For the best, really.
I had the attention span of a gnat and could easily forget I was making something with an open flame. In college, Poppy and Dana had taken away my hot plate because I’d done just that. They didn’t understand Eugene, the spirit of the janitor from the building we’d lived in, had come to me with an urgent matter. He’d been having issues with a dark entity in the basement of the building. The entity had been trying to get Eugene to leave the grounds.
It just so happened the dark entity made another attempt to force Eugene out while I was warming soup.
“Are you there?” asked Dana.
“Sorry, I was thinking about the time you took away my hot plate in college,” I admitted.
She snorted. “You mean the time you tried to burn down the entire building, using something that wasn’t even allowed to start with?”
“Yes, that time,” I said with a nod.
“Can I ask how your brain went from me asking if you’re sure about what we’re doing tonight to the hot plate?” questioned Dana. “I really want to know because my brain can’t make the leap.”
“The phone cord is wrapped around me,” I said, licking my lower lip.
She laughed. “Again? Do I need to call Poppy’s cell and tell her to go help you?”
I grunted. “It’s not like the last time.”
“So, you’re not stuck against the wall near the phone base?” she asked.
I smiled. “Nope.”
“What are you stuck against?” she asked.
“The stove.”
Dana laughed more. “Hold on. I’ll text Poppy.”
“She’s taking a nap,” I said.
“Okay, I’ll text Tucker. He’s home, right?” asked Dana. “You know, if you’d just break down and use the cell phone that I bought you—the one you refuse to let anyone call yours—you wouldn’t get stuck in a cord.”
I sighed. “I’m fine. I swear. I don’t need help. And I can’t use the cell phone, which is so not mine, because I’ll either lose it or it will fizzle out like most tech does around me.”
“I love you, and I love that you’ve gotten so wound up in a cord before that you’ve actually needed intervention,” she said, laughing more. “Don’t ever stop being you, babes.”
Her laughter was slightly infectious, and I found myself joining in.
“For realz though, you’re good?” she asked.
“Yep.” I nodded, not that she could see me or anything.
“Swear it,” she said.
“George Michael,” I returned without hesitation.
“Okay then, about tonight,” she said, returning to our original discussion. “You sure you’re up for it?”
“I’m sure about tonight. Are you?” I asked, already knowing the answer. Dana was thinking of backing out of our plans for the evening. I understood why.
When Maria, the head of the local witch coven and head of the Council of Elders, had learned I was searching for details about my biological parents, and had been coming up empty, she’d suggested I ask Dana’s father, Bram Van Helsing, about accessing the records he kept at his estate.
Since the courthouse and the county building had yielded no fruit on the subject matter beyond the worn old birth certificate I already had, I wasn’t so sure the Van Helsing estate would hold any answers, but Maria had been insistent. She’d also been slightly cagey when it came to answering questions, like how it was that she knew so much about me being born in Grimm Cove, yet seemed to know nothing more. Or why she was so insistent I show my birth certificate to Bram when the moment felt right.
As a fellow practitioner of the craft, as well as someone who also talked in circles, I found her ability to answer without answering impressive. So much so that I wanted to be her when I grew up.
We’d become close since my arrival in town and I loved deepening my knowledge of the craft with her guidance.
While she appeared totally and completely unassuming, there was something about her that left me wanting to listen to her recommendations. So when she’d told me to ask Bram for help, I’d done the only thing I could think to do.
I ran to Dana to ask for me.
Bram confused me, while also intriguing me. In my lifetime, there had only been one other person who had been as unusual of a read as Bram. That had been my ex-husband. As much as I disliked drawing parallels between the men, the fact remained that there were a number. They both seemed to sneeze money and had similar taste in clothing choices. Not to mention they were built a lot alike as well, both around six foot seven.
Giants compared to me.
Donald had been older than me by fifteen years; at least, that was what he’d first led me to believe. Now that I was on the other side of the relationship, I honestly wasn’t sure of anything anymore. What I did know was that Bram was old. Very old. But he was frozen in time.
Like with Donald, I instantly found myself drawn to Bram in ways that were far more intense than normal. Granted, both men were incredibly attractive, so that was a factor, but it was more than that. I knew I was grasping at straws but there was a reason for it all.
When Donald and I had first collided on a sidewalk in Chicago, I’d felt an unnatural urge to touch him, and to be touched by him. The same feeling had come over me a month ago when I’d first lain eyes on Dana’s father. Everything around me had stopped, and in that moment, it was just Bram and me.
I could almost hear his heart beating and could almost feel his desire to make contact with me. I’d mirrored everything I was sure he’d been feeling, wanting to run to him but resisting. I was all for hugging people, new to me or not, but something had kept me rooted in place. It was as if I knew I’d not stop with just a hug, and that would have been awkward for all involved.
Burgess, my witch’s familiar, had been present, and his impressions of my first meeting with Bram had not gone unnoticed by me. Burgess—who just so happened to be a Southern fox squirrel—seemed to think Bram was someone very important to me.
My special person.
The other half of what made me whole.
Since I’d thought as much of Donald years ago, I wasn’t ready or willing to walk blindly into anything again. I didn’t want to believe Dana’s father could ever be like my ex, but I was guilty of being an eternal optimist. Always believing there was inherent good in every person. The older I got, the more I was learning that wasn’t true. Some people ran out of good early on, having very little to start with.
Donald had been one of them.
Though, looking back, I’m not sure he ever had any good in him to begin with. There had been a lot more to him than even I’d known back then. Things that I had no solid proof of now, only speculation, but if my gut was right, I was lucky to have gotten away from him with not only my life, but my soul as well.
There were fates worse than death.
“Marcy, you’ve gone quiet. Are you communing with the dead, a mosquito, a bumblebee, or did you slip into some meditative coma? Dear God, did the cord win? Did it choke the life from you?” asked Dana, a touch of humor in her voice. I knew she was teasing me.
I laughed softly as I stirred the mixture in the pot nearest me on the stovetop. “Got lost in thought.”
“Do I even want to take a guess what you were thinking about?” she asked. “And did it involve my aura?”
“You’re such a skeptic when you’ve seen firsthand how very real the supernatural is,” I said, a gentle smile easing over my lips. She’d had the blinders ripped from her eyes the night of our arrival to Grimm Cove. She was doing surprisingly well with it, all things considered.
Finding out her father was not only alive, but a vampire, was something she was still struggling with.
That was part of the reason why I was making a large batch of hand salve. Her form of dealing came by way of cleaning. The large waterfront cabin she now shared with her new husband, Jeffrey Farkas, was so clean you could eat off the floor. The cost came in the form of the
skin on her hands.
“Did you know there are apparently some great private detectives here in Grimm Cove?” she asked. “I can hire one to help find information about your birth parents. My treat.”
“Dana,” I said softly as I turned in a circle, attempting to unwind myself from the phone cord. “If this is all too much, too soon, I’ll understand. I don’t need to go to the Van Helsing estate tonight. It can wait until a time when you’re ready to be around your father.”
“They tell me he’s immortal,” she said, off-the-cuff. “So, if we wait for me to be ready, we might never go.”
I returned to stirring the mixture on the stovetop and lowered the heat level on the rest of the pots.
“I need to get to know him, right?” she asked, sounding almost childlike.
“Only if you want to,” I returned. “As someone who doesn’t have any family to speak of, if I found out my father was alive, I’d want to hear him out at least. It’s pretty clear Bram wants to have something of a relationship with you, right? How many times has he reached out since we’ve been here?”
She mumbled a response.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t catch that,” I said.
She groaned. “A little over twenty times now.”
It took all of me to keep from laughing. “And we’ve only been in town how long now?”
“I’m not answering that because you already know,” she said with a grunt. “How about you just go out and have him show you where the records are kept?”
“If that’s what you want,” I said. “I can see if Poppy can drop me off out there later, or maybe Brett can.”
“Brett has a pack meeting tonight,” said Dana before sighing. “I’ll take you.”
“Are you sure? I know you’re busy getting the new law office up and going fully,” I said. “And it’s pretty clear you’re not ready to sit down with your father just yet. I just need his number to call and see if it’s okay if I come alone. I’m guessing he only said yes because you were going to be with me.”
Dana let out a long breath. “I’m sure. I’m doing this with you. I’ll be there in about an hour. That work?”
I bit my lower lip. “That works.”
She was quiet a moment. “You totally said all of that because you knew I needed to feel like I was the one making the decision to do this, didn’t you?”
I faked shock. “I’d never.”
“Swear it on Richard Marx,” she said, yanking her favorite ’80s pop star into the discussion.
“I’m going to plead the…sixth?”
She snorted. “The fifth.”
“No. For me it’s the sixth because my sixth sense is telling me this is a good thing, Dana. That it’s time you and Bram were on the same page,” I returned. “And I’ll Richard Marx swear on that until the cows come home.”
“Okay, my weird little friend, I’ll be there as soon as I can,” she said, hanging up.
I went to do the same, only to find I had to turn in more circles to get unwound from the cord. It took some doing but I managed. I returned the receiver to the base on the wall and then hurried back to the stove. Several of the things I’d been working on were done, so I removed them from the heat and poured them into new containers to set aside for use another evening.
The salve for dry hands wasn’t quite finished yet so I went back to monitoring it as I swayed to the music that was playing from the old boom box I’d found in the attic. With it had been cassette tapes and a record player with records. Basically, I’d stumbled upon an oasis of awesome. Currently, I was enjoying the Grateful Dead. The surrounding plants seemed to like hearing Jerry sing to them as well.
I let the soft buzz of power that was always in the home slide over me, giving me comfort as I continued to dance in place. I’d felt the energy associated with the home the second I’d stepped onto the grounds a month ago. Of course, back then, the power had also been laced with negative energy.
It wasn’t the house’s fault. It was doing what it did—holding power.
The blame fell solely on the evil dipshits who, for one reason or another, continued to arrive in Grimm Cove. The first had been the succu-witch (or succu-bitch, if you asked Dana her thoughts on the matter) named Marla. She had decided that a four-hundred-plus-years-long life span wasn’t enough. She wanted more. And how she’d decided to go about gaining that longevity was by draining powerful witches of their magiks and their lives.
Marla had left a trail of bodies behind her all over the United States in her quest to cling to her youth. When it became clear that no amount of power was staving off the inevitable, she’d taken even more drastic measures. She’d decided to come after one of my best friends, hoping to drain her dry.
Since Poppy came from a line of powerful witches with ties to Salem, sucking her dry would be like hitting the magikal jackpot. I’m sure the thought had entered Marla’s mind when she’d dreamed up her half-baked idea. What she’d forgotten to take into account was that Poppy didn’t walk the path of life alone. She had Dana and me—her backup bitches.
In the end, the succu-witch had been struck by lightning and went poof.
As it happened, I really enjoyed watching things go poof. It was so much more satisfying than when they burst into slimy bits. I’d also had some experience with exploding creatures not long back.
Interestingly enough, around forty-eight hours after Marla’s demise, we’d found ourselves in the crosshairs of evil once again. This time the culprit had been a master vampire named Dragos who just so happened to control a horde of ghouls.
Dragos and his horde of ghoul followers had come at us with all they had. Their show of force had been impressive. The ghoul-be-gone potion I’d been part of brewing had done its job—a little too well—leaving them exploding the minute it made contact with them. As cool as that sounded, standing too close to one when they popped was a lot like having a bucket of innards dumped over one’s head.
Not that I made a habit of dumping innards on anyone or anything. I didn’t judge people who did, but still, not my style.
I’d had to listen to Dana complain about having dead ghoul bits in her hair for days after the attack. I didn’t bother to point out the ghouls had been dead prior to exploding. She wasn’t exactly great with constructive criticism and wasn’t exactly open to feedback on her complaints.
Basically, her strengths were menacing glares, sarcasm, and punching things. If she cut back on her caffeine intake, it would probably help with her anger issues, but suggesting as much would have been the equivalent of putting my life in my own hands.
Unwise, for sure.
So, pointing out ghouls already started out as dead wasn’t on my to-do list.
Thankfully, the ghouls who had come with Dragos were all destroyed, along with the master vampire. He’d also met his end by way of lightning. He’d gone poof too.
Super satisfying to watch.
I really wished I’d have thought to record it for playback later, especially since the man who had thrown Dragos in the air, allowing for the lightning strike to occur, made the entire act look sexy.
Then again, Dana’s father made everything look sexy.
He was tall, dark, handsome, and a vampire. Not to mention, since meeting him, I’d come to realize he was the mysterious man from my dreams.
Discussing the dreams with Dana wasn’t an option. Telling her I was having sex dreams about her dad would end poorly. Poppy wasn’t an option either. And since I’d come to Grimm Cove, I’d not seen Jack once to be able to confide in him. I’d even tried a few summoning spells, but nothing worked.
Dana’s bathroom back in New York had been the last time I’d spoken to Jack, and that was worrisome.
I glanced upward. “Jack?”
No response.
Not that I was expecting one. It didn’t hurt to try.
It was impossible not to think about the demon attack that had occurred on the last day I’d seen him. While the attack had been fleet
ing and foiled, it had been intense.
A large part of me worried that whatever it was that had made a play for him had done so again, but this time, it had succeeded.
Poppy picked then to enter the green room. She’d spent a large portion of her day in town with her ex-husband and her twins, doing their best to create a new normal. Easier said than done, considering Thomas (the ex) had only just learned the truth of supernaturals existing and that his children were part witch. He was doing the best he could with the information. We’d not even gotten to the subject of everything else that was also real in the world and Grimm Cove.
One step at a time.
“Did you have a good nap?” I asked, all smiles as I continued to stir the pot of ingredients on the stove.
“I did. I was hoping you wouldn’t be gone just yet,” said Poppy with a smile.
“Dana rang. She’s running late at the office,” I said. “She’ll be here to pick me up as soon as she’s done.”
Poppy shook her head. “Didn’t take her long to become a workaholic again.”
“No,” I said with a laugh. “It didn’t.”
“Marcy, the almond spice soap you made smells awesome,” said Poppy as she went straight for the old boom box that was sitting on the farm table at the back, near several molds of homemade soap that were setting up. She maneuvered around the pots of sage that were next to the boom box. “You have the greenest thumb known to man. These look amazing and they’re huge.”
“Aww, thank you.” I’d decided several weeks back that Grimm Cove could not possibly have enough sage on hand. Warding off evil was a full-time gig around these parts. “I’d love to take credit for it all, but they’re big fans of the music. And they like to watch me work in here.”
Poppy adjusted the volume level of said music. “They have, um, interesting taste.”
“The word you’re looking for is good,” I corrected. “They have good taste in music, buttercup.”
Spellcasting with a Chance of Spirits: A Paranormal Women's Fiction Romance Novel (Grimm Cove Book 3) Page 6