Dearly Departed: Magic and Mayhem Universe (Poppy Carlyle Chronicles) Read online

  “I’ll have the exact same thing,” Jack said, folding his menu and handing it to the waiter.

  “Excellent choice.” The man collected the various menus and then pivoted and scurried away.

  “Alone at lasts.” He reached across the table and took my hands in his. “There’s something I want to talk to you about. You know I care about you a lot, right?”

  “Yes.” I smiled and gave his hand a little squeeze, praying the conversation wasn’t about to take a huge downturn. “I care about you too.”

  “And you know I would never do anything to purposely jeopardize our relationship.”

  Purposely jeopardize sounded a lot like he’d inadvertently done something that would absolutely jeopardize our relationship.

  My smile widened, as if I was trying too hard to seem okay with whatever he was trying to say. “Of course, Jax.” Cocking my head, I inhaled slightly. “But, now that you bring it up, have you inadvertently done something I should know about?”

  “Maybe.”

  My heart dropped to my stomach. Here it came. “What did you do?”

  A high-pitched female voice cut off his response. “Jaxson, is that you?”

  I silently groaned as I recognized his aunt’s voice.

  “Aunt Anita, what are you doing here?” Jax asked, pushing to his feet.

  In a flurry of lilac chiffon, she fluttered toward us. Behind her chugged his uncle Clarence, looking none too happy to be there.

  “Well isn’t this just the most wonderful coincidence?” She pulled Jax into a quick hug and gave him an air kiss on his cheek. “I was at the beauty shop the other day when Florence Taggart mentioned this quaint little place, so we decided to check it out.” She grabbed her husband’s arm and tugged him forward. “Isn’t that right, honey?”

  “Whatever you say,” he grunted. “Hey, Jaxson.”

  “Hey, Clarence.” Jax redirected his attention at his aunt. “Wow, it is quite a coincidence that you chose tonight.” From his tone, I could tell he was suspicious of his aunt’s motives. “I mean, what are the chances?”

  “I know. Happy accidents.” Her gaze drifted to me. “Hello, Poppy. Nice to see you again.” The cool edge in her greeting was in direct opposition to her overly bright smile.

  “Nice to see you again, Anita,” I lied.

  “Good evening,” said the waiter. “Do you two have a reservation?”

  “Oh, heavens me, no.” Anita pressed her hand to her chest in a mock apology. “We didn’t know we needed one.” Her voice dripped with honey sweetness, and I could see the waiter softening under her southern sensibilities. “I have an idea. If you’ve got a table for four, you can seat us altogether. I’m sure my nephew won’t mind if we join them for dinner.” She turned up the intensity of her smile. “We’re family, after all.”

  I hadn’t been sure what the evening had in store for me, but this wasn’t what I’d imagined. My gaze darted to Jax.

  His mouth thinned as he lowered himself back to the chair. “I’m sure there’s no problem getting you your own table. I’d hate to interrupt date-night.”

  He was being incredibly diplomatic. I, on the other hand, wanted to tell his aunt to move along. I knew what she was up to. She was there to run interference for the family.

  “Don’t be ridiculous. This isn’t a date. We’re just having dinner.” She spun and surveyed the restaurant. After a second, she pointed. “How about that table over there? It’s perfect.” Without waiting, she flounced to the table and draped her sweater across one of the chairs. Clarence trudged to where she’d perched and claimed the chair next to her. “Come on you two.”

  “I’m so sorry.” Jax lowered his voice. “I have no idea how she found us. I didn’t tell anybody.”

  Before I could comment, another familiar voice rent the air. “Poppy? What in the world are you doing here?”

  “Aunt Charlotte?” I craned my neck to see beyond her. “And Aunt Sugar? What are you two doing here?”

  “Well,” my Aunt Sugar said, “I was at Darling’s Drugstore yesterday, and Florence Taggart told us about this new restaurant. We thought we give it a try.”

  “That’s highly coincidental,” I said, gesturing toward Jax’s aunt and uncle. “Anita and Clarence are here too.”

  “Oh.” One corner of Charlotte’s mouth hitched upward, looking like she smelled something bad. “Lovely.”

  “Jax and Poppy were just about to join us for dinner,” said Anita.” From the look on her face, the challenge had been made. “We’d invite you over but...”

  “Excellent idea,” my Aunt Charlotte said before Anita could finish her sentence. “I’m sure we can just shove another table next to yours.” She pinned our waiter with her beady brown eyes and fluttered her eyelashes. To say my Aunt Charlotte was an unfortunate looking woman would be putting it mildly. She embodied the essence of an armadillo Shifter, but she didn’t let that stop her from flirting. I would have admired her for embracing her shortcomings, but I didn’t think she realized she’d been slighted in the beauty department. “I just hate to be a bother, but would it be possible to join our friends? Maybe we could move that little table over?”

  Unperturbed by my aunt’s request, the waiter smiled. “Of course. If others will be joining you, we have a larger table available in our private dining room.”

  Both of the aunts hemmed and hawed. Finally, Anita said, “Maybe that would be better. You never know if somebody else will show up. Better to have more space than too little.”

  “I agree,” Sugar chimed in.

  “What is going on?” I whispered.

  “I don’t know,” Jax said. “It’s like a horrible nightmare.”

  “They planned this, right?”

  He nodded. “Definitely. I just wonder how they figured out where we were.”

  “You don’t think they followed us, do you?” The idea of them staking out my place was incomprehensible.

  “Why would they?” Jax asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe they’re trying to prevent something from happening.” I shrugged. “Maybe like you asking me something? Like this mysterious thing you wanted to talk to me about?”

  “That’s crazy. How would they even know about that?”

  “They probably don’t. They’re probably freaking out because they think you’re going to ask me to marry you,” I said, laughing like it was the craziest thing in the world. I stared at him, waiting for his reaction.

  “Well, they’re all going to be sorely disappointed.” He stood, shaking his head, and picked up his glass of water. “But, since it doesn’t look like were going to be able to get rid of them, we may as well join them.”

  “Yeah, if you can’t beat them join them.” As I retrieved my purse from the back of the chair and my glass of water off the table, I released a silent heavy sigh.

  It wasn’t that I’d thought Jax was going to ask me to marry him. Far from it. But I had kind of hoped it was something along those lines. If his family knew about it, for that matter, if my family knew about it, the reason had to be something neither one of them wanted. And if it wasn’t marriage, then I had no idea what it was. And it looked like I wouldn’t be finding out anytime soon.

  Chapter Six

  Dinner had started out as the two of us. That had grown to four when Jax’s aunt and uncle had shown up. Then to six when Charlotte and Sugar coincidentally arrived at the restaurant.

  By the time drinks were served, Jax’s Aunt Vickie, Uncle Newton, and two daughters, Lynette and Virginia, had joined us. My uncles Jessup and Zedikus arrived with my cousins Honey and Zeke in tow, heralding the entrée portion of the meal. And when it was time to order dessert, my cousin Amy and Jax’s cousin Sammy made their appearance.

  Though everybody claimed they’d heard about the restaurant from Florence Taggart, and that it was just a coincidence we showed up on the same night, I wasn’t buying it.

  As I lifted my martini for another much needed sip, another voice sounded beh
ind me. “See, I told you something was going on.”

  Who else had arrived? Most of my family already sat at the table. Steeling myself, I looked over my shoulder. “Oh shit.”

  My Aunt Tula stood at the front of a ghostly crowd. A couple of the people I recognized, but most of them I’d never seen before. From their style of clothing, I guessed they’d died long before I’d been born.

  Jax leaned toward me. “What’s wrong?”

  “My family is here.” My gaze skated to him. “All of them.”

  He turned, his brows pulling down in confusion. “Explain.”

  “Even the dead ones.”

  His brows shot upward. “Oh”

  “I knew you were up to something, Tula Dolbinrod.” Jax’s Aunt Rosalie materialized directly behind Anita. “Always skulking about, poking your nose into other people’s business.”

  “Me?” my aunt shrieked. “You’re the one always whispering nonsense in everybody’s ears, acting like you know more than you do.”

  “Oh God.” A dull ache pulsed at the base of my skull. “This isn’t happening.”

  “What?” Jax asked.

  “Your Aunt Rosalie just arrived with her crew.” I rubbed my neck and rolled my head. “It’s like a spirit standoff.”

  “Rosalie? I barely knew her,” he muttered.

  “Well, she seems to have taken an interest in your personal life. She visited me earlier. No offense, but she’s not the most pleasant woman to deal with.”

  “I’ve heard,” he said. “Can you see who else is here?”

  “There’s about twenty of them. Here.” I held out my hand. On a reap once, Jax had been able to see Bunny and the spirits I’d been reaping. Maybe it was our bonded connection that allowed it, or maybe a fluke, but I seriously hoped it worked now. “Take my hand and I’ll try to show you.”

  He pressed his palm to mine and locked fingers. “Shiiit.” The word hissed from him, and his eyes rounded. Casting a quick glance over his shoulder, he repeated, “Shiiit.”

  “What should we do?” I asked.

  “Hell if I know.”

  “Bless your hearts,” Aunt Sugar cooed. “but aren’t you two the epitome of a happy couple?”

  “That’s so sweet.” Charlotte rested her elbows on the table and locked her fingers together, resting her chin on top. “Don’t you think she’d make the most beautiful bride, Jax?”

  “Stop,” I snapped and then turned to him. “I’m so sorry. Don’t answer that.”

  “I just asked a simple question, Poppy.” Charlotte slumped against the back of the chair and crossed her arms over her chest. “It’s not like I asked him if he was going to propose.”

  The table fell silent, all eyes zeroing in on Jax.

  “But now that she’s mentioned it,” Tula said from behind me.

  “Stop right there, you meddling hag,” Rosalie bellowed. “I’ll be damned if I let you hornswoggle my nephew into proposing.”

  Jax and I both flinched. Too bad we were the only ones who could hear the ghostly insults sailing around the room.

  “As tacky as it was to mention,” Jax’s Aunt Anita said, “Charlotte has made a good point.”

  Jax shifted in his seat, squaring up with his family of spirits, and leveled an unwavering stare on his aunt. “What point would that be, exactly?”

  “Just that...” She shifted in her chair, her eyes cutting first to her husband, who was too involved in his molten chocolate cake to care about what was going on around him, to my Aunt Sugar. “You and Poppy have been dating for awhile now. You brought her to dinner, and from what I hear, you’re practically living together. We’re just curious if you two have talked about getting married.”

  “No.” His answer was direct. “We have never talked about getting married. Nor do we live together. I have my place, and she has hers.”

  “Lurleen says she sees you leaving Poppy’s place every morning.” Lynette’s mouth pinched into a smug teenage smile. Lucky she wasn’t part of my family or I would have smacked the smartass right off her face.

  “Yeah,” Virginia said, jumping into the mess. “She said sometimes you’re still buttoning up your shirt.”

  “Lurleen needs to mind her own business,” Jax said.

  I snorted. “Yeah, like that’s going to happen.”

  “Seems to me you should make an honest woman out of my niece,” Zedikus said.

  “This isn’t the eighteen-hundreds, Dad,” Amy said.

  “That don’t matter, Amaryllis Jean,” Zeek cut in. “A woman’s virtue is her most precious commodity. Ain’t no man out there who want somebody else’s sloppy seconds.”

  “Good thing you don’t have to worry about that, Zeek, because every time you open your mouth you drive another nail into the coffin of your lonely existence.”

  “You shut you’re piehole,” Zeek said.

  Amy shot to her feet and leaned across the table toward him. “Make me.”

  “Both of you shut up,” Zed barked. “Amaryllis Jean, sit down and stop poxing your brother.”

  “He started it,” she mumbled as she reclaimed her seat.

  “Sweet Jesus.” Rosalie sniffed and shook her head. “Your family are a bunch of animals. I can’t believe my nephew would even consider marrying into that inbred horde.”

  “You should be so lucky to have Poppy marry Jax.

  The throbbing in my skull intensified. I had no idea what prompted this obsession with Jax and I getting married, but I’d had enough.

  “We’re not getting married!” Both the living and the dead fell silent and looked at me. “I don’t know how many different ways we can tell you that.”

  My Aunt Sugar pressed her hand to her chest. “There’s no need to shout, Poppy.”

  “Obviously there is because nobody is listening to us.” My gaze skated around the table, but I resisted the urge to turn around and glare at my family of ghosts behind me. “We. Are. Not. Getting. Married.” I glanced at Jax. He squeezed my hand and smiled. I turned back to the table. “Stop nosing around in our lives.”

  “It’s called concern,” Anita said. “With Jax living off the compound—”

  Before she could finish her thought, he cut her off. “For good reason. I need to be in town for work.”

  Clarence finally raised his head from his dessert. “You shouldn’t even be working that damn job. You should be in the family business. As the oldest grandson it’s your responsibility to—”

  “I’m going to stop you right there,” Jax said, holding up his hand. “I like my job. I intend on keeping it. That’s actually a good thing for you two.” He tipped his head toward his aunt and uncle. “If I don’t take over the company, your kids are next in line.”

  It took a couple of seconds for his words to sink in. “I never thought of that,” Anita said.

  “Yeah,” Clarence said. He turned to his wife, staring at her in silent question.

  She shrugged. “Jax has a point. Neither one of the boys is all that bright. With Jaxson out of the way, Palmer will be next in line to inherit the business.”

  “Out of the way seems a little strong,” Jax said.

  “She just means with you busy doing all your policin’ work. That’s all” Clarence clarified.

  “Okay, as long as we’re clear that I’m still part of the family, the first son of the first son.”

  “Well, of course you are, sweetheart.” Anita rested her elbows on the table and gave Jaxson sweetest the smile. “That’s what we want too.”

  Vicki stretched her arms out, indicating her side of the table which held the Jackson clan. “Why do you think we’re here?”

  Jaxson shook his head. “I’m still trying to figure that out.”

  “We just want to make sure you’re not slipping away from us. We hardly see you anymore.” Vicki shook her head. “And when you do come over, all we seem to do is argue.”

  “That’s not my fault. No matter how often I tell the family that I’m happy doing law enforcem
ent, you keep pushing me back toward the business. It’s easier just to stay away.”

  “Well now, you know how your daddy is,” Newton said, finally speaking up. “He’s the most stubborn of all of us. He wouldn’t even come tonight. He said if you didn’t want to be part of the family than that was fine with him. He wouldn’t beg you. I think he had his heart set on you following in his footsteps. Any father would. I know I would’ve if I’d been blessed with the son.”

  “Gee, thanks, Dad,” Sammy said.

  “Now, don’t go getting your britches in a twist, Samantha Jean. You’re about as close as I have to a son and I appreciate the fact that you prefer hunting over makeup.”

  “Uh huh, right.” Sammy looked somewhat placated, but not completely. “Anyway, what were you saying about Jax being part of the family?”

  “Just that whatever he decides to do with his life we support him,” Newton said. “Because were family. The pride sticks together even if they’re miles apart.”

  Silence blanketed the table as his poignant words sunk in. After a few seconds, Jax said, “That’s real nice to know, Uncle Newton. And I want to assure you that family is the most important thing to me.” A smile stretched his mouth and he looked at me. My stomach did a little flip. “That’s why I brought Poppy here tonight.” He lifted our locked hands to his lips and kissed my fingers. “I have something I want to ask her.” He released my hand and stood.

  “Oh, my giddy aunt! He’s going to ask her to marry him,” Tula whooped.

  “No, he’s not,” Rosalie snapped. “They just told the whole room they weren’t getting married.”

  Jax dug in his pocket and pulled out a powder blue ring box. My heartbeat accelerated to a thousand miles an hour, and the room started spinning. Was this really happening?

  “B-but,” my Aunt Sugar stuttered, “I thought you just said you weren’t getting married.”

  “No, I said we didn’t have any plans to get married.” Jax shove the chair aside and knelt. “But I hope that’s all going to change.” His golden gaze captured mine, giving me an apologetic smile. “I’m sorry. I planned on this being a lot more romantic. You know, without a crowd, but that doesn’t seem to be possible, and I’m tired of waiting.”