Page 37 of Bears Behaving Badly
“Would you like some lunch? Hamburgers? Sushi? A piping hot bowl of vengeance?” Annette asked, and was startled when Caro showed a tiny curl of a smile.
Chapter 15
“This is insanity on wheels,” Annette announced. “And not just figuratively.”
In the short silence that followed, David considered his response. Caro couldn’t have responded even if she wanted to; her cheeks were bulging with red Skittles.Kid’s got good taste in desserts.
“I’m open to suggestions,” he said mildly.
“Just a terrible, terrible idea.”
“Again, happy to hear a Plan B.”
“What are we thinking?” Annette fretted. “We could get in an astonishing amount of trouble. Actually, we’re already in trouble. Trouble was a guarantee once Nadia let us into Lund’s.”
“Still waiting on your alternative.”
“My complaints should make it obvious that I have none,” Annette snapped. To David’s surprise, he heard Caro giggle. “Andyou. Who doesn’t finish a cheeseburger because they’re saving room for Skittles?”
David ahem’d, because he did that all the time. Almost daily. For which he made zero apologies.
“GoodGod,you’re both awful. Okay, here.” Annette was leaning forward like a hound on point, fingers gripping the dashboard. “Here-here-here. Turn left right here.Left.”
“It’s a one-way street on a bluff,” David pointed out. “Where else would I turn?”
“Oh, I’m sorry! Pardon me for making sure we don’t skid and die.”
“You really thought if you hadn’t said ‘left,left,’ I would have gone right and plunged us over a cliff?”
“You said you needed directions.”
“Didn’t know what I was getting into, did I?”So! Annette has two flaws: she’s a soft touch, and she’s an Olympian-level back-seat driver. And her hands are small and soft, and when she stands in your space because she’s pretending to be your wife, she smells like Madagascar vanilla and peaches. And her mouth is so, so sweet. Which aren’t flaws. But are worth mentioning.
David met Caro’s gaze in the rearview. “This isn’t as irritating as finding you was. But it’s pretty close.”
They’d swung through a drive-through, and between Filets-O-Fish, Annette had directed him out of Saint Paul toward Lilydale, a town on the Mississippi River that was smack in the middle of a national park. (It was always good when Shifters were on the city council; Stables were prone to asphalting woods, then complaining about the traffic).
After a five-minute drive, Annette had directed him to the older part of town, where they passed homes that were grand but aging less than gracefully. Stately home after stately home slid by, each needing a good mowing, a new paint job, or both. Nice enough, but not exactly real-estate candy. Which led him to ask…
“Is this a Shifter neighborhood?”
“Mostly. Lilydale’s probably 90/10. There’s one house on the block that may or may not be cursed, but otherwise, it’s all Shifter families.”
“Did you say cursed?”
“No one stays in it longer than three months.”
“That doesn’t mean—”
“There!”
“That’s the cursed house?”
“No, it’smyhouse! I mean, it was. The purple house with the white trim!”
The only purple house David had ever seen, in fact. Still, something in him was moved to tease her a little. “Can you be more specific?”
“The dark-purple two-story house with white trim and the smaller, purpler bird house in front! With the Slip ’N Slide still set up even though it’s September! And the attached garage, which is also purple! And last year’s Christmas tree, which is smeared with peanut butter so the birds have devoured most of it by now and it’s a huge fire hazard! And I’m yelling for some reason!”
