Something Magical (Witches of Hawthorne Grove Book 1) (3 page)

Stacy, his girlfriend at the time, hadn't even bothered to call him, to let him know Royal was sick. To give her a bit of credit, she
had
finally taken the retriever to the vet after he'd explained what she needed to do, but it was too little, too late. Royal had been too far gone at that point to save.

“It's just a dog, Jordan,” she had told him when he'd explained she needed to get him to the animal hospital as quickly as possible.

He'd felt alarmed and amazed by her attitude, but now he knew Stacy would never understand the bond between a man and his dog—just as she'd never understood his affinity for antique letter boxes. She had called them both a waste of his time and money.

Maybe she was right about part of it, he grudgingly admitted. He did have a rather large collection of antique boxes sitting empty throughout the house and today he'd still been stoked to find yet another to add to his collection. At this point, even
he
didn't understand why he kept buying them when he couldn't find anything to do with the ones he already had. Maybe he kept buying them because he was secretly hoping to find something worth keeping?

Not that the why mattered. Stacy would never have approved. How many times had she snapped at him for buying “more old junk” when he clearly had no use for the junk he already had? She'd pretended concern, telling him it seriously frightened her that he could not see how he was wasting his money—but she'd had no problem wasting it for him. It had been
his
credit card she'd used to pay for her three-month trip to the Caribbean, and
his
bank account that had covered the cost of the brand new Mercedes she was driving the day he'd finally had enough and ordered her to pack up her stuff and get out.

Jordan rubbed the tag between his thumb and fore-finger once more, pushing away the unwanted memories of his ex-girlfriend and the pain of his loss over the loyal retriever he so badly missed.

His eyes fell on the paper. It was showing an ad for the
Cressley Cade Animal Rescue Society.
There was a picture of a Golden Retriever that reminded him of Royal and who was apparently up for adoption right now. Jordan glanced back at the tag he was holding and the beginnings of a smile curved his lips.

Now that he was settled in his new home and had all the time in the world to do whatever he wanted, he'd realized it wasn't enough. Things were far too quiet here with him alone and he knew he wasn't ready to begin a new relationship, but a dog—yes, a dog was exactly what he needed.

Scooping up the paper, he quickly typed the address of the Animal Rescue Society into the navigational app on his phone. Then, he stuck the dog tag in his pocket, picked up the box, and headed for the door.

K
aylee knelt
down beside the new mother chihuahua and her litter of three.

“She really is the sweetest thing, Mrs. Conrad, and such a good mama,” she said to the elderly lady at her side before running her hand down the mother chihuahua's back. With her index finger, she gently nussed the mother dog under her chin before smoothing her palm down her back again. “Aren't you, Mimi? Aren't you? Such a good girl! Yes, you are!”

To the lady, she said, “The pups were born three days ago, so she won't be going anywhere for a few weeks. But once the little ones are weaned, we would be happy to give you a call.”

Even as she said the words, Kaylee felt a wave of sadness for the wee pups. After three years of working at the
Cressley Cade Animal Rescue Society
, she still could not make herself be the one responsible for separating a litter from its mother. She would not be the one making this call, either.

She didn't exactly know why, but in all this time, she still couldn't make herself do it. Separation anxiety was what her sister Jo called it. Jo had even gone so far as to suggest Kaylee's being jilted one month before her wedding was the most likely cause for it, but Kaylee didn't think so. She just could not bear the thought of the pups being separated from their mother, or vice-verse. It kept her up at night—much like the man from the antique store, she realized, a frown pulling at her brow.

“Would it be okay for me to complete the paperwork now, Miss Dean?” the gray-haired lady who had introduced herself as Mrs. Conrad asked.

Pushing away the cheerless gloom she'd slipped into, Kaylee covered her involuntary shudder behind the act of rising to her feet. Miraculously, she remembered to smile. “Of course. If you'll just speak with Marc over there, he will make sure everything's taken care of.”

“Excuse me, Miss. Can you help me?” There was a rattle of paper behind her left shoulder and Kaylee realized the man to whom the voice belonged was talking to
her
.

“There was a dog in Sunday's paper—a golden retriever who had been hit by a truck and then abandoned? I was hoping to give him a new home,” the oddly familiar voice continued. “Is he still here?”

“That would be Sarge, and he is right outsi—” Kaylee paused in the act of turning, and froze. It was
him
—the man from the antique shop. The man who'd kept her up every night since they'd met outside that store more than a week ago.

Today, he wasn't wearing the dark shades he'd had on before, and her first look into his smoky gray eyes was nothing short of mesmerizing. She saw within them the spark of recognition when he realized who she was and tried to look away, but she could not.

“Well, hello again,” he said with a smile, his tone making it clear he had recognized her, too, and Kaylee fought to find her tongue.

“You go ahead and help this young man, dear,” Mrs. Carson said, giving Kaylee's shoulder an understanding pat as she moved away. “I'll just speak with Marc.”

As Mrs. Carson walked away, the man with the startling gray eyes offered her his hand. “Since we keep meeting up, I suppose I should introduce myself. I'm Jordan Parker.”

“Kaylee,” she said, hesitantly placing her palm in his. “Kaylee Dean.”

Something in his eyes changed, but she wasn't sure what. “It is a pleasure to meet you, Miss Dean.”

The feel of his bare palm sliding against hers was electrifying. A surge of heat raced up her arm, making her entire body tingle with awareness—unsettling awareness. Quickly, she pulled her hand away to rub it consolingly against her other palm. Clearing her throat to force the words past the knot of anxiety she could feel forming there, she said, “If you will follow me, Mr. Parker.”

Break eye contact
, she told herself.
Now turn, and walk
. Her body followed her mental instructions but her mind tangled around some very disturbing realizations. He smelled like a teddy bear. Not the mundane, textile scent of fibers and thread and poly-fill, but rather, the surprisingly comforting aroma of cuddly, warm male mixed with a hint of mystery and an exciting though forbidden top note of yum. Kaylee felt a sudden urge to curl up around him and sigh.

Stop it, Kaylee
, she demanded
. A secure haven in which to snuggle up and lose yourself forever? Really? He's just a man, for Pete's sake! And a stranger, at that!

“Jordan,” he insisted, falling into step behind her, and Kaylee experienced a second of fright in which she was terrified he'd been able to read her thoughts.

“Have you owned a pet before, Mr. Parker?” she finally asked, trying to break through her own sudden feelings of awkwardness with seemingly related bits of conversation.

“Royal,” he said. “Also a golden retriever. I lost him two years ago. And you? Do you have a pet at home, Miss Dean?”

Her thoughts were instantly filled with visions of being met at her door by
him
, in a towel, and of herself immediately dropping her purse to run her eager hands all over him.

What in the world is wrong with you? He means a dog,
she cautioned her wayward thoughts.
Or a cat. Or any domesticated animal but definitely not a
man
, so stop it already!
But she could not stop the burning flush she felt spreading upward from her neck. She shook her head. “No, I don't.”

Flustered and annoyed because of it, she practically raced ahead of him to the outdoor kennels. Reaching the larger one Ms. Cade had assigned to Sarge, she reached out to flip the latch and open the door.

“This is Sarge, Mr. Parker.” Snapping her fingers, she whistled for the golden retriever whose ears had perked up the instant she touched the latch. “Sarge? Here boy. Come on out and say hello.”

To her surprise, Jordan Parker squatted, putting himself on eye level with the rehabilitated retriever, held out his hand, and then waited for the dog to come to him. It took a moment, but the dog finally ambled cautiously out of the pen to sniff at his outstretched hand. A few seconds later, his tongue was lolling and his tail happily wagging.

“Hiya Sarge. How are you doing, boy? Enjoying yourself here, are you?” Mr. Parker asked as he reached out to ruffle the dog's fur, first behind his head and then beneath his chin. He leaned closer, tilting his head to the side as if to hear whatever Sarge's answer to his questions had been, and said, “Oh, I know. I think so, too. In fact, I was just about to.”

Turning on his haunches, the man looked up at Kaylee, offering a hesitant, almost shy smile that made her knees turn to gelatin and said, “How about it, Miss Dean? Do you think you'd like to try the best mocha crème latte this side of the city?”

Kaylee's brow rose sharply at his back-handed attempt to ask her out for coffee. “I don't think so.”

Turning back to Sarge, he shrugged and said, “Hey, I tried, old man, but you heard the lady.”

Despite her best intentions, Kaylee laughed. “What did he say?”

Jordan looked up at her, one brow arched. “That you are a very beautiful lady and I should probably ask you out, of course.”

She rolled her eyes, ignoring the warmth shooting through her at his pretended second-hand compliment. “Sure he did.”

“He also said he wanted to come home with me today but that
you
would insist I fill out a handful of papers first. Is this true, Miss Dean?” he asked, getting to his feet.

There was a hint of apology in his eyes when he glanced her way again and she wondered what it meant. Was he sorry he had asked her for a date? Inexplicably hurt by the thought, Kaylee nodded. “Yes, there are a few papers we would need you to complete, for our records.”

“Well, there you have it,” he said. Pushing his hands into the front pockets of his jeans, he rocked slightly on his feet and looked at the ground, motioning toward the dog with his elbow. “If old Sarge here didn't lie about the papers, why would he lie about you?”

There was sincerity in his questioning gaze this time when he looked at her, and Kaylee bit her lip, fighting an unexpected urge to reassure him—of what, she didn't know. Her brow furrowed and she turned away before she did something stupid. Like hug him.

“If you're serious about adopting Sarge, Mr. Parker, you can do the paperwork now. It'll be a few days before you can take him home, but—”

“I am absolutely serious about it, Miss Dean. As serious as I was about coffee. Are you sure you won't join me?”

* * *

J
ordan Parker was
no stranger to rejection. The first six investors he had approached about financing his fledgling IT business nine years ago had turned him down, too. Granted, he was only nineteen at the time, with very little experience to back up his business plan, but the numbers were right, and as it turned out, so was he.

Investor number seven had helped him prove it to the world.

Within five years, his company ranked in the top one hundred IT companies in the world. When he'd sold it off last year after he'd decided to retire, it was ranked number seven in the Fortune 500. But being turned down for coffee by the peppy Miss Dean was a rejection that felt
personal
.

Not that it should have. If he counted every minute since their first meeting until she walked away from him at the end of their last, they'd spent a total of eighteen minutes together—hardly enough time for him to turn her refusal to share his caffeine addiction into a personal jab—and yet, it had wounded him somehow. Not unlike the antique letter box he'd picked up last weekend at the antique shop, he thought, rubbing at his injured arm, but even that hadn't bothered him as much as this woman's whole I-don't-want-to-get-coffee-with-you thing, and he didn't know why.

It's probably just that over-inflated ego of yours
, his conscience pricked as he followed her with his gaze.
She put a pin in it and the pain you feel is the effect of it slowly shrinking down to size
.

She hadn't waited around for him to finish the paperwork, either. After depositing him at one of the tables with a hasty mumble about someone being there to help him soon, she'd hurried off to see to another customer while he busied himself with watching her from afar as he made sure to dot all his “I's” and cross every “T”.

Shifting in the chair, he reached into his pocket to collect the dog license he'd unearthed from the letter box and held it up to the light, trying to make out something other than the name. He could clearly read the series of numbers, but rest of it was far too corroded to read. Still, it
was
responsible for his being here today. He'd come to the shelter to adopt a dog—not pick up a woman, he reminded himself.

Slipping the warm metal tag back into his pocket, Jordan signed his name on the last sheet of paper and walked to the front desk where he laid both the pen and clip board aside. “I've filled in the important bits, my cell number and my signature. If you need anything else, give me a call.”

Half an hour later, he was standing in his garage staring down in aggravated confusion at the antique letter box he'd moved to the worktable for dis-assembly. As he scowled down at it like it was some strangely intricate, impossibly difficult puzzle to be solved, he contemplated the ill-considered invitation he'd issued to Miss Dean to join him for coffee and then complained to the box that it was “just like a woman.”

And by that, he meant confusing. Not knowing the reason for disappointment at being turned down by the woman from the antique shop was as irritating as not knowing where his illogical passion for buying antique letter boxes came from. At the moment, both currently posed a mystery for him that was gnawing at his insides and adding equally to his growing surly mood until, glaring down at the box, he reached over and slammed the lid firmly shut.

Why
did
he keep buying the darn things, anyway?

* * *

H
untingdon's One Shot Coffee Cafe
was a cozy little coffee shop located on the outskirts of town to which quite a lot of Hawthorne Grove's residents gravitated, both in the mornings, for that first steaming cup of brew that the owner guaranteed would knock the sleep out of their eyes, and in the evenings when the lighting was dim, the mugs were thinner, and the exquisite brew topping every cup became a lot more artistic than the caffeinated jolt Sam Huntingdon faithfully served his sleepy-eyed customers in the A.M..