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CHAPTER ELEVEN
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Shorter than the average mama bear at four foot ten, Nana stood on the other side of the door and eyed the sisters with interest. “Should I take that personally?” Nana asked in her no-nonsense tone at the sisters reaction to her appearance. “And what’s wrong with your hair?” she asked Faith, squinting to the point where her eyes were just slits in her head.
Faith heard True sigh with relief, but she couldn’t feel the same. Nana or a big, mean ghost, she thought she’d prefer the ghost.
There was a part of Faith that wanted to keep the door locked and turn off the overhead light, but like the worst of the world, once you’ve seen it, you couldn’t unsee it, and Nana wasit. Nana was there, and she wouldn’t just vanish because Faith couldn’t see her anymore; more’s the pity.
Faith’s magic died on her fingertips as if it had given up hope as a lost cause with the presence of the elder, and she sprung the locks and pushed open the backdoor.
The elder walked in, eyeing her granddaughter as she went. Dressed all in black that seemed to make her look shorter and rounder, and with a woolly hat pulled low over her ears, she looked like everyone’s worst ninja nightmare, or that’s how she looked to Faith.
A shock of white curled hair poked out from the front of her hat, and the age lines carved into her face by the unseen hand of circumstances and life’s troubles seemed deeper than the last time they had met. Her green eyes looked washed out, but they still checked the area like a hawk before she turned them back on Faith.
“You always did like candy floss at the fair, but I didn’t realise you identified as one.” She motioned to Faith’s pinkish hair.
“You should have seen it last week; it was bright pink, this week it’s a little more washed out,” True said, enjoying her sister’s time to shine in Nana’s spotlight of misery. Faith rubbed her nose with her middle finger and glared at her sister.
“What did I tell you in life?” Nana asked, shaking her head and shaking a tiny fist. “You commit to something, see it through. This pink wishy-washy thing is so your attitude on the world.”
“Speaking of commitment, True is up for that,” Faith said, offering True a victory grin. She noted how True snapped to attention and warned her off with a hard stare, but Faith wasn’t about to be selfish; she liked to share the misery around. “She’s mated to an alpha.”
Nana just stood there, unspeaking, unmoving, digesting the information. “Well, nothing I can do about that now,” she said, resolved.
True offered her own victory grin right back at Faith. So much for sticking together, but maybe she had cast the first ‘get out of jail free’ stone of deflection in Faith’s direction. She raised her chin to show Faith she had won the first round.
Nana sighed. “Except for making her a widow at my earliest convenience.”
Faith spat out a chuckle; it sounded like disbelief mixed with surprise, but why she should be surprised by anything her grandmother did or said was beyond her. She’d learned long ago that Nana would be Nana no matter what anyone else thought.
True rushed to protest. “Nana!”
Nana rolled her eyes and waved a hand to silence her granddaughter. “Please, no screeching, wailing, or shrieking,” she said firmly. “I have a hearing aid,” she tapped her left ear, “I can hear a sneaky vampire a mile away, but loud noises rattle my brain.”
“A mile?” Faith said, amused.
“Well, as long as I get him before he gets me, I’m good with that,” Nana said. “So, you girls have a ghost problem?” She raised her eyebrows at the pair. “Explain.”
“Ghost ship off our starboard bow,” Faith said, hooking a thumb over her shoulder.
“I’m told that it was conjured by magic,” True said.
Nana looked surprised. “The ship?”
“The ghost,” True replied.
“And who did you miff off enough to do that?” Nana asked.
“Oh, it wasn’t us,” Faith said. “The vampire had a bet with True’s mate that he couldn’t woo her and threw shade at us via a witch and the shipwreck – so technically, in a roundabout way, it’s all True’s fault.”
Nana turned her full attention to the youngest sibling. “I see the glee you have for True’s mishaps hasn’t gone anywhere,” shesaid, but the way she said it hit Faith in the forehead like a bullet, an accusation with a hint of disapproval. Nana was nothing if not disapproving.
“Not yet,” Faith said, owning it. There wasn’t much more she could do with Nana; the elder knew her too well to try to pull the wool over her eyes.
Nana nodded. “Well, at least you’re honest about it.” She turned to True. “A vampire, a spell, and a ghost – I could write a book on that one.”
“So, you’ll be leaving?” Faith said, causing Nana to spin in her direction.
