Southern Charmed (Hell's Belles Trilogy Book 2)

by Alison Claire

  She hugged me tight, “You’re my whole world, Briar. Always.”

  I was back in the living room with a start, the sobs escaping me in waves. I could barely catch my breath through the emotion. I was dizzy, but I was desperate for more.

  I wanted to live in the timeline of my parents’ existence forever.

  “Shhhh,” Aleta said, her hand on my shoulder. “Be calm, Briar. It’s hard to come back from those kinds of travels. Don’t sit up. Be slow.”

  I nodded, not being able to speak. All I could think about was my mother. Her presence was the deepest longing I’d ever had. How could I go back to this life where she’d never existed for me?

  “That was my life,” I finally said. “Why couldn’t I have that? I would have been a better person if I’d had my family.”

  “Better is relative,” Aleta said. “You are strong because of your journey. It will be the reason you help to save us. We need your strength. It will take all of us to defeat Ezekiel.”

  Ezekiel. Hearing his name made my blood boil.

  “He sent Zillah to kill my family,” I said. “He’s the reason they’re gone.”

  “Yes,” Aleta replied. “He is.”

  I stood up, suddenly a fire in my belly.

  “Where is he?” I said. “Zillah’s gone, can’t we just take him?”

  Aleta shook her head. “Definitely not. Ezekiel is one of the most powerful supernatural entities on the planet. Zillah is very much child’s play next to him. His power is vast and dark. It will not be easy to defeat him. But we have to. Even…”

  “Even?” I said. “What? Even, what?”

  “Even if it means we all die with him,” she said, and the silence between us was deafening.

  Chapter 21

  A couple of hours later when the sun was finally up, Emma came downstairs, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.

  “Hey,” she said, sitting next to me. “Any coffee left?”

  “Not much,” I replied. “I’ll make you some though. How’d you sleep?”

  “Surprisingly well,” she said. “You?”

  “Not bad,” I lied.

  Emma stretched her arms above her head. I was still getting used to my own image in front of me. If I wasn’t me, from the outside, I would struggle to tell us apart.

  As the Keurig started it’s humming and coffee-making, I grabbed my sister’s hand.

  “I’m really sorry,” I said. “About being such a bitch. I’ve got issues. But I’m glad I’m not alone anymore. Even if I missed out on so much… at least we have each other now. That’s all that matters at the end of the day.”

  Emma grinned and pulled me in for a hug.

  “You’re not a bitch,” she said. “You’re a really amazing person. I wish more than anything you could have been with me my whole life. Merritt was a great sister. But it would have been that much better with our third musketeer. I know she would have loved you as much as she loved me.”

  Her expression turned sad for a moment. “I miss her all the time. And I still have a tremendous amount of guilt about not being there when they needed me most. When Zillah said those terrible things…” Emma’s eyes filled with tears. “I hate knowing she suffered like that. And that in the end she might have thought this was my fault. I let her down. I let everyone down.”

  I shook my head. “Do not take on this burden. The only person at fault is Ezekiel. He’ll pay for this. We will avenge our family. You’ve got me now.”

  “And me,” a voice said. Josephine bounded down the stairs, Calista following her.

  She slid over the floors in her socks and landed on both of us, wrapping an arm around each. “We’re all united now! There’s nothing we can’t do as long as we stick together.”

  “It’s way too early for the rah-rah crap,” Calista said, sitting down on a stool next to us. “I need coffee. Now.”

  The Keurig was done. I poured my sister and Calista each a mug full.

  “So what happens now?” I asked. “How is this going to work?”

  “We kill Ezekiel,” Emma said. “Simple as that.”

  “Ha!” Calista exclaimed. “As if it’s that easy.”

  “We were able to defeat Zillah,” Emma retorted.

  “Zillah is small potatoes next to Ezekiel Walker,” Josephine said.

  “But Emma is right,” Aleta added. “It’s the only way we save ourselves. And the city we call home.”

  “And how are we going to do that?”

  We turned and there stood Virginia, already dressed to the nines.

  “That’s the part we need to figure out I guess,” Josephine said. “I mean. Seriously. How is this going to work?”

  Calista rolled her eyes. “It’s like you’ve forgotten about Aleta. We have her. That’s our biggest advantage of all.”

  I was confused. As far as I knew, Aleta was strong in mind, but not so much in a physical way the way I was or Calista was.

  “Does she have something that can go against him?” I asked. “What are we in for here?”

  We all looked at Aleta who was standing next to Virginia now.

  “Might as well tell them, sweet child,” Virginia said to Aleta.

  “Tell us what?” Emma asked. Aleta closed her eyes, clearly in deep thought, the kind of thought where you’re not sure how to word something.

  “My advantage is that I’m Ezekiel’s weakness,” she said. “The only thing that could move him to let his guard down enough for us to strike.”

  “How are you his weakness?” I asked. “Is he in love with you or something?”

  Aleta shook her head, “Hardly. But he does care for me.”

  “Okay…” Emma and I both said in unison.

  “And why is that?” Emma asked.

  Aleta took a deep breath.

  “Because Ezekiel Walker is my brother.”

  THE END… FOR NOW

  Read the action-packed conclusion in CAROLINA CONJURING. I know cliffhangers are cruel, but I like to look at the Belles as being part of their own episodic journey. I promise, the ending will make the wait worth it!

  To find out when it releases, sign up for my newsletter. And to talk about all things Hell’s Belles and UF, join my reader group: The Secret Society of Hell’s Belles Readers.

  On the following pages read a sneak peek of a new series coming out Spring 2018, an Urban Fantasy adventure called A BOUQUET OF BOOKS… and MAGIC

  A BOUQUET OF BOOKS… and MAGIC

  Shifters and wizards and demons, oh my!

  Bookseller Violet Duncan acquires three mysterious ancient books that threaten to turn her entire world upside down. She finds herself at the center of a tug of war over artifacts of unimaginable power, and it will take all the cunning and muscle of her four mysterious guardians to keep her from falling prey to the dark forces that want to get their hands (and claws) on the magical books. When all seems lost, can love win the day?

  A reverse harem urban fantasy.

  ONE

  “Hey, Scott, did I miss anything interesting?” I asked.

  Scott was one of my employees at A Bouquet of Books.

  “If by ‘interesting’, you mean a paying customer, then no. If you mean a handsome stranger with a box of dusty old books, some of which I couldn’t even look for on Abe because they’re in a language I don’t recognize, then yes.”

  “Huh,” I replied, brilliantly. “Did you buy them?” AbeBooks.com was an invaluable resource to those of us in our business, a web site with encyclopedic listings of books and values.

  “He left them here and said he’d be back,” Scott answered. “I’ve gotten through most of them, but those few have me stumped. Now where’s my sandwich? I’m starving!”

  I opened my bag and pulled out Scott’s meatball sub. Business had been slow, and he’d reluctantly agreed to let me pay him a week late, becoming more enthusiastic when I sweetened the deal with an offer of free lunches all weekend.

  “Go eat, I’ll watch the front,” I offered, h
anging my cardigan on the back of a chair.

  “No chips or drink, I guess?” he asked.

  “Go into the fridge in my office and take whatever you want, there’s soda in there.”

  “Nothing diet, I’m sure,” Scott complained.

  “There’s water, too. Doesn’t get much more diet than that. Although maybe if you’d ordered the regular sub rather than the super you wouldn’t feel so guilty about drinking your calories,” I teased.

  “Okay, first of all, this,” Scott replied, holding up the giant sandwich, “is lunch and dinner. Second, I’m actually trying to attract a man.” He cocked his head and gave my ass a disapproving frown. I stuck my tongue out at him and he scurried to the break room in the back of the store, next to my office.

  I turned my back to the window and caught a reflection of my backside. I patted and lifted it, letting it drop back into place. Sure, I hadn’t been working out as religiously as I once had, but I didn’t think I looked that bad.

  My ten-year high school reunion over the summer had given me a bit of a confidence boost, after all. Three of the four varsity cheerleaders-slash-mean-girls from our senior class attended, and the decade since graduation had been unkind to two of them. They both looked like they may have eaten the missing pom pom girl, and one of them had suffered through a nose job that looked like it had been performed by a blind man. Krista Allen was still a knockout, but once the guys were done drooling over her, I’d gotten enough attention to make me feel like the belle of the ball, despite the twenty pounds I’d gained eating my stress since opening the store.

  A Bouquet of Books had been a dream since my best friend Rose and I met in third grade. We raced each other through everything on Mrs. Winterfelt’s bookshelf and then we attacked the library. While other girls in our class were into pop stars and Disney princesses, Rose Malone and Violet Duncan were known Babysitter Club superfans. We were obsessed.

  Books were our passion, and we’d beg our parents to take us to garage sales and used bookstores to fill the modest bookshelves in our bedrooms.

  It was Mrs. Malone, Rose’s mom, who first suggested the name that eventually hung on the sign outside our shop; A Bouquet of Books. After college, we poured ourselves into earning enough money to open our own used bookstore. Our plan was to have it up and running by my thirtieth birthday, one week after Rose celebrated her big three-oh. Things became accelerated, however, when Barney’s Books down in Charleston announced it was closing. Our parents loaned us enough cash to buy Barney’s entire inventory, for pennies on the dollar, and we found a space near downtown Summerville, our hometown. The location wasn’t ideal; a few blocks from Main Street rather than right in the midst of the hustle and bustle, but we knew we could make it work.

  The first year was difficult, learning on the fly what it meant to be in commerce and working long hours as co-owners and the only employees of our small business.

  When Rose’s husband received orders that he was being stationed in Japan, the Bouquet lost half its flowers, and I needed to hire an actual employee. Rose joked that I could only hire somebody with a flowery name, to which I replied that any applications from a “Daisy” or “Rhododendron” would receive special attention.

  I settled for Scott, an ex-accountant who’d had the foresight to throw some money into the early days of Bitcoin, enough to allow him to retire at thirty-eight. When he grew bored with idleness, he sought a stress-free job, more for distraction’s sake than for the money.

  He loved to read, and as a lifelong bachelor, he was available whenever I needed him. Since it seemed important to maintain a floral presence in the shop, I adopted a three-legged cat from the local shelter, and I named her Tulip. She was brown with white splotches, the fattest and laziest cat I’d ever known. A chipmunk got into the store once and Tulip couldn’t have been less bothered as Scott and I frantically chased it through the shop with brooms and wastebaskets, trying to corral or chase it from the store.

  “Excuse me, are you Violet?”

  A deep voice startled me from my reverie.

  From our front door hung a strand of bells which was theoretically supposed to alert us when our infrequent customers entered the store, but I’d heard nothing.

  I turned toward the counter and found myself eye to… well, eye to chest— truth be told— eye to broad, glorious, sculpted pecs, separated from me by only a light green t-shirt.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you,” the voice explained, and I craned my neck to meet his gaze. His eyes were so dark they were nearly black. He was well over six feet tall, maybe six-foot-six or seven, towering over me. He smiled warmly, extending an enormous hand, which completely engulfed mine as I shook it. “I’m Ethan, I came by earlier with some books, and the guy who was here told me I’d need to show them to you, that you were at lunch. Cool?”

  His voice, his muscles, his hair – I didn’t usually go for long hair on guys, but he had this thick mane of dark, wild hair that fell to his shoulders and it just suited him perfectly. If he’d just told me that he was there to throw me on the back of his bike and take me on the road with him and his motorcycle gang, and finished with “Cool?” the way he did, I think I probably would have just nodded my head, tossed the keys to the store to Scott, and been on my way out to Ethan’s Harley.

  Sadly, Ethan was only there to conduct business, and once I regained my composure, I mustered up my best business owner-voice and professional sheen. “Yes, Scott told me somebody had come by with some books. I’m sorry, I was at lunch earlier. I’d be happy to give you an appraisal or make you an offer.”

  “Hel-lo!” Scott said in a sing-songy voice, strolling up the center aisle from the back of the store to the counter, smiling broadly.

  Ethan grinned back at him. “Hey, bud. Any luck with my stuff?”

  “I checked on the Web, and I was pretty close, price-wise, on the ones I recognized,” Scott explained. “But a few of those books are nowhere to be found. I’m stumped. Three of them, the black one and the two green ones, aren’t even in any sort of language I can search for, so we’ll have to leave those to the boss, here.”

  “They came out of my uncle’s attic,” Ethan explained. “He passed away and I’m cleaning out his house over in Goose Creek. He didn’t have much money, so I’m trying to liquidate what I can so his nieces end up with something. He didn’t have any kids of his own.”

  I nodded. “Let me go back to the office and see what Scott was talking about. Maybe I’ll have some insight into the mystery books.”

  Scott was more than happy to be left alone with Ethan, so I walked back and sat down at my desk and started going through the stack. It was pretty typical, some Hemingway, a couple books by local favorite Pat Conroy, and some outdated travel guides. Nothing earth-shattering.

  In a separate pile, however, were the three mystery books Scott had referenced. They were thick, heavy articles; similar to old Bibles. The binding and craftsmanship marked them as timeworn and the paper felt like vellum, or lambskin. Certainly higher-end stuff than the Bouquet of Books typically peddled.

  The covers were somewhat plain, but the pages inside featured ornate illustrations and some of the pages were gilt-edged. The problem with them was that they were all written in a language, or languages, that were completely foreign to me. I saw no hints of the Roman alphabet, and none of it looked Cyrillic, either. I Googled examples of various Asian languages, Sanskrit, Swahili, and even Hieroglyphics, but the symbology just didn’t match up.

  I carried one of the two green books back to the register, where Scott and Ethan were chit-chatting.

  Plonking the heavy tome on the counter, I caught Ethan’s eye. “Sorry to let you down, but this one and it’s two brothers have me stumped. I’ll go twenty dollars for the rest, they’re things we can move quickly, but their condition isn’t the greatest.”

  “Can you go fifty?” he asked, bending down to rest his elbows on the glass countertop and grinning.

  I could go
seventy-five if you wanted to use the extra to take me to dinner, I thought as I mulled his counter-offer.

  “How about thirty?” I asked, and extended my hand to seal the deal. “And if you don’t mind, I’ll hold onto the other three to dig a little deeper. You can have them back anytime you want, but my curiosity is piqued; I’d like to run them by a few friends of mine. You could leave your number and I’ll let you know as soon as I find anything.”

  “Sold,” Ethan replied, and we shook hands again. Before we even broke our grip, Scott had a pen and paper in hand for Ethan to jot down his number. I handed over a twenty and ten, and our only customer loped out the door with a wave and disappeared down the street.

  I snatched the slip of paper from Scott’s hand. He’d been busily adding it to the address book in his personal phone. “I’m sure your interest in Ethan is purely professional, but…” I joked.

  “Oh, please, my dreams were dashed when Mister Tall, Dark, Handsome, and Muscly practically drooled watching you walk back to the office,” Scott rolled his eyes. “He’s straight as a string. And I bet he doesn’t care nearly as much about those books as he does your backside.”

  “Yeah, right,” I answered. “As. If.”

  I took some pictures of the books and sent them to Rose and some of our mutual acquaintances in the rare book world, but the best anybody could offer was that they’d share the pictures with other colleagues and get back to me if they got a hit.

  Scott had left after an afternoon with only a handful of customers, and we hadn’t even sold enough to make up the thirty dollars I’d taken from the till to buy Ethan’s collection. I was walking toward the front window to switch the “Open” sign to “Closed” when a slender man in a burgundy suit with graying temples and stylish glasses approached the door.