hold Anyan still as I climbed into the back seat.
Because otherwise we are totally fucked.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Although Anyan had hated getting in the car, he changed his tune when we started moving. He looked very happy sticking his head out the window over my shoulder, from where we’d coaxed him to jump into the very back of Caleb’s SUV. His soft fur against my cheek should have been comforting, but any such emotions were mitigated by the fact that he was panting, long ropes of saliva dripping from his mouth, and occasionally barking at passing street signs.
In other words, everything he did reminded me that the man I’d come to rely on was no longer lurking inside that dog. There was only kibble and slobber. Lots and lots of slobber.
As if on cue, from the seat beside me, Blondie apparated a handful of tissue and passed them over. She’d already apparated herself a long-sleeved T-shirt to wear over her wifebeater, undoubtedly not wanting to turn mortal heads. It was still well chilly here in Maine, despite spring nipping at Rockabill’s heels.
“Thanks,” I mumbled, as she gave me one of her disconcerting winks.
“Where should we head?” Caleb asked, his massive ram’s horns raking the ceiling of the SUV as he turned to look at Iris. She had her hand in her lover’s lap, something I normally wouldn’t have noticed.
But normally people wear pants when they’re driving, I thought, wiping a stray rivulet of Anyan’s spit off my earlobe as I replied to Caleb.
“Go to the town square. Everyone will already be there,” I told him.
We didn’t know where to head, as all we’d felt was a big boom. Nell would have been able to pinpoint the noise, but she was sucking down formula at the moment. So instead of relying on the gnome, we had to rely on Rockabill. Meanwhile, Iris tittered at my response, knowing small-town life as well as I did. And sure enough, when we arrived at Rockabill’s town square, there were already quite a few people milling about.
Caleb pulled rakishly across a few parking spots, and I was jumping out of the car before it was even completely stopped. Anyan followed me, scrabbling over the back seat and undoubtedly putting a few scratches in Caleb’s upholstery.
“Hi, Mr. Tanner! Mrs. Tanner!” I shouted across the square at our local baker and his wife. He waved back in return, but I also noticed Bob and Marge exchanging slightly panicked looks.
“What’s happening? What was that explosion?” I said, panting from running across the square.
“We’re not really too sure, yet,” Mr. Tanner started, looking to his wife for help. “We were having breakfast in the Trough—”
“All we know is we heard the bang,” Mrs. Tanner interrupted, nervously.
“And then Sheila and Herbert both got calls on their cell phones, and they raced out of the Trough going toward the B & B.”
I felt my stomach clench. Ever since Sheila and Herbert had taken over the Black and White B & B—Nick and Nan’s little pun on Gray—it hadn’t been the same. Nick and Nan had been Jason’s grandparents, who’d raised him after he’d been abandoned by his own mother, a drug addict. I’d grown up running between my house and Jason’s, and the B & B had been as much my home as Jason’s. When Jason died, and Nick and Nan had passed away shortly after, the house had passed on to the nastier side of the family, Jason’s yuppie aunt and uncle, Sheila and Herbert, and their darling son Stuart. Otherwise known as the Bane of My Existence.
The New Grays, as they were still called after all these years, gutted the B & B. What had once been shabby, inviting, and comfortable was done over to reflect a colder, more corporate if elegant feeling. Unfortunately, what the Grays hadn’t considered was the fact that people don’t come to Maine looking for chrome and glass, softened only by the occasional Louis Quinze–replica arm chair. They want quilts, warm fires, and clapboard.
The Black and White B & B sank like a stone, making Stuart’s already unpleasant family even less friendly.
“What’s up?” Iris asked. My friends had come up behind me while I was thinking of Jason, his grandparents, and what had once been a home to me.
“It sounds like it came from the Grays’ place,” I said, after thanking my fellow Rockabillians and turning to face my friends.
“Where’s that?” Caleb asked. Iris’s eyes were watching me, undoubtedly aware of my feelings.
“It’s pretty close behind