T*Witches: Don’t Think Twice

by H. B. Gilmour

  Bree had that right. Casa de Waxman East was nothing like Alex expected. It wasn’t even where she assumed it would be. The me-so-cool daughter of a him-so-hot Hollywood producer should have been living in swank Marble Bay Heights, in some palace fit for the princess she so was, right?

  Nuh-uh. Turned out to be a modest suburban ranch in a modest suburban neighborhood. The biggest shock? Brianna’s room. Expectations? Expensive, expansive, elaborate. Reality? Small, square, and spare.

  “Mom’s not home?” Alex asked, trying not to let her surprise show.

  “She’s at work,” Bree replied.

  “What does she do?” Alex had assumed the ex-Mrs. Waxman didn’t work. All Brianna ever talked about was her dad and the mounds of moolah he had. Was this another Bree secret Cam purposely kept from her?

  Brianna sighed. Might as well tell her. It’s not like I need to impress her.

  Thanks, Alex grunted.

  “Four days a week, she works at a doctor’s office. Two days, she works as a bookkeeper for an accountant. And on the seventh day, she cleans the house.” Alex’s eyes popped. Bree’s mom worked two jobs — like Sara had? But that didn’t make sense. For Sara Fielding it was about survival. Didn’t Eric the great Waxman even support his family?

  Brianna snorted, “In case you’re wondering, and I know you are, my dad would give us anything we want. He sends me money for clothes and stuff. But my mom won’t take anything. She considers herself very proud. And independent.” And stupid, Brianna added silently.

  Alex could not believe she actually had something in common with Queen Bree. But she said, “My mom was the same way. Proud. And independent. She was a great role model.”

  “Lucky you,” Bree said sarcastically. Then she sighed. “Look, you want a snack? I can probably dig up something.”

  While Bree was gone, Alex surveyed the room. Posters, magazine tear-outs, photographs — some of Brianna and the Six Pack, Bree and various boyfriends, but most of the snaps were family shots. Little Bree with both parents; with her dad and grandparents; preteen with her dad and some random starlet. Bree’s dad young, with his arm around Redford and Newman; Bree’s dad older, shaking hands with young movie stars; with politicians, holding up a poster and pointing to the line on it that said, Eric Waxman Presents. The room was like a shrine — to a dad she hardly ever saw.

  When Bree returned with a bag of chips, a jar of salsa, and two bottles of water, Alex pointed to one of the framed photos. “How old were you when this was taken?”

  “Around six or so, during my chubola period,” Bree answered sourly. “I don’t know why I even keep that one up there.”

  “You don’t look chubby,” Alex scoffed. “You look like a normal kid.”

  Normal enough for my parents to have split like a minute after that shot was taken. “I’ve been on the pudge patrol for, like, ever,” Brianna said dismissively.

  Which reminded Alex what Bree had thought of herself that night at the bowling alley. “Stupid, fat, and ugly.” But that expression — heinous as it was — was like the theme song for half the girls at Marble Bay High and beyond. It didn’t mean anyone really believed it. Did they?

  “Anyway,” Bree continued, “let’s get this studying thing over with. I really need to hit the gym.”

  Alex tilted her head. “Want to come over for dinner?” I can’t believe I just invited her….

  “Uh … no!” Bree wrinkled her nose and shot her such an “are you insane?” look that Alex immediately regretted asking.

  Studying with Brianna turned out to be okay. The girl had smarts and deftly memorized charts, elements, chem facts. Except for a father and the pile of cash everyone thought she had, Brianna Waxman was doing all right. She was the total opposite of stupid, fat, and ugly. But why did she always front — act as if being Eric Waxman’s daughter was the only thing that mattered?

  As if Bree had tapped into her brain, the bitty blonde mentioned offhandedly, “My dad asked me to spend the summer in L.A. with him. But I’m so not bathing-suit ready yet.”

  “You should go,” Alex said encouragingly. “Even though you practically just got back.” Then she heard Brianna’s tortured thoughts. Just got back, right. Back from my backyard. Cam knows Kristen stayed home. But if anyone finds out that my dad never sent the tickets, I’ll be like … no one.

  For the first time since realizing she could read minds, Alex had to work at not saying something about what she’d just heard. How could Bree not see that Eric Waxman’s neglect made him a deadbeat dad? Yet her self-esteem was totally tied to him. That was warped.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  DESTINY’S TWINS

  Cam deliberately avoided mentioning the most recent note to Alex. Even though her scarlet-haired twin acted like the new Six Pack expert, Kristen Hsu was Cam’s friend. And Cam wanted to think over what she’d just learned. All three anonymous notes were in Kris’s style. Obviously sent by someone who knew Cam’s locker combination.

  Of course, almost any decent witch or warlock could copy Kristen’s art and open a flimsy hall locker.

  Cam decided she’d spill all to Als eventually but for now she wouldn’t think about the mystery in Alex’s presence. She’d figure it out first, alone.

  Luckily, barring her twin from a mind break-in turned out to be a cinch. Emily and Dave had impulsively gone straight from work to some cultural do in Boston. Hence, the kids were free from compulsory family time around the table.

  Cam made herself a salad and tuna on toast and took it to her room. She could eat, mull over the notes, and finish her book report. No way would her sister, minus parental supervision, hang in the bedroom.

  She had that right. Alex and Dylan gorged on junk food — frozen pizza, cheese sticks, microwave popcorn, Skittles, and soda — which they’d taken into the family room. There, blasting the TV and jamming on guitars, the two were in Friday night pig heaven.

  Alex deliberately did not tell Cam about her field trip to Bree’s. Why should she? All this time, Cam had made this big play of wanting Alex involved with her friends. But that clearly stopped short of full disclosure between them on “sensitive” Six Pack issues.

  Cam had obeyed instructions to keep Alex away from Bree’s place. So that meant, in a choice between her true-blue buds and a newfound sister, blood came in second. Alex shouldn’t have been surprised, she told herself, or hurt. And if she’d learned a few things on her own, there wasn’t any hurry to share them with a two-timing twin.

  Avoiding each other was what they both wanted. So when the family phone rang and Cam grabbed it first, she didn’t bother asking who was calling. She pushed down the feeling that the voice on the other end was vaguely, unsettlingly familiar, and hollered downstairs, “Alex, it’s for you. Someone returning your call.”

  As soon as her twin picked up, Cam set down the receiver. Probably one of Alex’s Montana homies, she tried to convince herself, even as her gut told her it was not.

  Alex took the call in the kitchen, away from Dylan’s ears.

  The caller was Molly McCracken, the photographer’s widow. After some intense Internet detective work — way to be a tracker, Alex thought proudly — she’d found Mrs. McCracken on her own. There were definite advantages to going to a school with an excellent computer lab. As she’d figured, the photographer’s wife and her child were temporarily housed in a shelter in Carlston, California.

  Before heading over to Bree’s house, Alex had dialed the shelter’s 800 number and left a message for Molly to call her back.

  The moment Cam hung up the phone, Alex explained to the jumpy Molly that she was related to the girl who’d saved her life.

  “What do you want?” Molly asked suspiciously. Alex rushed to assure her that the only thing she wanted was the name and location of the sanitarium where the picture had been snapped.

  There was silence on the other end. Alex held her breath. But when Molly finally spoke, it was only to say, “I wish I could help you. I don’t know
anything about the picture. I only know that Elias was in California when he took it. But I don’t know where. And now it’s gotten him killed …”

  A few hours later, in the still of the night, Alex bolted up in bed. Something was wrong. She glanced over at her sister’s bed. Cam was upright and staring at her.

  “What is it?” Alex whispered. “How long have you been up?”

  “I didn’t tell you. I should have.” Cam’s voice was hesitant.

  That’s why she woke up, Alex thought. Cam’s conscience was bothering her. Well, that was another thing they had in common — so was hers. Relieved, Alex cut in, “There’s something I didn’t tell you, either. About Bree —”

  “I got another note,” Cam said at the same time.

  “One more thing,” Cam interrupted. “I know who’s been sending them. I just don’t know why —”

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  I’LL NEVER TELL

  Sneaking out of the house in the dead of night required stealth and absolute silence. Cam and Alex were on it.

  It was after midnight when they layered up in jeans, matching dark turtlenecks, and multiple sweatshirts under jackets — Cam in her pink ski parka, Alex in an old quilted camo jacket.

  Brushing by the full-length mirror, Cam couldn’t help cracking, “Aren’t we the fashionistas? We look like the Riding Hoods: Little Pink and Little Punk.”

  They tiptoed downstairs, slipped into their shoes — combat boots for Alex, Timberlands for Cam — and headed over to Kristen Hsu’s house.

  The big puzzler? What was Kristen’s connection to their missing mom? How would she know their mother was dying?

  Alex tightened her sweatshirt hood against the icy wind and finally said out loud what they’d both been thinking, “Unless she’s Thantos’s latest stooge?”

  Their villainous uncle had tried to snare them before, by sending a messenger disguised as a friend. But he’d never used someone in Cam’s closest circle.

  Break one: Kristen’s house was within walking distance.

  Break two: Cam’s excellence-driven friend had recently moved her bedroom to the basement, where she’d have more space and privacy and could stay up studying late into the night.

  Break three: The basement window was accessible from the back of the house.

  Alex kept a lookout while Cam knelt in the snow, peering in. As icy slush seeped through her jeans, Cam whined, “Just once, how about you try the sight thing?”

  “Mute the moaning, just tell me what you see,” Alex whispered impatiently.

  The window was covered by mini-blinds. Cam focused, telescoping in on the big dark room, and saw Kris, asleep, clutching a ragged old teddy bear. Alex raised her hand to rap on Kris’s window. “You’ll scare her. She’ll scream,” Cam cautioned.

  “Better idea?” Alex challenged.

  “Um … wiggle the teddy bear to wake her?”

  Staring into the dark room, Alex imagined the plush toy rocking back and forth … saw its stiff little stuffed arm poking Kristen gently in the face … on the nose, she thought, amusing herself. One little stuffed sausage of an arm batting Kris’s nose. Pow!

  “Very funny,” Cam scolded as Kristen’s eyes flew open and she cautiously touched her nose. Cam tapped on the glass and called out quickly, “Kris! It’s Cam! Don’t scream! Come to the window!”

  The slender girl was up instantly. And out the door almost as quickly. “What is it? Why are you here? Did something happen?” Kristen was quaking. She’d thrown a robe over her pajamas, but no coat. Her questions were a run-on sentence, punctuated by chattering teeth.

  “Kris, I’m sorry we had to do this —” Cam began.

  Alex cut to the chase. “Why are you sending us anonymous notes?”

  “If you are,” Cam backpedaled, but Kris’s reaction told her it was true.

  Alex could hear the girl’s heart quicken and listened in to her thoughts: Finally! They figured it out! Please don’t let it be too late!

  Kristen didn’t say anything out loud, just rubbed her arms in an attempt to warm up. “Maybe we should go inside,” Cam suggested.

  She shook her head, her long, lustrous hair looking enviably unruffled by sleep. “I can’t. We’ll wake them.”

  “Then let’s make this quick.” Alex so wished she could say, I know what you’re thinking. All she did say was, “Spill.”

  The girl was shaking. Cam slipped off her ski jacket and put it around Kris. Head bent, eyes downcast, Kris admitted quietly, “I only meant to send one.”

  It was the answer they expected. Still, Cam was shocked. “But you don’t know anything about her. How could you be sending those messages?”

  Kristen’s head snapped up. “Who would know her better than I would?”

  Alex tuned in to Kris’s panicked brain. If they can’t save her, I … I don’t know what to do. She could die.

  “Who put you up to this?” Alex demanded.

  Cam gripped Kris by her shoulders and implored her, “Someone is playing a trick on you, Kris. We know you’re the messenger. Just tell us where she is and how to find her.”

  “Don’t worry about Thantos,” Alex added.

  “Are you guys insane? She’s at home. Where else would she be?” Frustrated and shivering, Kristen cried out, “And what’s a Thantos?”

  “This is our mother we’re talking about!” Cam blurted, louder than she’d intended. “Stop pretending you don’t know.”

  “Our birth mother, Miranda, could be dying — and you know it.” You just thought that, Alex wanted to shout. She managed, “Or you wouldn’t be sending us those warnings.”

  “Huh?” Kristen stared at Cam, then at Alex.

  Alex heard the girl’s heart flutter. She repeated, “Why are you sending us notes about our mother? Who put you up to this?”

  And then little Kristen exploded. A volcano of pent-up emotions erupted. She put her fists on her slender hips and, in a voice way too big for such a small-boned girl, shouted, “Your mother?! Why would you think for a minute the notes were about your mother? Can you really be that self-absorbed?!”

  Cam and Alex were shocked into silence.

  “Well, of course they are. I mean, if not her … then … who?” Cam sputtered, wounded.

  Confused, Alex asked, “Who are the notes about, then? And why send them to us? Who’s dying?”

  Kristen shook her head and sobbed. “I can’t tell you. I promised. If you guys can’t figure it out … I can’t tell.”

  Alex got it. “A secret.” She whispered, “Like in your collage. You made a vow to keep a secret. And now you’re choking on it.”

  Whose secret would Kris be keeping …? Before Cam finished the question, she knew the answer.

  Brianna!

  My vision, Cam telepathically reminded her sister.

  Small, blond, Alex remembered. And the voice that had been frightened, but whiny, brittle. It wasn’t our mom. It was Bree! Cam told her. It all fits. Bree was in the snow because she was here, not in L.A.

  And postscript, Cam thought, it happened practically the moment Snibble said, “Does anyone know where Brianna is?”

  Alex’s shoulders slumped. She felt horrible — not only for Kristen and Brianna, but for herself and Cam, too. Of course it all fit. Hadn’t she just found out that Bree never went to L.A.? That the girl had self-esteem issues to the max. She — and Cam — had seen and heard only what they’d wanted to instead of what was right in front of them.

  Which was worse? Being blind to a friend in need or taking three giant steps backward in the quest to find their mother? Cam didn’t know. She inhaled the cold air. It stung her throat. Ileana knew the messages weren’t about our mother.

  Kristen noticed the silence but not the silent exchange. Cam put her arm around the sobbing girl. “What’s wrong with Brianna?”

  “I couldn’t tell. I tried to show you instead.”

  “Why’d you pick us?” Alex pretty much knew the answer.

  Kristen wiped
her eyes on the sleeve of Cam’s jacket and snuffled, “Because I thought you guys could help. Ever since you got here, Cam’s mojo has gone over the top. I thought this would be easy for you. I never imagined you’d be so involved in your own drama, you’d totally be blind to a friend’s — at least not you, Cam.”

  Cam winced. Alex grumbled, “Thanks.”

  “Just open your eyes!” Kristen implored them. “Bree can’t even see what’s happening to her. How come I’m the only one who can? When I tried to talk to her about it, she just shut down and made me swear not to mention it again, to anyone. But I’m her best friend. I can’t just let it happen.”

  The puzzle pieces suddenly and sharply rearranged themselves. The big clothes that hid Bree’s shrinking body, her sallow complexion, the nonstop exercising, stealth lunch dumps, lying, and secrecy. It was suddenly so obvious.

  Brianna Waxman was starving herself to death.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  THE CAVES OF COVENTRY

  There were many places spirits gathered. The ancient oak in Mariner’s Park was one; the one, Ileana remembered, where Karsh’s great-great-great-grandmother — a healer — had been hanged for practicing witchcraft during the dark days of Salem. The sacred stream that fed Crow Creek was another. And it was there that the twins claimed to have met their grandmother — the late matriarch of the DuBaer family: Leila, mother of Aron, Thantos, and Fredo.

  There was another, Ileana suspected. She unfurled her cape and returned to the dark side of Coventry Island, where Crailmore, the DuBaer fortress, stood. The caves of Coventry tunneled directly under the great stone fortress, where generations of DuBaer witches and warlocks had lived and died. It was there Aron’s spirit was most likely to rest — if it could rest, knowing the perils his children faced at the hands of his murdering brother.

  Ileana hurried through the forest, then fought her way through the dense bramble that hid many of the cave entrances. By the time she found the mouth of the largest cavern, her magnificent robe had been snagged on thorns and thistles, and a crown of vines, tree bark, and dead leaves wound through her golden hair. Nevertheless, she had succeeded. Her heart quickened by victory and expectation, she knelt at the entrance to the sacred cave and assembled her tools.