“Yes?” I asked.
She wanted to know if I was going to keep my promise to take her for a walk tonight.
“A walk?” I asked. I usually went out at night for an hour or two looking for Ellie.
She was out there, somewhere. Alone, and I hoped okay. I didn’t know, or at least I didn’t think I knew. I’d been keeping notes on my phone. I should probably check them before going to bed tonight.
I watched Gerard squat down so he was at his son’s height. He placed his hand on Jax’s shoulder. Words were spoken. Jax looked at the floor.
Slowly and self-consciously, Jax walked over to the table, where Akeyla ate her burger. He touched her arm.
She pulled away and wouldn’t look at him.
Jax slumped. His face fell. And the consequences of his behavior landed fully on his young soul.
He looked up at his father, who shook his head. Jax picked up his meal from the stack and walked away, presumably toward his parents’ car.
Akeyla chewed. Gerard followed his son toward the door, with Axlam and Maura following behind. And I stood on the deck watching everyone leave my little niece to eat her fries alone.
Something that, at least tonight, she seemed perfectly happy to do.
Sal tossed me another request for walk.
I rubbed my forehead and looked out along the lakeshore. “I should go in,” I said. My burger was getting cold, and my family needed me.
Ellie needed me, or so I told myself every night when I walked into the woods to search for stray magic and my dog.
Or maybe she didn’t. Maybe I needed her. Maybe I was intruding into a life I had no business touching.
Women were confusing.
I swung Sal onto my shoulder. “Maybe later,” I said, and walked away from the woods and toward the bright, burger-scented kitchen.
Chapter 9
It turned out our interloper had showed up two more times on Saturday, first at the Wolftown Gallery, and later still at Alfheim’s main grocery store out on the highway. Both times he’d sauntered in, done a lot of sniffing, and made a scene. Nothing broken, thank goodness, but he did rant about the “tribal” art at the gallery. And at the grocery store, he complained about the “pedestrian” deli choices.
Then he vanished. No security camera picked up a car with a license to trace. None of the local hotels or resorts had anyone staying who matched his description.
I was beginning to think that Alfheim had been crashed by the world spirit of Entitled Arrogance.
Thing was, the Wolftown Gallery was within three blocks of the homes of half the Alfheim Pack’s members, and according to Ed, no one had sensed anything weird. Same for the one elf who’d been in the grocery store.
That was five days ago. He’d left behind no magicks, and had somehow managed to avoid leaving any clear security footage. No one had seen—or sensed—him since.
Not me. Not Ed or any of the elves. Not the pack. Our interloper had disappeared as quickly as he’d appeared.
So Alfheim went about her business of preparing for the Samhain runs and the coming blizzard.
Because we most definitely had a blizzard coming. I felt it in my bones—and on the skin of my face. The morning was the coolest yet, as if the coming storms wanted to make sure all of Alfheim remembered to buy milk and coffee, and to make sure we all had gas for our generators and wood for our fireplaces. I left the garage door open anyway, for the bright Thursday morning light.
I probably should have dug around for a space heater.
Still, I had a bike in my garage that needed fixing. The kids had Thursday and Friday off for the yearly Minnesota Educators conference, and Akeyla was home, so I figured today was a good day to at least get one chore out of the way.
Turned out that the green bike’s brakes needed tightening. The rear tire also needed replacing—a patch would hold, but both tires were worn and in bad shape. The frame showed a little rust, too, and at least two coats of paint under the green—one red, and under that a thick layer of orange. The entire crank and pedal assembly wobbled enough that the chain easily slipped off the gears.
The frame had a heft to it that modern bikes did not, and all the mechanisms were well-worn and heavily used.
I wiped my hands on a rag and stepped back. The garage needed cleaning before the snow hit, otherwise Maura’s sedan would be out on the gravel with Bloodyhood. I couldn’t get the truck into the garage with the plow, so Maura might as well use it.
But for the moment I had an old forest green bike leaning on its loose kickstand in the middle of the garage floor as I tested its parts and wiggled its bits.
“Vintage” best described the bike’s workings. It was a lovely bit of craftsmanship, but like all old things that had lived a good life, it really needed to retire.
I pulled out my phone to snap a few images of the frame. Perhaps the shop in town could get me the parts I—
And there she was looking out at me, my sad-eyed mystery woman hugging my wayward dog.
Her name was Ellie. Ellie Jones. I had notes.
The bike was hers.
I looked up at the clear blue of the pre-blizzard sky. I was to fix the bike and leave it with a new cellphone against the outside railing of my deck, near the gap that led to the path into the woods.
That explained why I had a second phone sitting on the kitchen counter next to my landline.
My notes read like a hostage exchange—leave the bike, the phone, your million small, non-sequential doubts and worries under the oak tree or you will never see your dog again.
Why would I be so terse? My healthy and happy hound came home regularly. The hostage here was a
