Page 4 of Guy
“He was shot during a robbery.Wrong place, wrong time the police had said.”He asked her if she believed them.“I’m not sure now.I mean, can a twelve-year-old kill someone and not get caught?That’s how old the twins would have been when he was killed.The robber was killed on site.He didn’t get very far because someone with a gun killed him, too.”
“I’ll see what I can find.”She thanked him.“I have to go out tomorrow in the morning.I’m going to go and see Amber and help her get some security cameras around her house.She’s not been back there since she got it from you, and I can tell that she really wants to go there.”
“Would you mind if I went with you?If I have something to say to her, you can tell her.”He told her no.“Well, I’ll just pester you until you do, then.I know how much you hate my singing now, and I’ll do that.”
“Why don’t you find another house?This one is mine.”She told him again that she was there first.“I actually paid for it, and all you did was squat in it.”
“I was here first.You find yourself another place.I told you I’d help you.There are any number of houses in the little town that you could live in.”She didn’t want him to leave, not really.He’d been making the place cozy and warm with his being there.“Besides, where are you going to find yourself another roommate that doesn’t cause you trouble like I don’t?”
“You cause trouble just by being around.I have better things to do other than to cater to your needs, you know.”She thanked him again.“I’m going outside.The mail has run.”
Something else she knew about him that none of his family did was that he wrote first of all.Secondly, he did it under a false name.Guy wrote murder mysteries and was really good at it.While she’d not read one herself, she’d read the reviews on the back of the book and was quite impressed.And no matter how much she pestered him, he still wouldn’t read it to her so that she could have an idea of the man she was living with.Even if she was dead.
When he left, trudging in the snow banks on his way to town, she wondered what had happened to him that made him so bitter.She’d figured out that it wasn’t his brothers.They were all as nice as he was rude.But something had made him like the man that he was, and like her murder, she wanted to get to the bottom of it.
She knew about his parents.You couldn’t be dead or alive in this little town without hearing how they treated their kids.She’d also heard that the mother of these fine men had killed their daddy and tried to blame it on them.The police officer, whose name she couldn’t remember, had stood up for the boys and had basically adopted them into his own home with his wife to raise them after the mother was put in prison.Maybe they had something to do with him being the way that he was.Or maybe some woman hurt him.He didn’t like humans, which she didn’t blame him for.Humans were an odd sort of people.But someone had hurt him, and she wanted to know why so that she could perhaps fix him for someone.
She looked in on her treasures, things that she’d been able to pick up from others that she’d liked.Some of it was trash, a set of keys that she’d taken from a house so that the man couldn’t drive with his kids in the car while he was drunk.A letter that had come in the mail for a person who would have been hurt had they read it.She’d seen the person writing the nasty letter and had to wait at thehouse for it to come.
There were also treasures, too.Some lovely silverware—which reminded her of the people that were related to Guy and their underground help system to get people out of abusive relationships.Another ghost had wanted to use his treasures too to help with the railroad, but most of his was stolen, and they were afraid that it would come back on them.Just as she was going to go and look for other things to put away from humans to use, she saw a woman walking down the street with her twins behind her.
It was Amber; she just knew it was.And if she didn’t get any help, she was going to get hurt by the kids.Damn it all to hell and back.She needed to get some help.It was then that someone knocked on the door to their home.Looking at the couple standing there, she wondered how she could get them to help her daughter.
Finding Guy was easy.He only went to two places around, if you didn’t count his brother’s home; it was the bank and the post office.Finding him, she told him to call his brother and tell them to find Amber.She was in trouble again.Instead of doing what she wanted, he asked her where she was.
“Just outside the bank.”He took off toward the bank a little faster than she thought he could move and intercepted her before Shawn did.She didn’t know where Margaret was, but she’d be willing to bet that she wasn’t that far behind him.Amber was safe inside the bank when the other one walked by.“She needs to be more aware of what’s going on around her.Can you tell her that?”
He did, but it must have triggered something in her head about him because she asked if he was Guy Fraizer.He looked like he wasn’t going to answer her, but he did finally, and Amber hugged him.
“Don’t get all mushy around me.”Guy peeled Amber off him and took several steps back.“Your mother is here.She’s the one who warned me about your family.I’m glad that I was able to keep you from getting your head bashed in.”
“Yes.I knew it had to be you.You’re the rudest man I’ve ever talked to.Can she hear me if I just talk to her?”He told her daughter how it worked with her being able to hear her talking.“Good.And you’ll tell me what she says?I have some questions to ask you both.Why are you looking at me like that?”
“Mates.We’re mates.Damn it.”Belinda laughed.It did her heart good to know that Amber would be safe from now on because of her being with Guy, but she also thought it was funny that he’d found his mate today, and it was her little girl.“I don’t want a mate, especially a human one.”
“Well, isn’t that just too bad for you?Me too if you think you’re going to be rude to me for the rest of our lives.In the event you’re wondering, you’re not.”She looked around and smiled.“Tell me where Belinda is so that I can pretend to hug her.And don’t be rude when you tell me what she’s saying to me.”
“Do you think we can do this later?Your sister is looking for you, and now I’m going to have to make sure that you’re all right with her around.”She glared at him, and Belinda laughed again.“Laugh it up, and I’ll pretend like I don’t hear you when you want to have a talk with her.I mean it.I will.”
“Let’s go back to your house.They’d never think to look for her there.”He begrudgingly agreed.Belinda was more determined than ever to find out what had happened to him to make him the man that he was.If he was going to be around her daughter all the time, she wanted answers and soon.“Be nice to her.I know you can, I’ve seen you being nice to those little girls.”
He growled low in his throat, and she laughed again.Not as loudly as before, he was making sure that Amber got out of the bank safely.She’d just have to dig around for something—perhaps one of his brothers might know something.She’d figure out a way to get them to tell her soon.
Belinda didn’t mind the cold.She was dead after all, but she could tell that it was too much for Amber.Not only did she seem to be freezing, but she didn’t have the right boots on or coat.Before she could think of something to do for her, Guy took off his coat and put it on her shoulders.Amber didn’t fight him either, telling him thanks through chattering teeth.
It took them twenty minutes to get back to the house on the hill.Instead of taking his coat back, Guy got several of the new little quilts that were on the back of the couch and wrapped Amber up inthem.While doing that, he also turned on the gas fireplace and got a roaring fire in it.After dragging her to the fireplace, he went to make her some hot cocoa.This was a new Guy and she liked him.
After two cups of hot cocoa and thirty more minutes in front of the fireplace, Amber looked as if she was thawing out.Guy asked her why she wasn’t dressed better, and she thought that Amber was going to hit him.Instead, she simply turned in the chair so she didn’t have to look at him.
“I’ve not been able to cash the check yet.So I don’t have the money for a new coat and boots.I was hoping to get them while they’re on sale, but I don’t have the money.Again, I can’t cash my check.”He told her that he’d buy them.“No, you won’t.You’re already mean to me, and I don’t want to be beholden to you any more than I have to.You’re a mean person and a rude bastard.”
“I’m sorry, but when I see a grown woman in a heavy sweater and not a coat, I do wonder what’s going on.You should have said something to me.I would have gotten you whatever you wanted or taken the car to the bank to get you.”She huffed at him.“That’s really mature.Did you miss your nap by any chance?”
When she stood up, dropping the blankets and coat off of her, Belinda took a step back.Even her tiger was a little scared at the face that was looking at Guy.When Amber announced that she was leaving, he stood up as well and blocked the doorway.
“Don’t be stupid.You’ll catch your death.”She told him it was better than putting up with him.“I’m sorry.I’ll try to tone it down a bit, but I’m worried that you might have caught something out there, and I don’t want you sick.”Amber glared at him some more.“I’m not used to having people around me that I should be nice to.The others just take it.They might bust my chops about being so rude, but they take it from me.”
“Perhaps you should be nice to everyone.Whoever shit in your oats has made you this way, and it’s too much for anyone.”She stayed nearer to the fire, and Belinda was glad for that.“I’m betting there is a lynch mob after you about now.And for as rude as you’ve been to me, I’d help them.”
