Unbinding Love: An Angela Panther Mystery Novella (The Angela Panther Mystery Series) Read Online Free PDF

conversation about kids. You know, when you’ve got the chance.”
    “Yeah, I’ll do that. When I’ve got the chance. Because, you know, we talk about kids all the time.”
    “Thanks, I appreciate it.”
    She totally missed the sarcasm in my voice, or else she didn’t, but either way I was stuck telling my not-boss that his girlfriend of only a few months didn’t want to have kids. Awkward. That was the reason I didn’t want my best friend and my not-boss dating.
    Seven hours later my mother shimmered in and dropped the bomb we’d been waiting for.
    “We found him, and he’s alive.”
    I dropped a container of lacrosse balls and didn’t scramble to pick them up as they rolled in multiple directions across the garage floor. “Wait, he’s alive? Where? We need to get him.”
    “He’s with his grandma,” she said. “Just like I thought.”
    Mel stood behind me, begging me for info, so I repeated back everything my mother said as she said it.
    “But I thought Bill checked there?”
    “He did, but what can I say?” She held her arms out, palms up to the sky. “I got a gift.”
    “I didn’t see him,” Bill said. “I don’t understand.”
    “Huh. That’s weird.”
    “Not really,” Ma said. “Ya see, his grandmother, she’s one smart cookie. She’s got all this magic juju stuff to ward off evil spirits and Bill here,” she pointed to him, “’cause he was an evil criminal when he was alive. Me, on the other hand, I was an angel then and am now, so that magic juju stuff didn’t bother me none.”
    I shook my head in disbelief. “Magic juju stuff? Like what?”
    Mel nodded her head, wanting to know too.
    “Some ancient Chinese mirror that goes along with that fang sway stuff, a whole bunch a horseshoes, some wind chimes that I gotta say sounded really nice and calming. She had some evil eye thingie the Greeks copied from the Italian horn, them copycats. But it worked. I got in and saw the boy and he’s okay. Was playin’ some video games on the computer like Josh does.”
    I filled Mel in. “Wow. I had no idea any of that was possible.”
    Mel picked up the lacrosse balls. “You and me both. I’m so gettin’ myself a bunch of horseshoes. Those things will be my new décor. Hanging out with you and knowing there are evil spirits? I’m not taking any chances.”
    I grabbed my cell and called Aaron to fill him in, though, as I suspected, he was one step ahead of us.
    “Already knew,” he said. “But thanks for the heads up.”
    “Oh, yeah. I forgot to tell you, Aaron was there. Whoopsie,” Ma said.
    “Thanks for that. So I’m guessing he’s still with his grandmother? And he’s okay?”
    She nodded. ““He’s perfetto and he’s still there, for now. I think them Marshals are gonna try ‘n take him, though. I heard Aaron arguin’ with one of them and they wanna take over the Emma Marx case ‘cause too. They don’t think she tripped and fell down the stairs. They think somethin’s goin’ on and it’s all connected. Aaron, though, he got his undies all up in a bunch about it.” She smiled. “If I was on the other end of the phone, I wouldn’t mess with him. He gets a look in his eye when he’s mad. That Marshal, he’d be a giamocc’ —an idiot—to mess with Aaron, with a look like that.”
    I’ve seen that look. And I agreed something was up, and it was highly probable the two situations were connected, but I didn’t say that in front of Bill Marx. I didn’t trust him as far as I could throw him--not literally speaking, of course. “So wait, where have you been all this time? Did you just find Justin? We’ve been waiting for seven hours.”
    “Nah, weese went on a tour of Bill’s stompin’ grounds, like you asked. Remember?”
    “Oh, yeah.” My annoyance with my mother evaporated.  “What did you find?”
    She floated over and whispered in my ear. “I think there’s a connection between the boy and his ma’s death but don’t go repeating that around