by K. M. Waller
Amira cast a dark glance in her direction. Ally huffed.
Ris’s eyebrows rose full-peak as she continued. “No offense, but enough is enough. And never, not once ever in the past six years since they declared war on you have they taken a break. It has to be a good sign. I’m going to start looking for an apartment—out of town.”
Amira wasn’t so sure what direction the sign pointed in, but she wanted that freedom so badly for both her sisters. However, until they all reached the age of thirty, or their aunts called a formal truce, they were stronger together. Tragedy had killed their mom, but magic had killed their dad. Being the last of the line of Walker girls meant the aunts would force fake love on them to continue the bloodline. That hadn’t ended so well for their parents, and Amira would never let her sisters fall victim to the same fate.
“I think Ally’s right,” Amira said. “Let’s give it a little more time and make sure they’re truly done. As much time as it takes. We’ll continue with the deflection spell and feeling for them every couple of weeks.”
Ris dipped her head and her pink hair fell forward over her face. It was hard to miss the disappointment oozing from her pores.
They still held hands, and Amira gave both her sisters’ a reassuring squeeze. “Come now, thirty is the new twenty, isn’t that what they say?”
“Only thirty-year-olds say that. And you’re close to being done. You’ve got, what, about thirteen months, and you’re free.” Ris broke the circle.
A few seconds later, the back door slammed shut with a heavy thud.
Ally leaned over and gave Amira a quick side hug. “She’ll be back to her perky, annoying self tomorrow. Patrick’s wedding invitation arrived in the mail today, and she’s still stinging from it.”
“I know. I agreed to host the bridal shower tomorrow.” Amira could only shrug at Ally’s glare. “His mother is the mayor. I couldn’t turn her down.”
“Fine. But you’re telling Ris, not me, and you’d better do it soon.”
Amira ached for her baby sister’s failed relationship, but they all had to keep moving forward. Ris had fallen in love only to be burned when he turned to someone else—after their aunts’ spell bounced. Exactly the sort of situation Amira would never find herself in. There was no such thing as true love, so it couldn’t conquer all, especially not where magic was concerned. “Are you headed out too?”
“Yes. I’ve got to get back to the school and finish grading papers.” Ally stood and sniffed. “I swear I gain ten pounds every time I smell Mom’s chocolate cake.”
Amira tapped the table, knowing the answer to her next question even before she asked. “So you won’t be taking a piece with you?”
“Ha! Of course I will. It takes a lot of effort to keep the curve in these hips.” Ally dramatically sashayed to the counter and grabbed the piece of pre-cut cake. She blew Amira a Marilyn Monroe-worthy kiss before she left.
Amira waved her sister off and leaned forward to blow out the candle. Her breath touched the flame and the light flickered but didn’t go out. Instead it flamed up to twice its original size, and Amira scooted her chair back. A nervous flitter marched across her stomach when the flame turned from blue to orange to purple and back to blue. Too weird. And she’d lived weird. From what little she’d studied of her family’s candle magic, the flames reacted to change in the cosmos. Why hadn’t it reacted when they’d all been seated at the table together?
She glanced around and smothered the urge to run after her sisters. There would be no point in calling Ris and Ally back. They’d have no idea what it meant either. She and her sisters weren’t practicing witches. Well, not really. All they knew was enough to keep Aunt Hope, Aunt Grace, and Aunt Tizzy from intruding in their love lives, and that was enough of a drain. The younger Walkers had decided to control their own destinies a long time ago.
If she really wanted to know, she’d have to consult the family grimoires left in the Walker home where Amira now resided alone. A dry chuckle escaped her lips. It could mean something magical or it could be nothing more than unseen dust hiding on the candle’s wick. The easiest course of action would be to ignore it unless it happened again.
Her peripheral vision caught a movement outside the front window. She stood and glanced out into the parking lot she shared with a cluster of buildings, but didn’t see any moving shadows. A spark of dread tickled her midsection. With the aunts ever pursuing them with love spells to get them to the altar faster, rarely did she have a day where she didn’t feel some sense of foreboding.
When she returned to the table, this time Amira used a candle snuffer and the flame stayed out. Sighing loudly, she rolled her shoulders back and forth. She shuffled through a stack of magazines sitting at the edge of one of the tables. When the weather permitted, she placed a few tables outside and the lone tea drinkers would read books or the newspaper, or page through her collection of Home & Gardens.
She picked up a copy of Fortune 500 which had an article about top ten bachelors across the United States. Odd. She didn’t remember bringing this particular magazine into the shop. With the clientele consisting mostly of retired women, it definitely wasn’t a first choice for reading material. Flipping through the pages, she stopped when a picture of a handsome dark-haired man caught her attention. His hair was cropped, perfectly manicured, and his gaze, dark and serious, was focused at the camera lens taking the shot.
Oh, and he was super rich of course. Swoon.
She read over the caption. Calex Dimas, fourth generation Greek heritage with ties to real estate investments in every state. The article labeled him shrewd, cunning, and single. Hmm. Some lucky model or starlet would gobble him up before too long. Didn’t matter. That wasn’t the type of man for her. She needed simple, sweet, understanding, and willing to adore her despite her family drama. Hopefully after she turned the literal magical age of thirty, there would be a man like that out there for her. Not true love but good enough love. She didn’t dare want for more.
A sharp tap tap tap startled her. She hadn’t noticed any headlights pull into the front parking lot, but then again she’d been engrossed in the magazine. The man who knocked didn’t see her standing in the corner, and he placed both his hands against the glass to look through the lightly tinted window. She couldn’t see him very well since rain clouds had moved in and a hazy drizzle began to fall.
It had to be the real estate agent of the potential buyer who’d called her earlier in the day. Guilt nagged at her, forcing its way past the candlewick and great aunt concerns. She should’ve confessed to Ally and Ris she’d had an agent putting out feelers for buyers for the Tea Haven. Meddling aunts or no meddling aunts, she was tired of running the business her parents left her when they’d passed away. She’d worked in the Tea Haven the majority of her teenage years and every minute of her adult life. At first, she felt she’d owed it to Mom and Dad to keep it going, but now claustrophobia and the need for a change clawed at her. Plus, the money from the sale would let her and her sisters choose to leave or stay in Burberry. If their aunts had truly stopped meddling, the money would finance their freedom.
The man noticed her in the corner and waved at her with jerky movements. Apprehension at her brashness in meeting him alone after hours slowed her movements. He’d called not more than an hour after she’d made arrangements with a real estate broker in the city. She knew it was a long shot as she’d told the agent to make certain buyers understand the business was to always remain a boutique tea room. The agent warned her in return that commercial properties could take many months and even up to years to sell.
Amira hesitated as she flipped the lock, but instantly apologized for the delay as she swung the door open wide to let him in. “I guess I was lost in thought. I didn’t mean to keep you waiting, Mr.— ” Her brain stopped as she peered into the darkest eyes she’d ever seen in person. But she’d seen them before in pictures.
Holy Mother of Nature. It was Mr. Magazine Article in the flesh. A Greek go
d standing in her tea room.
But that was impossible. Amira glanced back down at the magazine clutched in her sweaty palm. Her gaze lifted to the man who stood inches away from her. Oh yeah, there was no mistaking the tall, dark, hotness with rain drizzle beading in his hair. It was the same man she’d been reading about. Real estate mogul in the flesh. Did she have latent conjuring abilities?
He extended his tan hand. “Dimas. Calex Dimas, but you can call me Lex.”
Amira made a desperate attempt to gather her wits. Feeling like a school girl caught cheating on an exam, her need to discard the evidence overwhelmed her. She threw the magazine across the room and jumped as a ceramic teapot clattered to the floor.
He dropped his hand and stared in the direction of the broken shards. Lightning lit the sky behind him.
“I’m so sorry. I’m just having one of those days. I thought I was meeting with a Mr. Smith, the real estate agent.” Don’t giggle, please don’t giggle. Or flip your hair. Calm yourself, woman.
“Mr. Smith is my agent, but I prefer to inspect the properties I’m interested in myself.” He looked past her into the dining room. “You’re Amira Walker?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Very hard to sell the family business, I imagine.”
“Yes, it is.”
“Financial?”
“Yes, it is.” She’d kill for a hand-held fan to hide her burning cheeks and take her temperature down five degrees. How was this man in her tea shop? After a few seconds of staring, it hit her she’d answered incorrectly. “Oh, what? I’m sorry. Do you mean am I going under financially? No, no. The business stays in the black year round. The ladies in this town love their tea, and I have a low overhead. Business is good. I, ahem, I’m the one who needs a change.”
“I’d like to tour the property. It shouldn’t take more than a few minutes.”
“Of course.” A few slow, deep breaths and Amira collected herself mentally. Physically she couldn’t control the spike in her temperature, her rapid pulse, or the awakening of her long-sleeping girly parts, but this man was here on business and she had to pull some sort of professional act together. Ally was never going to believe this.
They walked into the dining area. “This is the room where I serve guests who want to eat in rather than take out. We only serve hot teas and pastries or cake unless we have a party or book a special engagement.”
She hadn’t cleaned up the candle magic table yet, and when Lex passed it, the flame flickered to life. Before she could rush over to douse it, the flame went out on its own.
Lex appeared lost in his thoughts and missed the candle’s odd behavior. When he walked back by, the flame flickered again.
Something was going on. Something big. She needed to get him out of there.
Then another thought hit her, harder than any lightning bolt could have. Actually, she preferred a lightning bolt to the truth. She ticked off the signs in her head: the candle flame, the hot guy from a magazine she didn’t remember buying, and the lack of forceful magic protruding at the sisters. Or so they thought.
This had to be the workings of her great-aunts. They were still on the attack, but in an entirely new way. Instead of their usual spells that made the sisters more attractive to the general population of men—like deer hunters pouring out doe scent in the woods—they’d used a spell that made the “perfect” man walk through her front door. A reverse of the Weird Science movie, where the geeky high school boys made the perfect girl.
Heaviness settled around her heart. Did the great-aunts really think she’d fall so easily for a man just because he looked like a male model and had more money than a prince?
On the off chance she was insane and the man was really interested in buying the Tea Haven, she couldn’t toss him out onto the sidewalk without explanation. She’d give the tour, judge his interest, and then toss him.
∞∞∞
Lex surveyed the tea parlor and tried very hard not to wrinkle his nose at the blend of sweet and spicy smells. He hoped he wouldn’t have to buy it to keep up his cover, and in fact, it would be nice if he didn’t have to spend more than a couple of days in town. Find the witches, prove the witches were up to something nefarious, apprehend the witches, and head back to South Beach. The LSP tellers had predicted the paranormal crime against humans would happen sometime within the week.
Of course this place had to be the only commercial real estate for sale in the entire fifty-mile perimeter. Not that Lex had to purchase anything in the area, but he refused to go in with a half-baked cover story.
He glanced around and shuddered. The Victorian-themed tea room was coated in all different shades of pink and ivory. He’d expected the witches to be running the tea room, as it was a great way to dispense love potions, but the stereotypical, sweeter than peach pie, small-town girl in front of him didn’t resemble the old hippies Sparsh described. The best bet was still the herb shop two buildings down.
He’d milled around the town square earlier in the day, picking out several possibilities for the witches. Elderly women were in no short supply in Burberry, but he guessed they’d run a business that made it easy to sell love potions. The tea shop sat right in the middle of town, and it made a perfect base of operations for the next few days where he could observe all the stores. The magic amulet had warmed when he’d passed by the herb shop, but it’d warmed when he walked in the tea shop too. Proof the witches frequented both.
They moved from one side of the room to the other and he made an attempt to focus on Amira’s—pretty name to go with a pretty face—chatter about Earl Grey and scones. Acting interested was a gigantic feat on his part. Lex stared out the front window and noticed the rain had picked up.
“Mr. Dimas?” Amira Walker’s soft voice pulled him from his thoughts.
Damn, what were they on now? Doilies? “Uh—”
“Would you like to see the kitchen?”
“I think I’ve seen enough.”
Amira crossed her arms and cocked her head to the side. “Why are you really here?”
Lex coughed lightly into his fist to cover his surprise at her direct question, then flashed a practiced grin. “My associate told you over the phone. I’m here to make an offer on your tea shop.”
“I don’t believe you. Name three different types of tea.”
If he looked at the shelf behind him with the tea display, he’d injure his reputation as a master negotiator. He should’ve been paying more attention to the little tea cups with the matching pot instead of mentally moaning and groaning. It had taken him a couple of weeks after the assignment to find a commercial property for sale, and since his real day job was his cover, he’d had to jump on the sale of the tea shop.
She walked toward the door and placed her hand on the handle. “You do realize that the contract will specify this store continues to be a tea room? I won’t allow any changes other than the name.”
Not that he’d ever agree to those restrictive contract terms. But the name, the name… Lex slowly looked around the store trying to remember the name. Tea Heaven, Tea Hopper…Haven. That was it. The Tea Haven. He didn’t want to lose this opportunity. If he did, he’d be stuck in the town square spying from a cramped van.
He needed a different approach to warm up Amira. He gestured to the counter. “Is that chocolate cake? I bet it tastes even more amazing than it looks. Why serve baked goods too?”
“It’s my mom’s recipe.” The irritation in her features softened. “And Southern women like baked goods with their tea.”
“Why don’t we discuss the history of this place and the town over a slice?” He tucked his hands behind his back, hoping the gesture made him appear more agreeable.
Hesitation warred with her good manners, but knowing southerners, he guessed she’d choose good manners every single time. She pointed to a grouping of tables. “Have a seat.”
His muscles relaxed, and he picked a table near the back wall so he could keep an eye on all the exits. Ami
ra took the crystal cake stand into the kitchen and returned with a large slice of chocolate cake on a dessert plate. She placed it in front of him and sat on the opposite side of the table, perched on the edge of her chair.
To buy time, he took a large bite of the cake. An explosion of chocolate had his taste buds singing hallelujah. He didn’t want to let the goodness leave his mouth to make its way to his throat. “Whoa. What’s in this?”
She relaxed into her chair. “Secret family recipe. But if you purchase the Tea Haven, I’ll pass it on to you.”
If this was a perk to his cover, he’d make sure to grab a slice every day he was forced to spend in town. “As an honest businessman, I have to give you strong advice. Make whoever gets this recipe pay extra.”
He finished his piece in three more bites, unable to remember the last time he’d enjoyed something homemade. If everything tasted this good, he might reconsider purchasing the place just for the sweets. His gaze flickered to the woman sitting opposite him. Spending time with her wouldn’t be altogether painful.
She smoothed back a piece of flyaway hair and regarded him intently. Something had changed since she’d initially greeted him. His charm usually relaxed women; it didn’t make them more uncomfortable. She looked ready to bolt if he yelled “boo.”
“Tell me about Burberry. Seems like a quaint town.” Lex’s assistant Jordie had researched the town, and although Lex knew the statistics, he wanted to hear about the goings-on through the eyes of an insider. And he liked her soft voice. Paired with the bow-shaped lips and intelligent blue eyes, he could see the small-town girl vibe growing on him. Not that he could make a move on a girl like her. Normal women wouldn’t understand his paranormal-investigative alter ego.
“Quaint is a good way to describe it. Mostly it’s a retirement community or where families move when they’ve had enough of crowded cities. We don’t have any big box stores, but you can find just about anything you need in the shops along Main Street. Almost everyone knows everyone else’s name.” Her lips quirked. “The mayor has been trying to put Burberry on the map for years with eccentric little monthly themes, but no one ever takes her seriously.”