It Must Be Magic Read Online Free PDF

breathing fire from his nose. Any minute now, she’d be demanding to see his pitchfork. It was a terrible thing to have Lili look at him that way. As if he’d run over a cat and left it thrashing on the road while he went his merry way.
    She flapped her hand at him and huffed out a weary breath. “Okay, here’s the thing. I’ve been trying to figure out
how
to tell you, but I realize now that I’m never going to lead myself neatly into it. It has to be said.”
    She pursed her lips, which he was sure was a very un-Lili-like expression, and a knot tangled in his stomach.
Had
she bilked Wanetta out of the house? No. Even without Roscoe’s explanation, Lili didn’t fit the type. “Am I going to have to call the police?”
    He was trying to make light, but she heaved a great sigh, and all the giddiness seemed to slide right off her face. As if for the last fifteen minutes, she’d been giving him a grand performance. Or maybe
this
was the performance.
    “Not yet,” she said without a hint of her previous vivacity. “You should sit down.” She pulled a chair out and sat herself.
    Not yet.
That had an ominous sound. But really, how bad could it be? They were talking about a cat, for God’s sake. He didn’t think Lili was going to confess to murder.
    Grand larceny? Maybe. But not murder.
    “
I’m
the one who needs to sit down,” she told him. “And I feel very nervous with you towering over me. The Bigfoot comparison, you know. Please sit?” Then she beamed.
    He wasn’t sure how a woman could flip from pursed lips to beaming so seamlessly, but he figured Lili Goodweather couldn’t be kept down for long. Or maybe she had multiple personalities.
    Her smile knocked him sideways. Her fresh scent, like spring rain and new flowers, made him dizzy. Her voice and her nonstop dialogue had thrown him off balance from the moment he’d stepped into her house. Or rather, since he’d stepped into her world, because Lili seemed to live in a completely different dimension from him.
    He wasn’t sure how he’d keep her smile from overriding his common sense no matter what she was about to confess.
----
    CHAPTER THREE
    “P LEASE SIT.” Lili gave Tanner her most winning smile, which was difficult to do under the circumstances.
    Gosh, he was tall. She was on the tall side herself at five foot eight and not used to looking so far up at a man. Tanner had to be over six feet. He looked scrumptious in jeans and a dark blue, button-down shirt. In addition, like icing on a cake, he had broad shoulders, divine true-blue eyes and hanks of gorgeous, short blond hair. Erika’s was lighter, like golden threads, but her father’s was a deep tan color. And thick. Yummy enough to touch. Not to mention his low, sexy voice, which had an effect like caramel sauce drizzled all over your body. Then licked off. In a past life, he was probably a Viking warrior. Not a raider, but a protector. That was how he’d talked about Erika. He adored that girl. What a big sweetie he was.
    Only she didn’t think he was going to be so sweet when she told him what Fluffy had witnessed.
    Tanner sat. Einstein was still on the table. Glowering. Lili didn’t reproach the cat aloud. She’d already let her mouth run away with her and put Tanner on the defensive. At the very least, he thought she was an airhead even if she wasn’t blond.
    “So, as I was saying, when I —” She cut herself off. She couldn’t say
talked
with Fluffy, because talking about
talking
with animals had already gotten them off to a bad start.
    Bite the bullet, babe.
Her own face with a bullet between her teeth. Lili could see Einstein was going to be a problem.
    Vamoose.
The cat was born to be queen of the manor, and the minute she jumped down, her tail high, the flock on the kitchen floor dispersed right along with her.
    Lili clasped her hands in her lap. And bit the bullet. “I discovered that Fluffy witnessed a murder sometime last night.”
    She expected anger. Maybe even fury.