by Ann Charles
For another, it involved blood—mine.
After a long, steamy shower where I considered the pros and cons of being an Executioner in between wondering why Prudence had called me before the birds had even woken up, I joined Doc, Aunt Zoe, and the kids in the kitchen.
“Coop called,” Doc told me as he handed me a cup of coffee. “He wants us at the taxidermy shop at noon.”
I nodded and then raised the mug to my lips, taking a sip. “Mmmm. Nice and yummy.” I went up on my toes and gave him a thank-you peck on the lips. “Like you, Mr. Nyce.”
“And morning cookies,” he shot back with a wink.
“Come on, Mom,” Layne mumbled at the table through a mouthful of scrambled eggs. “I’m trying to eat here.”
Doc laughed and returned to manning the stove.
“What’s a taxidermy shop?” Addy asked, chomping on an apple slice. “Do you go there to pay your taxes?”
Layne snorted. “No, you bozo.” He started to lift a forkful of scrambled eggs to his mouth, but then jerked and spilled the eggs into his lap. “Mom! Addy kicked me.”
I grabbed a plate from the cupboard. “Adelynn Renee, keep your feet to yourself.” I stabbed a piece of French toast from the serving tray in the center of the table and dropped it on my plate. “Layne, you should refrain from calling your sister names if you don’t want to get kicked under the table.”
I set my plate down next to where Aunt Zoe was enjoying a cup of coffee with a faraway look in her eyes. I wondered where she was at the moment, and if there were a certain fire captain there with her. And if that fire captain had been tied up on a set of railroad tracks or in a bed.
Before I settled in at the table, I stepped over to Addy and gave her a “good-morning” kiss on the top of the head. Hold up! Her hair had smelled earthy. That was weird.
I leaned down and gave her another kiss, sneaking in a good sniff. Earthy and musky, along with a hint of pine and … dog!
I tipped her chin up, taking a closer inspection of her face. Her cheeks were pink. Too pink. Fresh from outside in the snow pink.
“Enough already, Mother,” she said, pulling free of my grip. “I love you, too.”
I focused on Layne, whose food-stuffed cheeks were also rosy, along with his nose. I walked over and kissed him on the temple, letting my lips linger a moment. His skin was cool to the touch.
He pulled away from me. “Mom! I told you I’m trying to eat.” He pointed his fork at the mound of scrambled eggs on his plate. “Doc says I have to eat a man-sized portion if I’m going to grow as tall and strong as him and Coop.”
I stepped back and looked toward the back door. The dark blue sweater I’d been wearing over my camisole last night hung on the wall peg next to it. That was odd. I could’ve sworn I’d left it draped over the back of the sofa in the living room last night before heading up to bed with my cookies.
I marched over to the sweater, zeroing in on the long, white dog hairs as I closed in on it. There were also a few darker hairs along with some pine needles and a couple of tiny twigs caught in the weave, not to mention a good helping of dirt sprinkled throughout. I lifted it from the peg. The front and sleeves were damp. I held it up, frowning at a streak of what I hoped was slobber and not snot on one of the shoulders. I leaned closer and sniffed, wincing at the strong eau de dirty dog.
Busted!
I whirled around, my jaw clenched.
Four pairs of eyes were watching me.
I homed in on the two kids sitting still as statues at the table. “Where is it?”
“Where’s what?” Addy said, her eyes bright. She smiled extra wide, looking a little too much like a miniature, demented, killer clown for my comfort.
I cringed slightly. The poor kid took after me more than I realized some days.
“Where is Rooster?” I asked the two slapdash schemers.
On the way back to the table, I swung by the laundry room door and tossed my sweater in on the washer.
Addy gave an uneasy laugh. “Elvis is a chicken, mom. Not a rooster.”
I pointed at her. “Don’t play dumb with me, child.” When I turned on Layne, he stuffed more scrambled eggs in his mouth, focusing intently on his plate.
I harrumphed and paid a visit to the sink, washing my hands. “What have you two done with that dog?”
“We didn’t do nothing,” Addy defended.
“Then why does my sweater stink like the dirty mutt?”
A glance in Doc’s direction as I dried my hands found him taking great care while flipping pieces of French toast in the frying pan. I looked closer. Was he biting back a grin? No. Maybe. Why? Was he aiding and abetting my children on this dog business? Surely he wouldn’t …
I turned to Aunt Zoe. She hid behind her coffee cup.
My jaw clenched. A lot of help she was. This was her house. She should be the one putting her foot down. Then I could be a lazy parent and blame her for not letting my kids add yet another critter to what was becoming the Parker Zoo.
I took a deep breath, taking control of the situation along with my temper before joining them at the table. “We are not keeping that dog,” I stated in a calm, clear voice.
“But Mom!” Addy wailed, whining at the exact pitch that always made my shoulders scrunch up. Jumping jitterbugs! She could give that banshee a run for her money. “Why not?”
“You didn’t even give poor Rooster a try,” Layne accused, scowling at me over his eggs.
“I don’t need to give that dog a try!” I waved my hands exaggeratedly in the air, losing my grip on that slippery calm. After putting up with Nachzehrer, the imp, the banshee, Prudence, Dominick, and that damned licking ghost, I’d reached the bottom of my well of control. “We have already forced Aunt Zoe to accept two messy kids and their crazy mom in her house, along with a vegetarian cat, an escape-artist hamster, and a mother-clucking chicken!”
“Don’t forget a large human male,” Doc said, placing a bottle of boysenberry syrup in front of me as I huffed and puffed and tried to blow the house down around me.
He gripped my shoulders, squeezing lightly. I wasn’t sure if it was to show me some support or to hold me down before I flew completely off the handle. His squeeze turned into a massage, releasing some of my tension.
“I was messy before you two came and I’ll be messy after,” Aunt Zoe told the kids. She patted my hand. “And crazy, too.” Then the traitor smiled up at Doc. “And it’s nice to have a man around here, especially these days.”
I shoved several curls out of my face that had come loose during my big bad wolf impression and grumbled into my cup of coffee for several slurps.
“See, Mom.” Addy grabbed a piece of French toast and dropped it onto her plate, giving me an it-will-all-be-okay look. “Aunt Zoe doesn’t mind us or our animals.”
I held out my hand, stopping any further animal-related mouth traffic. “No dog.”
“Boys are supposed to have dogs for best friends,” Layne groused and stabbed a slice of apple with gusto.
It was time to change the subject before my head exploded like a dying star.
“Aunt Zoe, how did things go with Reid and his son?” She’d evaded my questions last night after everyone left, claiming exhaustion and hurrying off to bed.
She avoided my raised brows, but her neck and cheeks darkened.
Doc returned to the stove, stirring some cheese into the skillet of scrambled eggs.
“Do you think Reid likes dogs?” Addy asked Layne in the awkward silence.
Layne perked up. “Maybe. We could ask him.”
“If he does,” Addy plotted out loud, “we can visit him and Rooster every day.”
“Would you look at that,” Aunt Zoe said, staring down at her bare wrist. “It’s time for me to get to work.”
I watched her rise from the table, empty coffee cup in hand, and scowled at her backside as she walked away. “When are you going to tell me about last night?” I wasn’t giving up that easily.
“There’s nothing to tell.” She set her cup in the sink. “Reid and his son came to dinner. The kids and I played hosts. We fed them before sending them on their way.” She came back with a washrag and wiped off the table where she’d spilled a drop of coffee.
“You know,” I said while slathering some butter on my French toast. “If you won’t answer my questions about Reid, I’ll be forced to pump my two children for information.”
My kids looked from me to her with wide eyes.
She clenched the dishcloth in her fist, squeezing several drips out of it onto the table. “Violet Lynn, there is nothing else to tell.”
I uncapped the bottle of boysenberry syrup and drizzled some over my food. “Addy and Layne, what was Reid’s son like?”
“Tall and strong.” Layne went back to shoveling in eggs.
“I’m pretty sure he likes dogs and chickens,” Addy added, struggling to cut her French toast with her fork. “He was laughing at my stories about Rooster and Elvis.”
I bet he was. I’d be chuckling too if it weren’t my children taking in every other stray animal in the dang neighborhood.
Doc came over with an empty plate and a bowl of steaming scrambled eggs. He spooned some onto my dish before sitting down at the table next to me and loading up his own. “Martin mentioned during our last poker game that his son is a firefighter, too.”
“A fireman, huh?” I reached into the middle of the table and stabbed a couple pieces of French toast, unloading them onto Doc’s plate for him. “Layne, does Reid’s boy look like his dad, only a bit younger?”
Layne swallowed. “His hair was colored more like mine, but his eyes were the same as his dad’s.”
Doc reached for the maple syrup on the table between the kids, but then paused after watching my daughter struggle with her fork. “Addy, do you want some help cutting that?”
She sighed and pushed her glasses up her nose. “Yes, please.” She handed him her plate.
“Equilateral triangles, trapezoids, or rhombuses today?” Doc asked, his knife and fork poised at the ready.
She pursed her lips. “What’s a trapezoid again?”
“Two sides are parallel,” Layne answered.
“That one, please,” she said, stirring whatever was in the coffee mug in front of her.
I pointed my fork at her. “What’s in your cup?”
“Doc made the kids hot cocoa,” Aunt Zoe said, sitting back down at the table. Apparently, she’d decided to stick around after all.
Addy took a sip, licking the chocolate mustache off her upper lip afterward. “He put some caramel on the bottom and topped it with marshmallows and chocolate chips.”
Yowza, that was a lot of sugar.
I aimed a raised eyebrow at Doc. “Are you planning to hook them up to a dog sled and have them pull you around the neighborhood this morning?”
Doc handed Addy back her plate full of trapezoid-shaped pieces of French toast. “We’re going to the Rec Center after you head to work. Right, guys?”
“Yeah!” Layne shouted and hopped out of his chair. He jabbed his elbows around in the air several times, like some kind of weird robot dance, and then sat down again.
I gawked at him as I chewed, wondering if he had a kangaroo stuffed somewhere in his pajama pants. “What was that about?”
Doc swallowed a forkful of eggs. “We’re going to practice some elbow strikes today when we spar.”
“Doc showed us some bruised-knee videos the other night on his computer,” Addy explained, digging into her French toast.
“Bruce Lee videos,” Doc corrected with a smile. “Although ‘bruised knee’ works too for that one guy who broke a board over Bruce’s knee.”
Doc had been teaching my kids some self-defense moves over the last few months at the Rec Center. The kids thought they were learning self-defense for fun, but the rest of us adults knew better. My family was at risk as much as I was when it came to the hazards of my killing profession.
The Executioner gene traveled down through the female line, making Addy the next Scharfrichter if I was eliminated from this game before my job was finished. But Layne wasn’t free of peril either, even though he was a male. Many, many generations ago, one of my ancestors hooked up with a hybrid male called a Summoner, if I remembered right, mixing together DNA in their offspring and adding the possibility that Layne might turn into something equally as worrisome as Addy.
Doc was doing his best to protect my kids by way of training them how to defend themselves if something came to wipe us all out, like what had happened to Prudence’s family long ago.
Me? I was just trying to stay alive long enough to see them into adulthood and keep this “killer” curse from falling on Addy’s shoulders before she was strong enough to fight back.
I focused back on Aunt Zoe. “Spill it, darlin’. What happened at supper last night?”
She shrugged. “Like I said before, we enjoyed a meal together and then they left. After the kids and I cleaned up the kitchen, they went to bed and I waited up for you guys to come home.”
I shook my head, rejecting her lame answer, and turned to my daughter. “Addy, what happened at supper last night?”
She swallowed her mouthful of French toast before answering. “Let’s see. Reid and his boy came over. Aunt Zoe made some really good chicken and biscuits for all of us. She made me wash my hands for thirty whole seconds before we ate because I showed Reid’s boy Elvis’s pen in the basement. For dessert, we had ice cream and cookies and Reid’s boy told me that he and his friends had to rescue a dog and a cat from the same tree once. He said the cat chased the dog up the tree and then they were both too scared to come down.” She giggled and stabbed two trapezoids at once. “I would’ve liked to have seen that crazy cat at work.”
Interesting—not just the story, but … “It sounds like Reid’s son is good with kids and pets. Does he have any children of his own?”
“Nope,” Layne answered. “He told us that he’s not ready to settle down yet.”
A low laugh came from my aunt’s direction. “That apple didn’t fall far from the tree.”
“Reid’s son used to be one of those firefighters who parachutes into the middle of a fire,” Layne said, pausing to slurp down some cocoa. “He has a bad scar on his arm and leg from a wildfire that nearly killed him.”
I looked at Aunt Zoe. “Really?”
She nodded solemnly. “He lost a couple of friends in that fire. I don’t think he’s made peace with it yet, either.”
“How long ago was that?”
“Just last year. He’s since returned to working out of a station instead of fighting wildfires.”
“He doesn’t think he wants to jump into fires anymore,” Addy added. “And I’m glad, because he’s a very nice boy and I’d hate to see him get hurt again.”
I smirked. Addy’s use of “boy” when talking about Reid’s son sounded like he wasn’t much older than my kids. But if my math was right, he must be in his early thirties.
“What’s Reid’s son’s name?” I asked anyone at the table.
“Ox,” Addy said.
“That’s not his name,” Layne said. “It’s his fireman nickname.” He looked at Doc. “May I be excused?”
Doc nodded, pointing his fork at Layne’s dirty dishes. Without a single complaint, Layne took his plate, silverware, and mug to the sink before racing out of the room. I watched the kid go with my jaw unhinged. Had an alien come down to Earth and taken over my kid?
“His name is Oscar,” Aunt Zoe clarified. “He’s an inch or so shorter than Doc and strong like his dad from chopping down trees and digging fire lines in the forest for the past decade. His hair is sandy brown, like Layne’s, and he’s handsome in a rugged way that will likely end up breaking many poor girls’ hearts in the years to come if hose jockeying continues to be his obsession.” She crossed her arms. “Now, can I go to work?”
I held up my finger. “One more thing.”
“On
ly one?” she teased. “That doesn’t sound like you.”
I chose my words carefully since Addy and her big ears were still at the table. “Does Ox begrudge your past copulatory congressions?”
“What’s ‘begrudge’ mean?” Addy asked, apparently getting stuck on that first big word, as I’d hoped she would.
“Feel bitter about something,” Doc explained.
“Oh.” She picked up her cocoa. “Ox told me he has a parrot that talks to him while he shaves every morning.” She took a drink. “If we can’t have a dog, Mom, can we get a bird?”
“You already have one.”
“I mean a parrot.”
“Nope.”
She sighed. “You didn’t even think about it before answering.”
“I don’t need to. There will be no dogs or parrots or tortoises or ferrets or snakes or lizards or fish.”
She snorted. “Like I’d ever want a fish.”
What? Hadn’t she asked for a fish tank for Christmas?
“All they do is swim around and poop.” She looked at Doc. “May I please be excused, Doc? I’m super-duper full.”
He reached over and mussed her hair. “Sure, kid. Rest up a little before we go work off this breakfast at the gym.”
She deposited her dishes in the sink and left the kitchen a little slower than her brother, holding her full belly.
“Well?” I asked Aunt Zoe.
She smirked. “I don’t think Ox even knows that his father and I were ever an item.”
“Shit.” Doc sucked air through his teeth, shaking his head.
Reid had told me yesterday that his son knew a little about “recent history” events, but he hadn’t clarified exactly how recent. “So, you think Reid never mentioned anything about you two to Ox back then?”
“Ox didn’t act like he knew one iota about our sordid past. But I can’t hold that against him. His father, however, has proven yet again what an idiot I’d been before.”
Ouch. That had to sting a little. Or a lot. I took a bite of French toast. Why hadn’t Reid said anything about my aunt to his kid back then?
“I liked Reid’s son,” Aunt Zoe continued. “He was courteous and friendly. And he really was genuinely great with your kids.”
