“Cid, I was about to tell Ted about my mystery date last night. Would you like to come in and sit with us, or listen outside the door?” Mia asked sweetly.
Ted started laughing.
“I’m in. Should I ring the bell? Murphy has far-out ideas on who you dined with.”
Mia looked at Ted, and he nodded.
Cid trotted over to the bell and rung it. They watched as Murphy moved down the hillside.
Ted opened the door, and Mia walked in and on through to the kitchen. She was hungry. She picked up a frying pan, and Cid took it from her.
“No sense in starting a fire. I promise to make you something to eat after you tell us.”
Mia turned and looked at the three males and nodded. She smiled and announced, “I met my grandfather.”
“Orion?” Ted asked.
“No, Émile Neyer. He’s my mother’s father. He didn’t even know I existed until my aunt Aubree saw the Ice Queen poster. You see, I look just like my grandmother Adele at this age.” Mia proceeded to tell them all about the meal and the kind offer of the visit. When she was finished, she raised her hand and said, “There’s more. Grandma Fred came to see me last night while I was waiting for you, Ted. She said that Émile is to be trusted, and that if this battle between good and evil starts, that I’m to take my family and my friends to stay with them in Alsace. That you would be safe there.”
“In France?” Murphy asked. “With frogs?”
Ted burst out laughing. Cid shook his head.
“And I thought I was bad,” Mia said. “You need classes.” Mia pointed at Murphy.
He smiled.
“So there is to be a battle?” Cid asked.
“I don’t know much about it,” Mia confessed. “But all this attention I’ve been getting has to do with recruitment. It may not happen for years, but evidently, sides are being drawn.”
“Does this explain the ramping up of the incidents of live haunts?” Ted asked.
Mia shrugged her shoulders. “I’m not sure. It would be nice to get a straight answer out of one of them, but no one’s volunteering any information.”
“Have you chosen?” Ted asked.
“Sides?” Mia asked. “I’m fighting for the human race. Last night, when I was floundering with my first flight, I promised my shield and sword to Sariel if he would get me to you. He wouldn’t accept it, as I was under duress. He stressed that he was there to help me, not recruit me.”
Ted took her hands and looked down at her with tear-filled eyes. “You would have enslaved yourself to Sariel as long as he got you to me. I could have rejected you, but still you did this.”
“Ted, when are you going to realize that you are the single most important person in my life? I’m nothing without you,” Mia said, embarrassed.
Murphy put a hand on Cid’s shoulder and drew him away from the couple. They both left the house and walked out into the yard.
“How do you feel about this Sariel?” Cid asked Murphy.
“I’ve never had a conversation with him, but he has been good and kind to Mia.”
“But so has Angelo,” Cid pointed out.
“Angelo wants more than Mia’s sword,” Murphy stressed. “He wants to possess her. He wants something from her that she has already promised to another. Sariel just wants a solider.”
“What about you?” Cid asked.
“I fight with Mia on the ground. Up there, I don’t belong.” Murphy shivered at the thought. “Up there, I want the mightiest of angels at her side.”
“Ted thinks Angelo will protect Mia because he loves her.”
Murphy spoke plainly, “Love gets in the way of common sense. It makes us weak when tough decisions have to be made. Believe me, I know.”
Cid nodded. “Well, starting the day after tomorrow, we are going to have the farm to ourselves. It’s just going to be us bachelors, no babies or women to mess with us.”
Murphy smiled. “We ought to kick up our heels.”
“Yes, we should,” Cid agreed.
“You are truly amazing. Are you sure I’m the one?” Ted asked.
“Why not?” she said. “You’re impossible to replace. I’ve looked in Heaven and in Hell for your replacement, and I could find no one that understands me better.”
Ted looked at the vacated kitchen. “We lost the chef.”
“Seems so, but I’m no longer hungry,” Mia said coyly.
“You, you’re not hungry?”
“Nope, not for food,” she said. A shadow fell across her face.
“What is it?” Ted asked, concerned.
“Last night, my grandmother took my ability to bear children away from me, temporarily.”
“Can she do that?”
“Evidently so.”
“Well, we did want to wait, and I’m going broke buying protection. Let’s look at this as a good thing,” he decided.
Mia smiled. “I was hoping you’d think so.”
“Does that mean no PMS or visits from Bloody Mary?”
“Ted!” Mia said, embarrassed.
“Well, we’ll take it one day at a time. Right now, I think we need to investigate if you’ve got any more feathers.”
Mia’s blush turned beet red. She picked up a tea towel and snapped him with it and took off running. She made the stairs by the time he caught up with her. He scooped her up and charged up the steps and into the master suite, kicking the door shut after him.
Cid looked over at Murphy. “First, a trip to Home Depot. Come on, I’ll let you pick out a tree to plant in celebration of Ted getting his head out of his ass.”
A shriek of outrage followed by Mia’s giggles rang through the countryside. Murphy looked at Cid and said, “Two trees.”
Chapter Sixteen
They passed the old house without seeing it. Mia was too preoccupied with Brian, who had to be convinced to stay in the car seat for another five minutes. And this five minutes was indeed just five minutes this time. Ted turned onto the long winding road that would take them to their rented cottage on the east side of Wolf’s Head Lake.
