by Celia Roman
I outlined what we found, hesitated a bit. Me and Riley been dating nigh on a month now and it was still a mite awkward, for my part anyhow. I glanced over my shoulder. David had his back to me, so I made a soft kissy noise into the phone and hung up with my cheeks flaming hot.
This dating thing was tough going sometimes.
I shoved my phone into my back jeans pocket as I shambled over to David, still crouched beside the fallen painter. “Left a message for him.”
David glanced up at me, his eyes squinted against the sun hanging in a pure azure sky. “Should we move her out of the road?”
I shook my head reflexively, paused. Not a lot of traffic out here, what with the road being so bad and all, but if a Jeep or truck topped that hill near dusk, the driver might miss the painter. It was big enough to cause a vehicle to flip or otherwise do real damage.
I sighed. “Yeah, we better. I got the front paws.”
David nodded and stood, and I bent over. On the way down, the painter’s eyes, permanently open in death, caught my gaze and I stopped in mid-stoop. Human eyes stared back at me, deep brown, round of pupil. Eyes about like I had before that no good scoundrel Teus changed ‘em blue.
Well, crap. This weren’t no painter after all, not a natural one nohow, and I had no idea what to do about it.
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