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  His square jaw worked back and forth as he considered me. “Are you new in town?”

  “I’m not from here, if that’s what you mean.” The dog licked my hands. I brushed my palms over her ears. “Aren’t you so smooshie? Such a sweet smooshie girl. What’s her name?”

  He smiled, and my stomach dipped. “Smooshie sounds like a great name.”

  “Doesn’t she already have a name?”

  “I’ve been calling her ‘girl’ mostly.”

  I noticed then the scars around the dog’s cheeks, but she looked healthy otherwise.

  As if he could read my mind, he said, “I own a pit bull rescue. She was in a foster home for a couple of months with some friends of mine, but they just couldn’t take care of her anymore, and we’ve been having trouble finding someone to adopt her.” He crossed his arms. “You wouldn’t be interested in adopting Smooshie, would you?”

  My stomach squeezed, and my chest filled with heartache for the dog. I knew him saying the dog’s name, calling her Smooshie, was a ploy to play on my sympathy, but this sweet girl had me at first lick.

  “I think she’s adopted me,” I finally said. “So I guess I have to let her take care of me.” Smooshie licked my hand, her long tongue getting into every crevice between my fingers. I’m sure the hamburger I’d scarfed played a huge role in her attentive kisses.

  “Good.” He clicked a leash onto her collar. “I think you two are a perfect fit. You really seem to know your way around a dog. You ever own one?”

  “No,” I said. But I am a Shifter, I didn’t believe in owning animals. Despite the whole cat-versus-dog stereotypes, werecats, in general, didn’t mind werewolves. Or dogs. Especially this one. “We’ll be friends,” I told Smooshie. The dog wiggled happily.

  The man’s blue eyes sparkled as his gaze met mine. “I’m Parker, by the way.”

  I had a moment of clarity meeting Smooshie and Parker. It reminded me of the time when I was five years old, and I was forced (and I mean physically) to attend Paradise Falls Elementary School. My mother and father had walked me to PFE on a mild August morning, kissed me on the forehead (after ten minutes of prying my claws—yes, I’d partially shifted into my Were form—from their legs), and ushered me to the long line of students waiting outside the front doors.

  I’d always been a solitary soul. I’d easily entertained myself for hours during the day, which made me a great child for my parents, but scored me zero points on the social interaction scale. So, it petrified me, as a loner, to be situated amongst a hundred other children who were all, much to my horror, taller than me.

  A lanky brunette wearing black leggings and a skull-adorned pink tunic stood in front of me, clutching her backpack to her chest and talking to herself, or so I assumed. I’d cast a glare of betrayal back at my parents, who both waved and smiled encouragingly. At that moment, I hated them for their treachery. I’d been happy at home in my own little Lily bubble, and the fact that they were making me go out in the world to face other people felt royally unfair.

  “Stop that,” I heard the girl in front of me say. “No, you have to stay inside.”

  I personally thought she was nutty as a walnut tree.

  She glanced over her shoulder at me and said, “Your hair matches Tizzy’s.”

  I thought she was insulting me until a tiny head popped out of the backpack, and the small red squirrel said, “Letmesee, Haze!”

  And in those few seconds of meeting my soon-to-be future BFF and her exuberant flying-squirrel familiar, I no longer felt abandoned and stranded.

  So when Parker offered me his hand to shake, I took it. “Nice to meet you. I’m Lily.”

  “Are you all right, Miss Mason?” asked the mechanic Greer Knowles. He strolled quickly toward Parker and me. For an older gentleman, he moved with ease.

  “Yes.” I put my mittens back on because between the cold wind and Smooshie’s saliva, a patch of ice was forming on my palms. “Thanks.”

  “That damn four-way is going to get someone killed.”

  “Morning, Dad,” Parker said. Apparently, the nice-smelling dog rescuer was the mechanic’s son. “You know the council is never going to approve the money for a stop sign.”

  “They will when someone dies.” Greer shook his head and turned his attention to me. “Good news. You sheared the distributor. Bad news, the part I need to fix your car is in Oklahoma. It will be Tuesday before it gets here.”

  “How much?”

  “Forty-eight for the part, plus twenty-five labor.”

  It was a fair price. More than fair, but I couldn’t help but think about the chunk it would eat out of my savings, especially since I didn’t have a job. Every cent I had would need to last me.

  “Thanks,” I said. Smooshie contented herself to stay next to me, and I admit, having her close made me feel more calm and centered. She was better than a mood stone.

  “I’ve rarely seen a dog so taken with someone right from the get-go,” Parker said. “You want to come down to the rescue and fill out the paperwork?”

  “Sure,” I said. I had nowhere to live. Which meant, the dog was going to be just as homeless as I was right now. Jeez, I hadn’t thought this through.

  “Uhm, Parker.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I’m just visiting family for a couple of days. I don’t even have a place to stay yet. I doubt if a B&B will let me keep Smooshie. Can you keep her for a couple more days?”

  Parker smiled. “I have a studio apartment over my garage. It’s just a bed, a bathroom, and a kitchenette, but you’re welcome to it as long as you need it.”

  “It’ll only be two or three days at the most.”

  He waved me off. “However long.”

  “You don’t even know me.”

  “You’re kind, Lily. I can tell in the way you are with Smooshie. As far as I’m concerned, that’s all I need to know.”

  “Parker!” a woman shouted. “Parker Knowles!” I looked up to see Katherine Kapersky sprinting toward us. She looked ready to spit nails. For such a put-together woman, she had an attitude worse than a skunk Shifter’s. And they were as crotchety as shapeshifters come.

  Parker groaned. “Not now,” he said out the side of his mouth.

  “That woman needs a muzzle more than your dogs,” Greer said. “You better get, son.”

  “Come on,” Parker said to me. “My place is just three streets down.” He didn’t bother waiting for me to answer as he headed in the opposite direction of my uncle’s café. Smooshie and I were right on his tail.

  So was Mrs. Kapersky.

  “Parker!” The woman used his name like a demand. “I know you can hear me.”

  I looked back over my shoulder. Her blonde hair had enough hair spray that it barely moved, even with her brisk pace. She flapped her pocketbook in our direction.

  “I think she’s going to follow you all the way to the shelter.”

  “Probably,” Parker said. He stopped and turned. “Mrs. Kapersky. So nice to see you.” Even though his words had been meant as a polite kindness, I could taste the lie like a green persimmon’s bitterness on my tongue, an unfortunate side effect of my witch inheritance.

  “I saw that dog of yours running around the streets.” Her finger shook as she pointed it at him. “Between your beasts and the crazy drivers, this town is turning dangerous for folks to even walk around in.”

  Had she seen my near miss with the car, or had she had a close encounter of her own?

  The creases between Parker’s eyes deepened. “My dogs have never hurt anyone, and you know it.”

  “The board meets this week, and I promise you, we will be voting on whether to ban the shelter from the city limits.”

  “Mrs. Kapersky.” Parker’s body went rigid, his hands flexing as if self-control was something he had to practice. “This is Lily Mason. She’s adopting the dog right now. You won’t have to worry about her anymore.”

  “Too little too late,” the woman snapped.

 
; Parker’s dad was right behind her. “If you want a real cause, Katie, you’d get this sign fixed. Miss Mason here almost got ran over.”

  The woman turned her laser beam eyes to the mechanic. “You stay out of this, Greer.” And with that, she turned on her heel and stormed off.

  Parker shook his head.

  His dad said, “That woman was born in a briar patch and never got all the thorns out of her sorry hide.”

  “That’s no lie,” Parker agreed.

  “I’m glad you’re okay, Miss Mason,” Greer said.

  I nodded at him. “Thanks.”

  “All right.” He gestured toward his son, who was already heading off again. “Parker’s a good kid. He’ll take care of you. I’ll give him a call when the truck is ready.” The scowl on his face returned as he stared down the street at the Kapersky woman. “Have a nice day, Miss Mason.”

  It took a minute to catch up with Parker. Smooshie, who’d been silent during Mrs. Kapersky’s tirade, whined. Her sad gaze made me want to go werecougar on the horrid woman. I know it had only been five minutes, but Smooshie was under my protection now. Anyone foolish enough to be mean to her would find my claws in their behind.

  “What was that all about?” I asked.

  Parker scratched behind her ear. “It’s nothing for you to worry about,” he said. “She’s an old witch.”

  Alarm rang through me. A witch was responsible for the deaths of my parents and my brother. While I knew they weren’t all bad, my best friend Haze, for example, I also knew that a rogue witch could cause a lot of damage and chaos. “A witch? How old?” The older ones tended to be more powerful, and as wrinkly as she looked, she had to be a thousand years or more.

  “I’m pretty sure the crone celebrated her sixtieth birthday last year.”

  “Only sixty?” I tucked my chin. She couldn’t have strong magic. I was still getting used to my own witch DNA, and I didn’t really have a hold on my own power yet. The blonde hair marked Mrs. Kapersky as a creator. “Do you have many…witches living in Moonrise?”

  “We have our share, just like anywhere else.”

  Really? It surprised me that he would know about witches. I was certain this was a human-only town, with the exception of my uncle. Hazel, now the chief of police in my hometown of Paradise Falls, had lived in the human world for nearly two decades, and no one had been the wiser. She said it was pretty easy to hide. But she’d been a witch, not a Shifter, and I wondered if it was easier to hide magic than shifting.

  “Does she have a coven?” I asked.

  Parker raised his brow at me. “A what?”

  “Mrs. Kapersky. I just wondered if she had a coven because I don’t sense her magic.”

  “If by magic, you mean pure meanness, then yeah. That woman is a demon.”

  Was she a witch or a demon? I was lost. Surely, Uncle Buzz would have mentioned if paranormal beings lived here.

  He studied me. “I don’t mean she’s a real witch. She likes to complain about everything all the time and stir up trouble.”

  Oh. I blushed. He wasn’t talking about real witches. Duh. “I think the word you’re looking for starts with a B. I’ve known a few of those, too. Ironic she’s married to the preacher.”

  “No doubt.”

  The rescue shelter smelled nicer than I thought it would. I mean, it definitely smelled like dog, but when you housed a bunch of dogs, that couldn’t be helped.

  “How many do you have?”

  “Right now I have enough room to take care of twenty dogs, but only enough volunteers for about eight. I’m trying to save enough to buy some property outside of town. I want to build a large shelter on at least ten acres to house at least two hundred dogs.” He shook his head. “I hate having to turn away a pit bull that needs care and attention. Some of them come to me in pretty bad shape.”

  I hated to think of what Smooshie must have gone through before her rescue. “Do you take care of them by yourself?”

  “I have two employees and some volunteers. Good folks who will come and hang out with the dogs in care, re-socialize them to people. When they are ready, we have foster homes who keep them until we can get them adopted. Like with children, it takes a village. We get donations in from all over the state, money, food, and such. The local vet office, Petry’s Pet Clinic, vaccinates the dogs for free, and neuters and spays them for me.”

  “That’s really nice of the vet.”

  “Ryan Petry is an old buddy. I usually ask for a small adoption fee from prospective owners. What I get, I give to Ryan. It covers his costs for the medicines.”

  “How do you keep it going? I mean, if you give away the adoption fees?”

  He chuckled. “The rest of this place is paid for with donations from animal lovers all over the state. We have regular monthly and one-time donors. It’s not a lot, but it keeps the lights on.” He smiled. “We have a website people can access.”

  His love for the breed moved me. “That’s really wonderful. These dogs are lucky to have you in their corner.”

  “I’d do anything to keep them safe.”

  I hadn’t had much help when I was raising my brother. Maybe if I had, he wouldn’t have died so young. “It’s a noble endeavor.”

  He smiled. “The dogs help me as much as I help them.”

  He didn’t elaborate, so I didn’t pry.

  “Thanks for putting me up,” I said, trying real hard not to move in closer for a better whiff of his delicious scent. “I won’t be a bother. I don’t plan to stay in town long.”

  Parker’s blue eyes softened. “That’s too bad.”