by Raven Snow
“What kind of hex was it?” asked Rose. She couldn’t cast hexes herself but she had as much knowledge about them as any of them did. Maybe more.
“It wasn’t very specific.” It seemed like it took Peony quite a bit of effort to admit that. “I should have been more specific,” she sobbed. “I didn’t want anyone to get hurt. I was just mad and afraid I was going to be laughed out of the gallery. I didn’t want my work made fun of again. I wanted Dayveed and Karen to keep to themselves not-” She was cut off by another sob.
Rowen reached out and gave Peony’s shoulder a squeeze. What she had done was wrong, but Rowen wasn’t completely innocent. “It wasn’t the right thing to do, but we’ve all done hexes. And, hey, just because you did that doesn’t mean it was your fault this happened.”
“Right,” Rose said quickly. “We should see this hex you performed, though. The sooner the better. We should also probably try and reverse it on Karen, just in case.”
Peony’s eyes grew wide. She looked back at Rose. “Do you think Karen is still in danger?”
Willow snorted, not looking too concerned about any of this. “She would deserve it. She’s a real jerk.”
“No one deserves what happened to Dayveed,” said Rowen, frowning at her cousin. “Did you know about this from the start?”
“I learned about it soon enough after.” Willow shrugged. She didn’t look for a minute like she believed she had done anything wrong. “For the record, I don’t think any of this is Peony’s fault. She wanted to try and apologize to Dayveed. I only agreed because she kept hounding me about it. It’s not like we even got to talk to him either. We didn’t have enough time alone and he never even answered us. I bet you anything the little twerp’s soul is still at the gallery, too.”
“What makes you say that?” asked Rose.
“Are you kidding me?” Willow pointed at the packed parking lot. “That place is just crawling with people who are convinced Dayveed would have been the next Van Gogh or something. Getting killed the way he did was, like, the best career move he ever made. You better believe that his spirit is in there right now soaking up all that attention.”
Having met Dayveed, that certainly sounded likely enough. She wasn’t sure what to do about it, though. It wasn’t like she would be able to convince anyone to let her try and contact him again. Seeing how the public had reacted, it was to Hawthorne’s benefit that this whole thing remained a mystery. It wasn’t like he was implicated.
There came a sudden knock on the window and everyone jumped. Peony gave a small shriek and leaned away from the window. Someone on the other side of it was leaning down to peer in. “Hey there,” said Nathaniel, standing on the curb in his expensive looking suit.
“What do you want?” Rowen demanded, staring.
“Can you roll down the window? I can’t hear you.” Nathan spoke loudly. The last thing Rowen wanted was for him to call attention to them all. She started the car’s engine in case they needed to leave quickly and did as he asked. “Much appreciated.” He lowered his voice. “I saw you guys leaving in a hurry out the back. Sorry to come snooping, but I just had to see what all the excitement was about.”
“It’s not anything to worry about, but thanks for the concern.” Rowen reached for the button to roll up the window, but Nathan quickly put his hand over the glass. She stopped.
“I don’t mean to be nosy-”
“But you are,” Rowen finished for him. “Look, no offense but this really isn’t any of your business.” She didn’t appreciate the way he was getting into her business. “Please just go back to the gallery. It’s your big night. Shouldn’t you be there?”
“Oh, I think my art speaks for itself.” Nathan waved a hand like that didn’t concern him one bit.
“Channel 2 isn’t out there, are they?” asked Rowen. If Nathan had found them so quickly, she couldn’t imagine Channel 2 would be far behind.
Nathan looked back toward the gallery again. “They’re out in the parking lot. Are they after you? They must not have seen you come this way— Back to you guys, though. Did I hear you talking about hexes?”
Peony gave a small, muffled sob. “I thought you couldn’t hear us?” Willow asked, glaring at the guy like she didn’t trust him. To be fair, Rowen didn’t either.
“I caught bits and pieces.” He smiled. “So, you guys hexed someone and you’re going to reverse it? Is that what all the fuss is about?”
“Not exactly.” Rowen was seriously considering pulling away from the curb and driving away. She had just about had it with Nathan trying to verbally hold them hostage here. “No offense, but it’s really none of your business.”
“Aww, c’mon.” Nathan tried what Rowen might have considered a charming smile under better conditions. “Can it be my business? Just a little? Let me help or watch you guys or something. I’m super intrigued by all this witchcraft stuff.”
“Back off, buddy.” Willow picked up a book from the floorboard and started rapping his fingers with it, trying to get him to let go of the window. It just about worked before Rowen stopped her.
“Wait a minute,” she said with a sigh. It was probably for the best if they stayed on Nathan’s good side. The Greensmiths were going to get a lot of flak for tonight. They shouldn’t alienate people trying to be sympathetic. “Fine. Everyone get out and meet me at my place. Nathan, get in. I’ll drive you there myself so you don’t get lost and I’ll bring you back here when we’re finished.
Nathan grinned. “Much appreciated.” He slid in on the passenger side as soon as Peony was out of the car.
“Hey,” Rowen called after Peony. “We’ll sort this out,” she promised. “Try not to be so hard on yourself until then, alright?”
Peony looked back at the car. She gave a nod that was hard to read. If Rowen had to guess, she would say that Peony didn’t believe it one bit.
Chapter Ten
Eric wasn’t there when Rowen pulled into the driveway. That was probably for the best. She didn’t need any distractions if they were to successfully lift a hex and, right now, Eric was a distraction.
“This your place?” asked Nathan, getting out of the car when Rowen did.
“Yeah,” Rowen responded curtly. She had thought that would be obvious.
“Looks nice.”
“Thanks.” Rowen went to the front door and unlocked it. Chester greeted them. The old dog spun in a circle, wagging his tail. He was as happy as could be right up until he saw Nathan. Suddenly, he began to growl. That was certainly unlike him. “Back up, Chester,” Rowen scolded, pushing him back with her leg. “Sorry. I’m not sure what’s gotten into him. He normally likes just about everyone.”
“Great,” Nathan muttered, stepping into the house. “So your dog hates me.”
“He probably just expected my husband,” Rowen lied. In truth, it seemed to her like her dog did indeed hate him. Maybe she shouldn’t have let him come along. Then again, it couldn’t hurt to do a little more subtle investigating into him.
Outside, more cars started pulling up. By the time Rowen had turned on the lights in the den, everyone was entering through the front door. “So, what exactly did you do?” Rose was asking Peony as they walked. “For the hex, I mean.”
“Normal stuff. It wasn’t anything special.” Peony shrugged, her eyes on the floor. “I put both of their names on a candle and just… Tried to stir up some cosmic justice while they burned down. You know?”
She was right. That was a pretty standard spell. Rowen hoped it wasn’t too broad a hex to reverse. She went to the drawer where she kept some of her candles. She selected a couple of black ones and headed back to the den.
“So you think Dayveed was killed because he got hexed?” Nathan was doing a very poor job of keeping a straight face. Even after the little demonstration in the garden, it didn’t look like he believed any of them about the magic stuff.
“He may have,” said Peony, rubbing at her eyes again as she sat on the sofa. She took a deep breath
and made a real effort not to cry. The drive here must have given her some time to reflect. Having a breakdown wasn’t going to do anyone any good.
“And what if he was?” asked Nathan. “Do you tell the police? Can you even get arrested for this sort of thing? Is there a special secret witch court that you have to go to?”
Rowen got the distinct impression that he wasn’t being serious. Still, it did raise the question of how they were going to handle this if it did turn out to be Peony’s fault. “We’ll just have to cross that bridge when we get to it.” There. That seemed honest and succinct enough. She set the candles up on the coffee table and everyone gathered in a circle, sitting on the floor to be closer to the candles. Rowen looked to Peony. “Did you burn the whole candle?”
Peony shook her head. “Only about half.”
Rowen nodded. She retried a lighter and got a pin from the hallway closet. With it she scratched names into the wax. “Everything look right so far?” she asked Peony.
“Yeah.”
“All right.” Here was where she diverged from the original hex. She broke the candles in half. “We’re all going to think positive thoughts of Karen and Dayveed. We’re going to let the dripping wax join these candles back together.”
“That thinking nice thoughts part is easier said than done,” Willow muttered
Rowen wasn’t in the mood for games. “Do you want to go wait in the car? I don’t want us screwing this up.” She turned her gaze to Nathan. “The same goes for you. Even your thoughts can have an influence on the outcome here.”
“Right.” Nathan assumed a serious expression. “I’ll keep my thoughts positive. Shouldn’t be too hard. I never actually met those two.”
“Good.” Rowen held out her hands. “Everyone make a circle.” Nathan took her right hand, Peony her left. She forced her thoughts to turn to Dayveed and Karen. Dayveed might have been dead but not including him in this felt wrong. They needed to lift the hex on both people before something else happened. Rowen didn’t think Peony could take something bad happening to Karen. Not now.
The candles balanced carefully atop their lower halves. Gradually, the wax dripped down and they became whole again. Rowen was ready to call the spell a success when Eric got home.
The door opened and Rowen was sure Eric noticed something odd right off the bat. He came into the darkened room. “Something I should know about or am I going to wish I’d never asked?”
“Hard to say,” Rowen said, honestly. “We’re pretty much done here, though.”
“That’s good… I guess.” Eric looked at Nathan as he passed through on his way to the kitchen. “And this is?”
“Nathaniel Powers.” Nathan stood and extended a hand. “Pleased to meet you.”
That hadn’t really given Eric an explanation as to who he was. Either Eric didn’t care or he was planning on asking Rowen later. He took Nathan’s hand and pumped it once. “Good to meet you,” he said, not particularly sounding like he meant it. He sounded tired, like he’d had an exceptionally long day.
“I’m going to see everyone off and make sure Nathan gets back to the art gallery safely. He rode here with me,” Rowen explained. “If you want to go ahead and eat dinner without me I don’t mind.”
“All right. Be careful.” Eric continued on to the kitchen. Everyone seemed to look at Rowen once he had disappeared around the corner. The cool reception he was giving her was impossible to miss. She was just about sick of it.
Everyone stood and headed for the door. Peony slowed down to keep pace with Rowen. “What if this was all my fault?” she asked, keeping her voice down.
“It wasn’t your fault,” Rowen said, reflexively. Neither of them could know that for sure, though. Plus, she could see that telling Peony that wasn’t calming her down. “If you had anything to do with it, it was an accident,” she said instead.
“Why not? I hexed them on purpose.”
“Sure, but you didn’t mean for either of them to die, did you?”
“No,” Peony said immediately, even though she really didn’t need to. Rowen knew Peony would never do that sort of thing on purpose.
“Well, there you go. It was an accident.”
Peony still didn’t look convinced. She bit the inside of her cheek. “Yeah, but… People still get arrested for murders they didn’t mean to commit.”
“I don’t think you’re going to get this one pinned on you regardless.”
“That doesn’t make it any better!” Peony was a good person. She wasn’t really equipped to deal with what ifs like this. The guilt was just too much for her.
“Let me keep looking into this thing.” Rowen wasn’t sure what else to say. It wasn’t like she could really reassure her without flat out lying to her cousin. “Like I said to Nathan, if it turns out that you did this, we’ll just cross that bridge later.”
“Okay,” Peony agreed, softly. She headed for the car Willow had brought her in.
Rowen waved goodbye to her cousins, Nathan waiting by her side. “They seem like a nice bunch,” he said. It was hard to tell if that was a genuine compliment or if he was just giving her family some generic praise.
“They’re the best,” Rowen said, regardless. She headed for her car. “Come on.”
“So, your family really believes in all this witchcraft stuff?” asked Nathan once they were on the road.
Rowen really wasn’t in the mood to argue about this stuff. “You still have your doubts I take it?”
“What can I say? I’m a skeptic at heart.”
“That’s fine.” Rowen shrugged. “I really don’t care what you believe.” She had far bigger problems on her plate.
“That was your husband back there, right? Does he believe in witches?”
“He does.” Rowen thought back to those early days with her husband. “He didn’t at first, but he came around. He’s kind of had to. It got pretty hard to deny.”
“I’m sure.” It was still hard to tell whether Nathan was just teasing or not. “So, have the two of you been married long?”
“Not too long.” Rowen shrugged. “Like a year and a half, maybe.”
Nathan nodded. “And the two of you get along okay?”
“I’m not sure how that’s any of your business.”
“Sorry,” Nathan said quickly. “It was just hard to miss how tense things seemed between the two of you back there.”
Rowen wasn’t sure how that observation made it his business either, but she didn’t see any harm in telling him the truth. “I did something stupid, and he’s still holding a grudge.”
“Oh yeah?” Nathan laid his arm on the arm rest between them. “What’d you do?”
“Really?” Rowen cringed. Did he really expect her to tell him everything like they were old friends? “I broke into a place to communicate with a spirit. There’s not really more to say than that. I got caught. My husband, rightfully, got mad I hadn’t said anything to him about it beforehand. The end.”
“Is it, though? You seem like the kind of woman who gets into her fair share of trouble. You seem… I dunno. Adventurous.”
Did she give off a bad girl kind of vibe? Rowen didn’t think she did. Not that she could deny getting into her fair share of trouble. “I’m sure I’ll do something dangerous again that he’ll get upset about.” Rowen shrugged. It was bound to happen eventually.
“I take it that’s been a problem before?”
“We’ve talked about it.” Once there had been a time when Eric hadn’t even liked her going out on her own to seek out suspects. Breaking in somewhere was really upping the ante, but could she honestly say that she was going to run everything by him in the future? She really couldn’t. “I dunno. It is what it is.”
“Maybe you just need a more adventurous guy.”
Rowen glanced over at Nathan. What was he getting at? Was he suggesting he was the more adventurous guy she needed? She sure hoped not. Fortunately, they were getting close to the gallery. “You know, I have a cousin tha
t’s single.”
“Which one?”
“Peony.”
“I feel like Peony might have enough on her plate right now,” said Nathan, and he really wasn’t wrong. “So, now that she’s not here… What will you do if you decide that hex of hers killed Dayveed?”
Rowen hadn’t really given it serious thought. She hadn’t wanted to. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “The police can’t pin it on her, and whatever we can do, she couldn’t do any worse to herself.” Rowen couldn’t imagine how upset Peony would be. Hopefully, she wouldn’t have to find out.
“I’m sure everything will work out,” Nathan said as Rowen pulled into the parking lot. He pointed to a red expensive-looking car parked up front. “That’s me there.”
Rowen pulled up to where he had pointed. It looked like the show was over for the night. There were still a few cars parked out front, but they probably belonged to people who worked there. “Well, off you go. Hope you enjoyed yourself.”
Nathan looked at Rowen, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I did,” he said and, before Rowen could react, he leaned in and kissed her.
“What the heck!” Rowen leaned away and acting on pure instinct, she slapped him.
“Hey.” Nathan put his hand to his cheek. It was quickly going red. “Seriously?” he asked, like her reaction had been a ridiculous one.
Now that she had had a moment to gather her thoughts about what had just happened, Rowen felt even more vindicated in what she had done. “Get out,” she said, firmly.
“I don’t think I deserved-”
“Get out!” Rowen interrupted, louder this time. She leaned across Nathan and opened his door for him. “Now.” She gave him a shove.
“Hold your horses. I’m going, I’m going.” He got out of the car. He started to speak again, but Rowen closed the door before he could. She drove away, not really caring if she ran over his toes in the process or not. The nerve of that guy. More than once she had suspected he might be flirting with her. She hadn’t thought he would be so forward about it. What was his problem? Was he so wealthy he was used to getting his way in just about everything? Well, he wasn’t getting his way this time.