Page 22 of The Vampire and the Case of the Perilous Poltergeist

I slid into the cab next to Fluffy and scratched his ears. He leaned into me and I put my arm around him as Connor drove us back to the Airbnb.

When we arrived, Connor looked at Fluffy. ‘You still haven’t told her,’ he said softly. A beat later, Fluffy became Reggie.

‘Told me what?’ I asked, putting my arm back around my young friend.

He let out a breath. ‘Connor – well, I agreed, but the academy reached out to the Nomo’s office to have you and me do a K-9 presentation. It’s a three-day thing, but only for an hour each class.’ Reggie squirmed and looked at me hopefully. ‘If you want to, that is.’

I beamed at him. ‘Absolutely! It’ll be so much fun. We’ll blow them away!’

Reggie smiled. ‘I’ll be the best K-9 they’ve ever seen.’ I was positive that he would be. As Fluffy he was formidable, and he knew it. I was determined that one day he would know his worth as a human, too.

Reggie said a quiet goodnight then went to his and Shadow’s room next door. I was pleased that at least he walked out as a human.

As Connor and I went into our room, I wondered what I would do with three hours of K-9 class. I had no training and no teaching experience. Usually we winged it when we were working and used Fluffy’s intelligence to get us through by the seat of our pants. I knew from the movies that a lot of highly trained dogs were taught commands in German but neither Fluffy nor I spoke a lick of German. I’d studied French and Latin; French had been useful when I vacationed in southern France in my youth, but no onespokeLatin.

Well, this K-9 and handler spoke English, so that would have to do.

‘Penny for your thoughts?’ Connor asked me.

‘I’m thinking about the K-9 classes,’ I admitted. ‘Obviously Fluffy will do anything I ask of him, but I don’t know anything about being a proper K-9 handler. I’m going to have to spend some of our time together doing research if we want to pull this off.’

Connor nodded. ‘I know, but I think it’ll be worth it. Reggie’s self-confidence is so low, I thought this might bring him out ofhis shell a little, help him see his own worth. Then we can try and apply Fluffy’s confidence to Reggie.’

‘It’s a great idea.’ I kissed him. ‘And so thoughtful of you. Have I told you how much I love how much you care for my…’ I trailed off: ‘dog’ wasn’t quite the right word.

‘I know what you mean. Anyway, I’m not throwing you in the deep end without giving you some tools to kick ass with.’

‘I do like kicking ass,’ I said brightly. ‘What tools have you got for me?’

‘A training manual. With your memory, you’ll have it down before you’re put on the spot.’

I felt some relief at that. I had a superdog that no one knew was human under the fur, and I knew he’d do everything perfectly; frankly, I was the weakest link here. But I did have an excellent memory and the ability to absorb a book in record time. I could do this.

I slid Connor a sidelong glance. I suspected that Fluffy’s wasn’t the only confidence he was trying to bolster. He took a kettle out of his bag, filled it with water and started to make me an honest-to-goodness cup of tea. ‘You’re making me tea,’ I said dumbly.

He gave me his lopsided grin. ‘I’d give you the world if I could, but tea will have to do.’

I moved towards him and spoke some words I nevereverthought I’d hear myself say. ‘Fuck the tea.’

We stared at each other for a long moment then lunged. Without knowing quite how we got there, we were soon tangled on the bed and our clothes were disappearing as if by magic.

I wrapped myself in Connor and all my worries fled.

Chapter 20

When my alarm woke me at dawn after maybe an hour of sleep, my worries came flooding back. Connor was still asleep; it was daytime and he was on vampire time like I should have been, but I had to stay on academy time or going back would be a bitch. It would be jet lag times a million – no thank you.

I had to stay awake so I decided to use the time to creepily watch my boyfriend sleep then maybe read the manual he’d brought me. First, though, I checked on my animals. Fluffy wanted out. For the life of me I didn’t know why he didn’t shift and use the facilities, but I guessed his need to be Fluffy outweighed his discomfort at having to wait to be let out to go to the toilet. We had a long way to go. I comforted myself with Stan’s words: it would take time, but it would be possible for him to acclimatise to a human life again.

Shadow rubbed my legs, purred, then looked pointedly at his empty dishes. I had no idea what food Connor had brought so Ichecked the small fridge. There was a bag of the raw food mix I kept for Shadow at home; Connor must have grabbed some from the freezer. I’d had the vet and the internet help me come up with a diet for a lynx. It was a mess to make because I had to grind several types of meat together with vitamins and minerals, but it was worth it to have a healthy kitten.

Since I didn’t want to disturb Connor, I sat down at the tiny kitchen table in Fluffy and Shadow’s room to read the manual. I started with the sectionTracking with a K-9because it was something we did a lot at work and I was comfortable with it. The other two topics wereSearch and RescueandDrug Detecting. I shivered as I thought about the Savik brothers on our first search and rescue. We’d retrieved bodies, not living men – but at least we’d found them.

Drug Detectingalso made me wince. Technically, our fisheye case was still open. We knew who had been dealing in town, but the case had become much more involved when an army general had shown up and we became aware that Portlock had been chosen as a black government site for experimenting on supernats. The damned black-ops soldiers were still on the loose, and I feared they were using fisheye and other drugs in other paranormal towns. Taking them down was still very much on my to-do list.

The textbook was comprehensive, and I realised that Gunnar already knew all this stuff because he’d had Killer, a real trained K-9. Although Fluffy had never been formally trained, it was clear that Gunnar had been quietly teaching him when we went out on calls, so a lot of the information wasn’t as new as I’d feared it would be.

By the time I’d finished reading, I was feeling a lot more optimistic. We could absolutely do this – or at least Fluffy could and I could act as if I knew what I was doing. Fake it till you make it.

---