Tess's phone rang, and she sighed. "Hold that thought."
18
Tess
"Is this my Aunt Ruby calling, or is it the mayor?"
"Definitely the mayor," she said, chuckling. "Good morning, honey."
"Good morning. You're on speaker."
"Happy Fourth, Ruby," Jack said. "What do you need?"
It took us a while to get him to call Aunt Ruby and Uncle Mike by their first names, instead of Mr. and Mrs. Callahan or, as Uncle Mike once suggested, "that guy who's going to kick your butt if you hurt my niece."
Yes, my nearly seventy-year-old uncle had said that with a straight face to my tiger shifter then-boyfriend. And he'd meant it.
The memory made me smile.
Watching Jack's respectful response to that, and how wonderful he was with my family and friends, had been a big part of why I fell in love with him.
"Why do you think I need anything? Can't I just call to say hello to my favorite niece and nephew-in-law?"
"No," I said. "Not on a festival day."
"You should run and hide," Uncle Mike called out, probably hiding in their kitchen. "She's got a to-do list a mile long, and she already dragged me into it."
"You hush," she told my uncle. "Okay, now that you mention it, I have a few small things you could help me out with."
I groaned, but not too loudly.
"Yes, ma'am," Jack said, grinning at me. "We'll be there whenever you need us."
"I kind of need you now."
"We'll be there in half an hour," I said. "But I reserve the right to come home for lunch to escape the heat and crowds."
"Whatever you need, dear," Aunt Ruby said sweetly, which meant "fat chance," and we all knew it.
We hung up, and Jack filled our water bottles while I got dressed in a purple tank top and denim shorts and hunted up a bandanna and my work gloves. Aunt Ruby's "few small things" could be anything from helping Mrs. Frost set out baked goods to building the actual stalls.
I'd done all of that and more at past festivals.
Jack, no stranger to Aunt Ruby and her requests, put on an oldLed Zeppelin T-shirt, hauled his toolbox out of the garage to his truck, and we headed off toward town.
"Do you really think the McKees are going to cause trouble at the fireworks?" I asked. "I mean, there are a lot of kids in that family. Kids love fireworks. If Lily and Bug find out their relatives ruined the fireworks, they won't be happy."
The new generation of McKees didn't show too many signs of following in their rowdy relatives' footsteps, and everybody in Dead End was grateful.
Jack shrugged. "You tell me. How serious were they about beating the sh…stuffing out of Cletus at your shop?"
"It was pretty serious. There were bloody noses and bruises and … oh, boy."
"Bloody noses and bruises and oh, boy sounds serious," he said.
I pointed. "No. Oh, boy,that."
It wasn't even eleven o'clock, but vehicles filled every available legal parking space and even some that weren't legal.
