PAPER STARS: An Ordinary Magic Story(19)

I waited for the words. They were there, in his gaze, in the soft pause of breath when he studied my mouth, my face, my eyes.

“I–”

A muted thump in the living room was followed by a crash then the sound of Spud running for his hiding corner.

Moment destroyed.

“I should check on the dragon?” he said.

“You should.”

His hands fell away. “But tonight?”

“It’s Christmas Eve, Ryder. It’s going to be a good night.”

I smiled, then moved past him and into the bedroom to change into my uniform.





Chapter Eight





One good thing about living on the coast of Oregon: we knew how to weather the storms.

Things didn’t usually get sketchy in our sturdy little town until the winds reached somewhere above an hundred-mile-an-hour.

But there were always little damages from high wind gusts. A fence, a store sign, garbage cans in the wrong yard.

Mrs. Yates’s penguin getting stolen.

Not that the wind had taken it, but apparently a storm was the perfect cover for the pranksters who liked to abscond with her concrete yard penguin.

“It’s Christmas for goodness sakes,” Mrs. Yates said for the tenth time as I stood there on her twinkling light-draped porch taking her complaint. “I always decorate the yard.”

“It looks nice.”

“And the house.”

“That looks nice too.”

“And the penguin. Really, he’s the star of the whole thing.”

“I understand.”

“He has a blog, you know.”

I did know. The penguin’s frequent kidnappings, creative hiding places, and hostage photos had taken a small corner of the internet by storm.

That penguin was pretty much our most famous citizen. And Mrs. Yates ate up the stardom-by-proxy with a spoon.

I’d always suspected that most of the kidnappings had been orchestrated by the high school kids, but lately, the kidnappings and photos seemed more professional.

Almost as if the kidnappers were a well-oiled, well-coordinated machine.

It wasn’t just Mrs. Yates who liked the limelight. Most of the town was totally into our adorable concrete claim to fame.

“He deserves to be home for Christmas,” she said. “We all need him home for Christmas, Delaney. It would mean so much to the town.”

And that’s when I knew I wasn’t going to get out of penguin search and rescue duty.

“I’ll do what I can to find him before the night’s over.”

“Yes,” she said, finally happy. “People drive by to take pictures of him in the yard, you know. Tourists too. Especially tourists. We wouldn’t want to disappoint them.”

She fluffed her hair and stared past me at the road, looking for drive-by photo ops.

“No,” I said. “I’m sure we wouldn’t.”





Chapter Nine





“Where?” Jean asked.

I took another drink of the Tom and Jerry Myra had made from scratch from the family recipe. It had just a splash of bourbon in it to cut the thick, sweet warm milk and nutmeg, and it warmed me all the way down.

The music was playing softly in the background, Ryder’s arm was draped over my shoulder, the house was decorated in that cozy but classy way that only Myra seemed to be able to pull off.

If I decorated like her, it would end up looking like I was living in a garage sale.

“Aaron’s patio at the back of his nursery,” I said.

Aaron was the owner of the garden shop. He was also the god of war, Ares, who up until a few months ago, was vacationing here.

Since he was gone, we kept an eye on his property for him.

“Doesn’t seem like much of a hiding place,” Hogan, Jean’s boyfriend, said.

The baker had had a drink or two, and he and Jean were cuddled up on the loveseat, both wearing hideous holiday sweaters. Hogan had accessorized with a pair of felt reindeer horns that flashed red and green.

Jean wore a hat shaped like a Christmas tree, lights and all. Apparently, it also sang.

Apparently, Myra had yanked the batteries out of the “obnoxious thing” after hearing Oh, Christmas Tree on repeat for an hour straight.

Apparently, Myra was “no fun” but since she “made a boss Tom and Jerry” the Christmas tree hat had remained silent.

“They weren’t trying to hide it, not really.” I shifted and Ryder tucked me in a little closer to his chest.

He was quiet, relaxed, and looked right at home with his stockinged feet propped up on Myra’s coffee table.

His bruises were just bruises, and the knock on the head was not a concussion.

As accidents went, he had been very, very lucky.

“They wanted the pictures on the blog for Christmas?” Myra asked.

“I think that’s what they were going for. This had to have taken some time and more than one person. They set up a whole holiday scene, using a bunch of the other statues on his lot complete with Christmas tree, a menorah, and a kinara and corn. Here.”

I leaned forward and Ryder sighed at the loss of contact, his fingers drifting down my back as I pulled my phone off the table.

I hadn’t gone home to change, since the penguin hunt had taken so long. They’d waited on me for dinner, which was nice of them.