Page 28 of Mochas and Minotaurs

“I didn’t say you lived there, only that you work next door,” Nick clarified.

Okay. She knew there was something amiss but not the full story.

“Are you running away from like an arranged marriage or something?”

I didn’t hear Marcus’s response, but I could guess by Nick’s victorious, “I knew it!”

The rest of the day went by as usual, and with the Faux Hobo gone, I got more walk-ins from the street. It wasn’t long before 6 p.m. rolled around, and we were closing for the day.

The first thing I did when I got back upstairs was let Triscuit out. He was cross with me because I’d moved him back upstairs when my friends arrived, and he didn’t get to greet any customers. But with everything that had been happening, I felt it was safest with him at home.

“I promise, Triscuit, once everything settles down again, you can come to work with me and greet everyone.”

His response was to toss his toys on the floor one by one. When he started on some of my things, I reacted.

“No, Triscuit.”

He glared back at me and then tried to shove the antique crystal candy dish one more time. I concentrated on it, making the bottom of the dish magically sticky so it wouldn’t budge. This was how I’d trained him not to touch my things. I simply made them impossible to move, and over time, he just thought they were unmovable and left them alone.

Tired of shoving at the immovable crystal dish, he went for the foil-wrapped candy inside, picking each one up and flinging it across the room. He punctuated each flung candy with a maniacal laugh. I rubbed the bridge of my nose, feeling a headache coming on.

But I knew better than to yell at him because if I did, he’d just fling them faster and louder. At least this kept him occupied and not causing any more chaos. I quickly made up his dinner, defrosting some of his pre-cut fruit and vegetable mix in the microwave and adding his evening ration of pellets.

I eyed his frozen fruits and veggies, then decided to defrost some for myself in a bowl and consider it a strange salad. I still hadn’t gone grocery shopping this week. Responsible me should go do that right now. But I was tired, and I also felt guilty for spending so little time with Triscuit lately.

African greys were like toddlers. They needed a lot of attention, or else they became angry toddlers. His time on my shoulder while we were working on the ward didn’t count. That was work, not fun, and my cutie pie needed fun. So I decided that today was a stay-in-and-play kind of day; I’d get groceries tomorrow.

My eyes landed on the wall separating Marcus and me. I wondered how he was doing. I wanted to call him, maybe ask if he wanted to hang out, but I also didn’t want to come off as being too clingy. Besides, he had a lot more to worry about right now. We really should’ve told Nick what was going on, even if it was just a made-up version of the story like the one he’d made up himself—that Marcus was trying to escape an arranged marriage.

Scrounging up some crackers and jam to eat with my makeshift salad, I settled down for a night of hanging out with—and cleaning up after—Triscuit.

Chapter 14

Marcus

I bolted upright, suddenlyawake. I looked around, but everything was quiet, the room exactly as it had been when I went to sleep earlier. With me putting so much of my effort into preparing the gym, I’d ignored my own living space, only setting up what was absolutely necessary.

That meant my mattress was on my bed, and I had a dresser where I’d stuffed all my clothes, but my nightstand was still outside in the living room. I felt around my pillow for my phonebut realized it had fallen to the floor. I reached for it, wanting to know what time it was.

It was just after midnight. I’d been asleep for less than an hour. I put the phone back next to my pillow, and that was when I heard it. The sound of breaking glass had me on high alert.

It sounded like it came from the front. Not my windows. The Witch’s Brew. Gigi!

If they harmed a hair on her body, they were going to wish they’d never been born.

I pulled my clothes on, ready to run over there to help her. But a nagging voice in my head warned that perhaps my mother was trying to flush me out. I reached for my earring, rubbed it, and said the words. Once I felt the familiar weight of the glamor spell on my face, I went to my window to check.

Two men with dark parkas and balaclavas covering their faces stood outside, baseball bats in hand. And just as I surmised, they were making quick work of Griselda’s coffee shop windows. Those sons of bitches! I quickly pulled on a top and some pants and was already on my way downstairs, ready to teach those thugs a lesson, when the phone in my hand rang with a call from Gigi.

I stopped in my stairwell to pick it up.

“Gigi? Are you okay?”

“Yes. Are you?”

“Yeah. I’m just about to go out there and chase them off.”

“No. Don’t. I’ve already called the police. They’re on their way. I’d rather these assholes get caught than run away. Maybe they’ll spill the beans and tell us who sent them.”

---