Page 37 of Renaissance Bear

She exhaled in heavy relief, but then elbowed him. "Yes, you should have! You're not a great liar!"

"I'm really not. Bears are kind of honest creatures. Where did you get that carbon paper?" Jon asked, amazed.

"Itwasstuck to the bottom of the plinth. I put it in my pocket and found it again when I was calling 911. No wonder the bank manager, or whoever it was, called Stuart this weekend. I wouldn't want to take somebody's hastily hand-written note as a legitimate…well, not bill of sale, but whatever that was. Release of lands for sale. Which doesn't even really sound legal anyway."

Jon shook his head in agreement. "No, but the whole 'possession is nine-tenths of the law' thing might be enough to keep a court battle going forever. Like, if whoever it is could even get a semi-legal stake on it, exchange money, something like that. You saved our bacon in there, Alis."

"I kind of did." She slumped against him. "How can it still be this early? I'm exhausted."

"Well, somebody did keep you up really late last night."

"Hah. Yeah, somebody did." She smiled, then stole a kiss before sagging against Jon's chest again. "But it's been a really intense morning. Oh, man, I hope your mayor is okay."

"Me too." Jon closed his eyes. "We have Faire all day. I don't know how I'm going to make it through that without losing my mind. Or falling asleep."

"Keep moving and you won't fall asleep, at least. I wish there were—" Alis broke off suddenly. "Okay, look, I have something to tellyou, and—" Her phone rang, and she groaned, answering it with, "Not now, Jasmine."

Jon heard her sister say, "Yes, now, sorry," as Alis scooted away, and, out of politeness, turned the engine back on and drove them toward the fairgrounds as Alis muttered, nodded, and finally hung up before returning to Jon's side.

"I am so sorry. Apparently one of the other ladies in waiting is really sick and she's got a real role that somebody needs to play today, and they wanted to know if I could do it."

"No, that's fine." Jon shot her a smile. "Does that mean I need to impress some new lady, or do I still have a shot with Alessandra?"

"Oh, man! I don't know! I'll have to ask! I think it's just that Alessandra's getting a promotion for a day or two and I can stick with her romantic storyline with you, but I'll let you know. I should get your phone number," Alis added, sounding surprised. "I don't have it yet."

"That seems almost impossible." Jon rattled the number off and she put it in her phone, then called his, which rang from his back pocket as they pulled into the fairgrounds parking lot.

"There, that's me. Now we can communicate. I'm going to be memorizing a scene all morning, though, so if I don't get back to you right away, don't panic."

"I won't," Jon promised, smiled into a kiss, and watched her hop out of the truck and run off toward her RV.

It was only then that he wondered why the Red Court coordinators had called her sister, and not Alis herself.

Chapter 17

Atext came in before Alis was even out of her commoner clothes. From Jon, saying,why didn't they call you instead of your sister?!?

She said, "Crap," out loud, and Jasmine, helping lay out her dress, glanced up.

"What?"

"Jon wanted to know why they didn't just call me instead of you. There's actually an answer to that, which is I had the phone set to emergency contacts only, so you were the only person whocouldcall, but honestly I'm not even sure he realizes you're here so it's weird if they were calling you back in Maryland or something."

"Also, they didn't call. Or they did, but nobody answered, so somebody came out to the RV and woke me up and told me they needed me on set by a quarter to eleven. I tell you what, I had a really bad moment there before I realized they thought they were talking to you."

Alis couldn't help a laugh. "Honestly, Jazz, I'm going to have to come clean pretty soon here so you stop having to deal with that kind of thing."

"It's the first time it's ever happened. If it happens again, yes, definitely, but in the meantime you can just tell Sword Boy that you had your phone off so you could concentrate on his fabulous abs." Jasmine paused. "Theyarefabulous, right?"

"Oh myGod, Jazz. You have noidea."

"Nope! That's it! That's all I need to hear!" Jasmine lifted her hands like she was putting up a sound barrier. "Glad it all worked out for you, now put your pretty dress on and go be a lady fair. Please tell me I don't have to be Lady Alessandra today? I want to finish this project by tonight."

"No, you're good. I don't fight again until the jousts on Saturday. Although I might go do the informal bouts in the unarmored division sometime this week if I finish playing this bigger part. I don't want a bigger part," Alis mumbled as she squirmed into her dress. "I like being a small fish and the Black Knight."

"Wouldn't it be fun to be a big fish and the Black Knight, though?" Jasmine zipped her up, then returned to her computer. "Lady Alessandra swaggering down out of the stands to strap her armor on while the crowd goes wild? It'd be great."

"Not until I've come out. Which I almost did to Jon, before you called."

---