Jessica
Milk is sacred to Gaia. Like the Mother Goddess, milk comforts and it calms. Drink milk to soothe and to fall asleep at night—but use caution. Like Gaia, milk can also harm.
Goody Fletcher, Book of Useful Household Tips
We ate our lasagna from cereal bowls in front of the fire instead of on the Limoges plates at the dining table.
It worked out great. Casual dining nearly always does—especially when you’ve already seen the other person naked and made them orgasm a bunch of times.
And honestly, my dining room chairs aren’t really that comfortable anyway.
I still couldn’t convince him to tell me who he actually worked for, though. I could barely even get him to tell me what he did for a living.
“So do you get paid to do this?” I asked him much later, as he climbed into my bed. Yes, I’d lured him into my bedroom. All it had taken was a nonchalant mention that I had ordered one of those mattresses that came out of a box, and that it was king-sized and supercomfortable, and that he should try it.
He did.
“Sleep with women?” He was sitting on the edge of my new mattress, giving it a few experimental bounces. Pye had, of course, followed him up the stairs, and now sat on the edge of the bed giving his paws a wash.
“No. Travel to small towns to help save them from demonic ruin.”
That actually earned a rare laugh from him. “Oh. Sort of.”
He evidently liked my bed, however, since he lifted his feet onto it, pulled my duvet up over his wide, bare shoulders, and sank his head into my pillows (in deference to the power of nine, there were exactly that many of them, each of varying degrees of fluff).
“I agree,” he said, stifling a yawn. “This is surprisingly comfortable.”
“I know, right?” I lay down beside him. I’d completely redone my room from when I’d been a girl, changing the pink to muted tones of seafoam and getting rid of all the Fiona Apple posters. It was a temple to serenity now. “So do you sort of go around saving small towns from demonic ruin full-time?”
My room was so serene now, it apparently put my sex partners immediately to sleep—at least this one, who’d been well-satiated by me—since his eyes had drifted closed. “Pretty much,” he murmured.
I rose up on one elbow to jab a finger at his naked chest. “Are you serious? What are you, some kind of paranormal handyman?”
“Exactly.” I couldn’t tell if he was kidding, or even if he was awake. His eyes were still closed. Then he rolled over onto his side—being careful, I noted, not to jostle Pye, who’d predictably curled up at his feet. “Lots to do tomorrow,” he muttered.
“Seriously?” I sat up. Unlike him, I was wide-awake. “This is what you do for a living? You travel around to different towns, helping them out of otherworldly jams?”
He murmured something. It was hard to tell what because his head was buried in so many pillows, and he was drifting off to dreamland. But it sounded to me like a Yes.
I couldn’t believe it. “And you get paid for it?” When he didn’t respond, I nudged him in the shoulder. “Hey. I’m asking you a question. Do you seriously get paid for this? Because if so, can I get paid, too? I think it’s only fair, since I’m the Chosen One. Who do I talk to about that?”
But he was out like a light.
Which I guess I could understand, given that he’d spent the last few days sleeping in his car, showering at the gym, and attempting to protect me from malevolent attack. I was pretty tired myself and, knowing tomorrow I had to finish up the hems of all the dresses I still hadn’t delivered for the ball, plus train Esther to battle the forces of evil, I crept into the bathroom to brush my teeth, trying not to wake him.
Fortunately my phone was still on vibrate, so when Dina’s text came, he didn’t hear it.
LegalBeagle: Mark and I drove by your house to make sure you were all right and none of your lights were on. Are you okay? Did that guy give you a sleeping potion and steal all your stuff?
Thank God they’d driven by after Derrick and I had made love—or possibly during—or they’d have gotten quite an eyeful through the windows. I wrote back:
I’m fine! We just went to bed early.
This wasn’t a lie . . . except the bed part. I wondered if Derrick would wake up with rug burns from when I’d pinned him to the floor and straddled him.
LegalBeagle: TOGETHER?????
After sending me so many eggplant emojis, she was shocked I’d actually taken her advice? I texted her several devil face emojis in reply. She responded with flaming hearts.
Grinning down at my phone, I came out of my bathroom to a sight that stopped me in my tracks: a naked man sleeping in my bed, my duvet half on, half off him, my cat curled between his legs, purring like mad.
There really wasn’t anything hotter than a guy sleeping shirtless with a cute cat curled up next to him.
Except maybe a guy who made breakfast the next morning. Though I would have appreciated it if he’d waited a few hours later to do it.
“What are you doing?” I asked, after I woke to the sound of my coffee grinder churning and came downstairs to find him in black sweats and a low, messy ponytail in my kitchen.
He beamed at me like I was the most beautiful sight in the world in my bedhead, pajamas, and robe. “Making coffee. Want some?”
I pointed toward the windows. “It’s still dark outside.”
“It’s morning. I thought you might want some breakfast.” He wasn’t only making coffee. He was making toast, as well as frying bacon and eggs. The smell had hit me as soon as I staggered down the stairs.
“I know it’s technically morning,” I said. “And don’t get me wrong, I’m a big fan of breakfast.” I was an even bigger fan of men making breakfast for me in my own kitchen after having defiled my body half the night, although to be honest this was the first time it had ever happened. “But don’t people normally eat after the sun rises?”
“I just went for a run.” He smiled, poured a cup of coffee, then walked over to hand it to me, slipping the mug into my hand and landing a kiss on my cheek. “I put a Nordic protection spell around the house while I was gone, though, so you were never in danger.”
“Oh, a Nordic protection spell. Thank God, you had me worried.”
His smile widened at my sarcasm. “Hungry?”
“I am,” I admitted, then put down the cup and headed straight for my electric kettle. “It’s just that I normally eat at a more civilized hour.”
He looked puzzled. “What’s a more civilized hour?”
“After the sun is up?”
The smile disappeared, and he went back to looking like his normal doom-foretelling self. It was hard to believe that stern face had been buried between my legs last night, sending me to the heights of ecstasy. “We can’t afford such a late start.”
“Oh, no.” I’d filled the electric kettle and turned it on. “Don’t tell me there’s more wolf hunting on the agenda.”
“No. But there are a lot of other things we need to get done.”
“Like what? We can’t pull Esther out of school and start training her in the art of the Craft, much as she’d doubtlessly enjoy that. I’m pretty sure her parents would object. And Sal’s not exactly a believer, so he isn’t about to write her a pass.”
“Right.” He took jam and butter from my refrigerator and set them out on the pass-through. “But before we even get to that, we need to secure this place.”
“Secure it? Your Nordic protection spell isn’t enough?”
He ignored me. “I have to fix all of your windows so they actually open, and install a security system that works against humans as well as supernatural forces.”
I blinked at him. “You want the windows to open? I thought you were worried about people breaking in.”
“I am, but it’s just as big a problem if you can’t get out. What are you going to do if there’s a flood?”
“Open the door and leave like a normal person.”
“And what if the door is blocked by detritus?”
“Can we not talk about detritus before I’ve had my morning caffeine?” I poured hot water from my electric kettle into a teacup. “It’s really a downer.”
“You don’t drink coffee?”
“Of course I do. But every cottage witch knows you’re supposed to drink a cup of Earl Grey tea first thing in the morning.” When he only looked at me blankly, I explained, “Earl Grey has bergamot in it. Bergamot is a type of orange grown in Bergamo, Italy, that for centuries has been thought to promote prosperity and success. And I think so, too, because ever since I started drinking it, the shop’s done really well.” I poured a generous dollop of milk into my tea, then took a big gulp. “Maybe it will help defeat demonic rifts, too.”
Derrick looked skeptically down at the tea. “I think you’re wrong.”
“About bergamot helping to defeat demonic rifts?”
“No.” He raised his gaze, and I was unnerved all over again by how bright his eyes were. “I think you’ve earned your success through hard work and good choices.”
I could have argued with him about that one—Billy Walker had not been a good choice. But instead, I slid onto one of the stools at the pass-through and said only, “Thanks. You could be right. I think luck had a lot to do with it, too, though. Which is why I think you should at least try the tea. Aside from its magic properties, bergamot is rich in flavonoids.”
“I’ll stick with coffee, thanks. Here you go.” He slid a plate down in front of me. It was kind of like sitting at the counter of your favorite diner, only the cook had given you a bunch of orgasms the night before.
I rotated the plate to get a better look at it, then grinned in spite of my sleepiness. “Aw, did you make an egg and bacon smiley face all for me?”
“Yes.” He didn’t return my grin. He settled onto his own stool across from mine, with his own plate, and began eating voraciously. Pye, whose normal morning routine was to demand to be let out as soon as I woke, sat patiently at his feet, gazing up at him adoringly and showing no interest at all in going outside—or in me. “Another thing I’d like to do today is get a look at that book.”
“Goody Fletcher’s book?” I took a bite of bacon. It was exactly the way I liked it. Not too crispy, but not too floppy, either. This man seemed to be able to do anything, including cook the perfect piece of bacon. “Okay. But why? I’ve read it so many times I have it memorized by now, and there isn’t anything in it about a rift. It really is just a collection of recipes and household tips.”
“Even so. Why do you think Rosalie Hopkins wanted to get her hands on it so badly, back in the day?”
I shrugged. “Aside from the love spell, which didn’t work for either of us, she always hated it when anyone had something she didn’t. Which wasn’t that often, because her family is so wealthy. I’m not sure she ever even liked Billy that much. She was just mad that I had him and she didn’t.”
“I’d still like to take a look at it.”
“Be my guest,” I said. “It’s in the living room.”
He regarded me over his now nearly empty breakfast plate, one golden eyebrow raised. “The living room?”
“Yes. On the bookshelf.”
His other eyebrow rose. “You told me you had it in a safe place.”
“It is in a safe place. Who would think to look for a book like that on a bookshelf? And even if they did—”
“Jessica. It’s a handwritten book from the sixteen hundreds. I’m not saying you haven’t done a great job keeping it safe for all these years, but I’m sure it’s fairly easy to find.”
“Okay,” I said, scooping up egg yolk with my toast. “Go ahead and look.”
“Fine.” He rose from the counter. “I will.”
I swiveled on my stool to watch as he crossed the dining room and then went into the living room to look for the book. For once Pye, perhaps knowing what was coming, didn’t follow him, but stayed near me. I looked down at him and winked. He slow blinked back at me, a sign, I’d read, that cats reciprocated their owner’s love, and accepted them as their cat equal.
“It’s in here?” Derrick was standing in front of my bookshelves, looking up at my many cookbooks, celebrity memoirs, books on herbology and the Craft.
“It sure is,” I said.
“You have a lot of old books in here.”
“Well, my parents did own an antiques shop.”
“Did they leave a lot of books behind?”
“No. These are all mine.” Despite the early hour and seriousness of the situation, I was enjoying myself. “Why? Is only Plutarch good enough for you?”
“No, I enjoy reading a wide variety of books,” he said, still scanning the shelves. “I just don’t keep them around after I’ve finished them.”
“Oh, right, because you travel too much for work. Your work going around, informing witches that their towns are under demonic attack.”
He gave me a sarcastic look. Then he reached up and expertly pulled down a large book covered in a lurid black-and-yellow dustjacket. Best Movies of the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, the dust jacket exclaimed.
“Watch out!” I cried in alarm as he turned the book toward him and opened it.
But it was too late. A thick cloud of black powder erupted from inside the book, covering his chest, arms, and hands.
I couldn’t help it. I dissolved in laughter.
“Yeah,” I said, grabbing a handful of napkins and then hurrying over to him. “I forgot to mention that I do have a security system. It’s called my exploding incense powder spell.”
He stood perfectly still as I dabbed at him with the napkins. He wasn’t laughing with me, but he didn’t look upset, either.
“I told you I’d find it,” he said, still holding on to Goody Fletcher’s book.
“You did.” I was blinking back tears of laughter. “Congratulations. What was the tip-off?”
“You have a lot of books, but you don’t really seem like the kind of person who’d hang on to an outdated ‘best of’ movie guide.”
“You’re right about that.”
“That incense powder doesn’t really seem to be coming off, does it?”
“You’re right about that, too.” But he didn’t seem to mind. In fact, the more I rubbed at him, the more he seemed to like it. “I think you’re going to need a shower.”
“Yeah. Maybe you’d like to join me?”
I looked up at him. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more intensely glowing pair of eyes—or a more invitingly upturned mouth.
So of course that’s when there was a knock on the front door.
If Derrick had had a weapon, I swear he’d have whipped it out and leaped in front of me to defend me from whatever danger he imagined was out there on my porch—or was keeping us from “showering” together.
But since he didn’t have one, he simply used his body to shield me.
“Are you expecting anyone?” he asked, those gleaming eyes narrowing dangerously.
“At seven in the morning?” I had to admit, my heart was hammering. Maybe I hadn’t quite fully recovered from yesterday’s hailstorm. “I’m not a barbarian.”
Then I heard Dina’s familiar—and very loud—voice call from behind the door, “Jess? It’s me! I saw your lights on. Why aren’t you answering your phone?”
I was already at the door and opening it before Derrick could move a muscle.
“Oh, hi,” she said, bursting in and not even pretending to be surprised to see me standing there in my pajamas with Derrick covered in incense powder right behind me. She held up two large coffees from Wake Up West Harbor. “These are for you two. Jess, why aren’t you answering your phone?”
“Because it’s seven in the morning. I haven’t even looked at my phone yet.”
Although Mark and Dina were both early risers—dog owners generally were—they knew that swinging by my house with coffee before eight in the morning under normal circumstances was pointless, since I wouldn’t be out of bed by then.
But these weren’t normal circumstances. So there they stood, with carefully neutral looks on their faces, and steaming hot beverages in their hands. Mark, in his black leather jacket, was even waving a box of pastries.
All because they wanted dirt on my private life.
Or maybe not. . . .
“So you haven’t heard?” Mark asked.
“Heard what?” I asked, despite my own misgivings and the disapproval I could feel radiating off Derrick.
But it was too late. Dina had already thrust her coffees at us, and Mark was hurrying into my kitchen.
“There was a king tide last night.” Dina couldn’t spill the beans fast enough. She began shedding her coat and scarf, throwing her things everywhere, as had been her custom since we were tweens. “Water went all the way up to the Post Road.” Seeing my face, she added, “Don’t worry, it didn’t reach Enchantments. It stopped before it got to downtown. But there’s driftwood in front of the library.”
Derrick was so concerned, he didn’t even seem to notice the new coffee in his hand. “I saw that there was seaweed and sand on the road when I went for my run this morning. But I thought maybe that was normal here this time of year.”
“You run, bro?” Mark came back from the kitchen, an assortment of pastries laid out on one of my plates. “Me, too. What’s your daily?”
“I like to get in six miles, if I can,” Derrick replied.
Mark shook his head. “Six is murder, bro. You spend the first two getting warmed up, then you just get your groove going, and you gotta start cooling down. Gotta do ten.”
“Six works for me,” Derrick said.
“Hi, we weren’t properly introduced last night in all the fuss over the wolf.” Dina walked over and held her hand out toward Derrick. “I’m Jess’s friend, Dina DiAngelo.”
“Best friend,” Mark said. “Don’t forget. Best friend since middle school. Get ready, bro. If you tell one of these witches something, she’s going to tell the other one, and vice versa.”
“Well, it’s true,” Dina said, as Derrick extended his hand toward her. “Isn’t that what best friends are for?”
Derrick looked bemused. “Thanks,” he said. “I’ll keep that in mind. Oh, er, sorry, I—” He noticed the uneasy glance she gave his blackened hand, then said, apologetically, “Incense powder. Jessica and I were just—”
“Oh, Goody Fletcher’s book!” Dina laughed. “You found it. Congrats.”
He grinned. “Thanks.”
I carefully watched Dina’s face to see if it registered anything—shock, pleasure, pain—when Derrick’s fingers touched hers.
But it didn’t. Dina looked like her normal self—granted, in full makeup even at such an early hour, ready for a day at the office in her skirt suit, high heels, and pearls—as she dropped his hand. “It’s very nice to officially meet you. Derrick, right?”
“Yes,” Derrick said. He still seemed bemused . . . for which I couldn’t really blame him. Dina and Mark were a lot even at a normal hour. At seven in the morning, especially when you threw in the cannoli and the news of the king tide, they were extra.
“So how bad is the flooding this time?” I asked.
“Bad.” Dina shook her head. “I heard from Sal this morning. He had to call an in-home learning day for the high school. The cafeteria flooded. The entire first floor, really.”
“But it didn’t even rain last night.” I couldn’t believe this. “And the full moon isn’t until Thursday.”
“I know.” Dina was eyeing Derrick as he sipped the coffee she’d brought him. “Is this part of the rift thing Jessica said you’re here to help us with?”
“It could be,” Derrick replied, carefully.
“I knew it.” Dina shook her head. “I knew something weird was going on.”
“Something weird is always going on around this town.” Mark was also eyeing Derrick, only he was doing so suspiciously, making it pretty clear that he included him in the list of the many weird things going on around town. “Jess says you saw the wolf? Because I saw it, too, weeks ago, but nobody believed me. Everyone said it was only a dog.”
Derrick shook his head. “That was no dog.”
“Right? I know what I saw.” Now that Mark could see Derrick was on his side about the wolf, he began to warm up to him. “Hey, is that your ride out there in the driveway, bro? Dina’s brother told us about that hailstorm over at the high school yesterday. Sal’s a skeptic, so he doesn’t think it was paranormal, but I can tell you it didn’t hail over on my side of town. First the wolf, then the hail, now this crazy tide. What the hell is coming next?”
Derrick sent me a silent look, halfway between a plea for help and a rebuke—whether for letting Mark and Dina into my house in the first place, or telling them who Derrick was and what he was doing here, I didn’t know. All I knew was, a second later, Mark had his arm wrapped around him, and was steering him toward the front door.
“This is scary shit,” Mark was saying. “Your car looks like hell. Listen, I know a guy—”
“It’s a rental.”
“Oh, man, I hope you took out the supplemental. I can’t believe—”
The rest of what Mark was saying was lost as he herded Derrick out the door to go look at his dented rental car.
As soon as they were gone, I grabbed Dina by the arm. “Did you feel it?” I asked.
She shook her head, looking confused. “Feel what?”
“His fingers, when you shook his hand.”
“No. What are you talking about?”
“Like an electric charge from his skin—every time he touches me, I feel it. It’s like being hit by a shock. But in a good way. Are you telling me you didn’t feel it?”
“No, I didn’t feel a thing. His fingers just felt—normal. Wait—what do you mean every time?” Her eyes widened as her voice dropped even lower. “Like during sex, too?”
I nodded, unable to keep a smile off my face as I thought of the previous evening’s activities. “It’s so amazing, Dee. I don’t know if it’s a spell or a technique he learned somewhere or just a natural gift. But let me tell you, whatever it is, it’s hot. I have never, in my life—”
Both Dina’s hands flew out to grip my wrists. “Wait. Jess.” Her face looked graver than I’d ever seen it.
“What?” I asked, alarmed. “What is it?”
“What he’s doing,” she said. “That thing with his hands?”
“And his tongue,” I added. “And his—”
“Yeah,” she said, quickly. “That. That isn’t because of a spell, Jess.”
“It isn’t? What do you think it is, then? Reiki? Hypnosis?” I gasped. “Wait. You don’t think—not crystals?”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. “Worse.”
“Why?” I asked, already dreading the answer. “What is it?”
She grinned at me. “You like him.”