Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

 "So, what do you think?" Megan said as she stepped into the lounging part of her and Alexi's dressing room backstage.

Alexi and Harry had gone to get their car and bring it to the backstage entrance, for a quick getaway. Megan had confided in Bethany that she thought Harry was cute, so excited about riding in a real, Human-made car.

"I like him. How does his wife feel about him spending the holidays with me and my Dad?" Bethany said.

"No wife." Megan shrugged and slipped into her clogs before sitting down on the other end of the couch. "Which is a total injustice. Alexi says the girls can't see past his science experiments and his research, to the really great guy under the brainy persona."

"What kind of science experiments?" Bethany imagined Harry doing a Nutty Professor routine, his lab coat smeared with stains, maybe scorched in places. It fit. How long since she had let herself feel anything but mild social friendship with a man?

Maybe the fact that he didn't ask for her autograph, didn't ogle her figure, had a lot to do with the attraction. Because yes, she admitted to a strong attraction between them, from the moment that zap of static electricity sent a lovely, hot shiver down her back.

It was great to realize she was a normal woman after all, not a frightened, frigid little teasing twit, as that last studio-arranged date accused her of being.

This was going to be a great Christmas.

A knock on the door, then it opened and her heart did a funny little skip when she saw Harry, and the way his gaze zeroed in on her all the way across the room.

"Ready?" He stepped into the room and held out a hand. "This might tingle a little."

"Kind of like a force field or tractor beam or something wrapping around a ship?" she offered.

Harry's eyes widened and his mouth dropped open a little, and that funny feeling in her stomach turned squirmy. Had she turned him off already?

Then he grinned. That lovely zing climbed her arm when their hands touched. A buzzing sensation raced across her bare skin. It tickled and massaged somewhere between her skin and her bones.

"Wow." She flinched when her voice sounded a little off, not quite hollow.

Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

 "Umm... What exactly did they tell you about me?"

"Oh, I figured out the whole not-quite-Human thing a while ago. I just never confronted them with it." Bethany blushed and looked at her hands clasped on the table in front of her.

Something dropped inside his chest and warmth stole over him. He wanted to protect her. He wanted to take the paparazzi and the other bozos stealing her privacy, and send them to the Dungeon Dimensions for a couple hundred years. Nobody he knew blushed. The simple little reaction made her seem small and delicate and vulnerable.

Which she was anything but. He had seen her first movie, the tough chick who turned her world upside down to save it, who devised bombs and weapons from nothing to protect innocents. Even with that blush fading from her cheeks, he sensed a lot of similarities between the Bethany sitting before him now and the girl on the screen. It made no sense, but Harry didn't care.

"So, say something." Her smile went crooked.

"You're pretty calm about it. A lot of people would probably be freaking out, faced with the fact of a lot of other dimensions of reality, side-by-side with the one they know. I've always wondered what the CIA and FBI and all those foreign intelligence agencies and governments would do, if they knew about the Fae realms. If they'd maybe try to bomb us out of existence, or prosecute us as illegal aliens or whatever."

"So, who was here first? Fae or Humans?"

Harry sat for five seconds with his mouth hanging open, stumped by that question. That was definitely something for the Ether Lexicon. For all he knew, that was part of the no-need-to-know information the Lexicon sometimes stubbornly refused to divulge. Then he laughed. Bethany blushed again, but she grinned.

How come girls like her don't exist in the Enclaves?

Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

 "Bethany?" he murmured when he reached her table. Harry admired her self-control, so she didn't even flinch or look his way, betraying her disguise. He held up the half of Alexi's business card that served as his identification.

Bethany peered from under her floppy hat and slid her half of the card across the table toward him. She didn't take her fingertips off the card until he matched up his half to hers.

"Harry Morton," he said, and held out his hand. Bethany's slim, strong little hand slid into his. Something sparked, almost a buzz, between their fingers.

"Static electricity." She offered a crooked little smile and a whisper of laughter as she jerked her hand away.

"Uh. Yeah." Harry slid into the booth facing her while he gathered his thoughts. She had felt that? She had soaked up more magic than he had first guessed.

Fascinating.

"I think Alexi insisted on all this cloak and dagger just for the fun of it," she said, as the audience applauded the first illusion of the evening. She grinned, which made an inexplicable world of difference for Harry. If she had scowled or showed reluctance in any way, he didn't know what he would have thought of her.

"Yep, that's my favorite cousin."

"You look like him." Bethany offered an awkward little smile.

"You think so?" He glanced at Alexi, who stepped back and held up the silk purse on a pole, so Megan could demonstrate there was nothing in it. Real magic made things so much easier for magicians, Harry mused, but Alexi and Megan insisted on practicing sleight of hand, doing it the way full Humans did. He supposed it was all in the challenge. 

"He has more glitz, but there's a strong resemblance. Of course, combing your hair back like that and dressing so casual, that makes people kind of pass over you. So, you're really good at this invisibility thing?"

Read Penelope's Story NOW

 

Have you seen EPIC: The Musical, on YouTube yet? (It's The Odyssey, set to music, by the way. Love it!)

Have you wondered about Penelope's side of the story? Just why did she wait through 10 years of war and then 10 years of wandering and imprisonment, for Odysseus to come home?

Now you can read Penelope's side of the story!

Back in print after 10 years, PENELOPE OF ITHAKA is available exclusively on Amazon right now.

The official release date is November 1, BUT you can get the paperback NOW and save $3 off the official cover price.
Or you can pre-order the ebook.
Or you can wait until November 1 and read it in Kindle Unlimited.

And yeah, there's an audiobook coming.
Or you can listen to individual episodes now on the Ye Olde Dragon's Library storytelling podcast.

Take your pick.

But please follow this Affiliate link and check it out!! I'm so proud to have this book baby of mine available again!

https://amzn.to/47Ahv2N

Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

"She doesn't mind having a stranger around?"

"Funny, that's the same thing she said about you." Megan gave her top hat one more tiny adjustment.

"We're on, sweetheart." Alexi caught up with them, wrapped an arm around Megan's waist, and kissed her for luck as he did every night. A kiss that packed enough heat into a two-second liplock, Harry burst out in sweat. They stepped out onto the stage.

He gulped, locked down his counter-spell so he wouldn't fade out at an inopportune moment, and headed for the side entrance. Time to meet his assignment.

He stepped into the supper club seating area and meandered around the perimeter to the booth where Bethany waited. On stage, Alexi kept up the patter while Megan searched the audience for the first volunteer assistant. All the women watched Alexi, all the men watched Megan. Harry felt slightly nauseous from the rising pheromones. Didn't these Humans have any self-control? Especially when it came to two entertainers who made it very clear they were married to each other?

He didn't see anything wrong with window-shopping, as it were, and appreciating what was on display. But Harry drew the line at plotting how to break the glass and steal what was inside.

Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

  

"She's got magic," Harry whispered. He studied Bethany through the curtains while the emcee warmed up the audience for Alexi and Megan's last show of the night.

"You might be right." Megan adjusted her top hat. "There is something about her that makes my fingertips tingle. I just can't figure out what. If there's Fae blood, it's mixed with something that muddies the waters." She patted his back. "You're starting to fade."

"Oh? Sorry." Harry concentrated on his anti-invisibility spell and turned back to watching Bethany Miller in her shadowy corner table. That big, floppy hat and garish muumuu couldn't hide her, yet dressing in loud, obnoxious clothes did trick people into ignoring her. Somewhat.

Harry turned his vision sideways, looking into the 'tweening spaces, those half-step areas between dimensions. His long-term invisibility made it easy to slip halfway into the next dimension.

A soft, rainbow-streaked corona shimmered around Bethany, marking her as someone who had been touched by magic for so long, it had become embedded in her essence. The colors didn't quite clash with her outfit, but it was enough to make his eyes ache after a while. Still, he kept watching. She fascinated him. He loved puzzles, and Bethany had just presented him with one.

"So, she wants to be invisible?"

"She wants to spend the holidays with her father without being mobbed every time she steps outside," Megan said. "She's a nice girl who doesn't enjoy the rat-race of stardom. She refuses to change and act like a star, and that makes her even more popular. Kind of like a girl who isn't in Need is a whole lot more attractive."

Harry blushed, and his concentration slipped so he felt himself fading out. Which was actually a good thing. He wasn't about to admit to anyone he wished he knew the terror of being the target of a woman in Need. None of the girls he had grown up with had targeted him. It was humiliating. Hera-Jane maintained that if he socialized more, so people realized he had grown up into something of a stud, he would be hunted. Harry was too busy with his experiments to find out. Although, this adventure would be an experiment, wouldn't it?

Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

 "How's that non-magical betting system working out for you?" Harry snapped his fingers to bring a towel over and got out of the hot tub. He tapped the communications sphere, activating it so it shimmered into transparency. Alexi and Megan's faces appeared before him. He was glad he had opted for the towel.

Harry wasn't a skinny geek by any means, but Alexi had inherited the family build and good looks, along with the family curse. Harry was white-blond and buff, but Alexi had it cubed. Still, despite all the advantages Alexi had in looks and freedom and a real job in the Human world, along with a smart, fun wife who hadn't needed to trap him by going into Need, Harry preferred his smaller troubles. Alexi had nearly been doomed to spending eternity without magic. Megan had rescued him from that. While Harry wouldn't have minded being rescued by someone like her, he knew it would still rankle from time to time. He had a ridiculous longing to be the White Knight, rescuing damsels in distress.

"What's up, Cuz?" He gave an extra yank to his towel.

"We have a job for you," Megan said.

"You and your invisibility spell," Alexi added with that grin that had always meant really cool, really loud, really messy adventures when they were boys.

"I'm there." Harry snapped clothes onto himself. "Just tell me where and when."

It's QUIZ TIME! Ready to earn points for a free Neighborlee novel?

 

ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE QUIZ 

How do you play?

• Listen to Chapter 1 of ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE either on the Ye Olde Dragon’s Library storytelling podcast page on YeOldeDragonBooks.com, or on your favorite podcast app.
• Answer the questions.
• Send the answers to 2OldeDragons@gmail.com

Points add up to get a free ebook or audiobook or print book in the Neighborlee series.

All month, the featured book is at a discounted price, if you need to fill in the holes in your collection. I mean, there are 13 books altogether. If you have all 13 already, THANK YOU!! But chances are good you don’t have all of them.

Yet.

This is your chance to get more and catch up on the weirdness that is Neighborlee, Ohio.

 

1. What swarmed the ceiling of the main room of Divine's Emporium?
2. What was Maurice wearing for the party?
3. What did Maurice enjoy doing with Lanie's parents?
4. What came into the party with Dawn and Stanzer that didn't like being in the same room with Maurice?
5. What did Ken give Jo instead of the traditional wishing ball ornament?
6. Who promised to help Maurice figure out how to get around the barriers in his relationship with Holly?

 

 

Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

 

"I'd much rather you concentrated on doing new things," his sister said, "rather than fiddling with spells that are nearly as old as time itself. Less chance of something semi-sentient deciding to punish you. The really old spells have a life of their own. They don't like being tweaked." She reached out with her unerring sisterly sense, caught the sides of his face in her hands, and bent down to kiss his forehead. "Please wash up and come to breakfast visible." As she got to her feet, she made a face. "Bleah. Gunpowder. It tastes even worse than it smells."

"Well, you've learned something new before breakfast, just like me." Harry grinned when Hera-Jane strolled out of the laboratory, muffling giggles that sounded like nightingales.

The communications sphere shimmered into being while Harry relaxed in the hot tub -- another wonderful invention of Humans. Fortunately for him, and whoever might be calling at this time of the morning, the sphere remained opaque.

"I gave at the office," Harry said.

Alexi's rich, rolling laughter made him grin. Nothing like a call from his favorite rebellious cousin to take a morning from interesting and frustrating to fun.

Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

 

Uncle Mortimer patted his cheek. "I wish gunpowder had been around when I was your age. It's quite the thing to make messes when you're only 100 years old. When you're pushing nine centuries, well, you have to pretend to have some dignity."

"Especially when your cloaking spells aren't what they used to be and you can't hide the evidence," Hera-Jane added. "Uncle Morty...the Chinese had gunpowder back when you were a child."

"Hmm, yes, but the Asian Fae Enclaves were quite isolationist back then. They wouldn't share anything, least of all such clever Human toys." Their wild-haired uncle nodded once more for punctuation. "Quite all right now, lad? Back to normal?"

"Close enough. How much can you see me?" Harry asked.

"Not a speck. We can smell you, though." His sister sat back and wrinkled up her nose. "Well, are you any closer to success?"

"I think so. Not much, but at least I didn't trip any of the fire suppression and reconstruction spells." Harry allowed himself a few flickers of triumph over that, before diving into the new puzzle. "You say I was visible when I was unconscious?"

"Something disrupted the invisibility spell for a little while. It just proves my theory that the malfunction lies in the Ether connection that powers this particular invisibility spell. You need more research, lad." Uncle Mortimer slapped in the general direction of Harry's invisible shoulder and heaved himself to his feet. Chuckling, he tottered out of the laboratory. Standard housecleaning spells had cleared the damage while they talked.

Excerpt: ALLERGIC TO MISTLETOE, Neighborlee, Ohio, Book 10

 

"Hargrove? Hargrove! Wake up, boy!"

The admonishment, in the tired, worried voice of Uncle Mortimer, was punctuated with a slap that served quite adequately to bring Harry back to consciousness.

He lay still, trying to remember what had knocked him unconscious. A few cautious sniffs answered him. The stink of Human gunpowder and several sophisticated Fae explosives filled his sinuses. Memory streamed back into his head. He had been playing with a new kind of controlled explosive device, to help in archaeological excavations. Obviously, the charm controlling the direction of the explosion had malfunctioned.

Why were people hitting him?

"He must be conscious now. He's fading out," said his sister, Hera-Jane.

That yanked his attention off trying to figure out what he did wrong. "Fading out?"

"You were visible, the entire time you were unconscious." She fumbled across his chest until she found his shoulders, then shook him. "Come on, Harry, rise and shine."

"I'm always invisible when I sleep. I have to concentrate to be seen." He opened his eyes, relieved he could still see. That explosion had felt uncomfortably close to his face.

SAVE -- and get the paperback before everyone else!

 

The next Book & Mug Mystery, SKELETONS IN THE CELLAR, comes out October 15.

But you can get the paperback in an Amazon exclusive NOW and SAVE $$$ by following this Amazon Affiliate link.

https://amzn.to/4nR7HGY

Cadburn Township has stories about the Cadburn daughter who ran off to the Civil War disguised as a boy. Or did she? Maybe she ran away from home with her true love, to escape a forced marriage. Either way, legends say her ghost haunts the township.

Then there are the rumors of Underground Railroad tunnels leading from several houses to Cadburn Creek. And three years ago, there was a big fuss over some historical reenactors and historic researchers and academic rivalry -- with the couple at the center of the shenanigans vanishing suddenly, without warning.

Until a rainy fall starts flooding in Cadburn Creek, and suddenly, the truth of quite a few rumors and legends are brought to soggy light ....