There was a long silence. And just when I thought he must have hung up, Alejandro sighed again.
"We think it's feral Pixies."
After I hung up and we stopped snickering about feral Pixies, Jack gave me a somber look. "Speaking of supernatural beings, I had a long talk with Beau this afternoon. He told me, in between several heated rants about how awful Earl was, that the man was in debt up to his eyeballs. Evidently he was a gambler and spent a lot of time in a local gambling hall with an ogre? Do you know anything about that?"
I blew out a breath. "Nigel. Oh, boy. Yeah, I know him. He runs the Dead End Dance Studio now, but he used to own and run a gambling… den? Joint? Not sure what the correct term is. That was way before my time. I can ask Uncle Mike about it, if he's talking to me again. But we need to be careful about how we approach Nigel."
"I heard."
I laughed and shook my head. "No. Nigel is an ogre, sure, but he's a big teddy bear. It's his wife, Erin, who's the problem. She has a hot temper that pretty much anything can set off."
"She's an ogre too?"
"No. She's a fresh-water nymph."
Jack closed his eyes and groaned.
"What? You've met her?"
"No. Not her. It's just that the last water nymph I met tried to drown me. Five times."
6
Jack drove us down a road that looked like it hadn't been used in decades. It had definitely been more than that long since I'd been on it. The trees crowded in like monsters lurking in the twilight, branches straining to intimidate the unwary, and I caught myself imagining we were in the middle of a Stephen King novel.
I really needed to get a grip.
"Sure this is the way?" Jack made a face. "Why is the dance studio way out in the boonies?"
"This is Dead End. Everything is way out in the boonies. And, yes, I'm sure. I took three years of tap, ballet, and jazz dancing in the studio when I was little. I still have some of the songs stuck in my head from when I was five years old." I shuddered. "Trust me, 'Copy Cat Crows' is not the song you want ear-worming you."
"I'll take your word for it, but I'd kinda like to see you in a tutu."
I laughed. "To be honest, I'm surprised Aunt Ruby hasn't broken out the pictures to show you yet."
"Something to look forward to, if dead bodies and skeletons ever quit showing up to distract us."
Jack slowed down to take a sharp curve in the dirt road. And the large, white, two-story house that served as both the studio and Nigel and Erin's home rose before us. There was no sign to show what the building might be, except for the painted outline of a pair of ballet shoes on the front door. But this was Dead End and everybody knew Nigel.
Nigel's wife was less well known, being a fairly private person, but I'd met her once or twice. Which reminded me…
"Jack." I unbuckled my seat belt and turned to face him after he parked in the otherwise empty graveled front parking space. Saturday classes must still be canceled on festival weekends. "I need to tell you about Erin. When I mentioned her temper, I wasn't exaggerating. I once ran into her in the grocery side of Super Target screaming at an employee because the avocados weren't ripe. She's just—just—"
"Just a water nymph. I know, Tess. Trust me. I don't know where nymphs got the reputation of being gentle and delicate. The one who tried to drown me had teeth like a shark and the personality of a wolverine. She was a sea nymph, though, and I've never encountered a fresh-water nymph. On the other hand, I don't want to judge all nymphs by the actions of one or two, any more than I'd want somebody to judge me by some other shifter they've met." His jaw tightened. And I had the feeling that he'd run into just that sort of prejudice in his life before coming home to Dead End, probably more than once. Heck, even in Dead End, some people had taken a while to stop giving him wary looks, but that may have been more about his rebel leader past than the fact he was a shifter.
"Okay. Well, anyway, what is there for her to get mad about? We're just here to ask her husband if he was involved in a fifty-year-old murder." I slumped in my seat. "Is it too late to go home and watch TV instead?"
We thought about it for a moment, but then we summoned our courage and climbed out of the truck. By the time we walked up to the porch, I hoped that Nigel and Erin had decided to go to the festival instead of staying home. But the door opened before Jack could raise his hand to knock.
"Yes?"
I looked up. And up. And then up some more.
Nigel was nearly nine feet tall, and he filled the doorway in all directions. His shoulders were so broad I had to wonder where he bought his shirts. The one he wore today was made of maybe five yards of bright red flannel. His hair was a silky and flyaway blond that looked like corn silk, and he had enormous purple eyes that had always been gentle and kind when he taught our classes, and—not that I knew anything about how ogres aged—he didn't look a day older now than he had when I'd danced happily through the five-to-seven-years classes with Molly. And his skin was golden brown, with not even the slightest hint of green, despite what so many people think. He did have rather large and expressive ears, though. Slightly pointed. Tolkienesque, really.
Aunt Ruby had run into him when theShrekmovies were everywhere, and she said he'd been quite upset about them. Apparently, little girls and boys expected him to be green, talk with a Scottish accent, and live with a talking donkey.
I winced, wondering what Erin's reaction might have been if anybody'd called her Princess Fiona.
