Page 67 of Open Season

“I think you’re going overboard with this protection business.”

“Maybe, maybe not. Today the mayor got me to run a tag number; he said he’d seen the car parked in the fire lane at Dr. Bennett’s office. Guess whose tag it was?”

“Whose?”

“Yours.”

“Mine!” she said indignantly. “I’ve never parked in a fire lane in my life!”

He hid a grin as he set Midas down. “I didn’t think so. Do you have any idea why the mayor would want me to run your tag number?”

Slowly she shook her head.

“If he had seen your car, he’d have known it was you, so obviously someone else got him to do it. That has me a little worried. The good thing is, you’ve moved, so your address isn’t the same as what’s on your registration.”

She gasped. “My goodness, I totally forgot about that! I’ll go to the courthouse and change—”

“No, you will not,” he said sternly. “Not until I find out what’s going on.”

“Why don’t you just ask Temple?”

“Because I feel uneasy about the whole thing. Until I’m satisfied nothing suspicious is going on, I don’t want you to give out your new address to anyone. Tell your family to keep it quiet, too.”

“But if anyone wants to know where I live, all he has to do is follow me home from work—”

“After today, I’ll handle that. I’ll drive you home, and I guarantee no one will be able to tail us.”

She stared up at him, at the hard cast of his expression, and realized he was deadly serious. For the first time, a frisson of alarm skittered up her spine. Jack was worried, and that worried her.

Midas scampered into the kitchen, and she heard the splat as he landed in his water bowl. “Get the puppy and take him out in the backyard while I mop up the water,” she said, sighing. “Then we’ll go to bed.”

“With him?”

“He’s a baby. You don’t want him to cry all night, do you?”

“Better him than me,” Jack muttered, but he obediently took Midas outside and was back in five minutes with a sleepy puppy in his arms.

“I suppose he sleeps in the middle,” he said, grumbling.

Daisy sighed. “At this point, I’ll let him sleep wherever he wants. And we have to take him out every two hours.”

“Do what?” he said in disbelief.

“I told you, he’s a baby. Babies can’t hold it.”

“I can tell this is going to be a great night.”

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