by Lucy Score
“Uhhhh, oh politics today. I mean can’t we all just agree we want everyone to be healthy, safe, educated, and not poor?” Eva shoved a forkful of salad into her mouth to prevent the necessity of answering any follow up questions.
She was generally an excellent liar. After all, she was the only sister never to be caught sneaking home after curfew. But a few run-ins with the good sheriff, and she couldn’t even string a plausible fib together.
“Forgive Eva, Donovan. She lives in her own little world half the time,” Franklin said with an indulgent wink in her direction.
“My world is lovely. Thank you very much,” Eva said, snagging her wine glass, grateful that no one actually knew where her little world had led her.
“We were discussing the Halloween Carnival,” Phoebe told her.
“Ooh! A carnival! That sounds like fun. Unless of course the whole planetary alignment thing turns out to be true. Then it would probably be a nightmare.”
Donovan gripped his spoon like it was a weapon. “I guess I’ll have to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
A man cocky enough to think he could realign planets? Eva liked that.
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Eva begged off dessert, already thinking about the time she’d need to spend in Gia’s yoga studio burning off her dad’s damn bread. Plus, she didn’t want to have an awkward exit with Donovan. She’d had enough of those encounters today and didn’t need to add fumbling with her car keys and accidentally backing into the big oak tree in the front yard to the list.
He’d been a nice addition to dinner, the handsome sheriff. He was clearly close with Phoebe, and his presence had added a sense of history to the cozy scene. Eva was still getting used to seeing her father happy, deliriously so.
When her mother had abandoned their family, Franklin had done his best to hide his pain from Eva and her sisters. He shopped for prom dresses and tampons. He made every parent-teacher conference and soccer game. He’d consoled them when boys had broken their hearts and cheered with them at graduations and weddings.
He had found a solid, loving partner in Phoebe, and there were few things in the world that gave Eva more pleasure than listening to her father’s new wife laugh until she couldn’t breathe at one of his admittedly corny jokes.
She dug her keys out of her bag and—in juggling the plastic container of leftovers and her oversized purse—dropped them on the ground.
“Crap,” she muttered. Stacking purse and leftovers on the roof of her car, she blindly felt around on the ground until her fingers brushed her oversized keyring.
“Aha!” She rose triumphantly and smacked her elbow off her side mirror. “Son of a—”
“Car trouble, ma’am?” Donovan’s shadow, cast from the porch light, fell over her.
“No, officer. Everything is just fine.” Nerves played over her skin as he took another step closer.
“Have you been drinking, ma’am?”
“You sat next to me and watched me drink exactly one point five glasses of wine, Sheriff. And it’s dark out here, so let me verbalize the fact that I’m rolling my eyes at you in case you missed it.”
“I’m going to need you to walk over and back to that tree. Straight line, please.” The serious sheriff was playing with her. And that only made Eva want to play right back. She sauntered first, then strutted, and when she reached the tree, she got a running start and landed a perfect one-handed cartwheel followed by a curtsy.
“Smartass,” he teased.
“Shameful. Wasting the taxpayers’ money interrogating poor little old me,” Eva tsked, tugging her ponytail back into place.
“I get the feeling that an interrogation with you would get me nowhere,” he predicted.
“I have no idea what you mean by that.” She knew exactly what he meant by that.
“You’re sneaky. You’re distracting. I bet you lie really well.”
“And you can tell all this from dinner with my parents?” Eva asked.
“I like that you call Phoebe your parent,” he said, switching gears, his voice softer.
“If I could have handpicked a wife for my dad, it’s that woman in there,” Eva said pointing back at the house.
“They seem happy together. I haven’t seen her this happy in a long time.”
She smiled up at him. “I was just thinking the same thing about my dad. I love seeing him like this. It’s like all his dreams finally came true.”
“It’s a shame that you don’t feel like you can open up to them,” Donovan said casually.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Eva’s guard came up with her chin.
“Can’t even admit that you got taken out by a cabinet door.”
“Oh, that.” She breathed a sigh of relief. “And, hey! Who’s the sneaky one now?” Eva crossed her arms.
He grinned at her, and even in the dark, it was blinding.
“Fine. It’s just yet another oops in a long line of distracted accidents that only serves to reinforce their opinion that I’m the klutzy baby of the family.”
“You are the baby,” he reminded her.
“I’m the youngest. There’s a difference. I’m still an adult. I just don’t pay as much attention as I should. I’m in my own head too much.”
“So they think you need a keeper.” His tone made it clear that he agreed with her family.
“If anyone needs a keeper, it’s Gia. She can’t find Lydia’s diaper bag or her car keys on any given day of the week.”
“Gia has a keeper. Beckett. Who do you have?” Donovan’s voice had that rough edge to it that sent delicious chills up her spine.
“I’m still interviewing for the position,” she told him, looking up through her lashes. They were closer than she realized. She could just reach out and touch him…
He leaned in, stopping just inches from her face. Her breath caught and her body revved in anticipation.
“Good to know,” he said quietly. And just when she thought he was going to kiss her, Donovan reached for the door handle and opened her car door. “Drive safely. Good night, Evangelina.”
Oh, sweet Jesus. Her full name from those sinfully perfect lips? She was pretty sure her underwear had just incinerated. She was just going to melt into a puddle of lust right here in her parents’ front yard. She let out the breath she was holding and carefully slid under his arm and into the driver’s seat. “Good night, Sheriff.”
He shut the door once she was in place and watched her pull down the drive. Eva waited until she was sure he couldn’t see her before smacking her head against the back of the seat. “That. Was. Hot.”
It was only nine, she thought, looking at the dashboard clock. With inspiration like this she should probably put in a few more hours of work.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Charisma Champion breezed into the police station in a cloud of eucalyptus and thick, black hair. Bangles jingled on her wrist as she waved at Minnie. She wore a linen poncho in pale purple over a long skirt, managing to look both ethereal and disheveled. She hadn’t aged a day since Donovan had graduated high school.
“Ms. Champion,” Donovan said, switching his coffee to his left hand to greet her.
“Please, it’s been more than a decade since I was grading your papers. Call me Charisma,” she insisted with a grand gesture.
“Charisma then,” Donovan agreed, waving toward his office. “Thanks for coming in. I could have come to you.”
“But then I wouldn’t have been able to get a substitute for my Intro to Wool class and stop for a latte at Overly Caffeinated, now would I?” she said wiggling her coffee cup, eyes sparkling.
And since she’d walked past half the businesses in town to get to the police station, tongues would be buzzing with speculation.
“Well, thanks for making time for me,” Donovan said, settling in behind his desk. “I appreciate it.”
“I must say. A fire yesterday, and you calling me in for questioning? It�
��s rather exciting!”
“It’s related to the fire,” Donovan began.
Her eyes lit up. “Am I a suspect? How thrilling!”
Donovan shook his head. “Not at all, unless you have something you’d like to confess.” He was joking but cut her off when Charisma tapped her finger to her chin and began to think back on whatever mysterious transgressions she’d committed. “I just wanted to ask you a few questions as a consultant.”
He wondered if he was the first sheriff to use an astrologist to prevent calamity.
Charisma interlaced her fingers over her knee and leaned forward. “Do tell.”
“Do you recall anything strange happening in town back in the late eighties?”
“My dear sheriff, strange things happen here every day,” she laughed.
“True. But I’m thinking of several strange things. Around the same time?” he prompted.
“Oh, you mean when Uranus and Pluto crossed? That was quite the debacle, wasn’t it?”
“Was it?”
Charisma rose from her seat and approached his whiteboard, the lower portion of which was covered with stick drawings and crudely scrawled words like “fart” and “booger” from Aurora’s last visit.
“May I?” Charisma asked, gesturing with the eraser.
“By all means.”
She wiped part of the board clean and picked up the marker, slipping into teacher mode. “Here we have our solar system,” she said, drawing a series of circles. “And here are our planets.”
“Question. I thought Pluto was reclassified as a dwarf planet?”
Charisma snorted. “Science and astrology may share certain characteristics, but in the astrology community, Pluto is still Pluto, and its characteristics are still its characteristics. May I continue?”
“By all means.”
She turned back to the board. “Each planet affects or ‘rules’ specific aspects of our lives. Hence why people born under different ‘signs’ have different personality traits.”
Donovan was following her so far. The Monthly Moon dedicated an entire page to astrological signs every month.
“These planets are obviously not static. They’re constantly moving. Some slower than others.” Charisma began drawing arrows for motion. “The further out the planet, the slower it travels.”
So far so good, Donovan thought, picking up his coffee.
“In 1987, we experienced some seismic spiritual shifts, shall we say, when Uranus crossed Pluto.” She scribbled more circles and added a few x’s. The board was starting to look like an offensive line play.
Donovan rubbed the back of his neck. “Okay. What do Uranus and Pluto rule?”
She grinned at him like a prize student. “Very good question. Uranus rules qualities of change and originality. Whereas, Pluto rules power and transformation. When they crossed in 1987, the angle of the earth was perfectly aligned for a direct hit on Blue Moon”
That sounded implausible and very, very bad.
“So, what exactly happens when these planets cross?”
Charisma scribbled three blobs within circles and a triangle. “They magnify the effects of each other. Change and transformation becomes monumental rather than small shifts. Add in originality and power? That’s a big time strong, creative push to change.”
“So, it’s possible people might feel compelled to do things that are generally out of character?”
“Exactly!” She jabbed the marker in his direction.
“How often does this crossing happen?” Donovan asked.
“Every fifteen years,” she said.
“Why didn’t we experience the same thing fifteen years ago?”
Charisma went back to the board. “I’d have to check some resources, but my guess is the planets crossed at another time of year when the angle of the earth to the sun was different. Someplace else in the southern hemisphere probably went crazy that time.”
“So, it’s possible that we could be looking at another 1987?” Donovan clarified.
“More than possible. Highly probable.” Charisma didn’t look scared. She looked like she was thrilled at the possibility. “Let me do some research in the school’s meteorology/astrology lab so I can tell you definitively whether that’s what we’re looking at.”
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Donovan didn’t need Charisma’s chipper “it’s happening” email that afternoon to tell him what he already knew. Chaos, or at least the beginning edges of its stormy presence, had officially taken up residence in Blue Moon.
His mother had called him back and effectively scared the shit out of him. Hazel had pointed him in the direction of a locked file drawer in the station’s storage room. When he’d opened it with the key he hadn’t known was taped under one of his desk drawers, he’d felt the first tickles of panic.
The drawer was full of neatly typed and filed police reports all centering around October 1987. At one point, the doorless cells had become so overcrowded, Hazel had to start remanding prisoners into the custody of the head librarian who opened the doors of the library to accept detainees until they could bond themselves out.
“Do you want us to come home?” Hazel had offered.
“No, Mom. I know you guys have another camping trip planned. I’ve got two deputies and Minnie. How bad could it be?” he’d insisted.
If he had half a brain, he should have called her back and begged her to come home. The rest of his morning was spent fielding a series of bizarre calls. He was on his way back to the station after helping old man Carson find the lawnmower he swore had been stolen when he dialed Minnie.
“Find the mower?” Minnie answered.
“Under a tarp next to his back porch. Carson swears he never parks it there.”
“Vandals or old age?” Minnie asked.
Judging by the years-old tire ruts the tractor was parked in, Donovan’s best guess was old age.
“This is just the beginning of it, isn’t it?” he asked.
Minnie gave a mirthless laugh. “Oh, honey. Ain’t seen nothing yet.”
Donovan sighed. “We’d better put a call out to the team.”
Over hoagies from Righteous Subs, Donovan did his best to go over Charisma’s scribblings with his team in the conference room. True to Blue Moon standards, the station’s conference and mediation room was five times the size of the “prisoner holding area,” which was basically two glorified cubicles with cots instead of desks. The town’s founding mothers and fathers felt that mediation and education would be more effective than jail. And in most cases, their theory held true.
Layla pointed at the board with the remaining stump of her loaded veggie sub. “I get all the planetary circle crap, but where do the farts and boogers come in?” she asked.
“If you’re not going to take this seriously—” Donovan began, erasing Aurora’s artwork.
“We take farts and boogers very seriously,” Colby assured him. Colby, shaggy and blond, often reminded Donovan of a scarecrow in the field. Big smile, fuzzy tufts of hair, and a scrawny build usually hidden under flannel and denim.
“Ha,” Donovan said humorlessly. “Now, can we get back to figuring out how we’re going to ride this thing out without any loss of life or serious maiming?”
“Yes, boss,” they both nodded.
Minnie rolled her eyes. “Exactly how long is this thing supposed to last?” she asked.
“One month. It should come to a head on Halloween night and then dissipate or stop or whatever the hell planets do.”
That shut them all up. Colby dropped his bacon and bacon back onto the wrapper. “Well, hell.”
Donovan nodded. “My sentiments exactly. Halloween is one of the busiest nights for our department normally. With this thrown in, we could be looking at some serious trouble. Which is why we’re deputizing Minnie and working out two-man shift coverage until this nightmare is over.”
Minnie clapped her hands together. “Do I
get a badge and a gun?”
“You can have a badge and pepper spray,” he told her.
“How about a stun gun? I can test it on my husband to make sure it works.”
“No stun gun. And don’t test the pepper spray on Mr. Murkle either,” Donovan clarified.
Layla swore under her breath. “Come on guys. No planets are gonna break us,” she said, rallying their little team.
Donovan liked her delusional confidence.
“So, what’s the next step?” Colby asked.
“We call a town meeting and educate everyone on the fact they’re about to turn into certifiable idiots.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“This is so much better than the movies,” Emma Merill-Vulkov sighed, happily mowing down her carrot and celery hummus snack from the movie theater’s concession stand.
Eva laughed at her sister. They had commandeered worn seats in the Art-Deco theater’s middle section to make sure they wouldn’t miss any of the action. The screen was hidden behind dusty, crushed velvet curtains guaranteeing all attention would be on the podium front and center.
Emma’s husband Niko was down front in the theater, his camera at the ready. The fashion photographer and reformed ladies’ man had fallen hard for Emma and her adopted town and documented their time spent here in their gorgeous home. As a side hobby, he also fed human interest shots to Summer Pierce for her Blue Moon blog on Thrive’s website. Outsiders loved the blog.
“I freaking love this town so hard,” Eva told her sister.
“Isn’t it a thousand times better than bumming around the east coast?” Emma agreed.
Eva winced thinking about her last shitty apartment in the last crappy town she’d hidden away in. No matter how carefully she’d covered her tracks, her past had always come knocking. She only hoped that the past would be smart enough to stay far away from Blue Moon.
Gia flopped into the seat next to Eva. “Sorry I’m late. Evan weaseled an extra ten bucks out of me for babysitting duty for Aurora and Lydia, even though Lydia’s already asleep. ‘Negotiating’ he called it. I had to find and raid Beckett’s petty cash.”