Blood of a Werewolf (4 page)

Safe inside the house, she dropped the paper on the couch along with the eloquent note and set off searching the bookcase for the dictionary.
Finally! There you are
, she said to herself as she grabbed the huge book and threw it, too, on the couch.
 
She shuffled off to the kitchen to get that cup of coffee and saw Harry cleaning his face and looking quite satisfied with himself.
 

Shuffling back to the living room in her bunny slippers, she sat down, put her coffee on the coffee table, and looked at the beautiful writing on the card again.
 
She set it down on the coffee table very gently as if it were a piece of fragile glass that might chip if she set it down too roughly.
 

She grabbed the heavy dictionary and started to hunt down the T’s.
TE, TO, TR, Tryst, Ah, here it is. Part of Speech: Noun. Definition: (here we go) Meeting during a love affair. Synonyms: appointment, date, assignation, engagement, meet, meeting, rendezvous, union.
 
Wait…. Go back. Definition: Meeting during a love affair.
 
Oh my God, that’s got to be the most romantic thing I’ve ever seen,
she thought to herself
. Hmm, since I was wrong about “tryst,” let’s look up flower color meaning on the computer.
 

She grabbed the laptop that was sitting on the coffee table and Googled the words: lavender rose meaning.
 
And there it was in black and white –
Lavender roses: means love at first sight.
The onset of yet another swoon came over her.
 
Dear Lord, this man gets better and better with every passing second.
 

She grabbed her coffee and melted back into the cushions of the couch and sighed in pure delight.
 
She never even touched the paper that very special Saturday morning.
 

The rest of the day was a blur of cleaning the house, fluffing pillows, adoring the lovely note, which was now on the fridge attached with a Scooby-Doo magnet. The tiny yellow silk ribbon was lovingly tied back on to the card.
 

The rose was put in her grandmother’s heirloom bud vase and was set on the coffee table for all to see.
 
Then it was off to the store for toilet paper, napkins, kitty food, kitty litter, sodas, and munchies.
 

There was a quick stop at the bookstore to see how things were going there and check for messages.
 
There was a message from Rowan, of course, apologizing profusely about not showing up the night before and going on about an amazing guy she met.
Oh Boy
! Darby thought skeptically.
 

Next stop, the video store to rent whatever the hot new movie of the week was.
 
Finally, all of her running around was done and she headed back to the house. She noticed that in her new neighbor’s driveway was a very sweet brand-new Audi R8, black and sleek and sexy –
cha-ching – but Dang, if it wasn’t a beautiful beast,
she thought to herself. She turned to her little pride and joy of a car – A 2001 electric blue Honda Prelude.
 
Okay, so there is no comparison but it was the last year that Honda made a Prelude
, she thought proudly.
 

She popped the trunk to get the groceries out and remembered the day when she came home with the car. So proud of herself – her first brand new car.
 
She was beaming when her dad had inspected it, kicking the tires and looking under the hood. “It’s kind of...purple,” he’d said.
 

Insulted, she retorted, “No Dad, it’s Electric Blue.”
 

His eyebrows went up. ”Hmmm, why did you get a stick shift?”
 

“I don’t know, Dad! I guess I just like having something to do with my feet and my right hand while I’m driving,” she said, defensively, as she rolled her eyes in annoyance.
 

Nodding, he said, “It’s nice.”
 
That was the seal of approval.
 
He was an engineer and never seemed to get too excited about anything.
 
‘It’s nice,’ was the best she was ever going to get from him. Though he never said it out loud, her mother told her later that he was as proud as any dad could be.
 
He’d gone to work, bragging to all the other guys how his little girl bought her very own “brand new sports car” without any help from him.
 

With that thought in her mind and a proud smile on her face, she grabbed the groceries and went inside.
 
She put all the groceries away and changed the kitty box. She headed for the bedroom and put the clothes she was going to wear for the “tryst,” on the bed next to Harry. He was presently sleeping on his back, belly exposed and head on the pillow.
 
She looked at the clock – it was only 4:05 pm – what was she going to do for the next 3 hours? She lay on the bed next to Harry and rubbed his belly.
 

The doorbell rang, waking her.
 
She looked at the clock and the time was 6:30 pm. She must have fallen asleep. Harry jumped off the bed, disgruntled by the disturbance and Darby got up and headed for the front door.
 
Halfway to the door, she rubbed her eyes and suddenly it occurred to her,
Oh no, I bet I have bed head.
 
She ran both hands through her hair in an attempt to comb any crazy looking strays into obedience before opening the door. The doorbell rang again.
 
I’m coming, I’m coming,
she thought.
 

She opened the door to find a nervous looking Devon. She was a bit confused but said, “Hi, I’m sorry I fell asleep.
 
You’re a little bit early but if you want to come in...”
 

He interrupted her, “I’m so sorry, Darby. I’m going to have to cancel our date.”
 

“Oh. Okay. Is everything okay?”
 

“Ummmm, well there’s been an emergency.
 
A friend of ours needs our help and well… I just… well, we need to go right away. Can I take a rain check on that date?”
 

“Yea. No problem – another time then,” she said trying not to sound too disappointed.
 
But like anyone in the same position, she thought of about a hundred other reasons why he was really canceling.
 
After all, the excuse didn’t sound very convincing.
 
Then again, they’d only had one evening together; it’s not like they were joined at the hip.
 

As she pondered all this, Devon’s expression looked as though he was listening to her thoughts.
 
He was obviously very uncomfortable with lying and he did it rather badly. He said, “I’ll call you when it’s sa.., I mean, when I get back to make arrangements. Can you write your phone number down for me?”
 

“Oh, sure!” She walked to the table where the answering machine sat and picked up a pen and a notepad and jotted down her cell and her home phone. “Here you go. I hope everything is okay with your friend.”
 

“My what? Oh right, our friend. Yes. I’m sure everything will be fine.
 
Blake and I will just be gone a few days.
 
Again, Darby, I’m so sorry.
 
I hope you didn’t go to any great trouble.”
 

“Me? Phhhht! Naw! No big deal. Don’t worry about me.
 
Harry will keep me company,”
 
she chuckled just as Harry sprinted out the front door and into a bush across the street.
Great! Make me look bad why don’t you
, she thought. “Okay, so I guess I’ll see you around; have a safe trip.”
 

“Goodnight, Darby,” Devon said, and he was gone.
 
She shut the door and sat down on the couch.
Saturday night all alone, not even the cat wants to hang out with me.
 
At least I’ve got a movie to watch.
 

About ten minutes after their goodbye, she heard the sexy car leave the driveway next door.
Wow, he wasn’t kidding.
 
Hope he’s not running as fast as he can away from me.
 
With that she took some Ben and Jerry’s Cherry Garcia out of the freezer, grabbed a spoon and the movie, and went to her room.
 

Over the next seven days, a flurry of tokens from Devon arrived. Darby wasn’t sure how to react, as this was the first time she had ever been doted over. Her employee, Allison, had a lot of fun teasing Darby about the attention she was receiving from this mysterious new neighbor.
 

Allison Dover had freckles and beautiful, curly, red hair that went down to the middle of her back.
 
She was one of those gals that you never saw mad. She always seemed to be smiling.
 
Allison had become Darby’s ‘Right-hand gal’ in business, so to speak.
 
She had helped her make the bookstore a success and they weren’t just employee/employer; they were good friends.
 

The first day, an amazing ancient book of alchemy was delivered.
 
It was in almost perfect condition, bound in leather and all handwritten. The second day, four-dozen lavender roses came, representing the forty-eight hours he had been gone. The third day, a burglar outfit came for Harry, equipped with a black Zorro mask with cutouts for ears.
 
The package also included a man-sized kitty bowl and a bag of kitty food to fill it. The fourth day, a RedHook Coleman cooler with two growlers of beer and ice were delivered.
 
Also in the cooler was a RedHook tank top very similar to the one Darby had been wearing when she was caught watering in the yard. The fifth day, a very old book of Oljone history was delivered.
 
It appeared to be a diary of one of the original settlers. The sixth day, a small hydrangea plant came with a new watering nozzle for the hose and a CD of Modern English. The seventh day, an exact duplicate of her favorite comfy blue chair at Paddy’s was delivered. The eighth and last day, a formal invitation was delivered to the bookstore at about 10:00 A.M. by overnight FedEx. It said:
 

The pleasure of your presence is requested

by Mr. Devon Bloomington for dinner

this evening at 7:00 P.M. at his home.

She was excited he was coming back, but she had to admit to herself that she was feeling a bit apprehensive about the date.
 
She felt it had been so obvious he had lied about why he left that she worried about how that would play itself out.
 

“So what did you get from the mystery man today?” Allison pressed Darby, referring to the overnight letter.

“An invitation to dinner!” Darby handed the beautiful invitation to Allison.

“Are you excited?”

“Yeah! Nervous, excited and about a hundred other things.”

“I know.
 
First dates are like that.
 
So why don’t you just do something
witchy
, and see into the future?
 
That way you will know what to expect and you won’t be nervous anymore.”

“Just because I come from a family of witches, doesn’t make me a practicing witch.
 
My family hasn’t practiced witchcraft in at least one or more generations so nobody ever taught me to do anything.
 

“I found our family book of shadows, and I have made a few charms from it to help me or Rowan sleep or get over a cold faster, but that’s about the extent of my
witchiness
.
 
Rowan has actually taken a more active role in magic than I have.
 
She’s learned to read tarot cards and runes.”

“Huh. I always figured with opening a supernatural bookstore, that you were more active.”

“No time. I’m interested in it, but aside from a book here and there, the bookstore takes up all my time.
 
Besides, I’m not sure I have any talents. It’s not like I naturally have premonitions or cast spells.
 
Some witches are naturally talented with those gifts; so far I haven’t come up with anything I’m gifted with, except a head for business.”
 
Darby laughed and so did Allison.

“Well, maybe you’ve just never been in the right situation for your gifts to present themselves.”

“Maybe, but I don’t think I will hold my breath.
 
Besides, do you really want to be working for a witch? I mean, if you don’t come in on time, I could hex or curse you with chicken pox or athlete’s foot,” Darby said jokingly.

“Yeah. That could be a problem.”
 
Allison laughed so hard, Darby was sure she saw tears.

The rest of the day was like all days when there are anticipated plans in the evening, dragging at a snail’s pace. Darby swore she watched every hour on the clock go by. It was like the last day of the school year, waiting for the bell to ring so summer vacation could finally begin.