AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Possible, but I can’t imagine her leaving her grandson unattended like that. She doted on the boy.”
I grimaced. “I take it the rangers are trying to contact the mother?”
Belle nodded. “Apparently, Levi knows Brandon’s mom.”
Levi being Jaz’s husband. “She’s a werewolf?”
“No, human, but she and Levi had a bit of a fling before Jaz came on to the scene.”
Werewolves tended to do that. Hell, I was meant to be nothing more than a “fling” for Aiden. Thankfully, that changed quickly enough, and while we still had a lot of things to sort out, our relationship was at least heading down the right track.
Unless, of course, it all derailed yet again—a thought totally derived from my pessimistic streak than any real fear that it actuallywould.
It didn’t take us long to get over to Joselyn’s place. She lived in a leafy, well-to-do street in a gorgeous old Victorian-era home with a willow tree out the front and agapanthus lining the front of the porch.
Tala, Aiden’s second-in-command, walked toward us as we pulled up behind her SUV. I tugged the phone out of my bra, told Brandon that we were out the front and about to come in, then hung up, dropping the phone into my pack as I got out of the car.
“Liz, given the kid rang you, do you and Belle want to head into the house to check things out there? Monty and I will go around to the back and see if we can pick up a trail.”
She turned without waiting for an answer and strode toward the driveway to the right of the property, forcing Monty to run after her. I slung my pack over my shoulder and led the way in. The front door was locked, as Brandon had said, but a quick spell soon fixed that.
I didn’t immediately open the door however, glancing at Belle instead. “You sensing anything telepathically?”
“Nothing other than one hungry little boy.” She hesitated. “He was fed lunch but hasn’t had his afternoon snack, which usually happens around three.”
“Which at least gives us a time frame for her disappearance.” I opened the door and said, in a voice loud enough to be heard over the TV, “Brandon? It’s Lizzie, the lady who finds things.”
Footsteps echoed on the lovely old polished floors, and a second later, a cute kid with messy brown hair and the biggest blue eyes appeared. He stopped a few meters away, his expression a mix of uncertainty and relief. “Are you going to find my nanny now?”
I nodded. “I’ve got two friends out the back doing that right now. Can we come in?”
He nodded. “I need a drink.”
“My friend Belle will do that for you while I look for something that can help us find your nanny. Which bedroom is hers?”
He pointed to the room on the left, then pointed right. “Mine is that one. I have trains on the wall.”
“Oh, good.” Belle brushed past me and held out a hand. “I love trains. You’ll have to show me after we get something to drink.”
He nodded, took her hand—well, fingertips really, given he wasn’t particularly tall, and she was an Amazon—and led her down the hallway. I walked into Joselyn’s room, but paused near the door, expanding my senses as I scanned the neat, somewhat flowery room. Nothing immediately pinged, so I held up my hand and did a slow circuit around the room. I was close to the far bedside table when I felt the twitch of life. There was nothing other than a lamp and a glass of water sitting on the top, however, so I opened the first drawer. There, sitting on the top of an intricately carved wooden jewelry case, was a simple silver watch.
The pulse coming from it suggested that, at this point in time, Joselyn was very much alive. More than that, I couldn’t gauge, not without picking it up. I swung my pack around, pulled a silk glove out of a side pocket, and tugged it on. I’d taken to carrying both silk and latex gloves around since I’d become Monty’s assistant, simply because it was easier for those few times we headed out without a ranger in tow.
I carefully picked up the watch, then opened the psychometry gates. Images immediately surged, but they were little more than a rapid-fire reel of trees, grass, and water that spun around with giddying speed, giving me little information and no chance to understand where she was and what she was doing.
I frowned and tried deepening the connection. The reel slowed, but her emotions remained just as scattered. She was sitting in a small grove of trees, but she had no idea where she was or how she’d gotten there. She couldn’t move, but the pain that rolled through her system suggested her immobility wasn’t due to any sort of brief contact with the basilisk, but rather because she’d hurt a leg or an ankle.
I swore softly and left the room. Even though the images gave me little information, I could still use the pulsing in the watch to locate her—though in truth, it might not be necessary. Unless there was magic involved, Tala should be able to track her via scent.
I popped my head around the kitchen door. Belle was in the process of pouring chocolate milk into a cup, and Brandon was happily perched on a stool in front of the kitchen counter, munching on a couple of buttered Teddy Bear sandwiches. My stomach rumbled in appreciation, but I resisted the urge to ask Belle to make me one. We had a nanny to find first.
“Everything okay here?”
Brandon swung around, biscuit crumbs and butter smeared around his mouth. “You found my nanny yet?”
“Just about to head out now to find her. Will you be okay here with Belle?”
He nodded. “She’s going to play trains with me.”
