The vibe in the room was somber. Edgar sat on one of the couches, Aunt Gretchen sleeping soundly with her head on his shoulder. Jack paced in the far corner of the room.
And Kieran stood before the fireplace, gazing into the flames. He turned when she walked in, then immediately straightened.
He strode over to her and held out a hand. The memory of him staring at her with unadulterated rage while magic clutched at her neck came back to her. She placed a hand to her sore throat. This man, even if he was changed now, had tried to kill her. He’d almost succeeded. His face would be burned into her memory for a long time, if not forever.
Frowning, he dropped his hand to his side. “I know there’s nothing I can say to fix anything I did. I don’t expect forgiveness. I don’t deserve it. But please know I will be forever grateful to you for releasing me from that. I’ve been a prisoner in my own mind and body since birth.”
She stared at him for a long time, searching his face for some sign of malice or deceit. Finding none, she said, “You’re welcome.”
“And I wanted to be the one to tell you that I will be turning myself over to Chief Brown for the murder of Wilma Bennett,” Kieran said, lightly wringing his hands. “I realize I’m setting myself to go from one prison to another, but at least in this new one, my mind will be my own.”
Movement on the couch caught Amber’s eye. Edgar had moved Gretchen off his shoulder and propped her up against the couch’s back.
He approached the group and said to Amber, “Chief Brown is expecting us. I called him a couple hours ago. We’re taking everybody back to town. You and Gretchen need to see a doctor, and Kieran here needs to go to the station. We’ve only got one working car—Gretchen’s—which is still parked out near the woods. Kieran here destroyed yours and Old Blue Eyes.”
Amber cocked a brow at him.
“My old truck. Blew them both to smithereens.”
Well, that was going to be a problem.
Edgar glanced behind him at Jack who was still pacing on the other side of the room. “I think you need to talk to lover boy, cousin.”
Amber sighed, glancing that way, too.
“We’ll give you some privacy,” Willow said. “I’ll keep an eye on Kieran while Edgar fetches the car.”
And then suddenly Amber was alone with her snoring aunt, and a man she really hadn’t wanted to scare away so soon. Steeling herself, she walked over.
He had been so lost in his own head that he truly seemed startled to see her when he finally heard her approach. His bottom lip shook and he pulled her into a sudden, fierce hug.
Amber bit back a yelp of pain.
He quickly released her. “Crap. Sorry. I forgot. Well, no, I didn’t. I … I’m glad you’re okay. I mean, mostly okay.”
“I just need some rest,” she said, trying to muster up a reassuring smile for him.
“I saw it, you know,” he said, after a brief beat of awkward silence. “I woke up in that room and I looked out the window and I saw it. I saw what he did to you. That Kieran guy,” Jack said, his voice shaky and words coming out in a rush as if they’d all been lined up and waiting patiently in his mouth so he could set them loose the moment he saw her. “I can’t unsee that. I know they said he’s different now. Changed from whatever you did to him. But he almost killed you, Amber, and I can’t stop seeing it.”
Her eyes welled with tears. She didn’t know what to tell him. Didn’t know how to make him feel better because she would be reliving this for a while, too. But at least she’d known magic and witches were real before tonight. Jack hadn’t.
His voice was low and biting and desperate when he softly said, “Can you take it away?”
Brow furrowed, she shook her head. “What do you mean? Take what away?”
“What I saw. Can you make me forget?”
“How much of it do you want to forget?”
“All the …” He waved his hand vaguely in the air. “All the magic. I don’t want to know this kind of thing exists. I want to go back to flirting with you at Purrcolate—back when this was simpler.”
Amber’s shoulders slumped. She didn’t know why she was so heartbroken over this. Perhaps because he looked completely wrecked and she was the one who’d broken him.
“I can do it,” came a voice from behind.
Amber turned to find her aunt watching them from the couch. Amber wondered how long she’d had been listening in.
Jack immediately headed for Gretchen, her words a magnet, but then backed up a couple steps so he could face Amber. He took in her disheveled appearance, her bruised neck, her undoubtedly sad eyes. “I’m sorry.”
The way his voice broke on the last word was almost enough to break her, too.
Amber watched as Jack walked to her aunt and sat beside her. Once he confirmed this is what he wanted, Gretchen’s gaze found Amber’s.
“And are you okay with this, little mouse?” she asked, frowning.
Amber took in Jack’s disheveled appearance and his sunken, haunted eyes. “It’s his choice, not mine.”
She started across the room, tears running down her face; she knew this was likely the best choice for Jack. This was the reason she didn’t get involved with non-witches. Jack proved she had been right about that, no matter what Willow tried to say to convince her otherwise. As she stepped over the threshold, the first spoken words of a memory-erase spell rang in her ears.
Epilogue
Connor Declan spun lazily in his desk chair. Every few seconds, the bright glow of his laptop—the cursor blinking incessantly on a blank page—would appear in his vision before he rotated away again.
“Bro!” Wesley said. “Can we please go out tonight? This is my last night in town and you’ve paid more attention to your laptop than you have to me. I cannot—can not—go hang out with my sister and her goofy husband again, bro. I will lose my mind. Let’s go stare at some foxy ladies instead of you staring at your computer and me staring at the side of your head.”
Connor stopped spinning so he could focus on his friend. His friend who was now sprawled out in the middle of Connor’s living room floor, arms and legs spread wide as he did his best impression of a starfish.
“Isn’t that fashion show thing over already?” Wesley asked the ceiling. “What are you even working on now?”
It took Connor a bit of internal debate before he spoke. He hadn’t voiced much of this out loud. “You hear about what happened out at Edgar Henbane’s place?”
“Duh,” said Wesley, who had yet to move from his splayed-out position. “Everyone’s heard about it. Not every day a pack of kids from this boring little town ransack and vandalize a dude’s house. They set his and Amber’s car on fire, bro. You know I love a good arson story.”
Connor rolled his eyes. “Doesn’t that story seem a little odd to you? Why would kids go way out there to do that? It’s not like the house is easy to get to; you have to know it’s there to find it. No witnesses. No kids in town talking about it. And then the same night that happens, some guy comes out of the woodwork to confess to the murder of that maid? Did you hear someone saw Edgar Henbane drop the murderer off at the station?”
That made Wesley sit up. “Wait, really? They knew each other?”
Connor shrugged. “I don’t know. And then that ‘insect attack’ at the fashion show? More BS. Something weird is happening around here, Wes. And I hate to say it, but Amber Blackwood is tied to this stuff one way or another most of the time.”
“Willow’s foxy sister?” Wesley asked, then blew a raspberry at Connor. “What are you even saying? What do you think she’s up to?”
“I don’t know yet,” Connor said. “But I was talking to Heather Miller yesterday about what she saw during the supposed insect incident, and somehow we got on the topic of the Blackwoods. She said she had this really weird experience over at Mews and Brews where she was in the bathroom at the same time as this blonde woman she’d never seen before. She leaves, and the second—I mean the very
second—she leaves the bathroom, the woman locks the door. Heather had forgotten her cell in there, so she kind of loitered around outside for a while, thinking maybe the woman needed privacy. The door unlocks, Heather goes to open it, and bam—who does she see? Amber Blackwood.”
Wesley blinked at him.
“Different hair, eye color, clothing …” Connor said. “The blonde had been the only other person in there.”
“Wig? Contacts?” Wesley asked.
Connor shook his head. “Heather said it was like it was two different people. Even their voices were different.”
Wesley stared at Connor for a long moment, then laughed. “Bro. What are you even saying? You think Amber is a shapeshifter or something?”
Well, it sounded ludicrous when put that way. Connor sighed.
Maybe Wesley was right. Maybe Connor had been working too hard; the fashion show had ended up being his most involved Edgehill story to date. A break wasn’t a terrible idea. He reached forward and slapped his laptop closed.
“Sippin’ Siamese?” Connor asked.
Wesley hopped to his feet, clapped twice, and then pointed finger guns at Connor. “That is what I’m talking about!” Then he darted off toward the back of the apartment, presumably to change.
Still, even as Wesley’s incredulous laugh echoed in Connor’s head, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was onto something here—something big.
Resolve solidified in his chest. Something about Amber Blackwood was off—it always had been. He’d chalked it up in the past to her being the older, mysterious sister to the girl he’d had a thing for since freshman year. But he’d had little niggling thoughts about her lurking in the back of his mind for as long as he’d known her. After the last two months, those thoughts and whispered rumors he’d heard for years were becoming harder to ignore.
As he pulled on his jacket and cowboy boots and followed a cheerful Wesley out of his apartment, Connor smiled to himself.
He had his next story.
And her name was Amber Blackwood.
About the Author
Melissa has had a love of stories for as long as she can remember, but only started penning her own during her freshman year of college. She majored in Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology at UCDavis. Yet, while she was neck-deep in organic chemistry and physics, she kept finding herself writing stories in the back of the classroom about fairies and trolls and magic. She finished her degree, but it never captured her heart the way writing did.
Now she owns her own dog walking business (that’s sort of wildlife related, right?) by day … and afternoon and night … and writes whenever she gets a spare moment. The Microsoft Word app is a gift from the gods!
She alternates mostly between fantasy and mystery (often with a paranormal twist). All her books have some element of “other” to them … witches, ghosts, UFOs. There’s no better way to escape the real world than getting lost in a fictional one.
She lives in Northern California with her very patient boyfriend and way too many pets.
Her debut novel, The Forgotten Child, released in October of 2018, and the first book in the Witch of Edgehill series, Pawsitively Poisonous, released in June of 2019. Audiobooks are now available for both.
You can find out more about her upcoming books at: https://melissajacksonbooks.com
Acknowledgments
As always, I have to thank my growing beta-reader army. Love you guys! Thank you, Mom, Krista Hall, Margarita Martinez, Brandon Moore, Christiane Loeffler, Jennifer Laam, Lauren Sprang, Garrett Lemons, Lindsey Duga, Tristin Milazzo, Julianna Taylor, Jacynthia West, Jasmine Warren, Kara Klemcke, April Newton, Sophia Arnold, Bobby Lewis, Mary Studebaker, Samantha Lierer, Kimberly Ann Shepard, Kirsty Lawson, Jesika Olson, and Stefan Anders. And thanks again to Courtney Hanson for your epic cheerleader skills. SSDGM forevah.
Thank you, Maggie Hall, for these colorful, witchy covers. I want to come up with a new series idea ASAP if only so you can design more covers for me.
Thanks to Michelle Raymond for the cat-filled formatting. And for dealing with my neuroses. You’re a saint.
Thank you to Justin Cohen for being such a great nitpicky proofreader. You’re so lightning quick and fun to work with.
Thank you to Drew Clark for the lovely family tree. It was great fun working with you and I hope we can do so again.
Brittany and Chad. Thank you, of course, for your voice and your time and all that. The thing I’m truly grateful for is the cat puns. Chad, you’re a cat-pun master. Keep ’em coming!
Thank you to Sam for putting up with my crazy writing (and editing) hours. Thank you for taking care of the domestic stuff and helping me hold down the business. Thank you for the Overcooked! breaks even though it fills us both with rage. You’re still my favorite, I like your face, and I love you to bits.
Finally, thank you to my readers! Whether this is your first book of mine or your third, I’m so glad I get the opportunity to share my stories with you. I’ll see you back in Edgehill in December, 2019!
Thank you for reading Pawsitively Cursed! If you enjoyed this story, please consider leaving a review. Reviews mean the world to authors. Reviews often mean more sales, and more sales means more freedom to write more books.
Out now: Pawsitively Poisonous
Now available as an audiobook, too!
Continue the series with:
Pawsitively Secretive – coming December 2019
Pawsitively Swindled – coming March 2020
Pawsitively Betrayed – coming June 2020
Other books by Melissa Erin Jackson:
If you’re looking for a slightly darker tale, consider The Forgotten Child, a haunting paranormal mystery starring a reluctant medium.
The dead can speak. They need her to listen.
Ever since Riley Thomas, reluctant medium extraordinaire, accidentally released a malevolent spirit from a Ouija board when she was thirteen, she’s taken a hard pass on scary movies, haunted houses, and cemeteries. Twelve years later, when her best friend pressures her into spending a paranormal investigation weekend at the infamous Jordanville Ranch—former home of deceased serial killer Orin Jacobs—Riley’s still not ready to accept the fact that she can communicate with ghosts.
Shortly after their arrival at the ranch, the spirit of a little boy contacts Riley; a child who went missing—and was never found—in 1973.
In order to put the young boy’s spirit to rest, she has to come to grips with her ability. But how can she solve a mystery that happened a decade before she was born? Especially when someone who knows Orin’s secrets wants to keep the truth buried—no matter the cost.
Available at Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, and iBooks. Now available as an audiobook, too!
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