Page 74 of The Best Medicine


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It turned on. No password needed.

After hitting a few buttons, there it was: her library.

My Roman Empire.

The devil on my shoulder was cheering while the angel was shaking his head.

Polly had been reading theAmerican Tailseries—but I saw she now had a total of four books in that collection. Polly’s taste in books ranged from books that featured everything from vampires to drag queens, to ones whose covers would make my Gran, God rest her soul, do the sign of the cross. I’d never remember all these titles. Taking a few quick pictures of her library screen with my phone, I hightailed it out of there, racing down the stairs with my contraband.

I had some books to order.

* * *

It was raining all afternoon, so after picking up the kids from summer school, we spent the afternoon practicing magic. After all, having fun was now officially on the schedule, much to the kids’ amazement, and what’s more fun than magic?

My life had turned upside down in a week. Last week, I was driving strangers to and from the airport, contemplating where I was headed in life. Today, I was teaching a ten-year-old how to pull things out of a hat and giving a six-year-old a piggyback ride around a stone mansion, pretending I was a horse.

When Polly got home, it was impossible not to wonder what she wore under her work clothes. It got significantly worse when she went upstairs to change and came downstairs five minutes later, wearing a fitted dry fit T-shirt and compression leggings. Was this woman trying to murder me? I distracted myself by helping her make supper. Like it had the night before, our conversation flowed naturally, loving it when she’d throw her back in laughter. And yes, it was hard not to get distracted when she’d arch her back—hard being the operative word.

I couldn’t remember a time I’d laughed as hard as I had with Polly and her kids these last few days. During dinner, Ryla put a jumbo meatball on a fork, turning it into a character that walked around her plate. When Mr. Beefcake got a little frisky and did a little kick for flare, the meatball flew right off the fork and hit the light fixture above the island. We were all silent as the meatball initially stuck to the glass, then slowly slid down and dropped to the island, where it began a roll and then eventually tumbled to the floor.

Both Ryla and Max looked at Polly with worry when to my delight, Polly snorted. The snort turned into a chuckle, which made Ryla and Max giggle, and before I knew it, we were all laughing our butts off. Our laughter echoed throughout the house until our stomachs ached.

It might have been the most fun day I’d had all year.

Later that night, I heard a soft knock at my door. It was earlier than I expected Polly to come to my door, she’d just gone up to bed with Ryla ten minutes ago after I spent no less than thirty minutes teaching both kids the song, “On Top of Spaghetti”.

My heart rate picked up just the same. But when I opened the door, it was Max who stood there.

“Hiya, Max. You alright?” He nodded, leaning around me to peer into my room.

“Do you want to come in?” When he nodded again, I stepped back. He took a few timid steps into the room and looked around.

“Have you been in here before?”

Max’s shoulders inched up his neck. “Only once. It was dark and sort of scary.”

I couldn’t argue with him there. This room was straight out of some sort of Victorian museum. After Polly told me about her momma, it made more sense why the room felt more like a mausoleum than a bedroom.

“Aww, well. New places can be like that. Feel free to look around.”

“Is that a fireplace?” Max walked toward the far side of the room, then recoiled. Max whispered, “What’s that doing in here?”

I knew what he was staring at. Leaning against the fireplace grate, was the painting of Polly and her parents that I’d moved from the library.

“Uh, it needed to be cleaned. So, I told your momma I’d store it in here for now.”

Max still looked creeped as hell, wide eyes staring at the painting.

“You know what, I can fix this.” I picked up a large blanket and put it over the painting. Then, I moved some clothes off one of the leather chairs next to the fireplace and gestured for Max to sit. I took the seat across from him.

Both of our gazes naturally fell back to the painting, which was now covered with the blanket.

I still felt watched. I glanced at Max and raised my eyebrows. “It’s not any better, is it?”

“It’s like I can still feel his eyes on me.” Max’s voice was full of quiet revulsion.

I jumped to my feet. “Agreed. I’ve got just the place. Be right back.”