The kid had more money than the entire town but could still get excited by ice cream. Jax thought there was a lesson in that, but he was too tired to learn it. Her excitement almost made him smile though. When had anyone ever greeted him with such cheerfulness? His elderly adoptive family hadn’t exactly been the warm and welcoming sort.
Evie opened her arms to hug their ward—as he hadn’t. “Tadpole! Where’s your magic wand? I need you to turn me into a toad.”
“Harry Potter doesn’t turn people into toads,” the kid said with scorn, leading the way into the house. “He fights evil. I need to conjure spells for the wand to work.”
Jax wondered if fighting evil with a magic sword was as exhausting as doing it in courtrooms. Hauling his bags up the kitchen stairs, he addressed Reuben and Roark quietly while Evie and Loretta chattered and dug through the refrigerator. “Anywhere we can have a talk about those papers I sent?”
“Cellar. I can beat Reuben’s score on Pac-Man while we talk. Not much to tell you, though.” Roark stacked boxes inside the bedroom by the kitchen door.
“A crap player like you can’t beat a firefly,” Reuben retorted.
“Decent meal first,” Evie shouted at them. “Brains don’t work without being fed.”
“Man, it’s good having a cook again.” Roark helped himself to the coffee machine Jax had bought for himself, back in the days of luxury.
Communal living should be entertaining. Maybe he could talk his hermit sister into letting him move in with her. Although he’d need a car again if he lived out in the woods.
“So, do I still call you Jax? Or you want to be Demon now?” Loretta asked, sliding into her place at the breakfast banquette. The kid seemed to know everything going on.
“Demon!” Evie called. “I like that.”
“Better than Dam, I suppose.” Jax took the bench across from her. “But I prefer Jax, if I get a choice. It’s what my parents called me.” To solidify their stolen identity? Or dare he hope they were honoring a lost friend?
“Did you have fun with Aster and Gracie?” Evie slid what looked like a pancake with chocolate chips in front of Loretta.
“They have a trampoline in the backyard! And Aster may be learning to talk to dogs.” The kid slathered the pancake with peanut butter, then topped it with whipped cream.
Jax hoped Evie was fixing something more edible for the adults.
“Mavis said she’s running for mayor,” Reuben said out of the blue, taking the seat beside Loretta.
Jax winced and sighed as Evie slammed down her spatula, turned off the stove, and stripped off her apron.
“I assume you didn’t really want breakfast?” he asked the idiot nerd across from him.
“Reuben doesn’t have people smarts.” Loretta contentedly dug into her pancake. “And Evie only has to cook for me.”
Wordlessly, Evie walked out.
Roark reached over the table to swat his friend, then scooted out of the booth. “I can fry eggs.”
“He burns them,” Reuben muttered.
Nope, communal living was not going to work. Jax couldn’t abandon Loretta to go after Evie... But R&R had been looking after the kid these past days. What in hell did he know? Except that he was hungry, and he didn’t want to do a witch fight on an empty stomach.
Jax slid out of the booth to see if Evie had started buying bacon yet. The refrigerator had 2% milk and eggs but no bacon. He found ham slices, though, and amazingly, bagels. He dumped a bagel into the toaster, rescued an egg from the griddle, and fixed a breakfast sandwich for himself. The clowns could fix their own.
By the time he had his food ready, Loretta had polished off her dessert breakfast and was patiently waiting for Reuben to move his carcass so she could deposit the plate in the sink. Muttering, Reuben slid out to fix a bagel and steal a rubbery egg.
“Let’s go find Evie,” Jax suggested to the kid. Maybe Evie and her mother wouldn’t fight in front of a kid. “She’s tired.”
“Her bubble isn’t sparkly,” Loretta said, as if agreeing. “Can I have a bite of your sandwich?”
“You didn’t give me a bite of your pancake.” Jax left his culinary-deficient friends to haggle over who washed the dishes and set out for Afterthought’s Main Street.
Evie was a prickly explosive even when things were normal. Nothing was normal right now. Jax expected the roof to blow off Mavis’s shop at any second.
“You knew I was filing for that job as soon as I got back!” Evie was shouting as they stopped in the doorway.