Page 87 of Fresh Old Bounties

It didn’t mean I had to do it with my own hands.

“Why didn’t you report him to the bounty hunters, let others do the deed?” I caressed his face with my thumb, and he turned his cheek into the palm of my hand.

“My partner, my responsibility.”

“He wasn’t your partner for that long,” I pointed out. From what I remembered, Ian had lost his partner in his early or mid-twenties.

“Long enough.”

And there lay the crux of the matter. The man had continued his hitman career under Ian’s nose. Once Ian had discovered what had been going on, his guilt at not realizing earlier must’ve eaten him alive. He must’ve blamed himself for whatever deaths had happened while he was around.

Ian might be a bounty hunter, but there was nothing wrong with his moral code.

But Ian wasn’t a man of many words, and making him admit all this would not get us anywhere. He wasn’t stupid—part of him must know it wasn’t his fault.

So, I simply hugged him tight, telling him without words that I understood, and he’d find no pity or blame coming from me.

His arms came around me, pressing me close until I was sitting on his lap.

“Is that why you’re helping me?” I asked after a long time. “Why you help the strays? To clear your conscience?” To become the kind of mentor he had deserved but hadn’t gotten.

“No,” he said, sounding more like himself. Then his voice became the tiniest bit like mine. “Because it’s the right thing to do.”

The callback to my words when I’d tried to convince him to help Hutton just about melted my insides.

TWENTY-ONE

Friday dawned cloudy but not rainy, which was excellent weather for a tea shop. I had hazy memories of falling asleep in Ian’s lap, but when I’d woken up, I’d been in his guest room. In his guest room and running awfully late, so I hadn’t had the time to be nosy about his accommodations as I rushed out of the house.

Ian had killed his ex-partner to stop his killing-for-hire.

It was so simple, and yet so complicated. But the strays had already arrived by the time I’d woken up, and in my hurry to avoid being seen and getting home, I hadn’t been able to talk to him.

Not that he’d want to rehash the whole thing again.

I shouldn’t have taken so many pains to hurry because Dru had already opened the shop, looking like yesterday’s disappointment at the PBOA and not catching the thief hadn’t closed a door but opened a window into the land of steely determination.

“Let’s take another look at your grandma’s spellbook,” she said the moment I stepped through the door.

I halted, startled. “What? Why?”

“I want to make sure we didn’t miss anything.”

“I’ve read it a thousand times. There’s nothing to miss.”

“You have read it a thousand times,” she said triumphantly, as if it explained everything.

I got the gist, though, and she might have a point. How many times had I read the shop’s introduction on our website without noticing I hadn’t mentioned the word “tea” a single time until Doyle had pointed it out?

After washing my face and changing clothes, I grabbed Grandma’s spellbook and brought it down. With any luck, Bagley was still in the ether, as I didn’t relish her spying on us, but I also didn’t want to leave the shop unattended.

The man who had robbed us at gunpoint might be gone, but my paranoia wasn’t ready to stand down.

You know how it goes—find a robber unconscious on your floor, know there’s a dozen waiting inside your walls.

Dru took the spellbook from my hands and studied the front and back before placing it carefully on the counter. Opening the cover, she ran her fingers around the inside binding.

“Checking for hidden notes?” I guessed.

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