The Cougar's Wish (Desert Guards) Read Free Page B

up to me.”
    Alex folded her hands atop her lap and nodded in an
okay, sure
fashion.
    The curly blonde extended her hand next. “Lily. I’m Belle’s cousin. My dad is her mother’s brother.”
    He shook her hand. “I figured there’d have to be some relatives somewhere who weren’t Foyes.”
    “Plenty of us. Hey, do me a favor and don’t answer the phone if it rings, okay? My dad is paranoid with a Fox Mulder sort of ferocity.”
    “Hey, now. You’re too young to have watched
The
X-Files
when it aired. And I don’t blame him.” Steven leaned against the doorframe and folded his arms over his chest. “I would be, too.”
    Which probably made Steven a lot different from his own father. His pop had pretty much tossed Hannah to the sharks and said, “Swim, baby, swim.” Hannah had, but she’d sure as hell gotten chewed up a bit as a result.
    Lily sighed. “I’m twenty-three. I’m the old lady of the house. I’ll have you know I have Mason’s Netflix password, and so I’ve seen every
X-Files
episode, and all the ones with Nicholas Lea twice. He looks like my high school ex. Maybe it’s the murderous glint in his eyes. Dad hated him.” She shrugged again. “Anyway, after my legendary travails with that guy, Dad decided I couldn’t make good choices, but I think I learned how not to open the door to strangers by the time I was ten. You don’t have to be a Mensa member to figure that out.”
    “I wouldn’t have guessed twenty-three. You look sixteen or seventeen. No offense, but you look like jailbait.” At least to a thirty-one-year-old who actually had some common sense, in spite of what his sister asserted on occasion.
    Alex nudged Lily with her elbow. “I think that’s a compliment. Say thank you.”
    “Thank you,” Lily said blandly. She stretched her arms over her head and let out a long yawn. “I’m going back to bed. If I don’t get enough sleep, I’m not going to be able to feign pleasantness at work tomorrow. I need to be able to put sunshine in my voice when I’m answering the phone and responding to the same damn questions again and again.” She shuffled down the hall, grumbling.
    Alex rocked back on her heels. “Well, I’ll leave you to it. If I don’t get enough sleep, I’ll keep dropping trays at the diner, and I can’t afford to break any more dishes this month.”
    “Can you show me where the bathroom is before you go?”
    It was a small house. He imagined there’d only be one, and if there were a second one, it’d probably be attached to the master, which he guessed Lily would have claimed. All the same, he didn’t want to go opening doors and stumbling into things he wasn’t meant to see.
    “Come this way.” She gestured toward the hall, and pointed to the first door on the left as she approached. “Right there. If you need towels or whatever, the linen closet is there.” She pointed to the narrow door across the hall.
    “And where’s the secondary exit for this house? I know you’ve gotta have one.”
    “We do have one. It’s in the kitchen, but if you’re worried about Belle sneaking through it, you shouldn’t be. The door is behind a little bookcase and is painted shut. None of us have been able to unstick it. Not even Belle, and she’s stronger than we are thanks to her shifter weirdness.”
    “And how do you feel about her shifter weirdness?”
    Alex gave a dismissive wave. “Ah, I’ve always known about it. I’d say most folks in town know about the weirdos, and I think the ones who don’t know are being purposefully oblivious. Fun fact: most of the maternal side of Belle’s family moved away after Belle’s mom and dad bought out the ranch, but Lily’s dad stayed in the area.”
    “So, I take it that the folks on that side of the family aren’t shifters.”
    “Nope.” Belle stuck her head out of her bedroom door and glowered at the two of them in the hallway. “Mom’s normal and so are the rest of her family. If you’re going to