For the first time since Tess and I had started sleeping together.
I sighed. I wasn't a coward, and the man was in his seventies. Even in human form, I could take him.
Probably.
I turned left.
Mike was home alone, and I'd called first. I'd even brought a pizza in case he was hungry. Difficult conversations always went better on full stomachs.
He was sitting on the porch in his usual flannel shirt and jeans when I drove up, waiting for me. I considered myself lucky that he wasn't holding a shotgun.
Holding the pizza in front of me like a shield, I climbed out of the truck. "I come in peace."
He said nothing, just studied my face, and I suddenly felt more nervous than I had during a fight with a trio of rogue vampires during the rebellion.
"I'm only here about building Tess a garage for Christmas."
Aha.Thatgot him. His blue eyes—the same bright blue as Tess's—lit up in his weathered face, and he grinned at me. "Why didn't you say so? I've been wanting to add a garage to that house ever since she bought it. She's twenty-seven now. A woman that age should have a garage."
I wasn't sure what age had to do with garages. After all, I'd been thirty-two this year when I inherited the first house I'd ever owned. But I wasn't about to argue.
"I can do the work myself. Or hire Dave to do it. But I'd appreciate an engineer's eye."
Dave Wolf had been my best friend in high school, and we'd been rebuilding that friendship since I'd returned to Dead End. He owned a construction company and had built the building extension to Tess's shop that housed my fledgling private investigations business. But a garage was a fairly easy building, and I wanted to know that I'd put my sweat into the project, because it was for Tess.
Tess, whom I'd recently realized I was in love with.
So, I'd build her a garage. Nobody could say tigers weren't romantic.
"I'd be glad to help, if you want to do it yourself," Mike said, nodding as he led the way into the house. "We'll hire an electrician to do the wiring, but we can do the rest."
"And someone to pour the concrete slab," I said, juggling the pizza with the door, which Mike pointedly had not held open for me. "Dave can do that. What about building inspectors?"
In the kitchen, pouring glasses of sweet tea, Mike laughed. "Yeah, no. The last woman who tried to be a building inspector in Dead End retired after a month with a nervous condition. To Costa Rica, last I heard. Dead Enders don't much hold with people interfering in our business."
"Just for safety, though," I protested. "We don't want the thing to fall down on Tess's head."
Mike put a glass of tea on the table in front of me with athud."Wouldn't be the first thing to fall on her head lately, would it?"
"Okay. Here we go," I said calmly. "I know you raised Tess like your daughter—"
"And love her like one, me and Ruby both," he growled.
"I love her, too." I looked him right in the eye. "She is the most important person in the world to me. I'd die for her."
He looked at me for a long moment, searching my face as if looking for evidence of sincerity, but finally, he nodded.
"I can't say any different. I've seen you put your life on the line for my girl, over and over this year. You don't deserve her—"
"I know," I said honestly. "I'm a rough, overprotective ex-soldier, and a shapeshifter, which comes with its own set of problems. I could never deserve someone as wonderful as Tess. But she loves me, too, and I won't give her up unlesssheasks me to."
"You don't deserve her," he repeated. "But I can't imagine I'd ever think any man would. Of anybody Ruby and I have ever met, though, we've decided you come the closest. And we'd have to be blind not to see how you feel about her, and how she feels about you. So, treat her well, and we're on your side. If you ever hurt her, I'll hunt you down and make you very sorry, tiger or not."
He held out his hand, and I shook it, a lump in my throat. He'd just welcomed me to the family, in his own, gruff way. I'd do my best to deserve it.
"Now let's eat this pizza before Ruby gets home and makes me eat granola or some other dang thing. Meat Lover's?"
I grinned at him. "Is there any other kind?"
