by Amy Boyles
Rose and I had debated bringing Broom but ultimately decided against it. The object’s presence would probably only irritate Watts and make the entire situation a thousand times worse.
Lucky for us Watts didn’t know about Eugene. We considered the skull to be our ace in the hole. If we got in a desperate situation, Eugene would help us, he’d promised.
Just to guarantee it, I’d made sure Eugene understood simple words and phrases like help and get him.
We were all set.
I rang Watts’s doorbell and waited. Fear spiked up my back and I shivered. I hated everything about this—coming to the man’s house at night, standing on his front porch—all of it.
Before I had more time to explore everything I detested and the depths of my dislike, the doorknob turned and the door slowly creaked open.
A hole of darkness unfurled before us. It also smelled funny—strange, like fresh furniture had just been uncovered or something. The smell was hard to place, but I knew it was familiar.
“I don’t like the looks of this,” Rose whispered.
“Me either. But what choice do we have?” I took a deep breath. “I’ll go first. Stay close.”
As I crept inside, the first thing I noticed was the floor. It wasn’t the carpet like it had been earlier today. It sounded like tarp. The flooring crackled and rippled like plastic.
The strange smell came from that.
Cold dread washed from my head to my feet. Why would Watts put tarp down unless he intended for something to be messy—like our deaths?
“We need light,” I murmured.
A glowing ball of light formed in Rose’s palm. She glanced around the room and gasped.
It took a moment for me to see what had rattled her. Watts stood on the other side of the living room. Under one hand he held Pig. In the other he held a spear made of ice.
The spear was pointed directly at Rose and myself.
“Put the pig down,” Rose demanded.
“Not until you both lower your hands. I don’t want any magic coming from you—no funny business.”
“But we need light,” Rose said.
“Toss the ball in the air,” Watts demanded. “Let it hover there. On your side. Not near me.”
Rose did as he requested. The three of us stared at one another.
This was it. My moment to get Watts to confess. “She rejected you, didn’t she?”
Watts’s head snapped in my direction. I could practically hear the tendons pop as his neck tightened. “What are you talking about?”
“Frankie. She rejected you, so you killed her.”
“Frankie never rejected me.” He peered at me as if seeing me for the first time. “Are you joking? She wanted me. All those years of following her and worshipping the woman from afar had finally paid off.”
He settled Pig on the ground. “We were going to be together. It was finally going to happen, and then she was murdered. Killed by someone who didn’t admire her beauty the way I did.”
Anguish filled every line of his face. “What a waste. What an absolute waste.”
He started to sob but choked back the tears. “And then the two of you went snooping around in my house. You’re going to tell the cops, aren’t you? Tell them what I did. You’ll ruin me. Ruin my life if people discover that I watched Frankie. I can’t have that. I can’t have it at all.”
Suddenly Pig chomped down on Watts’s wrist. Watts screamed. He tossed the spear at us. Rose threw up her hands, and the spear turned into a fountain that spewed water on our heads.
A camera that had been set up in one corner of the room started clicking. I stared at it in disbelief and realized what Watts was doing—he was taking pictures of us.
This guy was so weird.
Rose pointed her finger at Watts, and a rope of water wound around him, tying him tightly.
“Charming, go and call the police. This man attacked us! Get them over here, now!”
As I moved to the door, Rose called Pig. “Piggy, come here. Are you okay? Did that mean old man hurt you?”
Pig gave little snorts that sounded like chirps of happiness. Good. At least one of us was okay.
I headed outside and pulled my phone from my pocket. I slid my finger over the bar to turn it on, but nothing happened.
“Crap,” I grumbled.
“What is it?” Eugene asked.
“It’s dead. The thing is fried from the water.”
“So what do we do now?”
I tapped my foot on the ground and picked through my choices. Hop in my car and go to the jail?
That was out. I couldn’t leave Rose alone with Watts. I glanced over my shoulder at the house. My muscles turned to tense strips of stone as the seriousness of the situation weighed on me.
I had to figure out a way to help Rose, and I had to do it now. A car driving down the street stopped. A window buzzed down and Vic Blass popped his head out.
“Charming, you okay?”
Relieved, I dashed across the street. “Vic. I need help. Watts Pugh attacked me and my great-aunt. She’s got him tied up, but I need to call the police. Or drive there. Or something.”
Vic popped the door locks. “Hop in. My phone’s at the house. It’s only a couple blocks away.”
The great weight of tension dissolved as I scurried around the car and slid inside. “Thank you so much. I don’t know what I would’ve done if you hadn’t shown up.”
Vic gave me his thousand-watt smile. “Oh, I’m sure you would’ve come up with something. A woman like you is very resourceful.”
His tone held a bitter undercurrent. I studied his face, looking for a hint of anger or resentment, but Vic just smiled on, seeming not to pay attention to anything other than the road.
He stopped outside a small brick house that looked like it didn’t hold any more than four rooms. “Here we are.”
“Great. I’ll follow you.”
Eager to get in, I practically zipped from the car and up the stairs while Vic took his time. Did he not hear what I said, that we’d been attacked? Why was he being so pokey?
I waited impatiently while Vic fiddled with his keys until he found the right one. The smell of liquor trickled up my nose, and I realized what was going on—Vic was trashed.
Trashed and driving. I’d be sure to mention that to Thorne when I got ahold of him.
“Here it is.” Vic smiled as he brandished the key. “I knew I’d find it.”
I grabbed it from his hand. “And here we go. Let me just do that. It’ll be faster.”
Vic rocked back, giving me room to stick the key in the slot, turn it and open the door.
Vic snapped on a light. Sparse furnishings spotted the room—couch, TV, chair, basic man-pad decor.
“Nice place,” I murmured to be polite. I don’t know why I said it, but it was one of those things. You walk into someone’s house, and to be nice you mention that the house is great.
But for some reason my compliment backfired. Vic’s eyes narrowed. One side of his mouth pulled up into a sneer. “I used to have more, but I fell into a funk.”
My gaze darted around the house as I searched for his phone. “I’m sorry,” I said without much passion.
I had an actual emergency and didn’t have time to discuss with Vic about how he fell into a deep depression for whatever reason.
“It happened after Frankie dumped me.” Vic sighed and slumped onto a chair. “It was bad. I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, and I stopped showing up to work. So I lost everything I had.”
I craned my neck, glancing around the room. “I’m so sorry, but about that phone…”
He waved me toward the kitchen. “In there.”
“Thank goodness.” I rushed over to it and was about to pick it up when a large brown bug crawled out from beneath it.
I squealed.
“Oh, don’t mind them,” he said.
The brown bug looked familiar. A black stripe zipped down the brown roach’s back. I gasped and shut my eyes tight.<
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Oh dear Lord. I’d done it now. I’d walked directly into the house of the killer. I lifted the phone from the cradle and started dialing.
That was when Vic’s fingers slammed down on the switch hook, ending the call before it was even made.
I backed away from him. “What…what are you doing? You said I could use the phone.”
Vic placed a hand on the counter. The disgusting cockroach peeked out from behind a stack of papers before padding across the counter onto the Vic’s hand and traveling up his arm.
I shuddered. How disgusting. But there was no time for me to contemplate Vic’s unhygienic companion.
Vic sneered. “I was going to let you use the phone before you realized what I’d done. Sorry you had to see my little friend, but now you know my secret.”
I scoffed. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. What secret? You like bugs? Lots of folks like bugs. Granted, I don’t know any of them, but I’m sure they do.”
Vic shook his head. “That’s not what I’m talking about and you know it.”
I nonchalantly peeked around him, gauging how far it was to the door. When I saw it, my hopes withered. While I’d been busy with the phone Vic had silently closed and latched the door locked.
Crap.
I was stuck.
With a killer.
Things didn’t look good for me at all.
From atop Vic’s shoulder the cockroach swiveled its feelers. Vic cocked his head back and peered at the creature.
“I agree with you,” he said to the cockroach in a baby voice that made me shudder from the sheer creepiness of it. “This gal’s not going anywhere. She knows our secret, and we can’t let her escape.”
Chapter 24
Before I could argue, Vic shot me with a stream of water. Ropes of liquid grabbed each of my arms and legs. The water hoisted me into the air, and my body pulled in four different directions.
I screamed in agony.
Vic threw out his hand. Water gushed from his open palm, a great deluge that covered the walls, making me feel like I was inside an aquarium.
“That should soundproof the room,” he said, amused. “Now you may scream all you want. Scream! Scream! Scream! No one can hear as you’re ripped apart.”
“You killed Frankie,” I said through great waves of agony. “Because she broke up with you?”
“More than that,” Vic confessed. “Because she broke up with me and I wasn’t one of her chosen soul mates,” he spat. “Whatever that means. All Frankie ever wanted was to be adored. Eventually I realized that.”
He shrugged as if murder was no big deal. “Then you came along and she saw her chance for even more fame. Of course not everyone liked Frankie.”
Vic lowered his chin and shot me a pointed glare. “Your mother, for instance, hated her. When someone magicked a dozen black roses on Frankie’s doorstep, it wasn’t hard to figure out who it might have been. So me and my cockroach friends decided to make it even more sinister.”
“So you left the roaches and the note?” I croaked.
“That’s right. So I did.”
While Vic mused on his brilliance, I was thinking through the pain, trying to figure a way out of this mess. I called on my water power and pushed at the ropes of liquid holding me, but a finger of water shot out from the tendril and snapped my water into submission.
“The only thing that can fight water is fire,” Eugene hissed from his spot on my chest.
“No,” I argued.
“Then I used my magic to kill her in the tub.” Vic laughed. “Once again with the help of my little friends. They frayed one of the cords and made it easier for me to cast the electrocution spell. What I wouldn’t do without them.”
Vic turned his attention back to me. “But now you must die and your mother must take the fall for my deeds. As much as I’d love to keep chatting, time’s a wasting.”
He pointed to the tendrils. “Rip her apart.”
The intensity increased and I screamed. I didn’t want to die. I mean, who ever did? But this was about more than me. This was also about Mama. I couldn’t let her take the fall for Frankie’s death.
Eugene lifted from around my neck. “If you won’t take my power, I’m just going to give it to you.”
“No, Eugene!”
But it was too late. The skull’s mouth opened, and it shot a line of fire directly at my chest. My body opened to it, absorbing the magic it offered. It felt like my body had been split open, swallowing and gulping up a dump truck load of power.
The magic streamed into me, and my world shifted and twisted, contracted and sharpened. Fire burned in my very core, and I felt like every cell in my body flamed.
There was something dark and powerful in fire magic. Water, air and earth were all very simple elements, things that could be molded and shaped to do what I wanted.
But fire? Fire was completely different.
The fire itself seemed to want to take hold of me and do what it wanted. That wasn’t going to happen.
I stared at the ropes of water strangling my right arm and I concentrated.
Fire flared from my wrist. It enveloped the water and extinguished it with a nasty hiss.
The same thing happened to my left arm, my right leg and my left leg.
I dropped lightly to the ground. I stared at Vic, who gaped at me, fear shining in his eyes. His mouth opened and shut like a fish gulping for air.
I extended my hand, and fire shot from a lamp. It wrapped itself around Vic and held him in a vise.
Then the rumbling started. I felt a great crack inside me. Heard a loud popping outside as if the world were breaking in two.
The fire holding Vic extinguished, and a deep well formed in the pit of my stomach.
This was it—the prophecy was coming true. I felt all magic drain from me, felt it disappear. I’d caused it to happen. This was all my fault.
But I didn’t have time to concentrate on that because Vic lunged for me.
Just then everything stopped. Vic froze as if he’d suddenly become paralyzed.
I gasped as a voice popped up behind me.
“So, it finally happened, didn’t it?”
I whirled around to see Hildegarde the Swamp Witch standing at the door. Water dripped from her clothing, pooling onto the floor around her.
I crumpled to the floor. “I’ve done it. I destroyed magic. It wasn’t my fault. I didn’t mean to.”
Hildegarde glided into the room, leaving a trail of water behind her. “Oh, I wouldn’t be so worried. Prophecies are funny.”
I wiped my nose on my sleeve. “What do you mean?”
She brought her hands together. “They happen but who’s to say how long they really last? Magic is gone, but for how long?”
“I don’t understand.”
A slow, knowing smile of superiority slid across Hildegarde’s face. “Did the prophecy say forever?”
“Um. I don’t remember.”
Hildegarde shrugged. “I don’t believe it did.” She raised a finger and cocked an ear as if to listen. “Wait for it.”
As quickly as it had extinguished, leaving me feeling as if a great void sat in the center of my chest, the power returned in a great rush, like a gale of air swooshing into my chest.
The tendril of fire that I’d wrapped around Vic returned, and I could feel it, the buzzing of magic in the very air.
I glanced at Hildegarde. “Why?”
She touched my cheek. “Perhaps it’s because only one person can possess all four elements. When that happened, magic had to reform, rethink how it will work together. You threw it for a loop, so to speak. But we are witches and we are strong. We survive and so does our power.”
She inhaled deeply and exhaled a cleansing breath. “Use your gift wisely. You will have trials and tribulations in your path, but I’m sure you’ll be able to overcome them.”
“Um. Okay. So magic is here. It’s back?”
Hildegarde’s mouth coiled into
a vacant smile. “It is. It’s back. Gone for a moment but here to stay.”
She turned to go. The water trailing behind her reminded me of a snail’s trail of slime.
“Hildegarde,” I said as she reached the door.
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
I hiked a shoulder to my ear. “I don’t really know, but I have a feeling I have things to thank you for.”
She smiled. “You’re welcome.” The door flew open, and Hildegarde pointed outside. “I believe the authorities are on their way. Be sure not to let that water wizard out of your fire grip. You have many powers now, Charming Calhoun. You are a rare creature. Enjoy it while your life remains simple.”
Wait. What? “I’m sorry?”
But the only reply Hildegarde bestowed on me was a blown kiss. Then she vanished out the doorway. The next thing I knew Thorne was crossing the threshold.
Lines of concern etched his face. “Are you okay?”
I took a moment to really gauge that. Was I okay? I now had the power of all four elements—earth, water, air and fire—and I barely knew what to do with any of them.
But physically, I was fine. No bones broken and Vic still hovered, wrapped in fire.
So the one major concern I had bloomed in my chest. “Mama?”
Thorne took me by the shoulders. “She’s okay. Fine, actually. I’ve released her.” He nodded toward Vic. “What’s going on there?”
“Oh, well, funny you should ask.”
“I didn’t do anything,” Vic shouted. “Get me out of here.” He wiggled against the flames. “Let me out right now. I’m innocent. Don’t believe anything she tells you.”
Thorne’s silvery eyes darted from Vic to me. “So I’m to believe everything you tell me.”
“Exactly.” I thumbed in Vic’s direction. “He killed Frankie because she rejected him. Used his cockroaches to help him.”
Thorne’s gaze landed on a roach as it scurried across the floor. “Well, that’s original. Not what I would have expected.”
“And yet it’s so strange.”
Thorne nodded to Vic. “Can you explain why there’s fire around him?”
“Oh yes, I did that.”
“Charming!”
My mother’s voice at the door was a welcome sound. I moved past Thorne to her and threw open my arms.
