Page 27 of Moody as a Minotaur

Parker smiled, and I swore everything seemed brighter and lighter. “Thanks, Levi. I’ll be there around two.”

I grunted again, unable to find any words when faced with that smile. Normally I’d retreat at this point, but Finley and Edith were here. I was going to have to sit at one of those tables so I could watch them. And then what? Would people come up and talk to me? Would Parker? I wasn’t sure if that made the idea more appealing or less.

Then I saw Dillon. The hellhound was our town’s newest rookie cop, although he wasn’t in his uniform at the moment. He also sat on his own, which was strange. When he wasn’t working, he was rarely without his fire mage mate, Ash. So… Was he working or not?

Dillon’s plate was filled with spicy breakfast tacos—I could see the heaps of jalapenos from where I was standing. There were a lot of them. When Parker had put that dish on the menu, I hadn’t expected anyone to order it. But I should have known better. The hellhounds and the fire mage loved things that burned through a normalperson’s stomach lining. My insides ached just looking at all those peppers.

My gaze met the hellhound’s. He nodded at me and the flames of his beast flashed over his eyes. He lifted his eyebrow. There was meaning in his actions. Then I pieced it all together. It shouldn’t have taken me that long.

Hewasworking. He was watching Fin and Edith.

Thank Magic.

Man, I must be really tired for it to have taken me that long to figure that out.

“Levi? Is something wrong?” Parker asked.

It was a fair question. I didn’t usually linger. It seemed we were all acting strangely today.

“Nope.” I charged for the door. I had to get out of there before I did something else that’d draw everyone’s attention.

I trudged home, finishing my coffee on the short walk to my century-old two story. On paper, the place seemed like a lot of space for one person, but that was exactly what I’d wanted.

I opened the front door. I hadn’t moved more than a few steps inside when the hairs on the back of my neck quivered.

Something was out of place.

I cast my gaze over the corridor leading from my front door into the living room. From here, I couldn’t see more than a few feet into my house because the maze-like configuration of my many, many shelves turned to the left beyond the threshold. But something was definitely wrong.

I inched forward to glance around the first corner.

A few years ago, a kid came to my door to sell cookies. As soon as I’d opened the door, she’d peered in—like she was a thief-in-training and had been tasked with casing the place—and immediately labeled me a hoarder. She regaled me with a thorough description based on some show she’d seen on TV until I forked over money for a box of cookies.

I wasn’t a hoarder. Not exactly. But I was a minotaur, and mazes made us feel safe.

My cousin had bought a whole warehouse to convert into a maze with his living spaces safely tucked away in the center. My house didn’t offer quite that much room, but I worked with what I had. And what I had were shelving units. Lots and lots of custom-built shelving units. Some held books. Some held my miniatures. And, most recently, I’d dedicated an area to my collection of minotaur and bull mugs from Carter and the cow-themed giftware I’d received from Parker.

At first glance, the floor-to-ceiling shelves appeared correct, but my gut said something was wrong. I scanned the shelves again. This area was dedicated to my first miniature pieces, where I tried to emulate scenes from famous paintings.

My gaze trailed over each piece. Wait. The edge of that one wasn’t quite parallel with the shelf. It was a minor discrepancy, but when you dealt with miniatures, everything was minor. If you weren’t paying attention, any not-quite-right addition to a project triggered something else to be out of sync, until the cumulation ofminor problems had major impacts on whether a piece worked or not.

I studied the diorama that had caught my attention. Now that I was looking, I saw more problems. The paintings on the wall in my tiny version of Van Gogh’sThe Bedroomwere askew. One of the pillows on the bed was at the wrong angle. And a shutter was open ever so slightly more than it should be.

How had all that happened?

I considered the implications. It was almost as if someone had slid it out of place to see what was behind it and put it back without realizing the chaos they’d created. I slowly slid the scene from the shelf and peered behind it.

Everything was as it should be. Was I imagining this? No. I knew I wasn’t. I started to push the diorama back into place when a thin black rectangle about the size of my fingernail resting on the top of the box caught my eye.

What the?—?

It wasn’t mine, which meant someone had been in my house. Someone had touched my things. Someone had left something behind. It had to be a listening device.

Was this where Tammy and Kyle were last night? Or—I gulped—were the intruders still here? I couldn’t risk confronting them if they were.

I retreated as quietly as I could to the door. As soon as I was outside, I galloped to my car. I dove into the front seat. In the next minute, I was gunning it to the police station.

Half an hour later, Van confirmed my house was empty. The intruders were gone, but he agreed that,based on the fading scent trail, someone had been inside my home several hours ago, possibly in the middle of the night when I’d been with Parker.