Tiny Glitches: A Magical Contemporary Romance (8 page)

I didn’t stand a chance of hiding anything from her. Sofie raised me. She knew my apparitions better than I knew hers. There wasn’t an emotion I felt that she didn’t know by sight. While this had been a blessing when I was a child, we’d set ground rules when I became a teenager. The number-one rule was if I wasn’t expressing the emotion verbally or through normal body language, she was to pretend she couldn’t tell what I was feeling and vice versa. This complicated our interactions sometimes, but it also allowed me to feel like a normal teenager—and now a normal adult—with a private life, thoughts, and emotions.

When I hopped out of the Suburban, Sofie’s eyes roved over me before meeting mine, and the finger puppets disappeared, replaced by a large wolf at her side, standing tall enough for her dangling fingers to rest in its insubstantial fur. She’d gone into protector mode. Add in some fear—a corset of ebony vines riddled with thorns piercing her flesh—and curiosity in the form of a beehive of sea shells, and I almost missed the castanet when she glanced at Hudson. Despite the apparitions she saw on me, a slice of meddling lurked in her.

A golden bundle shot through the door behind her and down the shallow steps. Salvador Dali, Sofie’s Lab, bounced around me, sniffing and licking and making soft woofing noises of delight to see me. I rubbed his head and came away with slimed fingers. Hudson walked around the hood of the dead vehicle, and Dali darted to him with toenails scrabbling on the stone driveway in his enthusiasm. If Hudson’s silver terrier had been real, it would have been bowled over.

“Hi, baby girl,” Sofie said. She enfolded me in a hug. I breathed in the aroma of paint and perfume, and a tightness in my shoulders eased. Sometime in my teens, I had surpassed Sofie in height, but not by much. Our shared genetics were impossible to miss. We both had the family curves, though hers were more lush than mine. Our hair was nearly the same shade—Sofie’s with a little help from a bottle these days. We shared mannerisms and our laugh was almost identical. But the subtle cleft in my chin, my blue eyes, and my long slender fingers were my mother’s. My full, almost square lips must have come from my father’s side.

“I didn’t expect you to arrive in such style,” Sofie said, pulling back. Her eyes held a hundred questions.

“Neither did I.” I wanted to blurt out everything, but Hudson finally extricated himself from Dali’s exuberant welcome. “I’d like you to meet Hudson Keyes. Hudson, this is my aunt Sofie. Hudson works for the company Gabriel hired to improve his security.”

Hudson shook Sofie’s hand.

“It’s a pleasure to meet the famous S. Sterling,” Hudson said. “I’m sorry your paintings were stolen. We’ll do everything possible to make sure it never happens again.”

“Why ever would you do that?” Sofie asked. “I think this is wonderful.”

I gaped at her. Of all the reactions I’d expected, glowing cheer hadn’t even made the list. “You’re happy?” I asked.

“Best thing that’s happened to me in my whole career. Only the greats get stolen. I thought I’d have to wait until I was dead to see it happen. But we can talk about that later. You two look hungry”—her eyes dipped to the stains on my skirt and the dirt on Hudson’s clothes—“and like you have a story to share. Why don’t you—”

We all jumped when something hit the Suburban’s back window with a loud pop. The SUV creaked on its shocks.

“Do you have something in there?” Sofie asked, squinting at the tinted windows.

“As a matter of fact, I do,” I said. “It’s, uh, well . . .”

Sofie pressed her face to the side window, shading her eyes with her hand. Her jaw dropped open and she eased back a few steps.

“An elephant?” she breathed. Wide brown eyes leapt from me to Hudson and back again. “Where? How?”

Muted pounding came from inside the vehicle. The oval tip of Kyoko’s trunk flattened against the window closest to us.

“Explanations later, Sofie, I promise. We need to get her out of there before she does more damage,” I said.

Sofie wasn’t listening. She yanked open the back passenger door and popped her head into the vehicle. Dali, beside himself with curiosity, wriggled at her feet, barking excitedly. I saw the dim outline of Kyoko raising her head, and I clamped my hands over my ears in time to muffle her bugle. Sofie fell back, dazed, and shut the door.

“That explains the smell,” Sofie said.

I snapped my fingers at Dali. “Hush. Sit,” I ordered. The Lab swung his head to look at Sofie, then me. I took a step toward him. He sat, mouth closed.

“Where was that authority in the trailer with Kyoko?” Hudson asked.

“Stunted by the handcuffs.”

“Handcuffs?” Sofie echoed. The wolf at Sofie’s side bared its teeth. A locket around its neck bristled like a blowfish.

I shook my head. “Later. Right now, we need a ramp, because the three of us aren’t lifting that beast out by ourselves.”

Sofie nodded and strode toward the house. Surviving my childhood had fine-tuned Sofie’s ability to prioritize in the face of unusual adversity. Or maybe she’d always been skilled at adapting, and that’s why she’d been able to raise me while my mother hadn’t.

My aunt had nothing strong enough to serve as a ramp, but we found two wide tables—one a worktable, the other a coffee table built to withstand a nuclear bomb—and we set them behind the Suburban to serve as steps.

“She didn’t have a collar that I noticed,” Sofie said. “How do you plan to get her to follow you?”

The open side gate to the backyard stood ten feet away. I lifted a plastic bag of baby carrots I’d raided out of Sofie’s fridge when I’d locked Dali in the house. “Bait.”

“Ready?” Hudson asked.

I nodded. An enormous great white shark loomed behind Hudson, maw agape, then disappeared to be replaced by the sombrero. The Monopoly pieces were gone. I glanced at Sofie. I would have really loved to confer with her about Hudson’s images, but we didn’t have the time. The elephant was restless.

When Hudson popped open the back door, Kyoko didn’t hesitate. She tottered off the soggy carpet onto the table. The SUV squeaked; the table groaned. Kyoko plunged to the coffee table. It bore her weight silently. Then she had all four feet on solid ground and she swung straight toward Sofie.

“Watch out! She—”

“Whoa, there!” Sofie said, scooting back a step to avoid a trunk to the crotch.

“She really is a pervy elephant,” Hudson said.

I shook the plastic bag of carrots and poured some into my hand. Kyoko trotted to me and snatched them from my palm, stuffing them into her mouth. Her attention wandered to the landscaped flower beds, and I grabbed for another carrot. Three more bribes, and she ambled through the gate. Hudson and Sofie closed the latch behind us, reinforcing it with a dead bolt. The wall to Sofie’s yard was stucco, matching the Tuscan-style house. Only the gate was wooden. If Kyoko planned to escape, it’d be through there. Fortunately, the little elephant showed no interest in the way back. She trotted straight to the eggplant-shaped swath of lawn, dropped to her knees, flopped to her side, and rolled.

“Would you look at that,” Sofie said.

Dali’s whines pierced the back door of the house, where we’d shut him inside before releasing Kyoko. Seeing an elephant in his yard broke through the usually mannered dog’s restraint, and his claws scrabbled at the sliding glass window.

“Uh-oh. I’d better—”

The glass door inched open and he shoved his nose through the gap, using his feet to widen the opening.

“Shoot. He just learned how to do that.” Sofie rushed up the patio steps, but Dali was quicker. He wriggled through the opening and shot across the patio, clearing the five steps to the lawn in a single leap. Kyoko pushed to her feet and trumpeted. Skidding to a halt, Dali barked. Kyoko reached for him with her trunk, ears flapped forward.

“Should we stop them?” Hudson asked.

“Too late.”

Dali sidled up to Kyoko, his whole body wriggling with happiness, and sniffed her trunk, her ear, her grass-stained stomach. She, in turn, prodded at him with the tip of her trunk, which he didn’t seem to mind at all. Standing side by side, Dali came to the middle of Kyoko’s barrel, yet he looked huge, being only a few feet shorter than an elephant.

Once the preliminary introductions were completed, Dali bounded away several yards, then raced back, ears and tongue flapping. Kyoko bugled and trotted after him. She followed him in circles while he did excited puppy pounces, lowering his front feet, leaving his hind end in the air, then darting away when she got too close.

I couldn’t help but smile.

“Dali’s a good host,” Sofie said, coming back down the stairs. “I can’t wait to hear the story behind . . . What did you say her name was again?”

“Kyoko.”

“Ms. Sterling, can I—”

“My friends call me Sofie,” Sofie interrupted.

“Ah, Sofie, can I use your phone? It seems the salesman lied about this burner’s reliability.” Hudson held the little flip phone open in his hand, its screen black.

“Of course.” Sofie shot me an amused look. “Let me show you where it is.”

Sofie led Hudson into the house. I settled into a lounge chair near the pool, well out of the way of the game of tag. The soft lawn wasn’t made for safari animals, and Kyoko’s feet gouged huge chunks every time she pivoted to confront Dali. I sighed. My next six months’ worth of consultations weren’t going to be spent paying for all the things this elephant destroyed. Maybe Jenny would reimburse me.

Ha. That was about as likely as her forgetting about my curse.

Kyoko’s attention was diverted by the pool. She slowed to a walk as she neared the edge, running her trunk along the hot flagstones and smacking the water.

Large, square, with a dark bottom and salt water instead of chlorine, the pool contained a wide shelf that spanned the width of one end, designed for lounging where the water rose only calf deep. The rest of the pool dropped to six feet deep for laps. Dali raced to the shallow shelf and plunged into the water. Kyoko followed, dropping into the pool beside the dog. Mud and feces and unidentifiable grime washed into the water. I added pool-cleaning services to my list of growing debt.

In doggy heaven, Dali romped around Kyoko, his tail a wet whip spraying water in arcs behind him. Kyoko slid her trunk into the water, then raised it over her head, spraying her back. Dali barked ecstatically. Kyoko did it again, only this time she angled her trunk to wash over Dali. He yipped and leapt out of blast range straight into the deep water, paddling to a step on the opposite side. The expression on his face made me laugh, and my shoulders loosened.

I was home. Safe. I was as far as I could get from anything electrical, situated where my curse could do the least damage. I relaxed the clamp I’d wrapped around my emotions. Mental knots of tension lifted, and I felt physically lighter.

I unbuckled my sandals and tossed them under the lounge chair, then padded to the shallow shelf.

“Are we friends?” I asked the elephant. She turned to watch Dali, who had climbed out of the pool at the opposite end and was now rolling in the grass. I eased into the pool beside Kyoko and stretched a hand to touch her side. She twisted to look at me, and her trunk hit the water, the spray soaking my side. “Not cool, Kyoko.”

Dali trotted to the edge of the pool, dropped a tennis ball into the water by my legs, and shook. I obediently tossed the ball across the lawn, then watched him tear out after it.

A blast of cold water hit the back of my head and drenched me. I spun to Kyoko, shoving strings of hair off my face. She blinked large brown eyes at me with false innocence.

“Fine. Let’s see how you like it.” I splashed an arc of water into Kyoko’s face. She tilted her head back and opened her mouth to catch it. “Oh, you like that, do you? How about this?” I circled her, kicking and splashing and spraying her with as much water as I could. She blasted me with another trunkful. She looked so smug I burst out laughing. “You just wait,” I said.

I was headed back to the pool with the hose when I noticed my audience. Sofie sat at the patio table with three glasses of water and snacks. She watched Hudson watch me, puppets the size of small mice coating her fingers. I narrowed my eyes at her, and she smiled serenely. Hudson stood at the railing, arms crossed over his chest, grinning like a fool. He unabashedly stared, and my body went hot when I realized my drenched dress clung to me like a second skin. A surreptitious glance confirmed my headlights were on. I blushed, then gave a mental shrug, seizing on my favorite embarrassment-coping strategy: pretend everything is normal.

“Want to join in?” I called to Hudson.

“Looks like you’ve got it covered.” His gaze roamed down my body, and fire followed in its wake.

“Chicken.” I put my thumb over the end of the hose and sprayed water in his direction. It fell well short of the patio. He backed up anyway, holding his hands up in surrender. Too bad. I wouldn’t have minded seeing his shirt molded to his chest. He could even have taken it off, if he was worried about getting it wet. If Sofie hadn’t been there, I would have suggested it.

I turned my attention back to Kyoko, who was splashing water at no one in particular.

“Okay, let’s get you clean,” I said, abandoning my original plan for payback. I detached the head of the pool brush from the pole and stepped into the pool beside Kyoko, brush in one hand, hose in the other. Kyoko had to examine the brush, then the end of the hose—which she shoved into her mouth for a drink—before allowing me to bathe her. The step was gritty under my feet by the time Kyoko moseyed over to the lawn and rolled. I glared as all my hard work was smeared with grass and dirt. At least she no longer smelled like a manure pile.