Page 11 of Horn in My Side
“Hey, where did your girlfriend go?”the waitress asked as shereturned, two trays of food in her hands, plus another one balancing on the end of her tail.
“She, uh, had an emergency.”
“Oh, did you want her food to go, then?”
“No, I’ll eat it.”
Mal finished both plates of food, even though it all tasted like ash.After paying, he dragged himself back to his motel room, though this time he felt no relief at being inside.Worse still, his stomach was tied up in knots, tightening as he stared at the white urn next to theTV.
Plopping himself on the chair, he let out a half-grunt, half-snort.He couldn’t let some pretty little thing and her big doe eyes derail him from his plan: get in, get the job done, get out.
How anyone could say no to those sweet brown eyes, he didn’t know.Worse, she didn’t even seem to know she was doing it.Maybe that’s how she finagled a job from Vrig in the first place, though she didn’t seem the type to use her womanly wiles.Perhaps Vrig had seen something special in her and had obviously grown fond of her if he’d kept her around this long.With his strength and magic, Vrig wouldn’t have needed a full-time manager.
Don’t even think about it.
He couldn’t stay here and run the pet shop with her.It was a crazy idea.Aside from the fact that he knew nothing about retail or magical creatures, there were half a dozen short-term jobs on which he could work; he could even go home and visit his parents in Vermont for a couple weeks.But he was absolutely not staying in this little town, working in that shop, day in and day out, without a plan or guarantee she’d even be able to get that loan to buy the shop from him.
He glanced back at the urn, then at his laptop.Opening it once again, he clicked on the mail icon and waited ...for nothing.
Slamming it shut, he leaned back on the chair and scrubbed a hand down his face.
Godsdamnit.
But, Mal supposed, he could hear her out—listen to her proposal, her plan to save money and get a loan.He owed Vrig that, at the very least.But he wouldn’t let her convince him to derail his own plans.
I’ll go to the shop tomorrow.
And if that email from the Historical Society arrived between now and then, he would take the first flight out to the homelands and find another way to settle Vrig’s affairs.
Chapter Three
JASMINE
“There, there,” she cooed at the fenrir cub who whined at her when she passed by its pen.“Don’t you worry.You’ll have your lunch soon.It’s not time yet.”
The tiny thing was incredibly food driven and eager to please, and she guessed it would make a good pet for someone who wanted to train it.After giving it a scratch on its chin, she continued toward the back office.
Pausing, she gave herself a little motivational pep talk before pushing the door open.Vrig’s office was exactly the way it was on the last day he came in.For all the care and effort he put in constructing the front of the shop, this space looked like any ordinary office.
Of course, while it was cramped for Vrig, as he had been seven feet tall, it was comfortable for her petite stature.She walked over to the oversized table, running a hand over the surface, a thin layer of dust accumulating on her fingers.She supposed she should clean in here, but it wouldn’t matter anyway.Soon, this place, along with the shop, the building, and the creatures, would all be gone.
Circling the desk, she climbed up the office chair, settling into a cross-legged position.Mal was certainly in his rights to do what he wanted with Fantastic Tails and all of Vrig’s assets, and she wouldn’t be able to do anything.
But he didn’t have to be such a surly grouch about it.
It seemed impossible to her that he and Vrig were related by blood.Most people would look at Vrig and think he was some mean and fierce orc, but really it was the opposite.He spoke in a soft voice and had been so gentle and careful with his words and actions.
His nephew, on the other hand, was very orc-like in nature.Not that she had encountered many of them, but they were known to be a menacing species, and also quite insular.From what she’d read, they often lived in communities that were closed off; in fact, despite its reputation for being a multi-species community, Vrig had been the only orc living in Dewberry Falls.
Jasmine knew she could be quite sensitive to words and tones and that was something she worked on.When she first moved to America, she had found the directness of the people abrasive and, having only learned English in a formal setting, it had been difficult for her to understand the nuances of the language and things like sarcasm and jokes.
Over time, she integrated into her new home, but frankly it had been difficult, not to mention inter-species relations, which added a different dimension to navigating everyday life in Dewberry Falls.But much like her transition to a new country, she had fumbled her way through it and somehow found herself entrenched in this cozy little town.And now she was going to have to start all over again.
This was not, as one of the first American idioms she learned said, her first rodeo.She’d moved and started a new life several times at this point.Her father had first been recruited to work as a nurse at a hospital in Los Angeles, where they stayed for ayear before he found a better offer in Miami.They lived there for two years, enough time for Jasmine to finish high school before they relocated again to Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania.She was in her first semester at Pitt when she decided to drop out, as she felt college wasn’t for her, and she went to New York, then to Denver, then to San Francisco, staying a year or two in each city before the urge to move overcame her.After two years in San Francisco, she’d decided to pack up her belongings and drive north with no particular destination when her car broke down outside the small town of Dewberry Falls.She had planned to keep driving once her car was fixed, but then she saw the “Help Wanted” sign in the window of Fantastic Tails and Magical Scales Pet Shop.
True, she hadn’t meant to stay here this long and she could always start all over again.
I just don’t want to, she thought with a petulant pout.
