by Zoe Chant
“Pink!” Doris exclaimed.
Pink jumped, the picture of guilt. Doris sighed. Nicola had let the kids put chocolate syrup on their pancakes that morning, disgusting as that had sounded to Doris.
She saw at once that Pink had formed a snatch plan, and had nearly gotten away with it. “Three years old and you’re already a chocoholic?” Doris said, taking the bottle from her hands. “I like chocolate, too, but too much of that stuff will make you sick!”
She retrieved the bottle and stuck it in her pocket to put back in the fridge later. No way was she venturing back into the kitchen and getting caught up in the family chaos. “Why are you all dressed up?”
“Snow,” Pink said.
“Oh, there you are!” Nicola descended on her stepdaughter, with her other hand firmly clasped on Lon’s. “Thank you for catching my escaped Alcatraz inmate, Doris. I’m going to go let these two run around in the snow for a while to make sure they work off some of that pancake-breakfast sugar in case I have to put them in the car later. Want to come?”
“Thanks for the invitation, but I’m trying to find Joey. Have you seen him? Or Xi Yong?”
“I can’t tell you about Joey, but Xi Yong is in the back bedroom.”
“Thank you!” Doris told her, and headed off that way. She didn’t realize until she reached the doorway—though in retrospect, considering all that had been going on with her and Joey, she should guessed—that Xi Yong wasn’t alone. Isidor was with him.
The two were stripping the beds, moving with comfortable teamwork, side by side. She heard Isidor repeating what she suspected was basic Chinese vocabulary.
The way they smiled at each other, their soft voices blending, caused another flowering of warmth inside Doris. Today . . . today the sun shone brightly, and Doris had kissed a man who turned into a fox. She was no longer Doris Lebowitz confined in her sensible box, she was Doris Lebowitz who believed six impossible things before breakfast.
She didn’t have the heart to interrupt Xi Yong and Isidor. Instead she decided to take a walk and see if she could find Joey on her own. She knew he was all right; he had been taking care of himself for ages. He was so good at everything he did, and don’t forget nine-tail fox, with tails that went into other dimensions.
But it was a gorgeous day, and she had no intention of going anywhere near the mansion. She would walk to the old playhouse and the road with the Jeep, to see if he was there, and if he wasn’t, she’d come straight back.
The walk was magical in the post-blizzard hush, with the sun shining on the fresh snow that decorated the trees as well as the ground. Doris breathed in the clear, pure air, and strode vigorously, kicking through snow just beginning to soften toward slush.
When she heard voices echoing from the general direction of the old road, she had to laugh, remembering her surprise when she discovered Joey and the other three back here.
She bent her head and walked fast, glad of the exercise.
Then more voices—a shout. It sounded . . . angry.
The hairs along her arms prickled with nervousness.
While mentally running through excuses to be checking on them in case it was just more of that flirt-yell thing Marrit and Vic seemed to have going on, she toiled at top speed straight up the hill, cursing under her breath when her feet came down on unseen rocks. She pushed ahead, trying to spot a way through the thick line of snow-covered prickly phlox without getting herself scratched up when she heard cursing.
Then a sound, pop-pop-pop, only sharper, sending echoes up the mountain. Firecrackers?
That’s not firecrackers, she thought, the back of her neck prickling. She ducked instinctively, realized that was a useless move, and threw herself behind a huge pine. Shaking, she inched around the rough bark to peek at the snow-covered road.
She froze, staring at the half-buried Jeep.
Standing near it, side by side, were two wolves.
Facing it was a snowmobile with the same two men who’d come to the house to beg for handouts: one tall and blonde with crazy eyes, the other short and mean-looking. The short one was driving. The tall one held something she’d only seen on cop shows—an automatic weapon.
Pointed right at Joey, who stood some thirty feet away, hands up, palms out.
As Doris watched, horrified, the blonde one stroked the automatic weapon with nervous fingers, jerked it toward the air, and let off another brief burst.
“Now, who are you! How many shifters?” the mean one shouted. “What are you doing here?”
“We’re going home,” Joey said in a low, coaxing voice. He took a step toward their snowmobile, then another.
“You’re cops!” the tall, crazy-eyed one yelled on a panicky note.
“I’m not a cop. Look at me—I’m too old to be a cop. I’m a teacher—that’s my Jeep. It’s not a police vehicle. Let’s part peacefully—” He took another step.
“Stop right there,” the crazy-eyed one shrieked.
“If you’re not cops, you’re still trouble. I smelled those two wolves on this Jeep,” the mean one snarled. “You got no business up here.”
“We’re on our way out,” Joey said in that soothing voice, smiling his sunny smile. He looked harmless and friendly, but Doris could see that it wasn’t working. The men only seemed to be growing more belligerent.
The twins looked ready to pounce the second those men’s attention shifted. Joey took another small step forward, his voice soothing. He and the twins outnumbered the two men—but they had no weapons. If they only had a distraction . . .
She had to help. But what could she do? Doris hit her palm lightly against the tree’s bole, desperate for an idea. As she moved, something bumped against her hip. She slid her hand into her pocket, wondering what on earth—and her fingers closed not on a weapon that had somehow snuck in there, but the plastic bottle of chocolate syrup that she’d taken away from Pink, and meant to return to the kitchen.
And then she remembered what Joey had said about the men. And how she’d met Joey in the first place.
With shaking hands, she dropped her sensible coat, shook the bottle, and with a breathed out, “You can do this,” upended the chocolate over her hair, her face, and down her front.
The gooey stuff was even more viscous in the cold air. She smeared her hands over it, rubbed them over her face, then stared down at the black rivulets covering her hands that looked exactly like some horrible form of blood—
Doris stepped out from behind the tree, stiffening her entire body, and started shambling forward.
“Bra-i-i-i-ins,” she croaked.
Snap!
All heads turned her way.
“BR-R-R-A-A-I-I-INS!” she moaned.
“I knew it!!!” the tall one shrieked. “I KNEW zombies are real!”
—and he swung the weapon toward her.
She stared in horror at that obscene little hole, then flung herself behind a tree as a flash of silver arced across the road. The gun went off, obliterating a branch ten feet above Doris and sending a shower of pine needles drifting down.
The gunfire stopped abruptly.
She peeked out in time to see Joey in silver fox form leap up onto the snowmobile. A fan of long, fluffy tails whapped the tall man clean out of the vehicle.
The weapon tumbled to the snow a few feet away. The short guy dove for the weapon, hands outstretched to grab it—but one of the twins in wolf form leaped on him from behind, smashing him flat into the snow, and the other landed hard on the tall guy next to Joey.
In moments, it was over. Both men were down in the snow, each with a wolf on top of them. Joey shifted back to human form and tossed a handful of ropes from the Jeep to the transformed wolf twins.
“Tie them up!” he ordered, and looked wildly around for Doris. As soon as he spotted her, he ran toward her.
She fell into his arms, chocolate and all. He hugged her tightly against him. She felt his heartbeat racing as fast as hers as he whispered. “You were magnificent.
But please don’t ever do that again.”
Her legs were like water, and she was grateful for Joey’s strong arm around her. “I’m sorry about the chocolate all over you.”
He huffed a quiet laugh. “Would it be wrong to say that under other circumstances I’d like to lick it off you?”
Her answer was to stop and face him. Next thing she knew they were locked in a bone-melting, time-halting, turning-every-organ-to-liquid-fire kiss.
“Hey, Uncle Joey!” Vanessa’s voice interrupted them. She was stark naked and standing on the tied-up blond guy to keep her bare feet out of the snow. “What are we going to do with these two?”
Joey turned, keeping his arm around Doris as if he never wanted to let her go. “We’ll call the police from the house. You two make sure they don’t go anywhere, but clear out if any of their buddies show up.”
Vanessa mimed a salute. “Yes sir, Uncle sir!”
Vic had shifted too. “Day-am, you were awesome, Doris,” he told her, eyes wide with admiration.
“Totally,” Vanessa chimed in. “I did not know you were such a badass. Best. Decoy. Ever!”
“I’d rather not be a decoy ever again,” Doris admitted. “How did this happen?”
“It’s our fault,” Vanessa said. “We were banging the snow off the Jeep and didn’t pay attention and suddenly they were there. I think they were lying in wait to see who came to get the Jeep.”
“So we ducked behind it, got out of our clothes and shifted to run, but then that guy shot above us. We stopped,” Vic said. “They started yelling at us to go with them, but then Uncle Joey showed up to help.” He flashed a brief grin at Doris. “And then suddenly you were there, doing the zombie shuffle from behind the tree.”
“I’m always going to be glad I saw that,” Vanessa whispered, eyes shining. Her teeth were beginning to chatter.
“Why don’t you two shift back before you get hypothermic?” Joey said. The twins shifted back to their wolves, and each sat down on one of the prisoners, tongues lolling out in lupine laughter. To Doris, Joey added, “How about we get you back to the house so you can change. That stuff is freezing on you.”
“I know,” Doris said, picking at brittle stuff sticking to her eyebrows. “Who would have thought chocolate would itch so much?” She looked back at her tracks through the snow, and suddenly her legs ached at the idea of slogging through that much snow. “It’s going to be a long, tiring walk back.”
Joey gave her a sly smile—a very foxy smile. “Have you ever wanted to ride a snowmobile?”
NINETEEN
JOEY
Joey had driven snowmobiles in the mountains a few times, but it was never like this, with his mate wrapped warm and delightful around him from behind. He had offered her a chance to drive it, but she preferred to ride, snugged up against his back with her head resting on his shoulder.
On the ride back, he explained the situation to Xi Yong on the mythic plane. Xi Yong replied that he would use the house phone to call the police and send them up to retrieve the criminals. He also told them that the snowplow had come and gone, and the family was making plans to leave that afternoon.
Joey halted the snowmobile before they reached the house, though his fox complained bitterly of the dramatic entrance they would have made. He pulled the vehicle off into the edge of the trees, and wrapped his arms around Doris.
“Want to find out what happens when all nine tails come out?”
“I guess so?” Her eyes were bright with both anticipation and nervousness.
He gathered himself and shifted. In a tremendous bound, mate and all, he cleared fifty feet of road and landed in the snow just outside the driveway leading to the Lebowitz house. Then he shifted back.
Doris took a few gasping breaths, and then she said, “Why didn’t we just walk?”
“Because we don’t want to leave tracks around a snowmobile that’s not ours.” He grinned down at her. “It’s a fox trick.”
“You have a lot of tricks, don’t you?” she said, tilting her head back for a kiss.
Her kiss was sweetness and fire, sugar and spice. It was only reluctantly that he broke his lips from hers. They walked up the driveway with their arms around each other’s waist. As they left the road behind, Joey heard the sound of distant sirens, far down the mountain.
“Aren’t those men going to tell the police they saw people turning into wolves and foxes?” Doris asked quietly.
“Would you believe them?”
She smiled. “Well, you have a point.”
“Anyway, I don’t think they will, because they’re shifters too.”
“From the mansion?”
His mate was clever. Too clever, sometimes. “Yes. I followed them up there the other night.”
She paused, tugging on his arm. “What now, Joey?”
“Now? Now the police come and have a look around the place. Cang’s not going to like the publicity. Either he’ll clear out or hunker down. Anyway, we’ll wait ‘til the cops leave and then go in and see what we can find out.”
“We meaning you and Xi Yong?”
“Yes, and some friends.” It was time to get Mikhail and the rest of the Guardians involved now. He sent out a silent call. There was no immediate response.
As they got closer to the house, Joey caught sight of Xi Yong beyond the chimney corner. He and Isidor were clearing the snow off the cars as Brad used a broom to golf-whack snow into ice white fans on either side of the driveway.
As Joey watched, he saw Isidor say something, to which Xi Yong responded with a face alight with laughter. Joey had never before seen Xi Yong happy. It was clear he was transcendently happy now.
Xi Yong seemed to become aware of his scrutiny, and glanced over. Am I needed?
Let’s see the family safely off, then investigate the mansion, Joey replied on the mythic plane.
Xi Yong dipped his head in acknowledgement and returned to his task.
Joey said to Doris, “We’ll be staying on here for a few hours after your family leaves, long enough to finish our investigation. Then we’ll drive back down the mountain.”
“I’ll wait here for you,” Doris replied, with an earnest look straight into his eyes. Even covered with chocolate, she was so beautiful it almost hurt. “If I drive home right now I’ll go crazy not knowing what’s happened to you here.”
He kissed her again. She reached to cup his face, then noticed the chocolaty smears all over her hands and yanked them back. “Ugh! That’s it. First thing I’m doing is a shower. I’m going in through the mud room. I don’t want to deal with questions now. What are we going to tell them?”
“We don’t have to tell them anything, unless you want to.”
“I think for now I’d like to just keep it between us.” She shivered. “I keep flashing on that horrible gun aimed at you.”
“And then at you,” Joey said, a shiver running through him, too, at her bravery and danger.
Our mate, his fox said with satisfaction. Brave and thinks tricksy.
‘Tricksy’ was a very high compliment from a fox.
Joey smiled to himself as walked into the kitchen, which he recognized by now as the Lebowitz commander center.
Doris’s mother exclaimed, “Ah! There you are! Lunch is almost ready!” She proudly indicated two tables pushed together, laden with food and surrounded by every chair and stool in the entire house. She added with sly coyness, “Where’s Doris?”
“Bathroom, I believe,” Joey said, suppressing a desire to laugh. He was very aware that Doris’s mother’s approval had less to do with him than with his status as a respectable university professor. That was all right with him—if her family accepted him, the happier Doris would be.
“Oh. Well, it can wait,” Elva said airily. “I just remembered, she’s doing all the bed linens.” She took a step nearer. “So . . . what do you think of that Brad?”
Joey understood the worry beneath the superficial animosity: the anxiety of a matriarch who wan
ts the best for those they love. He’d come to understand that Elva saw security as the first requirement for a suitable partner—and social respectability only bolstered that. He leaned into his fox’s natural ability to smooth over romantic troubles, and then he knew exactly the right thing to say.
“I think he’s an excellent match for Nicola,” Joey said. “It’s clear that he loves her. And he’s a good father. Those children are loved. What’s more, this business he’s starting with her friend Isidor sounds very promising. In fact, I’ve decided I need to consult them professionally. I own a fairly sizable lot, and keeping it nice tends to get away from me.”
Sure enough, Elva’s whole demeanor brightened. “Well! Yes, Isidor has an excellent business sense. Always has had. We always hoped that . . . well, perhaps enough said. He seems to have hit it off with your exchange student. Maybe—if Xi Yong stays in California—he might do some designing for them, Chinese-style.”
Joey suppressed a laugh. “I think that is very possible. Now, what can I do to help get the lunch ready?”
So this was what had been missing, Joey thought as he sat next to Doris: the family gathering. Family gatherings were equally important in China. The only real difference, besides the language, and the utensils, was the tables were round instead of rectangular. But the essentials were all there: plenty of delicious food, and people enjoying the food and each other.
Plates passed back and forth, as well as conversation. Joey counted at least five conversational topics zinging back and forth, exactly the way he’d loved so much in China, and had tried to encourage at his own house ever since.
He divided his time between soaking in the cheerful atmosphere, and Doris at his side. She and her mother were totting up the foods that actually taste better on the second day.
On her other side, Nicola cut Pink’s sandwich into little triangles, explaining how her Aunt Doris had done that for her when she was little. “Somehow triangles taste better than squares, don’t you think?”