Page 113 of Dragon Charmed

“Mom.”

“What? It’s wonderful that she’s found someone to be happy with, and if he comes with money, why not embrace it?” She turned to Marcus. “And who is this?”

“This is Marcus. Marcus. This is my mother, Lina Stuart.”

“This is Marcus? You made him sound like he was one step away from the grave. There’s nothing further from the truth.” And she smiled, which normally caused even the strongest of men and women to fall under her spell.

Marcus scowled even more and grunted.

And Lina Stuart’s eyes widened at the response. Time to intervene.

“Mom. Why don’t you come inside? I’ll go find Megan.”

Her mom narrowed her eyes at Marcus before turning to her and smiling. “That sounds wonderful. And then you can tell me why you have been ignoring me.”

Let’s see…abduction? Dragon leader amnesia? Missing oracle girl? Not something Tessa planned on talking about. And speaking of Lily, she poked her little head around the corner to peek into the foyer.

“And who do we have here?” Lina gushed.

“This is Lily.”

“Aren’t you adorable!”

Lily nodded and Lina laughed. “I like a girl who knows who she is.”

Lily beamed at her.

“Why don’t you go sit in the living room with Lily? I’ll go find Megan and see if Bella is awake.”

Lina followed Tessa into the living room and looked back at a still-scowling Marcus. “You’re sure this isn’t a cult?”

Tessa sighed. “It’s not a cult. It’s a family that runs a business together.”

“Like Dallas or Dynasty.”

“Exactly.” Tessa had watched enough reruns of those eighty shows with her mom over the years to get the reference. If JR Ewing could have sprouted wings, that would have added a whole new can of worms to that show.

Lina sat on the couch, and Lily scrambled up beside her with a handful of books. “I’ll leave you both here for a couple minutes, okay?”

“That’s fine, dear. Lily and I will get to know each other.”

Tessa made a beeline to the office and flung open the door, which brought in a gust of air and sent papers on the desk flying around the room.

Megan, Sienna, Eric, and Adam looked up in surprise. Even Bella, who was sitting on the floor, stopped playing.

“Sorry about that.”

They started to collect papers from the floor.

“Is something wrong?” Megan asked.

“No.” Yes! “Well, my mom is here.”

Megan blinked. “Lina is here?”

“Yeah. She’s been worried about me because I haven’t been answering her calls or texts the past few days.”

“How did she know where you were?” Sienna said.