Mind Over Magic by Lindsay Buroker

9

It waslate morning and Amar was still working outside when Morgen walked toward the barn with a coffee mug and a bag of vegan granola. It was one of her road trip snacks, and not likely something that would excite a werewolf, but she felt she should offer Amar something in case he was hungry after his morning of chainsaw aggression toward stumps.

She’d spent several hours continuing to look for clues and organizing the cellar, but she still hadn’t found anything related to bone clips. Amar had ignored her trips in and out of the house, as if he preferred to pretend she didn’t exist. Maybe he did.

The fact that he was still wielding the big power tool made her hesitant to approach, but she wanted to explain her plan to Amar before the news in the gossip-loving town found its way to him.

Morgen circled widely around him, not wanting to startle him or take a flying wood chip to the eye, and stood where he could see her. Talking over the roar of the chainsaw would have been difficult, so she waited for him to stop and ask what she wanted. Except that he didn’t. Frowning, he kept working, his blue eyes almost scary with intensity as he focused on his art.

It must have been a workout, for sweat dampened his wild hair. A bead ran down his biceps, leaving a trail in the fine wood dust that coated his bare arms. If Morgen were the type to ogle a man’s physique, Amar would have been ogle-worthy. Fortunately, she was a mature and rational woman, not one driven by her hormones.

He finally turned off the chainsaw and looked at her, exasperation furrowing his brow. “What?”

“I wanted to thank you for dinner.”

He grunted. Was that the wolf equivalent of you’re welcome?

“Is that all?” he asked. “A client is waiting for this piece. I need to finish it today.”

“Yes, but I brought you coffee. And food if you’re hungry.” She held up the granola bag, wondering if she should have put it in a bowl, but since she didn’t have any almond milk—or any other kind of milk—that had seemed unnecessary. When she was in a hurry, she usually ate it dry.

“That’s food?” he asked in his gruff voice. He always sounded like he was on the verge of breaking out into growls.

“Espresso-flavored granola. It’s high-protein and low-sugar. And has caffeine in it, though since you were up making chainsaw art at dawn, I guess you don’t need caffeine in the morning.”

He looked at the bag the way a bear might eye a trap in the woods with leaves scattered atop the iron teeth. Make that a wolf in the woods. “What kind of protein?”

“Uhm.” She read the label on the back. “Watermelon-seed protein.”

“What is that?”

Morgen dug out her phone and Googled it. “A highly digestible plant-based protein rich in B-vitamins and magnesium. How is your magnesium, Amar?”

His expression turned from suspicious to disgusted. He strode up to her, and she pulled the bag to her chest, worried he was going to knock it aside. The last thing she needed was Lucky running over to Hoover up caffeinated granola. He was looking for gophers in the holes proliferating the lawn near the garden, but he had a knack for hearing the drop of food from miles away.

Amar halted in front of her, took the cup of coffee, and guzzled it down in a long drink that gave her a prolonged view of his bobbing Adam’s apple—and his chest when a few droplets dripped down to slither between his pecs. Like his arms, they were covered in a fine wood dust. That vest didn’t offer a lot of protection from dirt, dust, or coffee droplets.

Amar handed the empty cup back to her and returned to his stump.

“Happy to be of service,” she said.

That earned her another grunt. She decided it was not only his equivalent of you’re welcome but also thank you. Maybe even good morning, have a nice day at work, and your hair looks good today.

As he hefted the chainsaw, she lifted a hand. “Wait, there’s something I wanted to tell you.”

He looked at her over his shoulder, his scruffy hair hanging in his eyes. “Is it about Gwen’s murderer?”

“Related to that, yes. You were here yesterday when the local real-estate agent, Magnus Christian, was talking to me right? Do you know him?”

Fury flared in his eyes, making Morgen take an involuntary step back.

“I know him,” Amar growled. “He tried many times to talk Gwen into selling her property. He has talked many older people in the area into selling their homes that are on acreage, because developers from up north are moving into this area and wish to turn it into housing communities and golf courses.”

“I imagine you prefer trees to golf courses.”

“Unnatural grasses that are not native to the area and are full of chemicals that make your fur itch when you roll on your back are despicable.”

“Your fur?” Since he’d transformed from wolf to human on the hood of Morgen’s car, she supposed he wasn’t trying to hide his secret. Maybe it wasn’t a secret at all. Maybe all the townsfolk knew about the lone werewolf who haunted the area.

“My fur and my skin. Christian is an enemy to the pack.”

“Oh, there is a pack? I’d wondered. You seem… solo.”

“I am solo.” His eyes narrowed. “But there is a pack. There are two packs that compete for this territory. It is one of the few areas along the western coast that has not been completely destroyed by the encroachment of civilization. So far.” His eyes remained narrowed as he watched Morgen like the predator he was, making her uneasy about the survival of more than her granola. “Why do you ask about this man?”

“You heard that he wants me to list the property through him, right?”

“You said that you would not.” His eyes narrowed further.

Why did she get the feeling that he would spring over and throttle her if she said the wrong thing?

Though she wanted to scurry farther back, she made herself hold her ground and look him in the eye.

“I did, but I’m thinking of letting him list it—that wouldn’t obligate me to sell it—so I can find out who wants to buy it. I thought that whoever made an offer might be the person who… arranged for Grandma’s motorcycle to have an accident.”

“Who arranged for her to die,” he said.

“Yes.”

“You did not find answers about the magical clip?”

“Not yet. I’m trying to find information related to it, but until yesterday, I had no idea about any of that.” Morgen waved toward the root cellar. “Or that my grandmother had a quirky hobby.”

“She was a witch,” he stated, as if that was a completely normal thing. To a werewolf, maybe it was.

“Right. She neglected to mention it to the family.”

“Perhaps because her family never came to visit.” His still-narrowed eyes radiated icy disapproval, making Morgen wince and once again wonder if she’d misread Grandma, if she’d only said she preferred her privacy but had secretly felt alone these past years after her daughters died.

Morgen still missed her mother terribly, the only person who’d ever accepted her and Sian as they were and hadn’t tried to force them to be more extroverted or social or normal, like their brothers. The loss had been horrible for Morgen, but she imagined it had been as bad if not worse for Grandma, who’d lost not one daughter but two. Aunt Alys and Mom had both died of cancer, as if they’d been marked by the same faulty genes.

Faulty genes that Morgen often feared lurked in her own blood. That had more than a little to do with her decision to adopt a healthier diet.

“She always told us she preferred her privacy,” Morgen said quietly. “And Sian and I—that’s my sister—are both like that, so we assumed she was telling the truth.”

“She was a private woman. That doesn’t mean she always wished to be alone.”

“Maybe she should have told us that then. We’re not mind readers.” Morgen clenched her teeth. Even though she was too wary to do anything but step lightly around Amar, she didn’t appreciate the lecture.

He only glared stonily back at her.

“Forget it,” Morgen said. “I just wanted to let you know about my plan and that I’m not really going to sell the property.” Unless the taxes made it impossible for her to keep it… But she would worry about that later. “But like I said, I want to see if I can lure out the person or persons who want it. Who maybe want it badly enough that they killed to remove the primary obstacle to getting it. I’m telling you so you won’t freak out if you see it listed. Maybe I won’t have to go that far. I’m having dinner with Christian at a place called the Timber Wolf, and if I can learn who the prospective buyer is, we might not have to—”

“The Timber Wolf?”

“Yes. It looked like your kind of place. There’s a dearth of watermelon-seed protein on the menu.”

“It is not my kind of place. The Loups Laflamme claim that pub.”

“Flame wolves?” Morgen asked.

“Yes. They are the rival pack to the Lobos Sanguientos.”

“Uh, blood wolves?”

“Yes.” For the first time, his eyes lost their irritated squint. “¿Hablas español?”

She shook her head. High-school Spanish had been a long time ago. “Un poco, sorry.”

“That’s more than most here.”

“We’re a ways from the Mexican border. French wolves seem like more of a fit.”

“They are not a fit.” There went his eyes narrowing again. “The Lobos were here first, when this territory was not claimed by any.”

“That’s your pack?”

He hesitated. “I have no pack.”

“Because you’re waiting for the, uh, breeder to die so you can take his place?” Morgen didn’t know if the werewolves actually used the terminology her sister had shared, but Amar seemed to understand what she meant.

His nostrils flared, and his back stiffened. “My brother leads the Lobos. I do not wish him to die.”

Maybe she shouldn’t have trotted out her newly gained wolf knowledge and assumed it applied to him. “Ah. Sorry. I was doing some research on wolves earlier and trying to figure you out.”

“Why do you care?”

Good question. Mostly, she didn’t want to annoy him.

“Grandma said you helped her.” Morgen shrugged. “Just because I wasn’t here doesn’t mean I don’t—didn’t—care about her.”

“This place is special. It needed a protector. She needed a protector.”

And how the heck had he come to be in that role? Morgen flashed back to him leaping on her car with his fangs on display. He was about as protective as stinging nettle.

“She should not have left the property so much,” Amar grumbled, turning his back on her. He dusted wood chips off his project. “She was independent and refused to be told what to do. Or to take suggestions regarding her safety. She believed, as a witch, that she could take care of herself.”

For the first time, his voice was soft and touched with an emotion other than gruff surliness.

Morgen bit her lip, not sure how to react to the change. She wasn’t much better than her sister at knowing what to do to comfort people, and it wasn’t as if he was a typical or predictable people.

A soft, “Yeah,” of agreement was all she could manage.

Amar looked to the foggy gray sky, as if wrestling with some decision, then turned back to her. “I will take you to the Timber Wolf and make sure the Loups do not bother you.”

“That’s not necessary. I can’t think of any reason why French werewolves would care about me.”

“It is necessary. Because now, you control this.” He extended his arms toward the trees in both directions.

“Why does that matter to werewolves? This can’t be the only forest land around here.” Though she admitted it was likely difficult to find hundreds of acres of unbroken wilderness nestled between the towns along the coast. The Cascade Mountains were full of national forest and had to be appealing for wolves, but perhaps other packs lived out there and claimed that territory. Or perhaps werewolves, unlike regular wolves, had to live near civilization so they could have jobs and homes. After all, they were human half of the time. Or most of the time? She didn’t even know. A day ago, she hadn’t believed they existed.

“It is special land. Magical.” Amar lowered his arms. “Come. I will show you.”

“Uh.” She glanced at the clock on her phone, but the conversation hadn’t been that extensive, and she still had a long time until her date with Christian. “All right. Lucky.” She called the dog away from his gopher hunt. “Do you want to go for a walk?”

Walkwas one of the words Lucky knew, and he bounded up, ears flapping and tail wagging, though he slowed down when he drew close to Amar. He dropped to his belly and whined uncertainly.

“Amar is going with us. He’s recently guzzled coffee, and he’s probably feeling perky.”

One of Amar’s eyebrows twitched, but he didn’t reply, simply heading off toward a trail behind the barn.

Morgen followed, wondering what he would show her and what she’d gotten herself into by agreeing to dinner at a restaurant claimed by one of the local packs. Hopefully, any werewolves that lurked at that restaurant didn’t hang out there before sunset.