Page 4 of Witch Upon a Star
Dosia collapsed back into her seat. She looked completely flustered, but also excited. Her head tipped to the right towards Frankie, and the two of them burst out laughing. Dosia hastily tried to wipe her eyes. “That was terrifying!”
“Hey, you won!” Frankie nudged her shoulder. “You get to go on a date with your man.”
Dosia nodded, obviously relieved by this fact. As if she only just remembered I was here, she turned in her chair to see JJ sitting on my lap.
We stared at each other for a long second. I don’t know if she saw the apology in my eyes or if it was the sight of JJ reunited with Oolong, but Dosia smiled down at me. I met her smile, and knew the two of us would be okay.
“We need to talk,” I told her quietly over JJ’s story. She was telling Oolong all about her new daddy.
Dosia’s eyebrows drew down. “Everything okay?”
I nodded reassuringly, and Dosia let out a sigh of relief. Since I wasn’t in a rush to say what I needed to say, we silently telegraphed to wait until JJ was done speaking before we talked.
It took some time to get through the rest of the auction bachelors. It wasn’t just the club members who were being bid on either, but police officers, teachers, and even the captain of the fire department. The entire town had a blast with it, and not just because we got a bit of a strip tease from Captain Hunter. Only two club members were left when the lady on the other side of Dosia than Frankie got up, freeing a seat at the table. I snatched it before anyone else could. Dosia moved JJ’s coloring pages in front of me so her daughter could continue to color now that Oolong and I were filled in on every detail about Pumpkin JJ could think of.
“You look good,” I said with a smile.
Dosia grinned back. “I feel good.”
“Really? After spending a thousand dollars on a date, I’d be,” I covered JJ’s ears, “shitting my pants,” I said in a mock whisper.
Dosia chuckled. Sitting back, she officially introduced Frankie and me.
“Ah, so you’re the infamous, younger aunt,” Frankie said while shaking my hand in front of Dosia. “JJ’s told me a lot about you.”
“Has she now?” I tickled JJ’s sides to my great-niece’s delight.
“Are you here to bid?” Frankie asked as a young man stepped on stage. He was wearing glasses and looked far younger than the others wearing a cut.
“No!” I exclaimed with a nervous laugh. “Just here forthe view.” I knew that Quinten would be on stage soon. I was still due my daily viewing.
“Who’s that?” Dosia asked Frankie, which was the same question I had. Based on the looks of the women in the crowd, they were not overly excited for this man’s bid as they had been for the other men.
“Keys,” Frankie answered, a bit distracted. It looked like she was noticing the crowd’s disinterest in this man too as Louisa introduced him. According to the card she was reading off of, Keys was a computer expert and the club’s Tech.
“We’ll open the bidding at fifty dollars,” Louisa announced.
Crickets fell as no one bid for several heartbeats. I looked around. The man, Keys, was young, sure, but he was cute in a nerdy kind of way. There had to be someone in the crowd who would want to bid on him.
Louisa said a bit nervously into the mic, “Come on, ladies. I’m sure one of you needs a tune-up on your computer or to have a website built.”
Still, there was nothing.
Frankie was half out of her chair when nearly every device on and off stage suddenly beeped with a message. Like everyone else in the audience, I looked down at my phone.
Unknown: $50,000
“Holy shit,” Dosia breathed out. Saying what I was thinking too. “Is that for real?”
Frankie shrugged, retaking her seat. Louisa was showingKeys her phone and asking him the same question that Dosia had asked Frankie.
Keys did something on the phone and then nodded.
“It looks like we have a new high bid!” Louisa announced to the crowd. “Fifty thousand! Going once, going twice, sold!” she shouted without waiting a heartbeat like she normally did.
Keys practically ran off the stage.
“Who could have sent that?” Dosia asked Frankie.
