Chapter 1

Shawn had to laugh every time she looked at her son. Shamus was too stiff, to say the least, but the fact that he was complaining about her having a job and money of her own made her realize that leaving him to stay with her parents might have been a mistake. That was the reason that she now called him Shamus instead of Finn. He acted, even though they'd been gone for over fifteen years, just like them. Her grandparents Shawn and Shamus Farley. Lately after being out and among humans, she realized that he even dressed like them. And seemed to be much older than they had been, even for being in their nineties when they passed on.

"What do you mean you don't want me to go over your accounts, Mother? Are you afraid that I'm going to find that you've put yourself in the red? Don't expect me to give up on things that I love simply because you don't know how to manage money." Another thing that she hated. That he called her mother instead of mom like he used to. "You're spending a great deal of money here, and it will not do you a bit of good to be broke before you're ready to sit back and let me, as your son, care for you. That is my duty, you understand? I don't think that you do, but I will take it seriously when the time is right."

"I'm well aware that I'm spending a great deal of money, Son. But I have it, and I'm going to use it to bring this place back from the dead, no pun intended." He huffed at her, something that her grandda had done a great deal when he'd been alive. "Now, do you want me to pay for you a house, or are you going to be nice while living here with your mom? Either way, Finn, I'm happy to make it so that you can come and go as you please. Mostly, it's so that we won't have to have this same argument over and over."

"I can pay my own way. I know how money works." He looked like he was about four when he pouted like he was doing right now. "And I've decided that I'm going to be staying here instead of in town so that no one takes advantage of you. I know that you think men don't care for you, but you'd be wrong. You're a very beautiful woman who has a great deal of money that you seem to be spending willy-nilly."

"Thank you for saying that I'm beautiful before saying that I'm stupid with money." She hoped that he'd at least say that she wasn't stupid, but he didn't. Letting out a long breath, Shawnie decided that she'd had enough un-mothering today and headed to the fully stocked kitchen. She continued on with her conversation as if they hadn't just had a little break. " If you're going to be living here with me, and right now that's debatable, there are going to be rules. You are to stay out of my office, my money and my room. If you don't want to do that, then I think that you'd be better off buying yourself a home and leaving me to become a wreck and ruin all by myself."

"You're impossible." She thanked him. "That wasn't meant to be a compliment, Mother. You're difficult to make understand even the smallest of things of late. Or has it been all my life? It matters little. You need a keeper, especially about men and money. I think that you'll be in ruin if I don't stay around and protect you. There, I've said it. You need me here for no other reason than to keep you safe."

"From what? That you're a fuddy-duddy that has a rod up his ass? No, I understand that just fine. Or is it that you have yet to become a part of this century. You'd better be getting on that, Son, or some modern woman is going to take you to task. And she won't be easy on you either. By the way, in the event that you don't know how fucking works, how do you think that I got you? Answer me that." His face heated up, and he told that Georgie was like that. "Yes, she is. And she thinks that you're odd. Did you know that? Not that I think that you'd care."

"I don't. She's the odd one." Shamus flopped down on the couch that had just been delivered. "I do think that she has good tastes when it comes to this house. Everything is just perfect the way that it is. Do you suppose she has her husband look things over, and that's why things are so nice?"

"I believe that she'd brain him like I'm about to do to you if he were to even suggest such an outlandish thing. Also I think she has great tastes as well. Though I don't want you in my boudoir, ever. I love that she made it look sturdy without it looking like it's a woman of the streets kind of room." He rolled his eyes at her. It was then that Finny joined them. "Ah, Uncle Finny. You remember my son, don't you? He's in no better of a mood than he was the last time you were around him."

"He needs his bottom beat if you were to ask me. But since you didn't, I'm going to have to ignore him." Finny, her great uncle from far back, never minced words with her. She loved him for that. And being a friendly ghost, she enjoyed having him popping in and out when he could. "That doctor, the one that worked on you the day that you were injured, he's making his way up here. Can't understand why when he told you that you were fit as a fiddle." She asked him which one. "Kayce. What sort of name do you think that is? I never heard of it before."

"You're beginning to sound like my son, Finny. And you know how much he irritates me." Shamus stood up when the doorbell rang. Telling him that she had it only served to piss him off more. Which, she told herself, she wasn't going to laugh at him about. Opening the door, she asked him what he wanted.

"It's lovely to see you as well, Ms. Farley." She felt her face heat up and she thought that she needed to take it down a few notches. Her son did that to her more and more of late. She told him that she was sorry. "It's all right. I have a request. You don't have to feel like you have to say yes, which I'm betting you rarely do, but I have something going on at my temporary place. I'm living in this little house until—I'm betting you don't care. But I do have a problem. I think that there is some kind of spirit in the house that wishes me harm."

"They can't harm you no matter what. But I will go and talk to them if there is one there. Sometimes, people forget that we're not the only people living around here." She meant it as a joke, but he only nodded. Grabbing her coat, ready to leave the house for a few moments, Shawnie decided that the fencing she wanted to surround her property needed to go up sooner rather than later. Too many people just thinking they could pop in and out to see her. Or to pester her.

Getting into his car she was glad to see that he kept a clean space. She hated it when people used their cars as a sort of trash can. Since she liked neatness, she didn't care for people that were unorganized either. She asked him about his problem.

"Whoever it is, they move things around. Not on a big scale, but enough that it's beginning to make me think that I was going mad. However, I spoke to the place, just sort of yelled out that I wanted them to talk to me, and the entire box of books that I had in the living room fell off the table and was strewn all over the room." He grinned. While she thought he was handsome, she wasn't looking for a date right now. "Anyway, I figured that you could help me out. Thank you for this."

As soon as she was in the tiny little house, she could see nothing that would have happened to have the spirit lashing out. Wandering through the house, she was careful not to step on things that had been tossed around. It would hold a bit more magic until the being, the spirit, was appeased of whatever was going on with it. She started talking to Kayce as she wandered around the house, looking at things that only she could see.

"Her name is Belinda Cross. She doesn't want you living here because you're a male. She had no use for them." Belinda came to her just as she asked her to. "Why don't you want this man here, Ms. Cross? From what I can see, he's doing nothing to interfere with whatever you're upset about?"

"He's a male." She just glanced at Kayce, who was watching her while sitting in the chair that was pushed up near the table. He seemed to be using it for a desk. "Isn't that reason enough to want someone out of your home?"

"I suppose it would be if you were alive. But you're not. Why don't you tell me why you don't want him here?" Belinda looked frustrated. "Okay, how about this. I tell you to leave him alone, and then I go home. I don't like being out and about anyway. Or I can banish you. You know that I'm well within my rights to do that to you since you're causing trouble for the living."

"My trouble with him is that he sleeps in the nude. Walking about my house like he owns it—in the nude. He even…I hate to say this because it's not all that proper for me to say so, but he sometimes eats his breakfast in the nude. His thing…it's flopping about like it has its own life. He's well endowed, I suppose, but he is in the nude while living in my house." She couldn't help it, she laughed. Then glanced at Kayce when he asked her what was going on. "You shant tell him, will you? I mean, he's nude and all, and I find that while it's giving me the vapors, he is a nice-looking man. Better than I ever had…why are you laughing. A nude man walking around is very serious business. Not something to laugh about."

She was rolling on the floor with humor. Christ, she hadn't had this much fun since…well, she couldn't remember when. Trying to tell Kayce what the ghost had said had her nearly sick with humor. When she was able to tell him, only little bursts of laughter after that, his face turned a bright red then he started sputtering.

"I didn't think… She saw me? I guess that stands to reason since I've been right here with…good Christ, does she actually watch me walking about…I'm a lion. I get hot, so… Good Christ."

When he left her there, she stood up and began picking up the books. The energy that had been used to toss them around wasn't as bad as it was when she first came in. After doing all that she could, Shawnie decided to walk home, as it wasn't that far from her land, and she needed some fresh air, too.

It didn't take her long to get home. Shawnie thought it mostly had to do with the straight-line walk to her home. While moving along at a nice pace, she could see that some of the spirits from the cemetery on her land were out as well. She didn't interact with them unless they came to her. She'd bet that most of them knew that she could talk to them and was fine by not having to chase down every little thing that they thought was important.

She'd not asked for this…whatever it was. She had been born, they told her, with some kind of shawl around her face. Looking it up, she wasn't sure that it was just a myth or something true, but she'd been seeing ghosts for as long as she could remember, even as a small child.

As it was now, some of the spirits around thought that she should be at their beck and call all the time. However, since moving into her family home, one that she lived in as a small child with her grandparents after her mom died Shawnie was finding things around that helped her understand what she was. The books that she'd found, diaries for the most part, told of what she'd been able to do since birth.

Shawnie had lived more than her share of lifetimes. Also, since living here as a child, she knew more about the house than most people who lived around here did. She got a lot of information from the spirits that wanted to hang out with her. It had been very helpful in her getting the necessary paperwork to make sure that the house came to her. And not some idiot who thought that there were treasures around.

Thinking about her childhood and the things that she remembered, Shawnie couldn't believe how lucky she'd been to have such a wonderful upbringing. Her parents had been good to her while they were alive, and her grandparents had allowed her to come back into their lives when she showed up one day with Shamus in tow. It wasn't unheard of to have a baby out of wedlock as she had done, but to her grandparents, it had seen it as a sin beyond anything that they'd ever known.

Shamus had paved the way for her to have family around her. When she'd been so desperate for even a morsel of food for her son, her grandparents had decided that they'd watch over Shamus while she worked. However, she herself wasn't welcome in the home. That lasted for about a month before they were remaking room for her, not only in the house but in their hearts as well.

Being at their side when they passed, they never came to her after they were gone. She didn't know if that was normal or not, but she knew that she'd be as welcoming to them as they had to her all those years ago. It had been well over two hundred years since she'd lived here in the house as a child. She was sad again when she thought of their passing.

"Missy, you have company." She looked out into the driveway and was dismayed to find that Henderson Printing was here again. "You should call up them policemen and have him removed. He's like a bone with a dog."

"Yes, he is, but I'm not going to mess with him today." She looked at him. "It's a dog with a bone. I think you say those old sayings wrong just to see if I'm paying attention to you."

"Might be. That man out there, how you gonna get rid of him this time? I surely do love watching you have words with the man. I guess he don't know how to take no for an answer any more than you do." Shawnie tsked at the old man. "Well, you don't like to be told no, do you?"

"I suppose not." She watched Mr. Henderson as he fussed with something that he was trying to pull from the back seat of his car. Picking up her cell phone without looking at it, she pressed the button that would call the police. Having them on speed dial was one of the smartest things that she'd done, she thought as the man made his way to the porch. She was, as much as he entertained her at times, as fed up with the man as Finny was. "I told him that I no longer worked for him, but he keeps coming back."

"On account of you being so talented. His business is taking a flop, and he don't much care for that. I know you have talent better than most. I've seen you working on that mural in the dining room. Right, pretty if you ask me. Goes right along with the stained winders, too." Lance had told her a month ago that she could have the broken glass pieces replaced and that he'd get the colors that she needed if she did want to. "That boy, Lance. He coming around too? Them boys, they seem to spend a lot of time around here for you being a single woman and all."

"What do you want, Mr. Henderson? I have, numerous times, told you that I don't work for you anymore. I'm finished with your sly ways of trying to get into my underwear. Go home." He tried to hand her a folder that she had seen before. "You told the client that you did all the work on that advertising. I don't want to work for a man that takes credit for other people's work."

"Well, Tommy and the others up and quit on me and now I got no one working for me. What did you do, tell them all to leave me? I just need for you to finish off the work here and I'll be on my way. It's the least you can do for me after me putting up with your rudeness. I wonder now if you were that rude to the clients." She asked him if he thought that she'd have any clients if she was rude to them. "I suppose not. But I do need this finished. They're already demanding their deposit back and I don't have it. You wanting all your back pay and vacation right then put a damper on my funds."

"Like I care what you lost out on. Had you paid me…you know, I'm not going to do this with you again. Get off my land or—oh good, the police are here. I've nothing more to say to you." She wanted to slam the door in his face but she knew that talking to the police was something that she needed to do.

After telling them that she'd press charges, they told her that they could hold him for forty-eight hours before they had to let him go. They told her she didn't have to hurry or anything. Holding him that long was their privilege.

Ignoring the things that were now out of her hands for the nice day, she set about pulling out the ingredients to make bread and some chocolate chip cookies if she had the time. The smells were enough to get her into a better mood so she was going to get as much baking done today as she could. It left her less stressed to have this sort of job to do. And it would go perfectly with the roast that she was thinking of having tomorrow night.

Just as she was putting the last batch of cookies in the oven, her cell phone rang. However, she didn't answer it when Finny told her not to. While she didn't normally take the advice of a spirit, he seemed like there was something nefarious going on, so she did as he said.

"It's that man again, that Fairaday man. He's got it in his head that he can put him a temporary house on the land so that he could just have himself a look around." She asked him if he was doing it now or if that was his idea. "He's got him a camper, whatever that is and he's thinking that you'll just be stupid enough to let him live in this here house when he makes himself invaluable to you. I don't know how he figures that's going to work. He's not any value to that wife of his, that's for sure. His wife, she's fit to be tied, not happy with him spending the money before he finds it."

"I don't really have a need for the money, Finny, and I've never asked you this before, but is there money or something of value around here?" He nodded, his lips so tight against one another that she was sure that if he could bleed, he'd be doing that. "Finny, what is it that you're not telling me? Please don't make me have to beg you to do that."

"There is a treasure. Several of them, as a matter of fact. I can take you to them if you want. I'm thinking that you should just find them all and let that buzzard know so that he'll leave you in peace." She said that sounded like a good idea, but she was worried about the extra notice that it would create. "Yeah, there is that too. There is a man in town. You know him a little. Ethan, another one of them Tucker boys. He's been…I don't rightly know what it's called when he just goes around digging up little things when houses are torn down. He thinks its fun to find things. I'd feel a might better about leading you to them if you had you somebody around that can shift into one of them big lions. You can take care of yourself, but also, well, people pee themselves when he does that, and it's just too funny for me not to want him to keep an eye on you on the off chance that someone might try and get you."

"You just want him to scare people. Don't you care a smidge if I get hurt?" Finny told her to behave herself, that he loved her all right, he supposed. "All right. I'll give him a call. Is it safe to use the phone now?"

While he was going on about the stupid phone wasn't ever fit to use, she called the man who was on her list of doctors if she was hurt again. Of course, being what she was, a woman that had a bit of magic, she healed a good deal faster than a human, but it was nice to have someone around who could help her out when she hurt herself badly enough to have to be in bed. Like she had when she'd fallen through the floor and got stuck there. Dangling from the ceiling to the next level wasn't anything that she was going to repeat.

~*~

Ethan was just putting his tools into the back of his truck when his cell phone rang. He knew the number. All of them had been given Ms. Farley's number when she'd been hurt. Thinking that he and some of his brothers were the only people welcome at the house, he answered the phone, wondering what she was going to need next. If anything.

"Two things." He had to smile. She answered the phone much like he did. Getting to the heart of the matter. "I have baked some cookies, chocolate chip, as well as three apple pies as well as some homemade bread that I'll pay you with if you wish to help me around the yard. Finny, my long-gone uncle, said that there are treasures here about and has decided that I need a shifter around to make whoever comes around piss themselves while being chased by a big old lion. He told me that it'll make his day to have someone around who will do that for him. He's an odd sort of man."

"All right. Are we doing landscaping or something different? If you'd not mind, I'd love a few cuttings of the bushes you have out front of your home. I think they'd look fantastic when I get my own home set up." She told him what Finny had told her. "Oh, I can help you with that. Yes, I'd love to. Did he mention what sort of treasures there might be? I don't know much about you other than you're a little bit older than you look, which I didn't get a good look at you when I was—never mind. I'll be there in about, say, twenty minutes?"

"If you pick up my dinner I'll share with you and some of the hot bread. It's soup, a gallon of the potato cheesy soup I was going to have for dinner and freeze the rest." He said he'd do that for her. "Good. We can start on a plan that works for us both and see what kind of treasures we can find. So you know, I'd like to keep it under wraps as to what you're helping me with. I don't want anyone snooping around while we're working. I don't even want to have you around, I like my privacy, but it's a need that I can work with."

After hanging up, he couldn't help but think that she was an odd person, too. Who asked for help and then told them that they didn't want him around? Smiling, Ethan decided that he was going to have a look around her yard too. The landscapers had done a wonderful job and the place was looking about as new as the day that it had been finished.

After getting the soup, the smell was so wonderful all he wanted to do was to eat it from the bucket, he made his way to her home and pulled up into the drive. Someone had been doing work on the garage/apartment and he could see that it was going to blend into the house like it hadn't been put in only about twenty years ago.

Going to the front door, he was surprised to see that the stain glassed window in the large opening had been taken out. He was heartbroken about that. When he'd been here the last time, he'd been so impressed with it that he wanted to take some pictures of it to someday add to one of his doors. Going in when she opened the door, he was surprised and pleased that she was no different to him physically as she had been on the phone. She was nearly rude with her responses.

"We'll eat first. I don't know where these treasures are or even if they're of any value to anyone but Finny but—What are you doing still standing there with your mouth hanging open?" Ethan looked around the entrance hall for someone playing a joke on him, then back at Shawnie. She was getting pissed if her foot tapping was any indication. "Well?"

"I'm hungry. Do you have anything to drink? I have a case of water in the truck. However, it's not very cold. Even though it's cooler out, the water has been sitting in the sun all day. My truck, too, I guess." She didn't seem to understand him—nor did he understand himself, so he let it go. Ethan was happy as he followed her into the depths of the house. Christ, it was a huge home. "I was out on the Taylor farm this morning. Didn't find much. Not worth a great deal anyway. I believe that the elderly have a different view of what's a treasure than I do. Which is fine. The few things that I was able to find, they were happy with them. I'm starving all of the—"

"What's happened?" Ethan had to swallow twice before he could ask her what she meant. "You're not one to spout off whatever is in your head. I kind of liked that about you. But you're just talking to be hearing your voice right now. What's going on?" Nodding, he asked if he could have a seat. "So long as you understand that I'll kick your ass out if it's something stupid you have to say. Like we're related or something. Worse, being mates. I don't need a mate any more than I need a second hand. What's up?"

"We're not related. Not yet, at any rate. But I am your mate." He sat down in one of the most comfortable kitchen chairs he'd ever been in. "Is this from that set that Georgie got you? This is really nice. I might have to have her—"

"Stop babbling and tell me what you mean, I'm your mate." He corrected her. As soon as he did, he thought that it was a terrible idea. "What the fuck…Who cares who is mate to who right now. What makes you think—and I'm thinking that you have to be thinking that wrong makes you think that we're mates at all?"

"This is going to piss you off more, but I can smell you. Your scent, not at all bad, calls to me. And according to my brothers, we should be able to shift and have clothing on when we shift back. I'm not willing to try that today if you don't mind. I have a feeling that you'd maim me in some way right now." She told him that she might maim him anyway. "I don't want to test this either, but you're not supposed to be able to harm me. But I don't know about that one. Not with you right now. You seem to be pretty intense."

Not saying another word, she pulled the bread from the oven and laid it, still steaming, on the table where they were sitting. As she sliced it, he put copious amounts of butter on it so that it would be all melty and gooey when he had his bread. Since the bowls were out, he labeled the soup into them, giving them both a full bowl before pouring the tea in a beautiful glass pitcher into their already iced glasses.

He was on his third bowl, her a second one, when her son came into the room. He was just as he'd been told, a stick in the mud that seemed to have a large chip on his shoulder. Since they were both about the same age, him being a little older, he ate his soup while Shawnie dealt with him.

"I suppose you've done this to piss me off, Mother." She asked him what he was grumpy about now. "I'm not grumpy. What a thing to say. I'm upset that you have invited men here, and you've not cleared it with me. What if I had been going out? The two of you would have been here alone in the house."

"I'm going to ask you this again, Shamus, but just what century were you born in? Even my grandparents weren't as bad as you are." She pushed her half-empty bowl away, and Ethan pushed it back. "I've come to a decision. Two of them, actually. You are moving out. And I'm having the locks changed. You're driving me insane with your old-fashioned values. Which, I might point out to you, has nothing at all to do with me. Secondly," Shawnie looked at him. "I want you to move in here with me. My son seems to think that I need a caretaker and someone around all the time. I don't know how he figures that I made it this far in the past four hundred or so years without his guidance, but I'm sure that he'll figure it out. I was planning to sic Georgie or Brandy on him, but I think you'll be able to handle him. What do you think?"

Nodding once, he looked at the man who was going to be his stepson. Because he was in such a great mood, he told the other man that he didn't have to call him Daddy if he didn't want to. But he would be respectful to him and his mother.

Shamus left. While the two of them enjoyed their soup, seemingly ignoring the part where Shamus had been a true bastard, they talked about the treasures that they were going to find.