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Even with his—frankly, delicious, but I would never tell him so now—banana pudding, I held Jed at arm’s length until we could hold what Zeb called a “family meeting” at Specialty Books as soon as he was released from the hospital. Zeb was bruised and battered, his arm in a sling. I offered to take care of it for him, but he declined. He said it was good for him, to feel human, to remind him to pay better attention when he was in the shop alone. Jolene, who was now left to care for their twins while Zeb was on the injured list, objected to this strongly. But when Jane offered to take care of the hospital bills since the injury had occurred on her property, she seemed mollified.
It was strange spending time with Jed again with this new perspective. I’d missed him. It seemed strange to admit that. I missed the version of Jed I thought I knew. I didn’t know if that Jed really existed. He did his best to make it up to me. He helped me restore order to my ransacked living room and replaced my windows. The problem was that if it wasn’t Jed, who had broken into the shop? Who had gone through my things at the house? Had the Kerrigans sent another operative into our area?
Gabriel and Dick asked those questions and many more after I insisted that Jed confess his part in the Kerrigans’ plot. The vampires made it clear that they did not like or trust Jed. Zeb was confused about exactly who Jed was. But once he realized that he was once considered a suspect in his ass-whupping, he chilled considerably. Jolene was careful to stand between them at all times and appeared to be baring her teeth. Jane picked Jed’s brain over with a mental fine-tooth comb. She couldn’t detect any dishonesty, but she added that didn’t mean anything if Jed was good at covering up.
Dick also “offered” to let Jed stay in one of the other properties in town. Well, actually, Dick waited until Jane had Jed by the hair and leaned in close, growling like a jungle cat. “Just so you understand, that little girl over there is very important to me. If you hurt her again—I mean, if she’s the least bit unhappy, if she returns from any outing with you with so much as a hangnail—I will fix it so if people ever find your body, they won’t be able to tell if you’re human or a raccoon that got caught in a mulcher.”
“Dick!” I shouted. “I’m not a little girl!”
“Well, compared to Dick,” Andrea began.
I pointed a finger in her face. “Quiet, you!”
“Hey, I didn’t get to do this when you were younger, so I’m making up for it now,” Dick said.
“I had lots of uncles who did this when I was younger, and I hated it then, too.”
“He is being a little overprotective, but that’s sort of a thing with him and Gabriel,” Jane told me.
“Thank you.”
Jane turned to Jed and gave him a grim smile. “You do realize, of course, that none of us trusts you, and we reserve the right to whack you over the head with various blunt objects if the mood strikes us?”
Jed nodded after a moment’s consideration. “Understood.”
“How is that better?” I demanded. Jane shrugged.
“Before the head bashing begins, could I make a peace offering?” Jed asked before disappearing out the front door. He returned, hefting the heavy trunk full of journals under one arm. Suddenly, his ability to haul around paving stones made more sense. Did shapeshifters have above-average strength? Seeing Mr. Wainwright’s name stamped on the trunk, Jane was immediately intrigued. She knelt before the collection of old books and stroked the covers reverently.
“You’re still on probation,” she reminded Jed, who smirked at her.
She opened one and sighed. “It’s . . . in gibberish.”
“Jane,” Andrea admonished her. “I’m surprised at you. This isn’t gibberish. OK, who here speaks Mandarin?” Gabriel grinned broadly and raised his hand. Andrea handed him a journal. “And . . . Latin?” Dick raised his hand and accepted another. “I happen to read some Old Norse, thanks to a horrible ex-boyfriend whom we will not mention because it makes Dick pull his angry face. Which leaves us with old Gaelic, Sanskrit, and hieroglyphics.”
“I can take the Gaelic portions, or at least muddle through them,” I said. “And if you have some books on Sanskrit and hieroglyphics or, even better, Mr. Wainwright’s guides to those languages, we can get to work on them. Maybe we can find something in the journals that will give us some clue about the bell.”
“Oh, good.” Zeb sighed, shifting his arm uncomfortably while he and Jolene settled into the comfy purple chairs with their assignments. “Homework.”
* * *
It was a relief to have something to do, something we could all focus on for the week before the deadline. Although I found nothing to do with Mr. Wainwright’s trip to Ireland, the journals were pleasant and interesting reading. I did learn that I should consider the possibility that every animal I saw was actually a middle-aged man named Wally. Nana had told me that Mr. Wainwright was looking for were-deer, but it was still a bit shocking to find out that there were people out there who turned into skunks and weasels. Think of the dry-cleaning involved.
Using the journal dates, we constructed a timeline of where he had traveled when. To give our eyes a rest from Mr. Wainwright’s small script, we took turns contacting his favorite buyers, asking about bells, just in case. We visited every pawn shop in the surrounding two counties, but bells didn’t seem to be frequently pawned items. I continued working at the clinic, but each afternoon, I left earlier than my previously established routine, something that Dr. Hackett frowned on. He knew, though, that I’d be leaving soon and he would have to adjust to running the clinic without me.
I sent scans of the Gaelic portions to Penny, a swipe to my pride, considering how often she’d told me to study the language more faithfully, as I would need it someday. Her translations were interesting but ultimately unhelpful. Eventually, we were able to determine which journals were the volumes written just before and about two years after the Ireland trip, but we couldn’t seem to find the Ireland volume. The only bright spot, Gabriel observed, was that Mr. Wainwright never referred to selling or giving away the Elements in subsequent journals. We were sitting around the shop again, going over the journals, when Dick suddenly dropped to his knees in front of the trunk and knocked on the interior of the lid. Jane watched him warily, but as he tested the lid, she seemed to pick up on his line of thinking.>“Not good enough,” I said, toying with my coffee cup. “So you’re a giant armadillo monster.”
“I kinda wish you would stop putting it that way.”
“Not going to stop me from saying it,” I shot back. “I don’t understand why your status as a supernatural creature should change my plans to keep you as far away from the Elements as possible.”
“Because I can help you find what you’re looking for.”
He dragged an old-fashioned trunk into the kitchen and opened it. It was filled with small leather-bound notebooks, covered in dust. I gaped at the sheer number of volumes. “What?”
“They’re travel journals,” he said. “Mr. Wainwright seemed to travel a lot. I found this trunk while we were fixing some pipes in the basement.”
“So in addition to lying to me, you stole family heirlooms. You are just a charmer, aren’t you?”
