Page 24 of Whispers and Wildfire

He nodded and went to his truck, although I wasn’t sure if he believed me.

I glared at the door to the Timberbeast and got in my car.Thanks for screwing up my night, Mel.

Restless and dissatisfied, I headed home.

I poured a cup of the sludge Patrick considered coffee and took a sip. The garage was busy, as usual. The Dodge Patrick was working on would be ready for paint soon. That would make the client happy. And Ollie was in a pair of coveralls, head buried in the engine compartment of what had once been a 1964 Jeep Gladiator pickup. We’d scored that job from a guy down in California. It needed a lot of work, but it would be killer when it was done.

The dark roast had been brewed too strong, but I drank it anyway. I needed the caffeine. After the previous night’s run-in with Melanie the human hurricane, I’d slept like crap. Although my initial rush of anger had worn off, I’d gone home still amped with adrenaline. It had taken hours to come down.

My phone buzzed in my pocket, so I went into my office where I’d be able to hear. It was my mom.

I groaned. I loved my mom, and we got along fine. But Iwasn’t looking forward to her questions about a certain ex-girlfriend.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Hi, honey. Sorry to bother you at work.”

“That’s okay. What’s going on?”

“Well, I was just at Nature’s Basket and ran into Doris Tilburn. She said she heard you got into a bit of a quarrel with someone at the Timberbeast last night. Is everything all right?”

“Yeah, everything is fine.”

“Was it Melanie?”

“It was.”

“How is she? I haven’t seen her in so long.”

I blinked in confusion. “I guess she’s fine, although we weren’t hanging out to catch up.”

“I’ll have to reach out to Krista.”

“Okay…” I didn’t really care if my mom talked to her mom, but I didn’t know why she seemed concerned. “Is that why you called?”

“I’m not trying to be nosy. I just wondered what happened. Doris heard there was quite a commotion, and that doesn’t sound like you.”

“That’s just the gossip line blowing things up, as usual. There was no commotion.”

“Good to hear. Okay, honey, I’ll talk to you later.”

“Bye, Mom.”

I slipped my phone back into my pocket and rolled my eyes. Commotion? Come on, we hadn’t caused a commotion.

Much.

Ollie knocked and poked his head into my office. “Someone in the lobby to see you.”

I tipped my chin to him in acknowledgment and went to see who it was.

Pausing just inside the lobby, I suppressed a groan. Thepetite old lady in a lime-green velour tracksuit was not who I’d been hoping to see.

Aunt Louise.

She had silver hair she’d recently cut short that curled at the nape of her neck, and a large blue quilted handbag hung from her elbow. She took slow steps, gazing at the photos on the wall.

Don’t get me wrong, the almost-groan wasn’t because I don’t like my aunt. I like her fine. I just avoided her as much as possible because she’d appointed herself Haven family matchmaker. She was forever on a quest to get me and my brothers married off. I’d been subjected to her matchmaking attempts often enough that I knew better than to say yes. Ever.

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