“You can say that again.” I roll my eye. “Do you know they’re still holding the pig squealing contest?”
“Pig squealing?”
“Yes. Apparently, contestants bring in a pig and pinch it, and the one that squeals the loudest gets a prize.”
“Why, that’s completely barbaric—”
“I’ll say—”
“But terribly fun.”
“Oh, not you too.” I scowl. “Nevertheless, I have all this and an ex-Supreme Leader to hunt down and all before disaster strikes.” I chomp another bite of scone. “Between preparing for the fall fair and warding off the threat of Druens, I don’t know what I’m gonna do.”
“Well, we can start by postponing my parlor until later.”
“Oh no, Sotherby, I didn’t mean that.”
He reaches out and pats my hand. “It’s no bother. In fact, I insist. I’ll need time to decide between those three hideous board choices you’ve left me, anyway.”
I glare at him and catch a soft smile playing across his mouth. Then he bursts out in a laugh. “That was so not funny.”
“Then why are you smiling?” His rests his hand over mine, again. This time with no intentions of moving it, and I have to admit, I don’t mind.
“Thank you, Sotherby.” I look up at him and smile, and suddenly his whole expression brightens.
“You know, you can always count on me to be in your corner, no matter the fight.”
“Even against the Druens?”
“Especially against the Druens,” he tells me.
I don’t know what I’d do without Sotherby. He’s the friend I’ve always needed, the confidant I’ve always dreamed of, the jelly to my donut, the bumble to my bee, the magic in my spell.
I look down as he squeezes my hand and swear I see a small crackle of magic spark there between us. “Did you see that?” I stare down at the spot, then look up, astonished.
“See what?” Sotheby releases my hand, startling back.
“That little arc that just sparked between us, as you touched me.”
“I saw nothing,” he declares, a little too quickly, his ghostly cheeks flushing dark gray.
He didn’t see it, my magical bum. I can tell by the startled-rabbit’s look in his eyes that he did. What did it mean? What does he know that he’s not telling me?
Outside, a sharp flash of light streaks across the sky, beyond the front windows, and both our heads jerk that way.
“What was that?” I’m on my feet in seconds, racing toward the door, nearly knocking the table and tea set over, to get there.
“I don’t know. It looked like a flash.” Sotherby follows, shooting past me, and throwing open the door. “You don’t suppose—”
“It’s happening again?” Both our faces fall.
We look from one another, out the door, and back again. “Is anything burning?” I shout.
“Not that I can see.” Sotherby flies up to the rooftop and back down. “But that doesn’t mean anything.”
The sky suddenly glows an eerie pink. And it’s midday.
“What is going on?” I launch to my toes, seeing a contrail of pewter smoke, streaming across the pink skies.
“What is that?” Sotherby squints, shielding his eyes.
“I don’t know,” I say. “It looks like writing of some kind.”
Across the pink sky is written a message in white smoke. You can run but you cannot hide.
“Jeremy?” I breathe.
“Where is the dolt?” Sotherby turns to me.
“Convalescing still at the hospital.”
“Isn’t that what he said to you before he collapsed into your arms?”
“No. He said, ‘He’s not dead,’ and he’s not a dolt for the umpteenth thousand—”
“Look.” Sotherby points to the sky again. I turn just in time to see a message evolving out of the dissipating smoke. Consider yourself dead.
Chapter 4
Moments later, I’m sitting across from Jeremy, who is sitting in his wheelchair, on the front lawn of the hospital, the two of us enjoying cream cake. The sun is shining, and it’s a gorgeous day, in spite of what’s just happened. I keep my eyes, of course, on the skies at all times, terrified there’s going to be another flashing streak and a deadly message to follow. But so far so good.
It really is a lovely day, and Jeremy is in such fine spirits. In fact, he hasn’t been this coherent since before the accident happened. He sustained quite the injury to his head in the blast. I hate to ruin this, but I really must ask my question.
I have the sense his life may depend on it.
Jeremy looks up from his plate, sunshine streaking his stunningly azure eyes. “My gracious, this is good, don’t you think?” He talks with his mouth full of the decadent dessert, giggling afterward, like a schoolgirl.
I have to agree, I don’t think I’ve ever had such dreamy cream cake.
Or maybe I’m just starved.
My stomach has been in such a knot, ever since all the nasty council business, I haven’t really eaten today. Unless one counts the couple of bites of scone I just had at Sotherby’s, before the dreaded flash happened. I take another bite of cream cake. Nope, it’s definitely the cake. Best I’ve ever had. “Who on earth made this thing?” I ask.
“I dunno, I think one of the nurses,” he says. “They’re always bringing in this and that.”
“Well, whoever it was, kudos to them.” I tip my fork up to her. “Why, would you look at that.” I poke beneath the layer. “There’s even a secret layer of custard jam hiding in the middle.” I scoop up a forkful and lift it to my mouth. “Mmmmm, strawberry.”
Jeremy shoves in another forkful of his own.
“So, what have you been doing?” he asks, midchew, cake crumbles sticking to the corners of his lips. He smiles, and his teeth look like they’re suited up in marshmallows from all the cream.
“Not much,” I say, which is a total lie. But I can’t get into the witch’s council business with Jeremy.
“You?” I ask, being polite. I came to discuss that message, of course, but I need to make sure he’s completely astute before asking him the big question.
“You know, same old, same old,” he answers and steers his fork toward the hospital. “Good news is, docs say I can get out soon.”
“What?” I choke on my cake and look at him astonished. What are they mad? The man has only recently started to make sense again, after being struck in the back of his head with a falling beam as he raced from a burning building.
“Yeah. Just in time for the annual fall fair. Isn’t it great?”
“You’ve got to be kidding me!” I blurt, “I mean...yes. Fantastic!” I bite my lip.
Oh my. I can’t believe they’re sending him home so soon. Hex, only last week he was still insisting he was seeing aliens in his room. The doctors say he’s suffering from a rare form of trauma-based amnesia, so his memory has been unreliable at best, and only recently becoming more trustworthy. Though they claim it will improve with time and they expect a full recovery—he is clearly not there yet. In fact, I’m not even sure I’ll get the answers out of him I need today. But I have to give it a shot. His safety, quite possibly mine, and all of Hex Falls, may depend on it.
“So, you’re not happy for me then?” He scowls.
“Oh, no, I didn’t say that.” I grin.
He’s been like this, on again-off again, since the moment he woke up from the coma they put him in. They said they had to do that to rest his injured brain. But I still wonder if something happened to him when they put him under. I keep looking for a hint of the old Jeremy to appear. The one who was so on point during our recent investigation. The one involving the stolen body from the morgue. That Jeremy seemed so much sharper.
In fact, it seems, that Jeremy could have been a totally different Jeremy altogether.
If that’s possible.
I swallow another piece of cake.
And then there was that little matter
of his being able to somehow overpower the ex-Supreme Leader in a fight, as a mortal. I stare into his eyes searching for any glimmer of that Jeremy. But alas, I haven’t seen a glimpse of him since the coma.
The old Jeremy, yes. But the seemingly more advanced model, no.
Then it hits me. Perhaps the clarity I was experiencing with the on-point Jeremy coincides with my theory of him being a warlock. I stare up into the leaves of the tree above us and think back, trying to remember what color his eyes were when all that was happening, but I can’t. I mentally tap my lip.
That’s another question that needs answering as soon as possible—well, as soon he’s up to it. I don’t want to pressure him with too much today, with him being so genuinely mixed the last times I visited.
I look down at his now healed, but once badly singed, fingers on his right hand...searching for the telltale sign of a warlock. Well, one of them. But the double pinkie fingernail does not seem to be there.
Of course, it’s not. That would be too easy.
The memory of our kiss back at The Bottom of the Cauldron...the electrifying one...ripples through my mind. Yeah...that was a great kiss. I smile, close my eyes, and experience it all over again—the warm and tingling feeling from head to toe, complete with sparking, shocking end.
It just has to be true. He just has to be a warlock. I fling my eyes open again. Between the kiss and those times when I touched his hand and sparks flew, well...my assumptions just have to be correct.
What else could it be?
Unless...I did feel sparks when I touched Sotherby’s hand earlier.
Perhaps it’s not them at all and it’s me. Something with my being, you know, who and what I am. I gulp.
“You know, the doctors say I’ll be able to go home in time for the fall fair,” Jeremy repeats himself.
And if they could hear you talking right now, they’d probably take that back.
“You were saying,” I say.
“Yeah, no kidding,” he tells me around another mouthful of cake, then swallows it and frowns. “You were asking me if I was kidding, right?”
“I was.”
“Oh.” He nods and smiles, and I can tell by the tiny flash in his eyes, he’s pleased that his brain is working again. Well...somewhat.
“Are you sure that’s a good idea, though?” I look at him, dismayed. I don’t want to sit on his birthday cake, but at the same time, I don’t want to see him hurt. “I mean, the fair is in just a little over a week, and well, you’re still not feeling completely yourself, are you?” I put it as gently as I can. I can’t believe his doctors would make such a rash decision, after all he’s been through. Perhaps Jeremy is just mixed up again.
Or perhaps he heard this from the alien.
“Yeah, they’ve cleared me to go, if I promised to take it easy. And if there’s a problem, I have to come right back.”
“Hmmmm. . .”
“So maybe just some funnel cake and a couple of rides, then.”
“A couple of rides!” My gaze pops. “Jeremy, I hardly think you should be spinning around on one of those crazy things, right after just being released from hospital with a head injury.”
“Gotcha!” He makes like he’s shooting me with his finger like it’s a gun, and grins.
“Oh, you!” I swat him with my napkin. “You almost gave me a heart attack.”
“Okay, so maybe just funnel cake.” He grins again, so full of cheek.
I guess he is getting better.
“At any rate—” He becomes inordinately shy all of a sudden, spinning his fork around in the cream left on his plate and then licking it slowly from the prong. “I was wondering if, well...perhaps...” he looks up at me, eyes sparkling“...you’d...like to accompany me to the fair?” he asks. “You know, like a date,” he adds when at first, I don’t answer.
“Oh, yeah...about that.” I hesitate, biting my lip. “I’m sorry, but I don’t think that’s going to work.”
His face falls.
“Not that I don’t want to.” I throw up a hand. “It’s just, well...I have a lot of responsibilities that night.” He frowns. “I don’t know if I told you, but I’ve been put in charge of this year’s fair, which means I kind of have to work it.” I twist the end of my napkin. “Being that I’m in charge and all.”
It’s the truth. But there’s something else niggling at me. The little matter I just discussed with Sotherby. To thine own self be true, my mother always said. And I’ve always tried to live my life that way. At this point, our going forward as a couple just doesn’t feel right for me anymore. He’s such a sweet man, he really is...so kind and generous and definitely good-looking. But over the last little while I’ve come to realize, he’s just, well...not the man. For me.
“So, does that mean you won’t go with me?” Jeremy frowns, his bottom lip quivering.
“Well, now, I didn’t say that.” Exactly. What am I saying?
I reach across the table and brush the hair from his eyes. “I’d really, really love to go with you. I mean that...” Do I really? “But I’m afraid I just can’t. Duty calls, you know?”
He looks at me sorrowfully, and I’m suddenly struck with the worst pang of guilt.
“I’m so sorry, but it’s an obligation I just can’t duck out of. You can understand that, can’t you? Besides, don’t laugh now, but I’ve also been elected Grand Marshall of the whole event. Which means, I must officially open every one of the shows, all weekend long, by announcing them over the microphone. It’s apparently to help drum up excitement, every hour, for every new event. So, you see, I wouldn’t be very much fun. I’ll be far too busy.”
Jeremy looks at me, hurt. “You’re always fun.”
“Oh, that’s so sweet of you to say.” I take his hand, rubbing my thumb over the top of his knuckles, then look down. Wait a minute. No sparks.
“How on earth did you get that job, anyway?” Jeremy scowls.
“Oh, you’re never gonna believe this but...because of you,” I say, flicking my brows up.
“Me?”
“Uh-huh.” I smile. “Apparently, this is my prize for saving you from the fire. The town’s beloved sheriff. Oh, and the town too, while I was at it. Or at least that’s how things were perceived.” I fiddle with the doily under my tea plate. “In actuality, I really didn’t do anything but send Mrs. Dumfries for the ambulance.”
“Mrs. Dumfries?” He winces, as if trying to remember.
“Yeah. She was there, somehow. Just like she always is.” I tilt my head.
“Hmmm...I don’t seem to remember that.” He lifts his plate and licks it. “Of course, I don’t seem to remember much about the day.” He spins the plate in a circle on the end of this tongue.
“Oh.” I slump, sounding disappointed.
“Then again, I think you’re right. They totally got that wrong, didn’t they?”
“Huh?” I look up.
“I mean, if they only knew who was really behind what happened that day, they wouldn’t be thanking you.” He chuckles.
“What did you just say?”
“I said, if they only knew the truth, you’d be far from their hero.”
“What do you mean?” I lunge across the table, clutching his face in my hands, and stare deep in his eyes. “It’s happening again, isn’t it? Your eyes have changed, shifted in color. You’re not you, are you?” His eyes have distinctly morphed from striking azure blue to a faded shade of denim blue. He’s back. The clever Jeremy is in there right now. Talking to me. “Who are you? Tell me?” I resist the urge to shake him.
“I-I don’t know,” he says, reaching out his hand to clutch mine. A small spark ignites, and he pulls them back.
“Who are you, and what do you know? Tell me, please.”
“I-I don’t know. I-I don’t remember,” he stammers, his eyes changing.
“No. No. No. Don’t go.” I shake my head. “Come back here. You have to tell me, who did this to you? Who’s not dead? Who was behind it? Pl
ease,” I desperately shout at him as a cloud of confusion draws over his face. His muscles relax and his brow softens.
“Jeremy?” I say. “Jeremy, is that you? What happened that day? You were just about to tell me.”
His gaze darts all over my face. “This cake,” he says, “is really amazing, isn’t it?” He pulls his face from my hands and takes up his fork again. “Whoever made it, kudos to them.” He grins and tips his fork in the air.
He gone back to the beginning of our conversation. He’s repeating himself.
Or rather, me.
I sit down.
It’s over. Whatever glimpse of hope he was about to offer me has been dashed. Completely lost. A streak of sunlight crosses his face, leaking in from between swaying leaves of the tree above our heads. When the breeze finally settles, his eyes are back to azure blue. I quickly check for the double pinkie nail on his right finger, but I’m too late.
There’s nothing. I should have glanced at it earlier, I berate myself. But something definitely has gone on here.
“About the fair,” Jeremy says, looking up, his azure blue eyes full of hope. “Maybe we could just meet up for a short stroll through the midway and some funnel cake?” he suggests.
“I could probably do funnel cake,” I say. “But just a forkful.” I raise a playful hand in caution. “After this”—I point to my empty plate, then pinch an inch on my middle—”I shouldn’t be eating cake again for weeks.”
He laughs, a good old-fashioned hearty one, then taking me by surprise, leans forward, kissing me on the side of the cheek.
But...nothing. Absolutely nothing happens. I felt nothing between us.
Not even the least inkling of spark. But how can that be? I sit back, perplexed.
Perhaps the reaction I felt at The Bottom of the Cauldron that day only occurred between us because he kissed me on the mouth. I can’t stand it. I have to know. So, I dart forward, clutch the sides of his face, and kiss him as hard as I can on the lips.
“Whoa...oah!” Jeremy says. “Okay then.” He blushes. “I was gonna save the hot stuff for later but”—he looks around—“if that’s what you want.” He lunges forward, taking me into his arms and kissing me again. A long, hard kiss. A wonderful kiss. A solid and loving one. But...
Abracastabra (Hex Falls Paranormal Cozy Mystery # 4) (Hex Falls Paranormal Cozy Mystery Series) Page 3