Page 15 of The Claiming of the Shrew (Fated Mountain Lodge #4)

Leah shoved her shrew to the back of her mind and held up a finger, then another. “Thing one, I don’t have his number.”

“You don’t? Really?”

“It hadn’t come up yet,” Leah said, annoyed. “Thing two, raccoons don’t carry phones, and I think he’s off sneaking around somewhere as a raccoon.”

“Is that what he turns into?”

“We can’t all marry dragons, Joy.”

“I’m not casting aspersions on your raccoon, I swear.”

“I’m a shrew anyway,” Leah said loftily. “I am immune to shifter animal species-ism. Shrews are objectively the best shift type anyway, and raccoons are second best, so?—”

MIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINE

“—now we have that out of the way, if someone did plant that jewelry in Fawkes’s room, it had to be somebody who had the opportunity while Fawkes and I were out today. Joy, have you been in the hotel most of the day? Did you see anyone coming or going?”

“I was with Bar in the morning, then came back to take a nap. But, Leah, I didn’t exactly make a list of every person I ran into in the hallway on my way to or from my room.”

Leah heaved a sigh. “They’re always coming and going. I mean, people circulate in and out of the Menagerie all the time. And someone’s always running off on an errand or going to the bathroom or whatever.”

Joy glanced at the clock by the bed. “I’d love to help, but it’s going to have to wait for tomorrow. I have a date. Do you want to use my room tonight? Bar’s picking me up soon for a moonlight flight and then I’m spending the rest of the night at the house he’s building for us.”

“Sounds buggy and unpleasant,” Leah said, wildly jealous all of a sudden. She wanted to take a moonlight sneak with Fawkes.

There was a soft tap at the window. Leah jumped.

Joy rose from the bed. “In fact, my ride is here.”

Leah twisted around to look. She could just make out part of Bar’s huge draconic head through the window. A saucer-sized gold eye was looking in at them. Bar, as a dragon, was standing on his back legs so that he could look in the window.

“Show-off,” Leah remarked as her sister picked up a prepacked overnight bag sitting on a chair. “I assumed you were going out the front door.”

“You assumed wrong.” Joy opened the window and leaned out to pat Bar’s snout. “Hi, honey. Just let me get this fastened on.”

Bar obediently leaned forward so that she could reach the spikes just behind his head. Craning awkwardly out the window, Joy affixed the bag to the spikes by its strap. Then she returned to the bed to hug Leah.

“Oh, there’s no need—cut it out,” Leah protested, but allowed herself to be hugged.

“You’ll do just fine. I’ll be back in the morning. Maybe late morning. Pregnancy hormones seem to be making me extra?—”

“Shut up!” Leah covered her ears. “Too much information!”

Joy grinned. She shed her shirt and pants, leaving her in a loose undershirt. Then, with no noise or fanfare, she seemed to vanish and her clothes collapsed in a heap.

A moment later, a long-tailed Malabar giant squirrel shot from the heap. Unencumbered by its pregnant state, it hopped on the windowsill and from there to Bar’s head. Leah turned to watch as the squirrel ran down Bar’s neck and settled snuggly against his back spines.

“Have fun out there, you crazy kids,” Leah said wistfully.

She got up and made her way to the window, hanging on furniture, and leaned out.

Bar moved away from the lodge to the lawn and spread his wings.

There was a boom-crack like distant thunder as he snapped them in a downbeat, and Leah’s hair ruffled.

Then he took off, soaring up into the sky, where a near-full moon had risen above the trees.

Leah waved, though she had already lost sight of them against the sky.

She looked around for raccoons, saw none, but optimistically left the window open and went to sit on the bed.

In retrospect, getting Fawkes’s number would have been a great idea. She just hadn’t thought of it, because he was right here at the hotel, and cell phones didn’t work half the time around here anyway.

If the jewelry had been planted in Fawkes’s room, it must have happened while they were taking their hike.

Gloria’s makeup had probably been tampered with around the same time.

One person wreaking havoc? Two or more people?

The next thing was probably to talk to Gloria about who in the crew might have it in for her, but Maggie’s ban on interacting with the Menagerie was going to cause problems with that.

There was a hesitant tap on the door.

“Oh, now what,” Leah complained.

She crutched over and opened it. To her surprise, Sally was standing there, wringing her hands. The bit part actress and Leah barely knew each other.

“What?” Leah said, a little crossly.

Sally twisted her hands behind her back. “I thought I saw you go in here. Listen, I—I just wanted to tell you, I don’t think it’s fair, Maggie kicking you off the crew like that. You know, you’re great, and everyone likes you.”

“Oh.” Leah stared at her, mind going completely blank. “I, uh, thank you. I mean, really. Thank you.”

“I just wanted to tell you that.” Sally turned slightly pink. “And really, I don’t think you’re the one who did that to Gloria. It’s a stupid prank, that’s all. Someone’s gonna ‘fess up and we’ll all have a laugh about it. But I saw your face. It definitely wasn’t you.”

“Thank you,” Leah said earnestly. Now she felt bad about snooping in Sally’s room. Also, she was glad she hadn’t looked in the sex toy drawer. “I really appreciate you coming here to tell me that.”

Sally nodded, going pinker, and quickly withdrew.

Leah closed the door and found herself blinking back tears for very different reasons.

I DO have friends here, she reminded herself.

She was abruptly distracted by the sound of scrabbling claws and a thump.

Leah looked around in surprise. “Fawkes?” It hadn’t sounded big enough for a raccoon, but she was pretty sure something had just come in the window.

The room appeared to be empty.

“Fawkes, if you’re in here, this isn’t funny.”

She went over to the window, looking around as she did. A small shifter could be under the bed or in the closet. Or maybe she’d heard a branch scraping against the wall? She leaned out and looked around, but saw nothing.

“Fawkes?” she called softly.

There was no answer. As she started to pull back inside, she sensed more than heard someone moving behind her, and as she moved to whirl around, a pair of arms clamped on her from behind.

Leah got in a good backward elbow, heard a whuff of breath, and then one of the hands clapped something soft but smothering over her mouth and nose.

In panic, she shifted, but this just caused her to fall directly into the soft, damp cloth, which smelled overwhelmingly of a sharp-scented chemical.

She was out in seconds.