Confined (A Tethered Novel, Book 3)

by Snyder, Jennifer

  “No running in the house! I don’t think your parents want to come home to a little boy with broken bones,” Callie shouted after him. “Good grief, he’s a handful sometimes.”

  “I can imagine,” I said. I stepped inside and closed the door behind me. The smell of fresh paint wafted to my nose, and I noticed how glossy the front door actually was. “Did they just paint their door?”

  Callie nodded. “Yeah, I like it. It used to be a shade of yellow, but I think the blue goes well with everything. They even painted the ceiling of the porch too.”

  “It’s nice, but I bet the door looked good as yellow,” I said, glancing up at the ceiling while thinking how strange it was that they had painted it the same color as the door.

  “I thought so too, but Mrs. McNeely has been talking with Twila Van Rooyen—the old lady at Fisherman’s Brew who makes all the Hoodoo spells in town—about getting rid of the negative energy and spirits she thought were following her around and causing a string of bad luck.”

  We walked through the small foyer and cut a left into a kitchen/dining room area. It was beautiful, as expected. Brayden and the little girl I remembered from the beach were in the kitchen banging their popcorn bowls on the counter, counting down with the microwave timer.

  “What does the color blue have to do with that?” I asked in a low voice so the kids wouldn’t hear, in case they didn’t know their mother dealt with a Hoodoo Conjurer on occasion.

  “It’s called Haint Blue, and it’s actually supposed to confuse evil spirits and keep them at bay. Lots of people in town have their front doors, their windowsills, and even the ceiling to their porches painted that color. Some even have it throughout the inside of the house as well.”

  “Huh, so does Twila Van Rooyen do Hoodoo for a lot of the townsfolk as well as the Elementals?” I asked, whispering the last word lower than all the others.

  Callie nodded. “Yeah, she’s known by the locals as the Voodoo Queen. Even though we both know what she does is not Voodoo, but Hoodoo. Locals don’t care about that though. All they care about is whether or not the spell she gave them works and staying on her good side.”

  I was shocked. Soul Harbor was not the innocent Southern town I’d initially thought it was. It had secrets everyone was in on—except the tourists.

  “Do the locals know about Elementals as well?”

  The timer on the microwave beeped, and Brayden raced Payton to open it. Brayden ripped the bag open and began pouring it into the two bowls they’d set out.

  “No, they have no need to know about us,” Callie said.

  The kids began arguing loudly over who had more in their bowl, and Callie walked over to them. She placed both of their bowls on the counter, and stared at them intensely to make sure they were indeed even.

  “They look the same to me,” she said. “Who wants cheese on theirs?”

  Both of the kids shouted, “I do!” at the same time. Callie reached into the little cabinet above the stove, pulled out a small blue and white bottle of something, and began to sprinkle it on the kids’ popcorn.

  “There, now, Payton, let’s go watch your movie. Brayden, are you watching too or are you playing video games?” Callie asked.

  “Video games. I’m not watching The Little Mermaid!” he said, sounding so offended and disgusted I laughed out loud.

  “All right,” Callie said. “I’ll be in the living room if you need me.”

  Brayden scooped his bowl off the counter and headed to wherever his video games were.

  “Have you ever seen The Little Mermaid?” Payton asked me, her eyes large and excited. “I haven’t. This is my first time ever. I love mermaids!”

  “I have. It was one of my favorites growing up,” I said.

  “Who’s your favorite Disney princess?” Payton asked me as she popped a piece of popcorn into her mouth.

  I felt like she was testing me in some way, because she continued to stare at me as she chewed, waiting for my answer. I’d never been interrogated by a little girl before. It took all I had to keep my face serious.

  “Belle, from Beauty and the Beast,” I finally answered after a little thought.

  We started toward what I presumed to be the living room. Payton walked beside me with her big bowl of popcorn in her little hands.

  “Why?” she asked me.

  I glanced at Callie and noticed her large grin. My smile practically mirrored it.

  “Umm, well, because she was the only princess with brown hair like mine, and she loved to read as much as I do,” I said, hoping my answer would suffice and the questions would stop.

  Payton smiled. She was missing one of her bottom teeth, and stuck her tongue through the little gap when she grinned.

  “I like Belle too. And I like to read,” she said. “Come on. Let’s go watch. You can sit by me too.” She raced ahead of us and plopped down in the center of the couch, spilling a little of her popcorn from the bowl and scurrying to toss it back in.

  Callie turned the DVD player and TV on. I sat on the couch beside Payton, not thinking that this was how I was going to be spending my babysitting time with Callie.

  “We don’t really have to watch the whole movie,” Callie said to me as she sat down on Payton’s other side.

  “Yes you do,” Payton said. “My mama says girls need romance in their lives.”

  Callie and I laughed at the same time.

  “Romance, huh?” Callie asked. “And when does your mama say that to you?”

  “When she’s mad at my daddy for forgettin’ one of her special days, and she has to see Miss Carrie at the bank gettin’ flowers from her new boyfriends all the time for no reason,” Payton said around a mouthful of popcorn. “She tells me that then.”

  “Oh,” Callie said with a laugh.

  Kids were so funny. No wonder she babysat these two; they were entertainment.

  Callie and I ended up sitting through the entire Little Mermaid movie and then Beauty and the Beast, because I had said it was my favorite. “All right, time to go play outside,” Callie said to Payton as she turned the TV off. “Go tell Brayden nicely that I said he has to turn off the video games and play outside too, please.”

  “Okay,” she said as she ran down the hall.

  I followed Callie back to the kitchen.

  “Did you enjoy the Disney movie marathon?” Callie asked as she set Payton’s empty popcorn bowl in the sink.

  “Honestly, I can’t believe the message in them targeted toward little girls. I mean, in one she gives up everything about her—everything she loves most—to be with some guy she barely knows. And in the other, she falls in love with a complete jerk who treats her like crap. I don’t know what I ever saw in those movies,” I said.

  Callie chuckled. “That’s not what they’re about. They’re about sacrificing everything you have for that one chance at true love and finding love in a person who has lived without it for so long.”

  I scrunched up my face. I could see her point, but still, the Beast locked her in her bedroom!

  “I don’t know. I think we might have to agree to disagree on this one,” I said.

  “I can do that,” Callie agreed. “So, are we still on for shopping?”

  “Absolutely. I have no clue what to wear to this,” I admitted.

  Tightness entered my stomach as indecision squirmed through my mind about the initiation. I’d been making a mental list of the pros and cons of becoming initiated. So far, the list was short, on both sides.

  Pros:

  No more tether.

  I would be able to tap into my magick.

  I could leave whenever I wanted.

  Cons:

  I’d be stuck in Soul Harbor if I wanted to continue using my magick.

  I’d let people down that I cared about if I left after.

  I swallowed hard and pasted a smile on my face when I noticed Callie staring at me from across the kitchen.

  “You okay?” she asked.

  “Yeah.”
I nodded.

  “The McNeelys should be back any minute.”

  “That’s fine. I’m in no rush,” I muttered.

  And I wasn’t.

  Soul Harbor didn’t have much of a selection when it came to clothing stores. We’d stopped at the select few and scoped them out without any luck, before deciding to head to a few of the shops closer to Craven College. It was at a little hippy-looking shop where we finally found what we were looking for.

  The place was called Down to Earth Apparel, and as we stepped inside, the strong scent of incense met my nose as whimsical music filled my ears. A woman in her late forties with ringlets of brown hair falling to her waist and absolutely no makeup on greeted us. She was wearing a flowing beige tunic and a gypsy-looking skirt that brushed just above her ankles. Callie told her what we were looking for—solid-colored, flowing dresses or robes—and the woman pointed us in the right direction without even a moment’s thought.

  “What about this one?” Callie asked, as she held out a baby blue dress that hit just above her knees. “Too short?”

  “Eh.” I contemplated its length, unsure of what would be considered appropriate for something like this. “Shouldn’t it be something that at least falls below the knees? I don’t know, I mean, this seems like it would be rendered as a formal event.”

  “Yeah, maybe you’re right,” Callie said. She put the dress back on the rack and began her search again.

  I shifted my eyes around, looking for another rack of dresses to flip through. A long, fluid dress hanging on the wall behind Callie caught my attention. It was bright red and made of a rippling fabric that looked as though it would be breathable while at the same time remaining opaque, unlike some of the others I’d seen.

  “What about something like this?” I asked as I walked toward it.

  “Oh, that’s perfect!” Callie squealed from behind me. “I wonder if they have it in blue too.”

  I reached for the dress and got it down. Holding it up against myself, I scurried to find a mirror while taking note of how gorgeous the dress actually was. It was lightweight and came to the tops of my feet. The color was a vibrant red, which represented my element. It was perfect.

  “Oh, look at this color,” Callie whispered in a soft tone.

  Glancing over my shoulder at her, I found her holding up an exact replica of my dress. The only difference was hers was a pale shade of blue. The color of the dress against Callie’s dark skin was going to be stunning.

  “We have to get these,” she said. Her lips twisted into a whimsical smile, and her eyes widened.

  I nodded my agreement, and then looked at the price tag for the first time—$22.50. They were ideal for what we needed them for, would look stunning on both of us, and were within my price range.

  Maybe I was meant to become initiated after all.

  After buying our dresses and stopping to get something to eat and a milkshake at the nearest fast-food place, we headed back to Soul Harbor. I was supposed to meet Kace at my house in under an hour. Who knew it would have taken a little over four hours to find a freaking dress for something?

  “I need to make one stop before we head back to your place,” Callie said. She turned down a street I knew, but I still couldn’t figure out where we were going.

  When we passed Putman’s Diner and cut into the parking lot of Fisherman’s Brew, my stomach dropped to my toes.

  “What do you have to get here?” I asked. I prayed she said food, even though we’d already eaten.

  “A spell to keep my mom at bay,” Callie said without bringing her eyes to mine. Her voice was shaky as she spoke. “I know she won’t allow us to go through with the initiation without some sort of interference, not with the way she was spelling you so heavily to leave town. I just need something that will counteract anything she might try, maybe something to make her seem more compliant with the whole idea?” She swallowed hard as she gripped the handle to her car door.

  I stared at her, unbelieving she was even thinking of going through with something like this, especially after the way she’d reacted when I told her it had been her mother trying to get me to leave town.

  “Do you really think it’s necessary?” I asked. I licked my lips as I continued to stare at her.

  Callie let out a long breath and looked me directly in the eye. “She’ll try to stop us if I don’t do something to keep her from doing it, Addison. I know her well enough to know that. I’m sorry. Please don’t think any less of me, but this is something I feel like I have to do.”

  Her eyes grew misty, making it clear to me how much she worried I would think less of her after this.

  “I know this seems sort of hypocritical of me, but trust me when I say this is something that needs to be done,” she insisted.

  “Okay, but umm, I’m hanging out here,” I said.

  There was no way I was stepping foot in Fisherman’s Brew with this tether still in place. Actually, I shouldn’t even be in the parking lot.

  “That’s fine.” She tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear, and then opened the driver’s side door. “I’ll be just a minute.”

  As I watched her walked across the nearly full parking lot, I thought about how much I hated that she felt spelling her mother was the only way we would be able to continue the initiation without any problems. Callie had always seemed so innocent and sweet to me. The notion of her doing something so vindictive made my skin crawl. I prayed this was the only time she chose to do something so malicious.

  I wasn’t sure how much time had passed since Callie had gone inside, but I soon felt the familiar warming sensation, which signified Theo was nearby, swim through me. My skin tingled as the feeling intensified. A mixture of agitation and desire rippled through me, causing a sickening feeling to consume my stomach instantly.

  Leave me alone, Theo, I said in my mind as loudly as I could. I hoped this new mind trick we’d obtained still worked, and he’d heard me clearly enough to listen.

  “I won’t. What are you doing here?” Theo asked from somewhere beside my opened window.

  Jumping, I glanced at both sides of the car, trying to pinpoint where he was standing. He had to be close, because he’d used his actual voice and hadn’t been inside my head when he’d spoken. However, he was nowhere to be seen, or so I thought, until I noticed the paint of the red car beside me ripple as though it were made of flowing water.

  He was using a glamour.

  “Callie needed to get something from your grandma. I’m just waiting for her.” I spoke directly to the waving paint, knowing that was where he was standing.

  “You shouldn’t be here. My grandmother has been making herself crazy with all the spells she’s been trying to use against you lately,” he said. His voice was low, but I could feel the concern and attraction he felt for me behind his words. This made my stomach knot even more. “She knows we’re tethered now.”

  My breath left my lungs in a puff of air. That couldn’t be a good thing.

  “How did she find out?” I asked.

  “She has her ways.”

  “Well what happens now? Is she going to come after me or something since she knows?” I asked as I attempted to swallow the lump that had risen in my throat.

  I remembered what Theo had said his family would most likely do to me if they ever found out we were tethered, and a shiver ran along my spine. I sunk into my seat; Callie needed to hurry up.

  “I’m not sure. She questioned me some, but I denied everything as best I could,” Theo said, still cloaked by his glamour.

  A sudden desire to see his face nearly overwhelmed me, and in an instant, the glamour was dropped and Theo stood before me dressed in a pale yellow T-shirt and low-hanging jeans. The action sort of freaked me out, because I wasn’t sure if it was something he’d thought to do on his own or if he’d heard me wishing for it in my mind. How did that mind thing work anyway?

  My eyes traveled up the length of him, until they locked on his lips. This was wher
e they froze as a rush of memory involving those lips and their featherlight kisses surged through my mind. It was then that I remembered the whole he can probably hear my thoughts thing again, and cleared my mind as best I could.

  “I expected her to continue with the questions and for my mother to become involved in the interrogations as well, but that never happened. Today, they’ve been acting as though they don’t care,” Theo said. His caramel-colored eyes met mine directly. “Still doesn’t mean you should be here, though.”

  “Trust me; I don’t necessarily want to be here.”

  Theo’s face grew somber. His eyes darkened as though he didn’t like what I’d said, and he resorted to glancing around the parking lot. “I still think something is going on. I’m not sure what, but I know it has something to do with this tether and the reason it was put into place.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked, perplexed.

  He’d mentioned something along the same lines back at my house, but he’d never really elaborated on the idea.

  “I mean, I think whatever reason it was created for is about to make itself known. My grandmother wouldn’t back down otherwise. I have to be right. Can’t you feel it?”

  I didn’t feel anything like that. Gaping at him for a moment, I wondered if I should wait to become initiated. Initiated, maybe that was it.

  “Maybe it’s because she knows the tether will be broken soon. She probably just knows that I’ve agreed to become initiated,” I said.

  It did make sense.

  Theo shook his head. “Why? That’s the last thing my family wants…at least my grandmother. You’d take away her main source of income by doing so.”

  My sudden optimism deflated. He was right. They didn’t want me initiated—that was the whole point of doing all the spells against me.

  “Hoodoo is her main source of income? I thought Fisherman’s Brew was,” I said, unsure why my mind chose to focus on something so trivial.

  “She can make more doing Hoodoo spells for people in town in an hour than she does working a full day at Fisherman’s Brew. Plus, it’s what she loves to do most,” Theo answered, his voice low and deep.