Lily jerked away. “No.”
Tears filled Camie’s mascara caked eyelashes. If the woman cried any more, underneath her eyes would look like a football players’ black grease they wear to reduce the sun’s glare.
“Your mom would help me. She’d forgive me.”
Low, but Camie was right. And she did like seeing the woman grovel a bit. “Fine.” Lily pushed her shoulders back and marched to the register for the pad and pen. “Give me the details of what she wants.”
***
“I’m stuffed.” Lily shook her head as Jarred offered her a bite of his spicy orange chicken. The Chinese restaurant, even at midday, was dimly lit with paper lanterns hanging from the ceiling. Crimson tablecloths covered the tables with white placemats with Chinese zodiac signs printed on them.
She pushed her plate away and examined the zodiac, finding hers, she laughed. “Guess this explains a lot. I’m a dragon. What are you?”
For a moment, he frowned at the paper. Did he think horoscopes were vain or silly? It was just fun to her. Nothing to take too seriously. When he glanced up, the light hit his eyes making them appear animal-like. She gasped, and he blinked, the reflective surface of his pupils disappearing.
“I was born in the year of the dog.” He leaned back, a cocky grin on his face. “Must be pretty fierce to be born under the dragon.” When the waiter arrived, he said, “Just the check, please.”
Was he embarrassed she had a stronger animal than he did?
“It says you’re loyal and protective.” She tilted her head to the side. “Did you have them write these up before we came here today?”
He winked and his fingers stroked the inside of her palm. “If I had, I’d have put you as a rabbit so I could explain why I want to chase you.” His voice was teasing.
A thrill raced through her on the idea. “If you could catch me.”
“Oh, I can run faster than a lot of people.” Playfully, his foot nudged hers under the table.
A blush heated her skin. “I may put you up to that one day.”
The waiter returned with their check and asked if she wanted to take anything home.
Thank you for lunch.” She waved off a to-go box. There wasn’t much left of her food anyway, and she needed to get back to the store.
“Any time.” His cell buzzed and, after glancing, a frown settled on his face. “I’ve got to go out of town on a case for a few days, but we’ll catch up and have dinner after that?”
“Sure. Everything okay?”
Leaving cash for their bill, he rose and held out his hand. She stood and they strolled outside.
“Yeah. Just something’s come up. I should be done in a few days.”
Snow tickled her nose outside, and she snuggled into his side for warmth as they walked to his Jeep. Still, something was bothering Jarred. His brow pinched as he drove her back to the ice cream shop. She pushed aside the nagging feeling sinking into her stomach as they drove.
“Looks like you’ve got a line.” Jarred nodded to the front of the store. Sure enough, a dozen girls in private school uniforms waited out front.
“Oh man, I’m five minutes late.” She hated letting down her customers. “Gotta go. I’ll call you later.” She gave him a quick hug, then hustled across the street.
The day whizzed by as Lily filled ice cream and cake orders. It was after ten p.m. before she locked the door and yawned. Usually, she closed the shop at nine, but she’d been steadily busy all day. If this kept up, she needed to hire help for even the winter months. Would Amanda like to help out part-time? She’d ask her friend tomorrow. Right now, she could barely keep her eyes open.
Upstairs, she fell across her bed, not caring that she hadn’t eaten dinner or showered. Soon, she drifted off to sleep. She dreamed of her aunts standing in the cold outside of the shop, rattling the door. They muttered about losing their key.
Lily jerked awake. Darkness filled her room, and she strained to listen. No sound at the door. Still, she padded downstairs and searched the doorway and the street for any sign of her aunts. Nothing. With a shrug, she climbed back upstairs and pulled her blanket over her head. She really needed to figure out what was causing these dreams and visions. Maybe it was stress. Whatever it was, it needed not to wake her up at one thirty-two in the morning.
***
Downstairs rattling woke Lily up and she groaned, blinking at her alarm clock. Five a.m. Who the hell needed ice cream this early? She yanked her pillow over her head to drown out the now banging on the ice cream shop’s door.
Whoever this was, she was going to let them have all her pre-coffee rage. She tossed her covers off and stomped downstairs.
“Do you’ve any idea of what time it is?” She yelled crossing the shop. Two figures in coats huddled by the door. “We don’t open until ten.” What if they were robbers? She stopped short, then shook her head. No, they probably wouldn’t knock.
One of the figures peeked through the window. Aunt Jess! Lily raced over and threw open the lock. She had them both in a hug before they could say a word.
She pulled back and noticed they were both super pale and shaking as though they hadn’t eaten in days or something.
“Oh, my God, what happened to you two? We’ve been trying forever to get hold of you!” Lily pulled back and her stomach sunk. Both her aunts had pale faces and appeared ill. How long had they been out here? “Come inside, you both must be freezing.”
“W-What’s happened?” Aunt Martha asked. “We had a bad feeling and flew back as soon as we could. There was a lot of… bureaucracy and we were… bumped from several flights on the way here.”
“I was so nervous,” Aunt Jessica rubbed her hands, “I couldn’t get the lock open… I mean I couldn’t find my key… I must have lost it.”
Just like her dream. Lily’s legs faltered, and she dragged a chair out. “You both might need to sit down.” She plopped into the chair before she fell. How was she going to explain everything and tell them her mom had died while they were away?
Chapter Seventeen
“You both have some explaining to do.” Lily wagged her finger at both of her aunts. “Where have you been?”
They looked at each other, their eyes widening, then at her. “Bahamas. You know that,” both said in unison.
“No, you couldn’t have been. Neither of you answered my text or voice messages, and even the police couldn’t locate you with their contacts overseas.”
Aunt Martha leaned against the wall beside the door as if using it to keep her from falling. “Police? What’s happened?”
“I knew something bad was happening.” Aunt Jessica’s face paled even whiter than the walls.
God, how was she going to tell them? “There was an accident… Mom fell.” She thought she’d cried so much already that she wouldn’t be able to cry more, but the tears fell anyway, hard and fast.
“Is she at the hospital?” Martha shook her head. “No, it’s worse than that, isn’t it?”
Lily faltered. How did they know? “She hit her head on the glass case… she died.” She took a shaky breath, tears still coursing down her face. “We had her funeral yesterday.”
Aunt Jess let out a strangled sob.
“What a horrible thing to joke about.” Martha glowered. “It’s not funny at all. Did your mom put you up to this?”
“It’s true.” Lily held out her hands. “Believe me, I wish upon everything in this world and the next that it wasn’t.” Her voice hitched. She would do anything to save her mom, even trade places with her if she could.
Shock and grief raced across her aunts’ faces. All three huddled together on the floor, hugging each other and crying. Why had her aunts not responded when she tried to reach them? Why now? And showing up like they were almost ill?
“I’ll fix you both some tea.” Lily wiped her eyes. Her aunts would need time to process this. To mourn. There would never be the four of them laughing and eating ice cream when a storm passed through and their tu
bs had melted. Never again would they sing along with the radio while her mom sung the wrong words while business was slow.
“Who did it?” Aunt Jess frowned, her brown eyes narrowing. “Who killed her?”
“W-What?” How did she know that? Wait, they said they had bad feelings…did they have visions too? Was it a hereditary thing? “How do you know it was a murder? I never mentioned that.”
Martha patted Lily’s shoulder. “It’s unbelievable that your mom would slip. You know, she was a dancer all through school.”
No, she hadn’t known that. Still, something about the look the two exchanged said there was more to the story than they were letting on. “What’s going on with you two? Yes, a guy shoved Mom because she wouldn’t sell and she slapped him. But why are you acting like you’re in a spy ring or something?”
“You were here when Betty fell?” Aunt Jessica’s shaky hand flew to her mouth. “Oh my poor thing. Was she conscious after she fell? Or no, it was instant wasn’t it?”
A shiver rolled through Lily and she took a faltering step backward. “I-I wasn’t here.”
“How did you know she slapped him?” Martha cocked her head. “Did he confess that? Seems strange that a killer wou—”
“Not exactly.” The words slipped out before she realized she’d spoken them aloud.
“Tell us.” Aunt Martha focused on her as if Lily were a bug she was debating to put into a jar or not.
Should she confide in them? They might call the lunatic society and have her committed.
Lily sunk down into the nearest chair. “It’s a long story.” She shivered and pushed down the sorrow that welled up inside her, threating to choke her. “Before Mom died, I had a horrible dream… and the feeling like I didn’t want to leave her alone. But everything was fine that day and I felt like I was being silly. The next day, while I was at Joe’s to get a part for the freezer, I got this vision of something bad happening to her.” Neither of her aunts said a word, but stared at her, unmoving. Lily rushed on, “I couldn’t get ahold of Mom. Not on the shop’s phone or her cell.” Her voice hitched. “I panicked and called the police, but by the time they got here, it was too late. She was dead just like my dream and vision.” Her body shook. “So am I crazy or what?”
“Honey, that’s terrible.” Jessica stepped forward, and pushed back Lily’s hair. “But sometimes people have weird dreams and call them premonitions. It’s just coincidence.”
No, it wasn’t. Lily shook off her aunt’s affection and stood. “I don’t believe that. It was too precise. The blood, the glass.” She gasped. “And the picture frame. In my dream it was broken exactly like it was at the crime scene.”
“Have you ever had these… dreams or visions before?” Martha leaned forward on the edge of her seat, her hands fisted in her lap.
“No.” Wait, that wasn’t entirely true. “Yes. When I first touched that picture frame at Michael’s store, I saw it shattered and blood everywhere.”
Her aunts exchanged a look she couldn’t discern.
“What? What is it?”
“We thought the gift skipped you.” Martha looked up at her. “We’d no idea it would manifest this late in your life. Usually it comes by your seventh birthday and when you showed no ability, we thought you were like your mother.”
“You mean you both have dreams and visions?” Maybe it was hereditary and she was a late-bloomer. “Why didn’t you tell me we have prophetic dreams? If I had known, I-I could’ve saved Mom. She’d be alive right now.” Sobs tore through her.
Jessica reached toward her, but Lily stepped backward.
“Don’t.” She pushed away. “Mom is dead because of your secrets. And what were you two doing that we couldn’t contact you? ‘Cause I’m pretty sure you weren’t in the Bahamas or anywhere near there.”
“We don’t have the gift of dreams or visions.” Martha sighed. “If I’m in the same room with someone, I can control their bodies. But only for two minutes.”
Jessica gave a soft smile. “I can move objects with my mind.”
Her aunts were crazy. And that meant Lily was going out of her mind too. Maybe that’s where they disappeared every winter and why they had no tans; they were at an asylum for medicine and counseling. All the years that she remembered them going and returning, they’d been tan. Had they done fake spray-on ones before this and she hadn’t noticed?
“You don’t believe us?” Jessica shook her head.
“Well,” Lily crossed her arms, “if you could move objects, why didn’t you unlock the door earlier?”
“I couldn’t. My nerves where frazzled from the ride back to the States and I felt like something was wrong.” She wiped the corners of her eyes. “I couldn’t concentrate enough to open it.”
Lily turned to her other aunt. “And you? Controlling people? I don’t believe it.” Suddenly, Lily’s arms unfolded and she marched to the register, pushing buttons. What the hell was going on? Her body wasn’t obeying her commands. It felt like she was sleepwalking, but she was wide awake. Almost as if she watched herself do these things, but had no control over them.
“Believe us now?” Martha tilted her head to the side.
“It’s a trick… like hypnosis or something.”
Aunt Jessica shook her head, then her brow furrowed as all the ice cream drums lifted out of the case and danced around for a few seconds before settling back down. “No, our gifts are real. And now you’ll come with us for training.”
“What training? Look, I don’t want anything to do with this stuff.” She wanted her Mom. “I’ve got college and…” a new boyfriend. Now wasn’t the time to bring him up.
“Lily,” Aunt Martha shuffled toward her as if afraid of what Lily would do, “you’re like us. We thought that you were just a human like your Mom, our sister, because you never displayed any abilities… until now.”
“Yes, we watched you.” Jessica nodded. “Even though your Mom was magicless, both your grandparents possessed abilities, along with your Dad, so we were surprised you didn’t show any…”
“Wait.” Lily held up a hand. This was news to her and her head was spinning. “My dad? No, he died in prison, remember? The bad guy that Mom fell for.”
“He was bad, but he’s in a magic prison.”
Lily stumbled back. “A-Are you saying he’s alive? All this time, my Dad’s alive?”
“Yes. Your mom agreed that we’d tell you part of the truth, him being in jail. She wanted to protect you from what she went through.”
“And what was that?” Dread coiled inside Lily’s gut like a cobra waiting to strike her down.
“Being a human in a family of witches.” Sympathy or some other similar emotion filled Martha’s face. “She wanted you to have a normal life without worrying about your Dad or magic or anything out of the ordinary from what a human girl would experience.”
“I-I’m a… a…” She couldn’t say it. It was insanity on crack.
“A witch.” Jessica finished for her.
“If I had this power, why wasn’t it enough to save my mom?” When she’d had the dream, she’d pushed it aside as silly when nothing had happened the next day. If she’d known she was having premonitions, real ones, her mom would still be alive.
“No,” Jessica’s eyes filled with tears. “It would’ve happened eventually.”
Lily refused to believe that. The future wasn’t set. It couldn’t be. Believing that meant believing that no one had any choices. No way to fix wrongs. She couldn’t help her mother, but Lily was going to learn all she could about her gift and how to use it to help others. She was going to become the best witch on the planet.
---End---
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
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