“Yes?” He canted his head. “I walked out here. Ran, actually.”
Groggy from my wakeup, I missed the big picture earlier. “You hunted in my backyard?”
“Your yard is warded.” He smiled the tiniest bit. “I hunted in your neighbor’s yard.”
“This isn’t going to be a problem, is it?” I gestured between us. “Whatever this is.”
Without answering me, he turned on his heel to go, with that pleased-as-pie look on his face.
He made it to the end of my driveway before I caved to my better nature.
“Wait,” I called to him. “I’ll drive you.”
Rushing inside, I changed clothes and pulled up my hair. “Colby, I’m heading to work.”
No answer.
No surprise there.
I scribbled a note that said the same and stuck it to the pantry where I kept her pollen.
Asa waited for me with one hand in his pocket. When I rolled to a stop beside him, he made no move to get in. I stared at him. He stared right back. I considered driving over his foot. He only widened his smile.
Giving in to him, a dangerous habit to start, I leaned across the seat and shoved open his door.
“You are one weird dude.” I strapped on my seat belt. “Why did you stand there?”
“You had to invite me in.”
A laugh burst out of me. “Are you serious?”
“No.” He laughed too, softer. “I was teasing.”
After the drama from yesterday, he was trying to make amends. I appreciated that, and I decided I might not want to beat him to death with his own shoe after all. Daemon culture wasn’t a subject I had studied with my parents or later, with Black Hat, though some witches specialized in summoning the nastier ones.
From my general studies, I couldn’t peg Asa’s caste. He didn’t behave like any daemon mentioned in the darker texts that had been my focus. Maybe his fae blood was to blame. I wasn’t sure, and it was rude to ask. Worse, it would open me up to questions like So, were you born evil, or did you choose to be?
For a black witch, there was only one answer. For me? I wasn’t so sure anymore.
The radio kept us entertained on the way to town, and I dropped Asa off at his hotel to free Clay.
As much as I hated to abandon my store, I didn’t have much choice. I couldn’t balance both jobs without dropping one or the other, and the case had to be my priority. I had my speech planned out when Arden glanced up from the counter and pointed to voices coming from the back room.
I followed the conversation to Miss Dotha, who sat behind my desk. Hunched over my desktop, Camber beside her, she had started filling online orders that needed to go out on our next mail drop. Her glasses had slid to the end of her nose, which almost touched the screen, but her cheeks were flush with purpose.
Miss Dotha, being farsighted, had no trouble spotting me across the room. “What are you doing here?”
“I work here?”
Camber snorted then straightened when Miss Dotha gave her side-eye. “Why aren’t you on vacation?”
While the girls believed I was helping the police put my abusive ex behind bars, Miss Dotha, and the rest of the town, got the much more vanilla excuse of me taking a trip to the mountains.
“I came to break the news to the girls.” I smoothed an eyebrow. “I see you have things under control.”
“Gran told me you called her to set things up,” Camber confessed, “and I told Arden.”
The phone tree was a real thing in this town. Probably everyone and their momma knew I was leaving.