Her mother had already mentally moved on to more important matters. “I’m trying to decide what type of paper you should choose for the wedding invitations. Also, there’s a lot of different styles of calligraphy to consider and I think-“
“I am officially hanging up on you now. I love you, and you’re insane. Seek professional help.” Ginger clicked the “off” button, but as she walked up the back stairs, she allowed a little flutter of hope to quiver inside her heart.
Maybe she could stay here. Maybe she could keep Loch. Maybe her heart didn’t have to break into a million pieces.
Chapter Fourteen
“So if you get married, can I be a bridesmaid?” Lola was leaning back in her chair with her combat boots propped up on the desk, flipping through the pages of a bridal magazine.
Ginger grabbed it away from her. “My God. You, my mother, Loch’s grandmother…Why is everyone in the world so obsessed with marrying me off?”
Then she peered at the page Lola had been looking at. “That is a beautiful dress. Wow. Ivory silk. And look at those hand embroidered roses. You know-no, damn it! I will not be sucked into this madness! It is way too soon to be talking about weddings!” She threw the magazine back down on Lola’s desk.
“Not around here. When the Alpha claims a mate, it’s pretty much bam, boom, done. And an Alpha wedding is amazing. All the packs from all over the state come, and the party lasts for days. Think how many hot guys I’d meet.” Lola pouted. “I’m bored with all the guys in Blue Moon. I need fresh flesh. Why can’t you think about my needs?”
Ginger walked away, laughing. Then she glanced at the corner of the room and saw Jax glaring at his computer, lips pressed together in an angry line, and she sobered up a little. She had a feeling that one way or another, Jax wasn’t going to last with the sheriff’s office much longer. He was a man of action, he had the temperament if not the self-restraint of an Alpha, and there was no way he’d put up with a desk job forever.
She looked up to see Loch walking out of his office, towards her.
“There’s been a break in the case,” he said.
“What break?”
“We got an anonymous tip from a disposable phone, telling us to search Tommy Deerkiller’s house. And Montgomery actually agreed to let us come on to Panther Nation property so we could do the search; he agreed this case needs to be resolved. We found the professor’s clothes hidden under Deerkiller’s bed. They were shredded, as if by panther claws, and they’re blood-staine.d We’ve been investigating Deerkiller for some time now, even before the professor’s disappearance, for suspicion of dealing in stolen Panther Nation artifacts.”
Loch didn’t look happy as he said it, though.
“What is it?”
“I just don’t like it.” Loch shook his head. “I don’t know why, because everything ties together neatly, and we do know for a fact that Tommy deals in stolen goods, but something doesn’t smell right here.”
“I agree, there’s something off about it. Who made the anonymous call? Why would Tommy hide the professor’s clothes at his house? And if he was the professor’s inside man, why would he kill him?”
“Theoretically, they could have argued over money. The professor could have threatened to blackmail him.” He sighed and shook his head. “Nothing we can do about it right now, anyway. Tommy’s lawyered up. My grandmother’s holding a barbecue at her place tomorrow afternoon, by the way. She invited you.”
She held up her hand to argue with him, and he shook his head. “Ginger, let me worry about the pack. Just come, all right?”
“That’s a very public statement you’d be making.”
“Yes it is.” He looked at her steadily, and she felt her heart swelling in her chest. He wanted her, and he wasn’t afraid who knew it. He’d be proud to be seen by her side. The thought took her breath way.
Stil, when she went back to the boarding house that evening she felt strange and unsettled. She felt as if they were missing something important. And she knew damned well that the professor wasn’t dead. Her powers had never steered her wrong before.
Tommy Deerkiller had, of course, vociferously denied knowing anything about the bloody clothes in his room. He’d denied killing the professor, communicating with the professor about selling him icons, or seeing him on the night the professor disappeared.
But he admitted that he’d been dealing in stolen property.
Odd, Ginger thought.
When Ginger walked in the door, Marigold was waiting for her.
She told her that three of the archeology students had gone home already. There was no point in staying; it was pretty obvious that the professor wasn’t coming back. “Also, heads up, Brenda and Tallulah are in a snit because you told them the professor was alive and now the bloody clothes make it look like he’s dead.”
Brenda and Tallulah, their rivalry apparently forgotten, were sitting on the living room couch crying on each others’ shoulders.
They both looked up and glared at her when she came in.
“Fraud,” Brenda hissed, her eyes swollen into little slits from crying.