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But the guy was insistent. He was up on his feet and skiing away in less than a moment, though it was obvious he was in some pain.
“Well, that was weird.” Mel watched the man go.
And that was saying something coming from him.
* * * *
Elisa had to check the urge to leave the conference room and go find her dad. It wasn’t that she was worried about her dad. Quite the opposite. Really she would be checking on Van and Hale. Who were with her dad. Who her dad had somewhat sneakily called out here.
Why?
He’d told her he had some work to do up at the lodge, and she’d assumed it was about tracking down aliens or the survivors of aliens. He apparently was considered a great counselor when it came to helping others process their alien abductions. She hadn’t thought he would be doing any of that with her boyfriends.
Well, her boyfriend and his friend, who sometimes slept with her and was definitely going to leave them both.
“I told my boss everything that happened. Am I in trouble?”
The woman named Chelle McIntyre looked like a brown doe trapped in the headlights as she stared at Elisa’s badge.
She’d gone over the report Chelle had made about fifty times. “You’re not in trouble. You didn’t break the law or anything, but you could know something that might help us track this person down.”
“What did she do?” Chelle asked.
“We’re not sure, but we have reason to suspect she might have broken into one of the cabins down in the valley and committed vandalism.”
Chelle’s big eyes managed to move into anime territory. “No. That’s awful. The valley is so nice. Did you know all the guys are hot down there? Like super hot. At first I thought maybe it was some reality show shooting around town, but no. Some of them were born there. They all actually live there.”
“Yes, I was aware that people lived there.”
“Hot guys.”
“And the women who love them and have a club called ‘I Shot a Son of a Bitch,’” Elisa pointed out. She was already getting protective of this town she found herself in. While the lodge was technically in Bliss County, many of the people who worked here for the most part kept to the lodge.
Chelle looked like she was still a teen, though according to her records she was twenty-two and had recently graduated from a community college with a degree in something called hospitality management. She’d moved from Boulder to the lodge, where she now worked the front desk. Her blonde hair was in a high ponytail as she nodded. “Yeah, the women are scary. They’re so strange. It makes me wonder if what they say is true.”
She should avoid this, but she couldn’t. “What do they say?”
“That the women of Bliss are all in a coven and they use the ley lines to enhance their magic and make the men do their bidding. I don’t know what a ley line is. Is it about getting laid?” She seemed to consider something and leaned forward. “Do you know? You’re a cop. You’re supposed to know things. The lodge seems normal, but sometimes weird things happen here. Did you know the east field was taken over by aliens sometime last night?”
Oh, this was what Nate had talked about in his pamphlet. Patience was absolutely required. “Okay, they are not witches. They are perfectly nice women who simply don’t like other women planning to steal their men. Ley lines are these things that people made up to describe weird but perfectly normal for the planet we live on phenomena. It has nothing to do with getting laid. Cops don’t know everything and if they tell you they do and they’re young and male, that is them trying to get laid. Ignore them. And if the east field was taken over by aliens, don’t worry. My dad is here, and he will handle it.”
“Who is your dad?” Chelle asked around the gum she was chewing.
It was nice to know not everyone had figured that out. She’d been called Mel’s daughter more than once as she’d started to get used to Bliss life. “He’s the head alien hunter around here, though I’ve been told he also handles sasquatches. Before you ask, they don’t exist either. Probably. I don’t know. I’m new here. I need a couple of years to get into the mindset. Now, did she give you her name?”
Chelle sat for a moment and then her brain seemed to turn on again. “Oh, we’re back to the lady who almost got me fired. I thought we were talking about the aliens or witches or something. You’re sure they’re not witches, because some of those women have two hot guys and that doesn’t seem right.”
It seemed perfectly right to her. When she thought about it, they were truly halves of a whole. Van was outgoing and easy to be with. Hale’s waters ran deep. They both struggled to navigate the world sometimes, and that was what she was good at. She didn’t mind being assertive.
