fricking fabulous and date big hairy truckers like nobody’s business.”
“Who are you?” George asked.
I blew out a sigh. “Your faery Godmother.”
With that, I turned around and headed back to the Victorian.
I didn’t call out to my mother, just headed up the stairs to my bedroom and sat on the window seat. Same view, different world. After a moment, Puck entered. My stomach growled. I’d been hungry since I woke up in bed beside Pete. No wonder I was such a bitch. I went through life hangry.
My phone buzzed again. I cursed and then fumbled with the thing.
There was a string of unanswered text messages from Pete. The first one read Joey, we need to talk. Call me. The next, I am leaving you. Joey, the creditors are calling, you are way overdue on the mortgage payments. Every CC is maxed out. Where is all the $?!? A quick follow up. You need to vacate the house. We need to liquidate. Followed by, I met someone else. The most recent, Don’t pretend you didn’t see this coming. We don’t want the same things anymore.
I laughed and it was a distinctly unhinged sound. What sort of chickenshit ended his marriage via text? Robin had called it. Pete Green wanted whatever he didn’t have waiting at home. I’d take on the blame for losing Darcy, for Grammy B and my parents. But to hell with Pete.
Sometimes an ass was just an ass.
“It sucks, doesn’t it,” Puck said. “The realization that you had it better before the bargain?”
“Clara?” I asked.
She prowled across the floor and then lept onto a spot by my feet. “Yep. And I have to say, I agree with the dickhead. I liked you better before.”
“You remember before?”
“I journey with him, keeping him anchored between timelines.”
“Dragon?” I was almost afraid to ask.
“I heard your mother on the phone with someone named Hannah earlier. She said she was sending Diedre to a boarding school overseas.”
I closed my eyes. “Of course she is.” So Dragon was being sent off again because her mother didn’t want to deal with her. Maybe that would be better for her in the long run.
“Prudence was also extremely worked up about some loan for a place on Skyhawk Court if that means anything to you. Apparently, the bank is going to foreclose on it.”
“And the hits just keep on coming.” My eyes burned with a dry grittiness. I had no tears left to shed. Not for self-pity, or even for my family that was in fact a hot mess.
“Are you going to attack me again?” I asked the cat, half hoping she would.
She scratched at her bent ear with a hind paw. “I think you’ve been punished enough, at least judging by your face.”
I stared at her. “You’re so calm. You were going to scratch my eyes out before.”
“That’s when I thought we stood a chance of defeating him.” She began to bathe her tail. “But you’re in it hip deep and sinking fast. He’s got you exactly where he wants you. One more trip and you’re all his.”
My hand drifted to the pocket where I’d stashed the hourglass. “So, all I need to do is go back and stop myself from interfering with the timeline in the first place and it will set everything to rights?”
The cat swiveled her neck to stare out the window. “Everything except you will still owe him. No matter when you travel to, past or future, it is your final trip and then Robin Goodfellow is free to collect his debt.”
So I could go back, stop me from interfering with Joey. Maybe knock my adult echo self unconscious before she interfered. Or kidnap her. All so that my journey would end and Robin would move on to bargaining with Ursula while cashing in my end of the bargain.
“This sucks.” I set the hourglass down on the bench seat and stared at it.
“Tell me about it,” Clara murmured and settled down between my legs, tail twitching. “Family curse.”
“What do you mean?”
Clara sighed. “It’s not important.”
“Somehow I doubt that.”
Her big cat eyes stared up at me. “You know that child I told you Robin saved? His last name was Whitmore."
My lips parted. “Are you saying…?”
She bobbed her head. “We are related. I think that’s why he targeted you. There’s something in our genetic lineage that he is after. I don’t know what or why. I don’t even know if he knows. But this was bound to happen. I’m just sorry it’s happening to you,