Wisteria Wrinkle

by Angela Pepper

  The other thing Zinnia was having feelings about was seeing Zara’s father again. The man, Rhys Quarry, had shown up without any warning whatsoever, and he’d also revealed his supernatural ability to his daughter and granddaughter. He was a shifter. One of them. One of the people who hated witches. However, rumor had it fox shifters weren’t as disgusted by witches as other types of shifters. Some were even attracted to witches. Rhys certainly hadn’t minded getting close to Zara’s mother, Zirconia.

  That might have happened due to Zirconia not being the typical witch. She had denied her magic. She had denied it to the point of renouncing her powers, and taking a poison to suppress her abilities. The worst part of it all was that the woman had probably gone to an early grave due to that poison. It wasn’t healthy for a witch to deny her powers.

  Zinnia finally settled on the perfect ensemble: a cute pair of flower-dotted leggings, paired with a paisley-and-floral tunic. The tunic didn’t have much of a shape to it, so she cinched it at the waist with a braided cord that she’d had a few extra feet of after making curtain tiebacks. She wasn’t sure how to wear her hair. Up? Down? She split the difference and plaited it back in a loose braid. It was a perfect summery look.

  She tidied her bedroom, and went downstairs to prepare the food she’d promised to bring—bagels, cream cheese, lox, and a nice fruit platter. Zinnia used a spell she didn’t have much practice with yet to make perfectly round melon balls. With each perfect melon ball produced, she felt more and more at ease, more like herself.

  Once she’d prepared enough food to feed a small army—and her niece and great-niece did resemble a small army when it came to the amount of food they could put away—she gathered everything in bags and headed out.

  The weather was perfectly sunny, which was typical for the middle of June in Wisteria. Warm breezes blew the scent of flowering bushes in through the car windows on the drive over. Zinnia wondered how Liza’s grandmother was doing in the other world. Had sixty-some years of experience on Earth prepared her to better handle her responsibilities as the queen? Or given her the perspective to better manage disagreements with her hot-blooded husband? Had they come to some agreement about having children together?

  Zinnia parked the car and let all her wondering drift away on the warm summer breezes.

  The key was gone now. Depending on one’s perspective, the key had either been smashed to pieces or was still making its way through time in an endless loop, being duplicated and becoming the original.

  Either way, there would be no traveling back to the accordion floor. The mayor had assured them of that, in no uncertain terms. Her job as a time paladin was to keep the timeline secure. Now that Queenie and Diablo had completed their journey to 1955, there would be no need of an opening between the dimensions. Probably. In Wisteria, it was best to never say never, lest you be proven a liar in the next breath.

  Zinnia walked up to Zara’s front door and rang the doorbell. She stood there patiently while the usual ruckus ensued on the other side of the door, with everyone yelling “doorbell!” at the top of their lungs.

  Zoey answered the door. She looked smart and adorable, as usual. Zinnia’s heart swelled with love for her great-niece.

  Before Zinnia could get her boots off, Zara’s grandfather, Rhys Quarry, had pounced. He hugged her. Zinnia was so unprepared for his enthusiastic greeting that she could do nothing but stand there helplessly, her arms flopping limply at her sides.

  Something bright and striped moved toward Zinnia. It was Zara, dressed in a striped blouse that would have looked right at home on a circus clown. She’d paired the blouse with a navy pencil skirt.

  Rhys finally released Zinnia from his tight embrace. “Little Ziti Noodles, it’s been too long!” He stepped back and looked her over. “And you’re not so little anymore. I’ll have to call you Zirconia!”

  Zinnia felt herself die a little. “You mean Zinnia,” she said, horrified. “I’m not Zirconia.”

  “Slip of the tongue,” he said, his green eyes teasing. It had not been a slip of the tongue at all.

  “Rhys Quarry, I’m not like my sister. Not at all.” She wished she had worn more of a serious ensemble, perhaps entirely black. Maybe then Rhys wouldn’t tease her so mercilessly.

  Rhys asked his granddaughter, “Zozo, did you know that your aunt was about your age when we first met? She was such a shy little thing, compared to you. I wonder if it’s a generational thing?”

  “I wasn’t shy,” Zinnia said, defending herself. “I was younger than Zoey, and I was raised to have manners. I knew better than to—” She cut herself off. She’d only been in the door a few minutes. This was exactly how Rhys always got under her skin! He wouldn’t make a fool of her this time. She changed her tone and said sweetly, “It’s lovely to see you again, Rhys.”

  “And under better circumstances,” he agreed. “A brunch beats a funeral every time.” He sniffed the air. “Bagels?”

  “Yes!” She was happy for a topic change. “I’ve brought a dozen fresh bagels, along with a selection of cream cheese flavors, as well as the world’s most perfectly round melon balls. They’re like marbles.”

  Zoey grabbed the bags with a happy whoop. “You had me at bagels,” she called over her shoulder on the way to the kitchen.

  Zinnia gave her niece, Zara, a warm smile. “Like mother, like daughter.”

  The three adults continued their pleasant interactions for a few minutes, still standing by the doorway. Rhys made a joke about the family of redheads play-fighting like fox pups tumbling around.

  Zinnia admitted that she hadn’t known Rhys was a fox shifter until Zara told her.

  Rhys immediately turned the conversation, as he often did, to himself. He grinned at Zinnia, his green eyes twinkling, and accused Zinnia of flirting with him.

  Zinnia nearly died, for the second time that morning.

  Zara uttered the word “gross,” and immediately ran off to the kitchen to help her daughter prepare the brunch.

  Zinnia and Rhys stood alone together at the entrance.

  “And here we are,” Zinnia said. “Funny how time passes but some things never change.”

  “You’ve changed,” he said. “You’ve become even more lovely than ever.”

  She shook her head. “You and your flattery, Rhys Quarry. How did I never know you were a fox?”

  He grinned. The sounds of Zara and Zoey happily arguing over food preparation in the kitchen drifted over. Rhys tilted his head and took another good, long look at Zinnia. She did the same to him.

  From the moment Zinnia Riddle had first met Rhys Quarry, all those years ago, she’d been smitten. She’d been a teen at the time, and he was a grownup of twenty-two, but he hadn’t fully crossed over into adulthood. He’d always talked to Zinnia in a way that made her feel like a lady, not a kid. He’d always been respectful and mindful of her innocence, which naturally ignited her wild, teen-hormone-fueled imagination. Her crush on the young man had been fierce and painful. The worst heartbreak of Zinnia’s young life had been when her older sister revealed she had become pregnant by Rhys. Their parents were furious. Rhys had been hired by the family as a matchmaker. His job had been to find a suitable husband for Zirconia, not to sully her with his own child—out of wedlock, no less. Zinnia had also been furious, but for different reasons. Her careful plans to marry Rhys herself after she reached eighteen had been dashed by this new development. She eventually got over it, as teenagers always do, yet seeing him now triggered those old longings.

  Rhys Quarry was not conventionally handsome. He was shorter than average, and slight of build. His hair was a rusty red. He had a weak chin, a slightly bulbous nose, and rubbery facial expressions. But he had those mischievous gold-green eyes. When he looked at you, you felt seen. Paid attention to. That was why the man was so successful as a matchmaker. And probably why Zinnia’s older sister had seduced him—or so Zinnia believed. Zirconia had pled innocence at the time, of course, implying that Rhys had been the on
e doing the seducing. But Zinnia knew her older sister better than their parents did. Zinnia had a pretty good idea about exactly what went down around the time Zara was conceived. That was all ancient history now, thirty-three years later, but being in the presence of Rhys brought back Zinnia’s feelings of heartbreak and outrage.

  After a few minutes of awkward silence by the entryway, they made their way through the house and then to the back yard, where Zoey had done a wonderful job decorating the overgrown jungle of a yard. The younger Riddles served brunch, and everyone talked a mile a minute, fighting to get a word in edgewise. Zinnia took it all in.

  As she watched Rhys eat brunch, there was a moment where Zinnia’s shoulders suddenly hunched up defensively. An unexpected emotion had come out of nowhere, the way these things do. She felt a hot rush of grief for the life she never had the chance to live. The life where she and Rhys were married, and the parents of a big brood of redheaded babies. Babies? No, their imaginary children would be fully grown by now, possibly having babies of their own. Zinnia could have been a grandmother at this very moment, in the other unlived life.

  Her shoulders relaxed again. Being a grandmother? No, thank you! She was much too young for that.

  This new realization gave her a different feeling. Relief. She wasn’t a grandmother, or a mother, or even a wife. She was only responsible for herself, thank you very much, and that was just fine. She had her work, her coven, her other group of supernatural teammates at the office, and now her niece and great-niece. She had enough. More than enough.

  She looked across the cheerfully-decorated folding card table at all of their smiling faces. If any stone had remained around her heart, her family’s joy at being reunited was now melting it away. Zinnia took a breath of fragrant summer air and took it all in. She was on Earth, in her own time, where she belonged. She had all of this, and it was... enough.

  For now.

  Thanks for reading Wisteria Wrinkle by Angela Pepper.

  The series continues! The next book set in Wisteria is called WARDENS OF WISTERIA, and it features Zinnia's niece, Zara Riddle. There will also be more from Zinnia and the folks at City Hall. Check the website at www.angelapepper.com for the most current series reading order and calendar.

  Wardens of Wisteria

  Turn the page for an exclusive Author's Note and behind-the-scenes glimpse from Angela Pepper...

  Author's Note from Angela Pepper

  Hello, darling!

  I hope the 7th book in the Wisteria Witches world, Wisteria Wrinkle, has left you (paradoxically) completely satisfied yet also craving more! It's okay to be a little paradoxical. It makes everything more fun.

  Would you like to know a little more about how this book came into being? I'd love to share some notes about the process, and I hope it doesn't ruin the “magic” for you to hear about the sausage being made, so to speak.

  Wisteria Wrinkle started with the combination of two things I love: forgotten spaces and old keys. When my sister and I were growing up, we were riding our horses when we found an abandoned farmhouse. The floor and structure were badly warped, but it was fascinating to look inside, at the random items left behind. It was exciting in a way the carefully curated scenes in the local Pioneer Museum were not. There was an old bed frame, some kids' toys from the nineteen-fifties, and so many newspapers. Now I'm feeling funny about admitting to a thirty-year-old trespassing crime, but in our defense we were just kids, and we didn't break or take anything. Please don't tell my parents, okay? As for old keys, I've always loved them as sculptural pieces. I buy assorted boxes of old keys on Ebay. I keep them in a wooden box with other curious objects, and sort through them sometimes for the pure joy of it.

  The idea of a key plus a forgotten space led to the idea of the hidden floor. I couldn't decide if it should lead to another world or another time, so I went and did both. Why not?! When I was first outlining the idea, I considered having some scenes from Liza Gilbert's point of view, but then I remembered that I don't like reading books that have multiple points of view. I have written a few novels that way (Dancing With a Ghost, in particular), and I feel it's a strong choice for a book with a thriller feel. That book really does deliver the chills, too. (Shameless pitch: If you're looking for another series to dive into, check out my Restless Spirits trilogy – available now in ebook and audiobook!) For Wisteria Wrinkle, though, I decided to stick with Zinnia Riddle and be consistent. The City Hall books are entirely from her POV, and then Zara's books will be entirely from her POV. If there are other characters down the road, we'll see about those ones when they happen.

  Sidenote: It's normal for authors to want to change things way, way, way before readers are ready for big changes. For example, I've been thinking about a Zinnia book since I wrote the 2nd Wisteria Witches book. But I'm being considerate of you, dear reader, so I wrote five books with Zara before mixing things up.

  Sidenote again: Most series lose readers in a huge drop-off after book five. It's common in author circles to talk about the curse of book six, and speak about how we should have ended our series sooner. Me, I don't want to end this series, so I took a chance to mix it up at the book six point with the first City Hall novel. For us authors, we are always walking a fine line between keeping things fresh and preserving the elements readers fell in love with in the first place. We've all read series that fall into the trap of repeating themselves ad nauseum. It's no fun for the reader, and even less fun for the author. And, for the record, I do want to have fun. If I were a robot who simply cranked out X number of words per day, there are certainly more economically advantageous things I could be writing. I could be chasing trends, or writing simpler things that don't require as much creative energy. (Not that I'm complaining! I'm happy to be writing what I love.)

  Back to the behind-the-scenes story of how Wisteria Wrinkle came to be: I reworked my outline to reveal the entire story from Zinnia's point of view. I figured out the timeline and how it would intersect with the Zara books. If you're a series fan, you've probably noticed that Wisteria Wrinkle overlaps books 3 and 4, Wisteria Wonders and Watchful Wisteria. The scene at the end, with Zinnia seeing Zara's father, is from the beginning of Watchful Wisteria.

  After working out the basic outline, I was off to the races with the first draft. The story came together quickly, and was a reasonable length. I was even ahead of schedule! But my first draft is only half the work, so after a short break, I got back to it for revisions. Then the story nearly doubled in size. OOOF. Cozy mysteries are typically about 50,000 words. This book you just read is over 94,000 words. OOOF. It is the same length as the first City Hall book, Wolves of Wisteria, but that length defies cozy genre standards. It is... an Epic Cozy. Even though Epic Cozy is technically not a thing. I considered pruning it back, but book length is only a constraint if you're publishing mainly for the paperback market. Publishers want all their books to be the same size, due to economies of scale with boxes, packaging, etc. If you're, like me, writing mainly for the ebook and audiobook market, then “standard” length is arbitrary. Besides, are these Wisteria books even traditional cozies in other ways? There's a body in Wolves of Wisteria, yes, but there's no murder or dead body in Wisteria Wrinkle. This series has become its own unique beast, and that's okay. Also, I couldn't think of a single scene I'd cut out. Every little bit had intrigue, wonder, and revealed the personalities of Zinnia's coworkers. Did it break my heart to write about Margaret's marriage breaking down? Yes, it did. We authors always hurt the ones we love.

  Speaking of love, thank you for posting reader reviews of my books at the venues where they were purchased, and thank you for posting your very nice comments on my Facebook page. Every author thinks they have the best readers, but I know that I have the best of the best.

  Now, on to the tough news. Previously, I was planning to write 3 books set at City Hall before returning to Zara's storyline. However, because these last two books have covered so much ground already, I needed to give Zinnia a breath
er before her next adventure starts up. That means moving forward in time. But I don't want to spoiler the Zara books in the fun crossovers, so we are heading back to Zara's perspective for a bit. The 8th book in the Wisteria world will be WARDENS OF WISTERIA - DAYBREAK #1, a book from Zara's point of view. There will still be more from Zinnia and her coworkers down the road. And other people. You'll see.

  In my previous author's note, I mentioned some health changes. I'm happy to report I still have great energy and feel good about my healthier diet. I won't get into the specifics, because people go to war over diets (see the youtube comments for any health video, ever), but I will tell you I'm eating foods that have higher nutrient density, and that lower inflammation, reduce insulin resistance, and provide more antioxidants. It's hard for us as a society to define what it is to not be functioning at an optimal level. I've seen many labels for subclinical illness. The thing is, I don't think it matters what you call it, or whether or not people believe you that you have it, if the treatment is the same. Cut the junk, eat real food, drink water, move around. Easier said than done. I never met a bag of candies I couldn't finish in one sitting. LOL. But now that I don't eat sugar, I don't purchase candy, so that removes the temptation. Some people will say “everything in moderation,” and those people are not me. I'm an all-or-nothing kinda gal.

  I'm trying to get myself to some fitness classes at the local gym, because I know I'll feel even better with some weekly huffing-puffing-sweating sessions, but it's hard to get there. I have been riding my bike, kayaking, and going for hikes in the woods. During the time I was writing Wisteria Wrinkle, I was walking in the woods when I saw a bear who was only twenty feet away and up a tree! I was tempted to put a bear in the story but didn't. Maybe he or she will show up in a future book.