“Are you short on funds? You’ve been here quite a while without…” I turned my palm upward and decided not to saydoing any productive work.After all, he’d found my pack’s missing medallion. That was plenty productive. But I hadn’t seen him do anything that people paid for. Few of the rusty objects that he’d extracted in my presence had any value, even at a pawn shop with low standards.
“Working?” Duncan smirked, probably reading my thoughts.
“Being paid.”
“You’ve paid me numerous times.”
“If you’re talking about the gas money I’ve tucked under the bobblehead doll on your dash, that’s not a living wage.”
He hadn’t spent any of it anyway. He’d spoken of saving it all to buy me a gift.
Duncan waved airily and plopped his magnet into the water again. “My funds are fine. I enjoy the hunt for treasure. I’ll admit I don’t usually raid koi ponds for my finds, but…”
“You’ve been sticking close to me.” I suspected he’d resorted to investigating such anemic bodies of water because he hadn’t wanted to be far away if trouble found me.
“You’re in danger often.” His voice was grave. “I trust nothing untoward happened at your networking event? I did consider sneaking into the party in case enemies found you.”
“Nothing too major happened, no. Unless you count an Arizonian werewolf from my past coming out of the woodwork to attack me in a billionaire’s bedroom closet.”
Duncan blinked.
“He might only be a multimillionaire,” I said. “We didn’t get into his financials.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah, but I don’t think I’ll be invited down to visit his sister in Arizona anytime soon.” I decided not to bring up Raoul.
“Hm.” Duncan slowly dragged his magnet alongside the dock. “There aren’t many excellent bodies of water to investigate down there.”
“There aren’t many bodies of water of any kind. I’ve also heard you get cactus thorns in your paw pads.”
“Quite.”
“When I’m forced to get a new job, I will ideally keep the employment hunt to the Pacific Northwest.” Technically, since my kids were grown and gone, I didn’tneedto remain here, but my stomach knotted at the idea of leaving the area. Even though I hadn’t, these past couple of months, kept up with friends I’dmade during my years of attempting to be normal, I’d started reestablishing relations with members of the pack, and getting to know Jasmine had been fun. “I don’t want to leave, damn it,” I whispered.
The words were more for me than Duncan, but he paused at dragging his rope and raised his eyebrows. Enough moonlight shone upon his face to see the sympathy and concern there. That touched me, soothing some of my anxiety. It was good to have met someone who understood what I was and cared anyway.
“I’m grousing again about the apartment complex being for sale,” I explained. “I know I need to be proactive and look for work and a new home, something affordable, but it’s hard.”
“Youhavebeen busy with other matters. And it’s your most foul nemeses who are attempting to buy your home, so you’re understandably distracted by trying to figure out what nefarious acts they’re plotting.”
“Tell me about it. But when their deal falls through, as I’m sure it will, someone else will put in an offer. Despite a few snide comments about the place at that networking event, there’s been interest.”
“It’s well-maintained, and the parking-lot unit has a lovely view of the woods.”
“There’s no parking-lot unit.”
Duncan smiled.
“Unless you mean your van.”
“I’m surprised you haven’t attempted to charge me rent for that spot yet. Were I situated for so long in one of this country’s RV campgrounds, I would expect weekly charges.”
“Ididnotice that you attached your hose to one of our spigots yesterday morning. I should send you a water bill.”
“I should think so.” His smile faded as he gazed at the pond, the silvery moonlight reflecting on the surface, shimmering with the movements of his rope.
“What brought you over here tonight?”
