by Amy Boyles
Cordelia twirled a strand of honey hair around her finger. “So this boyfriend of yours…are you pretty serious?”
“Yes…I mean, maybe.” I grimaced. “I don’t know. Caleb’s a great guy, but he hasn’t asked me to marry him or anything.”
I smiled brightly at them.
They both frowned.
Cordelia and Amelia exchanged a look. Amelia cleared her throat. “If Caleb’s not a wizard, he can’t come here.”
My hopes went splat on the floor. “Oh. I’d forgotten about that. Surely there are some exceptions?”
Cordelia shook her head. “No exceptions. Those are the rules.”
Mattie the Cat crossed in front of us, and I was instantly reminded of the pet shop I didn’t want lurking just down the street.
I gnawed my bottom lip for a moment. “So no outsiders are allowed here?”
“None,” Amelia said. “But we’re all great. We can keep you company plenty.”
I frowned. “So am I trapped here?”
Cordelia shook her head. “No, you can leave at any time. But you can’t tell anyone who isn’t magical that Magnolia Cove exists. It’s only for folks with magic, and it’s a pretty busy tourist destination.”
Mattie the Cat blinked at me curiously.
“So what happens if I tell someone about this place? You know, someone who’s not a witch or wizard or whatever?”
Amelia sighed. “Oh, you wouldn’t want to do that.”
My brows pinched together. “Why not?”
Cordelia sucked air through her teeth. A whistle bloomed from her mouth. “You tell anyone about this place, and you lose your powers. Forever.”
FIVE
What powers? I didn’t even know if I had any powers. I could hear a cat in my head, but that might be insanity and not witch powers. This place seemed like a huge joke to me, anyway.
After all I didn’t like animals. I’d met one talking cat who I didn’t mind too much, but the rest of them?
I hated changing litter boxes, and I knew plenty of people love puppy breath, but it wasn’t for me.
Still…maybe I should look in on the animals one more time, make sure all their water bowls were filled and the newspaper changed for the puppies.
And food…they’d need food.
I sighed. Crap. I felt responsible for animals I didn’t even really care about.
Not that I’m a heartless city gal, ’cause I’m not. I’m as easygoing as a country girl living in the city could get.
Shucks, I might as well put on Daisy Dukes, cowboy boots, a flannel shirt and call it a day.
Deciding to give the animals one last look before exiting magic town forever, I slipped away from the party and back onto Bubbling Cauldron Road. The sun was sinking past the buildings, shooting deep shadows over the sleepy hamlet.
I glanced toward the pawnshop. The OPEN sign still flared with light. Good.
As I strode down the street, a flicker caught my attention.
“Hey.”
I blinked. Mr. Sexy stood in front of the popped hood of a car. He was glancing over his shoulder at me.
Now, on a good day I liked to think I was attractive, but who the heck feels hot in khakis and a stupid golf shirt with a parrot sewn over the boob?
Pretty sure no one, and if anyone does, well kudos to you on that one.
“Hey,” I said in return. I paused, feeling heat creep up my neck as his muscles bulged beneath his shirt.
He rose, wiped a hand on a rag tie-dyed with grease. “Welcome to town. Name’s Axel.”
I swallowed an ostrich egg in my throat. “I’m Pepper. Thanks for coming.”
He flashed a smile. His blue eyes crinkled, and my insides did that weird thing again, the thing that made me feel like I was cheating on Mr. Fantasy Football who hadn’t bothered to call me all day.
The air swelled with discomfort—mine, if I had to label who it was coming from. I was seriously not good at talking to men, much less superhot ones.
“Well, great to meet you.”
He leaned on the car. “You too.”
I speed walked down the sidewalk, hoping to heaven and grits and bacon that he wasn’t watching me. When I reached the door, I shoved my hand in my purse, found the key and unlocked the door, not bothering to look back to see if he was watching.
Just kidding.
I popped my head around the open door and saw that Mr. Sexy was not. He was back at work under the hood.
I shut the door. The light switch was still on, though for the first time I noticed the CLOSED sign hung to face outside. I exhaled a deep shot of air from the pit of my gut and braced my back to the door.
Countless hopeful faces of animals stared at me. I glanced at each one and, unsure of what to do, started babbling, because clearly talking to a room of creatures that aren’t going to understand one lick of what I was about to say seemed like the best option.
Obviously I was out of said options.
Though sitting down and chowing on ice cream topped with some of those cinnamon-hot jelly beans sounded like the best. Idea. Ever.
Speaking of, I punched my hand into my pocket and pulled out a few, popping them in my mouth. Sweet Jesus-goodness melted on my tongue.
I swallowed and began my pitch.
“Okay, y’all—look, I’m not the owner for you. I don’t even like animals. Like, not really. What y’all need is someone who loves you and loves cleaning poop. And smelling poop, and that sure as heck isn’t me. Besides, I’m not a small-town sort of girl. I’m a big-city, love-‘em-or-leave-‘em type.”
I shook my head. “That didn’t come out right. What I mean is, I’m not the owner for y’all. But don’t worry, I’ll find one for you.”
Then it began. Like a swirl of grape jelly at the bottom of one of those jars where the peanut butter and jelly are mixed—the sounds mingled together like that.
“What is she talking about?”
“Oh, I kinda liked her.”
“I was gonna lick her face.”
“And smell her butt. You always smell butts—butt smeller.”
“I’m not a butt smeller. You are.”
“Would all of you shut up. I can’t preen my feathers with your stupid chatter.”
“Oh, shut it, bird brain.”
The entire room erupted in laughter. But none of them were talking. I could hear every single one of them in my head. It was like a symphony of tiny baby voices and squawks.
It was horrible.
I thought being able to hear one cat was bad, but this was like a thousand cat voices on steroids. And the entire time they were meowing and barking and squawking—
I was going crazy.
Surely that was it. Losing everything in one day had cracked me open. I was no longer Pepper Dunn, waitress extraordinaire and person who was occasionally late on the rent money. I was now Pepper Dunn, crazy cat lady who talked to animals and found friends who thought they lived in a magical land where only witches and wizards could exist.
Yeah. I needed to get the heck out of here and sell this key to Ebenezer for a bag of magic beans that would hopefully launch me on a beanstalk that I could ride all the way back to Nashville.
Sounded like a plan to me.
I switched off the light, and all the animals immediately went to sleep. Okay. So maybe when the lights were off, the animals went into some kind of stasis? I didn’t know how long my Uncle Donovan had been dead, but as far as I knew, I was the only one with the key who could take care of them.
I locked up and stepped out. Axel was gone, and the sun had slinked deeper down the horizon. A cool breeze kicked up, and I hugged my arms, ready to be done with Magnolia Cove, or Coven, more like.
I reached the pawnshop and opened the door. A bell marked my entrance. I immediately saw Ebenezer off to the side, his back to me. He was hunched over as if in pain.
“Mr. Ebenezer? I came to take you up on that offer to buy the pet shop.” I jingled the key even though he couldn�
��t see. “It’s all yours.”
I could use the money anyway. I’m sure he’d take good care of the animals.
He didn’t seem to hear me. Meaning, he remained hunched along the wall. I walked over and tapped his shoulder. “Mr. Ebenezer?”
He whipped around, and it was only then that I saw the knife plunged below his rib cage. He fell toward me, his mouth sagging, the light in his eyes dimming.
I caught the knife in my hand. It released from his muscles and fat, tearing more flesh as it came free in my hands. Warm liquid spread over my hands. Probably blood. Most likely blood. My stomach turned. I didn’t want to look down at it. I had a sensitive stomach when it came to these things.
Ebenezer slumped to the floor. I leaned over. “Mr. Ebenezer, are you okay?”
I heard the bell tinkle as someone else entered. It was only then that I realized I was standing over the pawnbroker’s dead body, the murder weapon clutched in my bloody fingers.
I looked up, bright-eyed, to see a man I’d never met, a mop of blonde curls hanging in his face. He flipped a badge from his coat pocket. Light glinted off the police shield.
“Don’t move. You’re under arrest.”
SIX
I dropped the knife. It clattered to the floor, sending blood splattering.
“I told you not to move,” he yelled.
I raised my hands. “I know. I’m sorry. I’m nervous. I’m new in town and just walked in to sell him the animal shop and I found him walking toward me. He had the knife in his belly—”
The officer showed me his palms. “Stop talking. I haven’t read your rights yet.”
I stepped toward him, my bloody hands palm up. “But I didn’t have anything to do with it. I walked in, and like I said, he was like this big hulking mass about to fall on me and that’s when I grabbed the knife—totally by accident, by the way. I do not normally go around grabbing knives and such. Really, I don’t. But he practically fell on me and all I was doing was—”
The man rubbed a hand down a tired-looking face. “Ma’am, can you please stop talking? At least for a minute. Long enough for me to call in backup?”
I fisted my hands. They were drying quickly, the blood making them feel thick and sticky. “Yes,” I said meekly.
The door burst open again, and this time Betty Craple, all silver-haired and jean-bodysuit-wearing, crashed inside.
“Toad, what are you doing with my granddaughter?”
The officer’s jaw twitched. “It’s Todd, Betty, and you know it.”
Betty’s gaze dragged over Ebenezer’s body and the growing pool of blood seeping onto the floor around him. I stepped back, not wanting to get blood on my shoes. Look, I didn’t need to appear any more guilty than this Officer Todd guy already thought I was.
Betty fisted her hips. “So you finally did it, huh? Killed your uncle so that you could have his pawnshop?”
Todd rolled his eyes and shook his head. “No, Betty, I didn’t kill my uncle, but it looks like she did.”
Betty snapped the lapels on her jumpsuit. “Who? My granddaughter? Officer Turnkey, you know that can’t be true. She just showed up in town. She doesn’t have the hate in her heart for your uncle that the rest of the town does.”
Todd’s eyes nearly popped from his head. “Way to celebrate a dead man, Betty.”
Betty crossed to me and curled a hand around my arm. “You’re welcome. Now I’m taking my granddaughter home with me.”
Todd shook his head. “She’s under arrest.”
Betty snapped her purse from her shoulder and swatted at him. “The heck she is. Go do your detective stuff and find out the real culprit. It’s not her, and I won’t let you touch her.”
Todd took a step forward. He hesitated. I could tell he was torn between handcuffing me and dealing with my grandmother.
Betty pointed her finger at him. “Remember the time half the town got the purple pimples?”
Todd stopped and glared at Betty. “Yes,” he said slowly. “I do. Why?”
Betty sniffed. “Keep walking toward her and you might end up with a bad case of it.”
Todd tipped his chin down. From this angle I could make out the sharp jaw and his piercing golden eyes. “Now Betty Craple, are you threatening a man of the law?” He glanced down at his fingers. “’Cause I do declare that if I’m not crazy, then you’re threatening me with giving me basically a case of the magical mumps.”
Betty sniffed. “I don’t threaten.”
Todd threw back his head and chuckled. “Then you’re plainly stating that if I take in your granddaughter, who has my uncle’s blood all over her hands, that I’ll definitely get the mumps, which means not only will next Saturday’s date night be canceled, but I’ll be scratching at my skin, trying to claw off the evil mounds of puss.”
Betty shrugged. “You said it. I didn’t.”
Todd’s gaze flashed to me. He clicked his tongue.
Betty chewed her lips. It made her look like a squirrel. “Half this town hated your uncle. If they could avoid selling to him, they would. He was a slum lord of those rickety old apartments on the south end of town—heard they had honey flowing from their faucets instead of water for two whole weeks. Who wants honey when you need water? I’d start checking with them first, but my granddaughter is innocent.”
Todd studied me. His golden eyes bored straight to my heart, and I shivered. He flipped his badge closed and sighed. “Okay. She’s not officially under arrest, but she’s a prime suspect, which means don’t leave. You taking her home with you, Betty?”
Betty nodded. “She’ll be at the house. We’ll keep her here.”
I flared my arms. “Wait. Here? I’m not about to stay here. I’m leaving. That’s what I was doing when I showed up. I was going to sell the animal store to Ebenezer and be on my way back to Nashville. So if y’all don’t mind, that’s where I’m going right now.”
Todd tucked the badge in his pocket. “Not anymore, you’re not. Looks like you’re staying in Magnolia Cove.”
I quirked a brow. “And if I leave?”
Todd rubbed a hand over his forehead as if to say why me? “If you leave, we will track you down, arrest you and bring you back to here, where you’ll be tried by a council of witches.” He paused, took a hard step toward me. “And let me assure you, witches don’t look kindly on other witches who flee.”
I gulped. “Which means?”
“They’ll find you guilty,” he said, his voice so rough it turned into a growl.
“And if I’m found guilty?” I said.
Betty took my arm. “It’s a nasty punishment. Worse than the magical mumps. You get sent to a magical prison. It’s buried deep in the earth, under an old system of caves. No light, no contact with people. Most go mad.”
I grimaced. “Sounds horrible. What’s it called?”
Betty’s voice grew spooky. “Witcheroo.”
I frowned. “Witcheroo? It sounds more like a crazy caper than a prison.”
Todd’s eyes narrowed. “Trust me. It’s very serious, and unless you want to wind up one of its inmates plagued by insanity, I suggest you stay in Magnolia Cove until this entire thing is cleared up.”
Okay. Well, I guess he told me.
A slew of police officers—I suppose they were police officers because they all wore badges like Ranger Todd—showed up. They weren’t in plainclothes. Instead they all wore big cowboy hats, handkerchiefs and dusters.
They looked kinda like Hugh Jackman in Van Helsing. I didn’t have the heart to tell to them that it wasn’t a very good movie and that they’d do better to dress closer to Neo from The Matrix.
Anyway, I explained what happened with Ebenezer, and about an hour later I was following Betty through downtown Magnolia Cove to a copse of houses a few streets behind downtown.
One looked exactly like a decorated gingerbread house with swirling candies, gumdrops stuck to the roof and even icing window shutters.
“Whose house is that?” I said.
I nodded. “Yes, very.” As we strode past, a whisper of mint drifted up my nose. “Actually, that is cool. Is it real?”
Betty nodded. “Yep. Go grab a bite. Sometimes local children do and Carmen replaces it. It’s spelled to stay clean and free of germs.”
“Well, okay,” I said. “You know, I don’t know anything about this whole witchy stuff. I feel like I’ve been thrown into an ocean and told to sink or swim.”
Betty shot me a sympathetic look. “Let’s get you in, get you a glass of sweet tea and some cornbread and we’ll discuss everything. Your cousins will be there, too, Cordelia and Amelia—they live with me.”
“Oh, that’s good.” I guessed. Heck, at this point I didn’t know my butthole from my navel. On top of all the craziness in the past day, I was now accused of murder.
Awesome.
Betty led me through a picket fence to a neat little white cottage with red shutters and a creeping vine winding over the door.
I stepped up on the porch. The vine twisted from the wall. A bud that looked more Venus flytrap than innocent rose shot out and wrapped around my arm.
“Let her go, Jennie,” Betty snapped. “She’s family.”
The vine sagged as if whimpering and slowly unwound from my wrist. The bud sniffed around my head and retreated back to Betty. She patted it like a dog.
Well, if that wasn’t magic, I didn’t know what was.
“Jennie protects the house. Attacks anyone she doesn’t know.”
“Sounds like a perfect guard-vine,” I said.
Betty smiled. “That’s exactly what she is. You are a witch, you know.”
I ducked under the vine as Betty opened the door. “Other than the fact that I can hear animals, I’m not convinced that I can work magic.”
We stepped inside. The cottage was cheery, bright with cream walls. A cozy fire crackled in the hearth even though it was summer, sconces cast amber light and lace doilies covered almost every available surface.
There were also pictures everywhere, framed colorfully in borders of reds, yellows and blues. Herbs hung drying on the walls and across the mantle. I peeked into the fire and noticed a cauldron bubbling away happily. I sniffed. Smelled of stew. Betty snapped her fingers, and a cast-iron skillet appeared above the licking flames.