front window.

“It’s Miss... I mean, Lady Flora,” she said. She frowned, watching the older woman climb from the back seat of what was apparently an Uber, leaning heavily on her cane. “Maybe we should go help her in,” she fretted.

Liam grinned at her. “You know she’s not old. I mean, she is,” he amended. “She’s like, really,reallyold, according to Maroulla. Like, millenia old.”