“Why didn’t you stop there?”
“Stop? I couldn’t stop. I had the book. I used it to spell your phone. I used it to guide the mind of that idiot kid who lives down my street. He was always trespassing, always looking for trouble. So I gave him some. He’s useless now. This isn’t.”
Hal threw down the staff and pulled out the gun.
“It worked on a werewolf,” he spat. “I’m sure it’ll do okay on a witch.”
I didn’t have time to think. I didn’t have time to do anything but react. To remove the threat—cereal eating, not so innocent, power hungry Hal.
It wasn’t much of an idea. I just had to do what had already been done to him, probably a thousand times. Just like Nell Baker.
Sure, it was probably a temporary solution. It’s possible he knew how to counter the spell. But when a man is pointing a gun at you, every second is precious.
I wished I knew how to go invisible again.
I only had one chance.
One shot.
An owl hooted in the distance, reminding me that I wasn’t alone. Maybe someone was watching over me somehow.
My mom.
“A rat with wings, a rodent that sings,” I chanted without thinking.
“He deserves this fate,
for breaking the gate.
For being a brat,
Halitosis Hal is a bat.”
The transformation happened rapidly. In bat form, he beat his wings wildly, flew high, and attempted to dive bomb my head. Trish’s spell held.
“Hoo, hoo.”
The owl swooped in, all talons and wings in the morning light. It snatched bat-Hal out of the air and was off, disappearing into the wood.
31
The Wrong Doug
“Pause. Now, rewind. Play.”
“Dave, I’ve already told you the whole thing twice.”
“But Willow hasn’t heard it.” Dave motioned at the deputy hovering by the doorway.
“She was the first one I told.”
“It’s true.” Willow agreed.
“Listen,” Dave said, “I’m on a lot of pain medication. I can hardly tell you apart from the other you.” He gestured with the finger wearing an oxygen monitor. “There’s dueling Willows. And there’s three of Trish. Can’t you just humor me?”
“Come on, Constance.” Trish nudged me. “It’s not going to hurt anything.”
“Except my voice.” I rubbed my neck. Then I explained it one more time from the moment Dave transformed into a wolf to the moment I turned Hal into a bat—a bat probably eaten by an owl.
“And you like owls?”
“My mother liked owls.”
Medicated and groggy, Dave didn’t remember much of what happened. Trish and I met Willow at his hospital bedside. Gran and Stevie stayed at the bookstore, searching the texts she had on hand. They’d resolved to find and retrieve Brad from whatever plane of existence Hal had sent him to. It would be easier if we had the book. But even with a thorough search of his squalid house and several summoning spells, neither Trish nor I could find it.
“So, you’re saying it was Hal the whole time?” Dave asked again.
“I think so.”
“And he was Nell’s first,” Trish added. “The timeline makes sense. You remember when his mother died?”
“I remember,” Dave said. “And I remember thinking it was all sorts of fishy. But I wasn’t the sheriff then. I didn’t have a lot of pull.”
“Wouldn’t Nell know he went missing?” Willow asked.
“She did,” I told them. “He said as much. He said she knew what he was capable of, but she didn’t care.
“So, he wrote that story and sent it to Jade.”
“Nell always did have a screw loose,” Trish said. “I never knew how loose.”
“I never met the woman,” Dave said.
“That’s probably not true,” Trish replied. “Nell had this spell that made everyone forget about her a few minutes after talking to her. It got on my nerves, so I found a counterspell.”
“Well, it’s a little late to worry about her,” Dave said. “And probably too late for Hal. Not much I can do without him here to answer a few questions.”
“We could exhume his mother’s body,” Willow said. “Run his mother’s DNA against the blood stored in the freezer.”
“Good idea, deputy. Speaking of exhumation reminds me we need to release a certain someone.”
Willow nodded. “Just say the word, and I’ll put the paperwork through.”
“The word,” Dave said.
She rolled her eyes.
“What about the boy?” Dave asked. “The one who shot me.”
“I found him last night—right where my vision said I would,” Willow said. “He’s in a room down the hall, cuffed to the bed. Just in case.”
“Good thinking,” Dave said. “If y’all don’t mind, I need a minute with Constance?”
I had the heart-sinking feeling of getting pulled over again. His injuries were at least partially my fault. Hal was after me, not him. He was after my power.
“None of this is your fault,” Dave said. “None of it.”
“But I—”
“No buts. I did this to myself. If I hadn’t tried the daylight potion, I wouldn’t have changed like I did.”
“You what?”
He shook me off. “It was an experiment. A dumb one. On a regular night, I would have been able to talk to you. But that false full moon combined with the potion’s side effects, well, it wasn’t my brightest idea ever.”
“You dumb, dumb werewolf,” I scolded him.
“Can this dumb werewolf get another date? Maybe this one won’t end in mayhem.”
“You promised me there wouldn’t be any mayhem last time.”
“Okay. No promises then.” He smiled.
I left him to get some rest.
With Hal out of the picture, there was no need to push his recovery. He needed to heal before I let him help me with my quest to find out more about the Faction—if I let him help. I’d already put his family through so much. I wasn’t eager to do it again.
I was going to find out what happened to my mom, no matter what. I couldn’t shake the feeling that she’d been watching over me in my fight against Hal.
On my way out, I passed green hoodie’s room. The chart on his door said his name was Doug.
Poor Doug.
He was just a pawn.
We spent the evening at Bewitched Books, drinking Cyrus’s red wine and going through old spell books. We didn’t find anything that might bring back my lost familiar.
I actually missed having a trash panda steal my covers. We finished the night with a new episode of Creel Creek After Dark. I hoped there was nothing new from the wonder twins, Athena and Ivana—or at least nothing about the Midsummer Festival. Trish was talking about wiping memories around town just in case.
When my eyes finally closed, I dropped into a dream-packed sleep. The images churned like the ocean in a storm. Hal turning into a bat then changing back. Why did I pick a bat? I’d wondered about it all day. Did I know that owls ate bats? Surely not.
I eventually realized why—he killed a vampire, so it seemed apropos.
I dreamed about a raccoon, then the shadow of a man, or not a man, a shadow with feathered wings.
I woke up hearing my father’s voice, a distant sound.
32
Creel Creek After Dark Episode 47
It’s getting late.
Very late.
The creeping dread of tomorrow haunts your dreams.
It’s dark out. Are you afraid?
Welcome to Creel Creek After Dark.
Athena: I’m your host Athena Hunter. With me, as always, is the lovely Ivana Steak.
Ivana: That’s right, I’m Ivana Steak. And can I just say, it’s been a weird few weeks?
Athena: In a place like Creel Creek, that’s saying something.
Ivana: I know, right.
Athena: Today’s episode is a follow-up to episode forty-four. That’s right. This week, we received another anonymous story.
Ivana: A true story.
Athena: Is it really?
Ivana: You know what I think?
Athena: No, what?
Ivana: I believe we have to find our own truth. That’s exactly what this podcast is about. Finding the truth here in Creel Creek.
Athena: Without further ado, here is Exit the Hunter by author unknown.
The Hunter left Creel Creek feeling satisfied. They’d be back. And with them, they’d bring more pain to the unconventional residents of the town.
With the vampire gone and the wolf incapacitated, the witches were next on the list. The witches were always the last to go.
From afar, the Hunter had watched the new witch come into her powers. She’d known nothing, at first. No magic. No history.
And how fair a fight would that be? the Hunter wondered.
The new witch had proven herself quickly. Time and again, she’d proven more than capable. She’d learned to use her magic to protect herself, to protect the town. And she’d taken on a warlock.
Soon enough, the fight would be even. And that’s when the Hunter would return.
The End
Stay tuned for a sneak peek of Never Been Hexed: Witching Hour Book Two.
A quick note
Dear Reader,
Thank you for reading Midlife Curses! After writing several cozy mysteries, this was my first foray into paranormal mystery. And I think I’ve found a genre I just love.
I hope you’ll consider leaving a review on Amazon. They mean the world to me and help other readers find their way to my books.
Explore Creel Creek through the eyes of its residents with exclusive episodes of Creel Creek After Dark when you sign up for the newsletter.
You can also find me on Facebook here: http://facebook.com/christinezanebooks
Thanks again!
Christine Zane Thomas
Ghost Dad
Even in the midst of a crisis, sleep is a necessity.
Sleep called to me. It begged.
I said no.
The problem was after going several nights with little to no sleep, staying up all hours poring over spell books and researching, I was no closer to an answer than when I’d started this whole endeavor.
My life is just one gigantic crisis. It doesn’t help that I’ve just turned forty.
And no, I didn’t go out and buy a new Corvette. My crisis started with something crazier: me becoming a witch. But it didn’t come with the elation of getting a Hogwarts’ letter. It came with a raccoon familiar named Brad and an overbearing grandmother whose magical teaching style was to give me just enough rope—and by rope, I mean magic—to spell myself off a tree on Gallows Hill.
Even now, with Brad gone, Gran did little to help get him back. It was me who did the heavy lifting—the reading, skimming over spell after spell in hopes of finding the right one. But every time I found something, anything I thought might be worthwhile, it usually left me with more questions than answers. These questions spun in my head every night, so even when I did try to sleep, it almost never found me.
I wasn’t trying to sleep.
No, I was hoping not to. With a book at my desk, right next to Gran’s old Singer, and my bed a few feet away, I studied until exhaustion got the better of me. The letters began to bend and morph. I read them over and over again, not making heads or tails of their meaning.
Unlike eating—or other forms of self-care—a body can force sleep. No matter how much caffeine in my bloodstream, no matter how determined I was to struggle through one more page, my body was done. Reluctantly, I gave in.
I turned off my lamp and crashed into bed, snuggling under the too warm comforter and allowed sleep to wash over me like a wave.
“Constance.” My father’s voice mingled with the dream I was having.
Maybe it wasn’t a dream but a memory. My mother’s blue eyes peered down at a younger, smaller version of me. Current me, at nearly six-feet tall, wouldn’t need to crane my neck to see into those eyes. They were so light. I could almost see through her. My mother’s eyes really were windows into her soul—a soul that went missing shortly before I’d turned ten years old, over thirty years ago now.
“Constance,” my father said again, distant—like maybe he was in the next room. Like he was calling to me in the memory. I fought the urge to leave my mother’s side. I wanted to stay. I wanted to be with her, if only for a little while longer. My father could wait.
“Constance, I need you to wake up.”
Isn’t that how all dreams end—with a need to wake up? It’s never a want. Not really.
My eyes fluttered open. They struggled, squinting against a pale luminescence in the room. It was still dark outside, but the room was oddly bright.
My body protested, having not had nearly enough sleep. I ached in several places. My back. My knees. My hips. My mind was much the same, not yet engaged with the guilt it had been feeling over the past few weeks—the guilt from losing Brad. It was the reason I couldn’t sleep and why my bouts of insomnia were at an all-time high.
Curse this crisis.
“Five more minutes,” I said out loud and closed my eyes once more.
“Constance.” My dad’s voice again.
Present.
Here.
Here in this room.
I jerked up, fully awake, threw the bedsheet off, and scrambled for my laptop. I thought I must’ve left it open. Usually, we FaceTime called or used Skype every few days. I didn’t remember him telling me he was going to call tonight. But he must have.
I squeezed my burning eyes closed against the wisp of pale energy in the room, not yet registering what it was. Not until it said my name again. The ghost of my father.
Henry Campbell, age sixty-eight, should’ve been at his home outside San Diego, California. Like me, he should’ve been asleep in his bed. Instead, he stood at the edge of mine, looking oddly like water vapor—a fuzzily outlined bright blue mist.
He wasn’t wearing any clothes below the neck, but his body was just a man shape. No muscles, no skeletal structure. No other appendages. He was a blur. His hands and feet were barely realized. When he moved, they stayed a moment like tendrils of water vapor, of mist, slowly catching up with the rest of him.
In life, my father had grown old. His hair was gray, almost white. He wore glasses. His eyes had been a brownish gray. And he sported a full beard. I couldn’t recall the last time I’d seen his upper lip.
This face was nothing like that. It was more like the man I remembered from my childhood, from around the time of that memory of my mother. Was it a dream or a memory? I wondered. Sometimes it’s both.
And is this a dream?
I would’ve screamed, had I not been dumbstruck. The hairs all over my body were standing on end. Then I realized that the hairs all over my body were in plain sight. In my sleep, I’d taken off my nightshirt. July had made the second story of my Gran’s house, where I slept in her spare bedroom, sweltering hot.
I stood frozen in the middle of the room, laptop in hand, wide-eyed in just light pink panties.
The specter of my father winced. “You don’t wear PJs anymore, sweetheart?”
“Uh…”
The comforter, which I’d half-kicked to the floor, dangled at the edge of the bed. I wrapped it around my shoulders like a shawl.
This had to be another dream. One of those Inception deals. But regardless, I had to take precautions.
“Dad?” I asked. It’s hard to know what you’d say or do when confronted by a real ghost—not until it happens. This seemed like a bad start.
“It’s me, sweetie.”
“Dad, you’re a—”
“A ghost. I know.”
I pinched my forearm. It didn’t hurt. I decided I hadn’t pinched hard enough. The next time, I meant it. And the next time, I felt it. Pain throbbed from the spot.
Still, I wasn’t convinced.
I read somewhere that one way to tell if you’re dreaming is to find a clock. My phone would have to do. Except I couldn’t remember what to do when I looked at the clock. It looked normal. It looked like several hours before sunrise.
“You’re not dreaming,” the ghost of my father said.
“That sounds like something someone would say in a dream,” I replied.
“You’re right. It does, doesn’t it?” He kind of smiled. “Tell you what. I’ll prove it. Ask me something only I would know. Ask me anything.”
I shook my head. “That doesn’t really work either. If I ask you something, you’ll either know it because you know it or because—”
“Because you know.” He nodded, his face blurring up and down. “Because it’s your consciousness. Yeah, I get it. But maybe it doesn’t matter if you think you’re dreaming or not. Either way tomorrow comes—and with it the news.”
“What news?”
“The news of my death,” he said.
Stinging tears filled my eyes, streaming down my cheeks. At that moment, I knew I wasn’t dreaming. Those were real tears.
“You can’t be dead.”
“But I am.”
“How? And how are you a ghost?”
In any normal circumstance, I’d probably be questioning this whole scenario—I’d think it was some joke. But the crisis—the crises.
My life had taken several twisting turns since learning that I was a witch—from a long line of witches, including my grandmother and my mother. I’d found out that my mother, who I thought died in a plane crash, might not be so dead after all. She’d gone missing after starting a job for a mysterious paranormal organization known as the Faction.
Then, before I could even come into my powers, I stumbled across the body of my former boss, only to find out he was a vampire. I got dragged into his murder investigation by the local sheriff, a werewolf. A ruggedly handsome werewolf.
Midlife Curses: A Paranormal Women's Fiction Mystery (Witching Hour Book 1) Page 19