“I wasn’t trying to sneak into her bedroom last night,” Landon tried a different tactic. “I was looking for the bathroom.”
Aunt Tillie snorted. “He only tried once, Winnie,” she explained. “That was after I found the girls sneaking around downstairs.”
“What were you doing downstairs?” My mom asked, turning her irritation in my direction.
I glanced down at the end of the table, where Lenore and Tom Baker were happily enjoying their breakfast and the morning show, and quickly made a decision. “We were trying to get a snack. We forgot Aunt Tillie was sleeping in the kitchen.”
It was a weak lie, but I was hoping it would work. Thistle saw what I was trying to do and swooped in quickly. “You guys are the reason she’s sleeping in the kitchen, after all,” she interjected quickly. “Trying to take an old lady’s favorite recliner from her? You should be ashamed of yourselves.”
I bit the side of my lip to keep from laughing out loud.
“Since when are you on her side?” Marnie charged.
“I just don’t think it’s right,” Thistle continued. “And that’s on top of taking away her wine closet.”
Aunt Tillie’s eyes lit up. “See! Even they know it’s wrong for you to be persecuting me this way!”
“Who is persecuting you?” My mom countered. “We just think that chair is old and gross.”
“And we have nowhere else to put the new furnace,” Twila added, shooting Thistle a murderous look.
At least they’d forgotten the previous line of questioning.
“You just get off on being mean to me,” Aunt Tillie said petulantly. “You’ve always gotten a charge about being mean to me.”
“That’s not true,” my mom protested. “You know we love you. We’ve always loved you.”
“And we’ve put up with a lot more than anyone else would have, where you’re concerned,” Marnie added under her breath.
“Then why won’t you let her keep her wine closet?” Thistle pressed.
My mom swung on her angrily. “You guys are just trying to distract us from what you were doing last night. That’s why you’re doing this.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Thistle said innocently.
My mom narrowed her eyes into dangerous slits. “What were the three of you doing last night? I want to know right now.” I could hear my mom stomp her foot under the table. “You better just tell us now. I won’t let it go. You know that.”
Oh, boy, did I know that. My mom had an elephant’s memory. She never forgot. Ever. Despite that, though, I wrinkled up my nose defiantly. “We were looking for a bottle of wine,” I admitted finally – even though it was a false admission. “We were bored and wanted something to drink. We thought that would make the night go quicker, you know, if we were passed out from Aunt Tillie’s special brew.”
“So you were going to take some of my wine without asking?” Aunt Tillie screeched. “See what little miscreants you three raised?”
“How is this our fault?” Marnie looked like she was about to blow a gasket.
“You’re the ones that raised them to think it was fine to fornicate with men they’re not married to,” Aunt Tillie swung back to me. “And steal my wine.”
I turned to Thistle. “You always push it too far. Why do you always push it too far?”
“It’s a gift,” she shrugged and slammed a huge bite of pancakes into her mouth so she didn’t have to talk anymore.
Landon was shaking with silent laughter at my side.
“What are you laughing at?”
“Never a dull moment, I swear,” he choked out. “You should all be committed.”
After the morning we had all just survived, I couldn’t really argue with him.
Twenty-Eight
The second half of breakfast pretty much mirrored the first half of breakfast – meaning it was an uncomfortable free-for-all.
Aunt Tillie wasn’t letting go of her anger (manufactured or otherwise) regarding the recliner or her wine closet: “You’ll all feel guilty when this drives me to an early grave!”
My mom wasn’t letting go of her suspicions: “I want to know what the three of you were doing creeping around the inn in the middle of the night!”
Thistle was uncomfortable in the presence of both her mother and her father, so she was pointing fingers at everyone else: “It’s Bay’s fault! She couldn’t have done it without Clove, either!”
Clove was busily trying to flirt with Trevor – and deny she was interested in him at the same time: “I wish you would leave me out of this stuff!”
Landon was enjoying breakfast and trying to tune everyone else out: “Will someone pass me the maple syrup? Is this fresh? Nice.”
Trevor seemed uncomfortable with the whole situation: “Maybe I should go back out and start clearing the snow?”
Twila was trying to pretend that having Ted at the breakfast table wasn’t throwing her for a loop: “So, Ted, it’s so nice that you’re in town for business – and to visit Thistle, of course. When are you leaving?”
Marnie was still angry with Thistle for turning the conversation around on her: “You guys think you’re so smart, but you’re not. Remember, everything you even consider doing, we’ve already done, and we’ve done it better.”
Brian wanted to get away from the noise – and the manual labor – and head to work: “So, do you think the roads will be passable or not?”
The Bakers were just enjoying the entertainment value: “It reminds me of being home,” Lenore Baker sighed.
Ted looked like he wanted to be anywhere else but here: “I should probably be going. Breakfast was great, though.”
And me? I just wanted the dull roar of the morning’s festivities to fade away. “Can everyone just shut up?”
Everyone at the table froze in the middle of their own personal freak outs and regarded me – and the massive one I was about to embark on -- carefully.
“What’s your deal?” Aunt Tillie asked finally.
“Excuse me? I have a headache, and you all are making it worse.”
“You’re the one yelling,” my mom pointed out.
“I had to yell to make myself heard over all of you,” I grumbled, getting to my feet irritably. I headed towards the kitchen. I could hear Aunt Tillie making apologies for me to the Bakers as I left the room.
“She’s always been a little high strung,” she said.
I attacked the mound of dishes in the sink with gusto, an attempt to wash away this morning’s stressful highs and lows. It wasn’t exactly working. I heard someone clear their throat behind me and I was surprised when I turned and found Ted standing there instead of Landon.
I raised my eyebrows questioningly. “Do you need something?”
“Your Aunt Tillie sent me in for another pot of coffee.” Ted looked uncomfortable at the prospect of being alone with me. I figured it had something to do with the fact that I had just screamed at everyone in the other room.
I punched the buttons on the automatic coffee maker – a little more harshly than I had initially intended. Ted backed away from my jabbing fingers.
“It will take a few minutes,” I said finally.
“Yeah, I figured.”
I eyed Ted for a second, wondering briefly if I should take advantage of the fact that I had him alone. What the hell, right? I might as well make the morning a complete disaster. “How’s your business going, Ted?”
Ted seemed surprised by the question. “It’s good.”
“Yeah, you’re buying up property all over the area,” I agreed. I was trying to catch him off guard.
Ted met my gaze evenly. “I’m working for a business consortium. They’ve got their eye on quite a few properties in the area.”
“A business consortium is interested in property in this area?”
“That surprises you?” Ted was playing the situation coolly, but I could tell my questions had him teetering on the edge of some unseen precipice.
“Surprises me? I don’t know if that’s the term I would use. I guess it would be more apt to say that it confuses me.”
“Meaning?”
“It’s just that the property you’ve bought, it doesn’t make a lot of sense for a business consortium,” I continued. “What, exactly, are they going to build out at the Hollow Creek, for example? That’s not zoned for business. The only thing you could build out there is a house.”
“I see you’ve been checking up on me,” Ted pursed his lips in response. He was hard to read. I couldn’t decide if he was angry or nervous.
“Of course I checked up on you, Ted,” I plowed on. “You came to town in the dead of night, you told my boss to lie to me about what you were doing, and then you asked me to lie to Thistle about seeing you. You can see why I would be a little curious.”
“I told you, I didn’t want you to lie to Thistle,” Ted replied. “I just wanted the chance to be the one to talk to her first. I don’t see what that has to do with you checking up on my business dealings. It’s really none of your business. I guess you’re more like your mother than you let on. Everyone’s business is your business, huh?”
I ignored the jab – even though I wanted to poke his eyes out for it. I was nothing like my mother. “I’m really more interested in the Dragonfly,” I said. “I mean, half that inn is burned out. The property is in a weird location, on a dirt road and all, and your business consortium is going to have to put a lot of money into that property.”
“That’s their business,” Ted said grimly.
“Your business consortium?”
“Yes.”
“Have you been out to the property?” I have no idea why I push things like this sometimes – I just can’t stop myself.
Ted stilled at the question and turned to me suspiciously. “Have you?”
“I haven’t been out there in years,” I lied smoothly. “I was just wondering if you had been out there. You know, how closely you’ve been working with your consortium?”
“I have seen the property,” Ted said finally. “I have not spent any time out there, so to speak.”
“So, your business consortium is going to open a new bed and breakfast, I’m assuming.”
“I have no idea what their plans are once they’ve acquired the property.”
“From you,” I interjected.
“What?” Ted looked confused.
“Well, you technically own the property. So they would have to acquire it from you.”
“That’s just business stuff,” Ted waved off the comment like I was a pesky child asking about the meaning of life, or some equally deep question that I couldn’t possibly understand the answer to. “There are certain tax incentives and deed documents that have to be explored. It’s not a big deal.”
“Of course,” I said stiffly. Pardon me for me being interested in something I couldn’t possibly understand. “You never answered, though. What do they plan to do with the piece of property out at the Hollow Creek?”
Ted stiffened. “I really have no idea. Why do you care?”
“I’m a reporter; it’s my job to care,” I said blithely.
“You’re a reporter for a weekly,” Ted scoffed. “I don’t think that qualifies you as Lois Lane.”
“Why are you skirting the question?”
I looked up in surprise when I saw Aunt Tillie slink into the room. It didn’t surprise me that she had been listening at the door. The only thing that surprised me was that she had held her tongue as long as she had.
“Tillie,” Ted’s demeanor changed from irritated to fearful. “I didn’t know you were there.”
“I was just checking to see what was taking so long with the coffee,” Aunt Tillie said. “I figured, given your track record and all, that maybe you had just run out and abandoned it.”
I couldn’t help but smirk. I was annoyed with Aunt Tillie – like any other day – but when she turned her considerably evil talents to messing with someone else it was always an entertaining event.
“I’m getting sick of your jabs,” Ted swung on Aunt Tillie suddenly, his face red with rage. “You have your version of events, and it’s pretty far removed from the truth.”
I was stunned with the change in Ted’s demeanor. He was actually trying to tower over Aunt Tillie – which wasn’t hard, given her slight frame – and he was trying to intimidate her. For her part, Aunt Tillie didn’t look all that worried. Bigger men had tried to terrify her into submission – that usually ended up with them crying and begging for mercy.
“Ted,” Aunt Tillie said calmly. “I don’t blame you for everything that happened when your marriage to Twila fell apart.”
My mouth dropped open in surprise. Was she actually placating Ted?
“I do, however, blame you for being a spineless worm that walked out on his daughter in his haste to extricate himself from a marriage that wasn’t working – and was never going to work.”
So much for placating him. I took a leery step towards Aunt Tillie. I didn’t think Ted would be stupid enough to physically attack her, especially given the fact that there was a FBI agent in the next room, but I couldn’t be a hundred percent sure.
“You’re right,” Ted said miserably.
“What?” I turned to him in surprise.
“She’s right,” Ted’s eyes were suddenly swimming in unshed tears. “What kind of father runs away from his own child?”
“A deadbeat one,” I said honestly.
Ted met my gaze, surprised by my honesty. “I know that you and Thistle are close . . .”
“They’re sisters,” Aunt Tillie said prissily.
“If you don’t like me, if you keep pushing me, Bay, then she won’t like me and she’ll pull back.”
I realized what Ted was asking – but I wasn’t sure it was something I could give. “It has nothing to do with liking you Ted. I think you’re up to something,” I said honestly. “Thistle is a grown up,” I continued. “She can make her own decisions.”
“Does she think I’m up to something, too?” Ted asked.
Aunt Tillie shifted her gaze to mine, waiting to hear the answer. She looked just as interested as Ted. My mind shifted to not one but two different excursions into the Dragonfly under the cover of snow and dark. “We all think you’re up to something,” I said reluctantly. “And until you own up to what you’re really doing out at the Hollow Creek and at the Dragonfly, I don’t see that changing any time soon.”
Ted swallowed hard. He looked like he wanted to say something else, but instead he just nodded. “I guess I’ve earned that.”
“I guess you have.”
Aunt Tillie and I watched Ted start to leave the kitchen, both of us with heavy hearts and minds. I didn’t think our hearts were heavy with the same thing, though, until Aunt Tillie spoke.
“I don’t think you’re a bad man, Ted,” she said finally.
Ted turned to her, hope lighting up his brown eyes.
“You hurt that girl, though, you make her shed one single solitary tear – even one – and I’ll castrate you and tie you to a fence post and let the vultures eat you.”
Ted’s face went ashen in the face of Aunt Tillie’s colorful threat. Once he left the room, I turned to Aunt Tillie. “There aren’t any vultures in the area,” I said. “It was an intriguing threat, though. Visual. One you can’t help but picture.”
“You think I can’t conjure up vultures?” Aunt Tillie raised an eyebrow and then sashayed out of the kitchen.
Cripes, that woman was definitely scary. It was a good thing she was on our side – most of the time, anyway.
Twenty-Nine
“I think you should let me drive.”
“I think you should mind your own business.”
“I think you should let me drive,” Landon repeated. He was standing next to Aunt Tillie’s aged plow truck – blocking her from the driver’s side door that she was trying to utilize.
“And I told you that you should mind
your own business.” For her part, Aunt Tillie looked like an enraged – but appropriately layered against the cold – hobbit with a purpose. And that purpose? To clear the country road between the inn and town from about a foot and a half of snow.
Landon, who often vacillated between amused and annoyed when dealing with Aunt Tillie, was firmly in the annoyed category at the present moment. He also wasn’t giving up any ground. “Do you have a driver’s license?”
“Of course.”
“Show it to me.”
“No,” Aunt Tillie balked. “I have a right to privacy, and that’s invading my privacy.”
“How is that invading your privacy?”
“There’s stuff on there that I don’t want anyone to see,” Aunt Tillie said stubbornly.
“Like?”
“Like my weight.”
“I won’t look at your weight.”
“Now that I’ve told you that I don’t want you to look at it, that’s the first thing you’ll look at,” Aunt Tillie said knowingly.
Landon rubbed his chin ruefully. I couldn’t help but notice that he hadn’t shaved that morning – and morning stubble made him look even sexier than usual. I internalized the sigh that threatened to escape. Now was not the time for flights of fancy with Landon and his scruffy face.
“I think you should let me drive,” Landon tried a different tack. “I’m a man and it will hurt my ego if you don’t let me drive.”
Aunt Tillie narrowed her eyes at him distrustfully. “I have my doubts about you being a man. Men are better liars.”
Landon grabbed his heart in faux pain. “You wound me.” His eyes were deadly serious, though, despite the mirth in his words.
“I’m driving.”
“No, I’m driving,” he corrected her.
“Bay, will you tell your boyfriend that this is my truck and I’m the one driving?” Aunt Tillie turned to me expectantly.
“Yeah, Bay,” Thistle sang out from behind me. “Tell Landon how it’s going to be. Lay down the law.”
I shot Thistle a dirty look and, if I’m being truthful, the finger, too. Then I turned back to Aunt Tillie. “Landon isn’t my boyfriend,” I said.
Witching You Were Here (Wicked Witches of the Midwest Book 3) Page 18