Broommates: Two Witches are Better Than One! (Kentucky Witches Book 2)

by Rebecca Patrick-Howard

  I know you didn’t make those people sick, Liza thought, nudging her sister with her knee.

  Do you really know that? Bryar asked. She picked up a blade of grass and began twirling it around in her fingers. Her nails had lost their polish. Some were even starting to look ragged. Her clothes didn’t match, either. Liza was secretly worried about her sister’s mental health. When she didn’t keep up with her manicures and she began mixing designer labels, it was a cry for help.

  Of course. I know you; you wouldn’t hurt a fly, Liza assured her.

  Bryar smiled thinly and gave the little blade a flick, sending it a few inches from her side. I should just go.

  But when Liza looked over at her, she saw the dark circles under Bryar’s eyes and the ratty hair thrown up in a messy ponytail. This was not the glamorous woman who graced the magazines. This was someone who was hurting. She couldn’t, in good conscience, release her back into the world like that. First it was twerking on national television, what would it be next time?

  You should stay. I like having you here. Liza reached up and touched Bryar’s ponytail. You should braid your hair again, that fancy braid. You always do a good job with it. You could totally have your own You Tube series.

  I might need to after what happened on TV. I don’t know that anyone will be hiring me any time soon.

  They’ll forget, Liza shrugged. They always do. You’re talented and hot. They’ll want you.

  Then how come my damn phone isn’t ringing? The grass around them moved in a wave, as though Bryar’s sudden burst of emotion sent a blast of cold air over them.

  It will take awhile. But it will come.

  I should leave, Bryar thought again. She directed her gaze towards the mountain range, towards Brown Bear Mountain’s peak. It looked nothing like a bear, or even a mountain if anyone was totally honest about it. It was more of a hill, even by eastern Kentucky’s standards.

  No, don’t leave. “I need you here,” Liza said out loud. She enjoyed talking to her sister through her mind, something they could only do when physically close together, but sometimes the words needed to be spoken aloud.

  Bryar turned to face her. “You definitely don’t need me,” she replied. “You’ve got your man, who’s awesome by the way. And his sisters who might be even more awesome. Even if they’re all named after horses.”

  “I need you,” Liza said softly. Feeling instantly jealous of those who saw Bryar regularly, Liza leaned over and put her head on her sister’s shoulder. What other chance would they get to learn about each other? When else would they have this time together?

  Several pastel-colored butterflies floated nearby, tiny wings beating furiously against the invisible breeze that threatened to hold them back. Liza lifted her palms and stretched her arms out. Within seconds the butterflies were flying over her outstretched hands, dancing on her fingertips.

  “Show off,” Bryar snorted, but did nothing to hide her approval.

  With a flick of her wrist, Liza sent the tiny winged ones over to Bryar where they circled her head like a halo and danced amongst the loose strands of hair that blew around her face.

  “I need you,” Liza said again, but this time with more force.

  Both sisters, as if by mutual and unspoken agreement, decided to ignore the dark cloud that suddenly covered the sun and the unexpected hint of desperation in Liza Jane’s voice.

  * * *

  COLT’S SISTERS MOVED fluidly through his kitchen and dining room, laughing and teasing one another as they carried heavy casserole dishes and bowls of steaming food back and forth. The radio was on in the living room, playing Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn duets. Every once in awhile one of the women would break out into song, singing loudly along with the music.

  Liza worked her own kind of magic in the dining room, setting the table and decorating it with flowers she’d picked from Colt’s yard. She still wasn’t much of a cook, although Whinny was trying to teach her. She wasn’t quite the cliché of the person who could burn water, but she wasn’t great at cooking “country” foods yet. Frying chicken, with all the sizzling and popping of the grease, scared her.

  She could pretty things up, though.

  “It all smells so good,” Bryar said shyly. She’d parked herself in the living room of the large log cabin Colt called “home.” She’d stressed over what to wear, sending Liza Jane into peals of laughter as Bryar marched downstairs in one outfit after the other, performing a nervous fashion show.

  “Well,” she’d argued, “I don’t want to be overdressed and have them think I think I’m too good for them. But I don’t want to underdress and have them think that I don’t respect them.”

  “Colt’s a farmer,” Liza had laughed. “I think you’ll be fine.”

  She’d settled on jeans, a button-down top, and a cardigan. They all belonged to Liza Jane.

  (She had a point, though; the majority of Bryar Rose’s clothes looked more appropriate at a Las Vegas nightclub than dinner with the “in-laws,” as she called them. Bryar had worn her “regular” clothes the first few days she was in town. She’d looked pretty funny sitting around the farm house in black leather pants and a low-cut silver camisole.)

  “Anything I can do to help?” Bryar asked. Liza could hear the nervousness in her voice and was a little touched that her sister was trying so hard; it meant a lot to her that she cared about the Bluevines’ opinions.

  Filly paused with a steaming bowl of biscuits in her hand and looked at Bryar. Liza thought Filly was a little in awe of her sister. She couldn’t stop checking her out when she thought nobody was looking. “You can set out the silverware if you’d like,” she answered.

  Happy to have something to do, Bryar jumped up and started for the kitchen. Liza smiled. Bryar was doing her best to redeem herself, trying to make up for the bad attitude she’d had upon arrival and for people thinking she was trying to off half the town.

  Dinner consisted of corn on the cob, green beans, pork chops, mashed potatoes, biscuits, and pecan pie. Liza had two plates.

  “This is soooo good,” Bryar said, talking from the corner of her full mouth. “I mean it.”

  “That’s saying a lot coming from Bryar,” Liza said with a smile. “She usually eats grass.”

  “I don’t eat grass,” Bryar smirked.

  “Foie gras looks like grass to me,” Liza said. “Bryar is always on a diet.”

  “The camera adds ten pounds,” Bryar shrugged.

  “I think I’d rather enjoy food,” Mare said, shaking her head. “I couldn’t imagine having to watch every single thing I ate like that, worrying that someone in a magazine would call me fat.”

  “It’s why she’s always in a bad mood,” Liza said. “She’s hungry.” Bryar sent her a dirty look from across the table but both women smiled.

  “Dang it, I forgot the butter,” Bridle sighed. “Hold on, I’ll be right back.”

  When she made a move to get up from her seat, however, Bryar held out her hand and motioned for her to stop. “Here, let me,” she said. “I didn’t get to do much.”

  The kitchen counter, where the butter was slowly melting in its pewter dish, was visible from the table. Everyone watched as Bryar turned to face it. Narrowing her eyes, she stared intently at the dish, beads of sweat popping out on her forehead from the concentration. Liza watched with delight as Bryar lifted the dish, let it hover in the air for a second until she gained her bearings, and then sent it flying into the dining room where they all waited expectantly.

  The “thud” that sounded as it dropped to the table wasn’t exactly graceful, but nobody cared. Whinny laughed–a sound full of delight–and Filly clapped her hands in appreciation. Colt grinned and spooned up another bite of mashed potatoes. Mare appeared nonplussed, she was getting used to Liza Jane and some of her antics by that point, but it was the look on Bridle’s face that caused Liza to take a second look. She wasn’t quite disturbed, but there was something in her eyes that was…thoughtful, perhaps. Liza c
ouldn’t put her finger on it and made a mental note to talk to her about it later.

  “That’s not really my thing,” Bryar said shyly, dropping her head a little. “Liza’s much better at it. I’m a little rusty, but I’ve been practicing.”

  “You done good,” Colt told her as he reached across the table and gave her an affectionate pat on the hand. As far as he was concerned, she was already part of the family–just one more sister in his life full of women.

  He was watching out for her just like a big brother, too. Earlier in the evening, he’d told Liza that a man had come to the farm for some landscaping shrubs and had mentioned something about Bryar poisoning the town. Colt had asked him to leave, telling him that a man that stupid didn’t deserve a Bluevine bush.

  Under the table, Liza ran her hand over his thigh as a wordless “thank you”, the feel of his jeans familiar and comforting. Later she would explain just what a big deal it had been for Bryar Rose to demonstrate her powers in that way. She’d never been comfortable sharing that part of her with strangers, or even herself. Bryar’s skills were not very developed, she really wasn’t sure what all she was capable of doing, and had never really been able to move things, either. Liza didn’t know she’d been working on it.

  The fact that she’d done it publicly, even within the privacy of Colt’s home, said a lot; it was her way of letting the Bluevines know that she liked them, approved of them, and even wanted to be a small part of what they had.

  * * *

  IT WAS STILL CHILLY, being that it was only May and in Kentucky it could snow one day and be ninety degrees the next, but every once in awhile they’d have a mild night and when they did they tried to make the most of it.

  Filly, Bryar, and Liza rocked back and forth on the swing, squeezed together companionably in the way only women are comfortable. Filly watched Bryar adoringly out of the corner of her eye. She’s apparently decided that even if she was making the townspeople sick, it was forgivable since she knew Beyoncé and Shakira. It didn’t take much to impress fickle Filly.

  Mare and Whinny had brought out lawn chairs and set them up on the porch. Bridle, always managing to busy herself with something, kneeled in the damp grass and tugged at weeds.

  “It’s 10 o’clock at night,” Filly called out. “Quit working!”

  “I want to start planting soon,” Bridle shrugged. “Just want to get things ready.”

  Colt, his old Martin resting across his knees, sat on the front porch steps and leaned against hand-hewn post. He’d built most of the house himself. Liza thought again about how pleasurable it must feel to come home every day to a place that you not only designed but actually created. Colt was cocky sometimes, but he always appreciated what he had. He possessed a lot of pride, and with good reason.

  Liza herself felt a similar contentment when it came to living in the farm house. Knowing that it had been her grandparents’–that she was living in what had once symbolized their dream, filled her with intense satisfaction.

  And to think–she’d once imagined that the epitome of success meant living in a cookie-cutter brick façade house, paying HOA fees, and having a healthy 401 (k). She imagined that some people still defined success in such a way, and that was okay. But she’d changed, just as her dreams had changed.

  “He’s really, really good,” Bryar whispered, gesturing to Colt.

  Colt, for his part, didn’t seem to be aware of anyone else on the porch. His U.K. Wildcats baseball cap was pulled low, covering half his face, but Liza could tell that his eyes were closed. His foot tapped out a slow rhythm as he sang about the adventures of Pancho and Lefty. His gritty baritone wasn’t technically perfect, he’d never make it through the final rounds on American Idol, but the way he sang a song made you believe he believed the lyrics. Liza loved listening to him sing.

  “Is it exciting working with all those famous people?” Filly asked, sounding like any nosy teenager.

  Bryar grimaced. “Sometimes. It’s kind of fascinating watching the really talented ones. I mean, some of them are just pure creative geniuses. I enjoy just sitting back and watching their process.”

  “And others?” Mare asked.

  “Others are a real pain in the ass,” Bryar admitted. “They’ve started buying into their own hype. Believe their own media. Hell, it’s hard to blame them. I mean, there are performers I work with people who will literally take a picture of their breakfast at iHop and within fifteen minutes they’ve got more than one hundred comments on their social media pages, telling them what geniuses they are for ordering the crepes instead of the French toast.”

  Liza and Mare laughed. Colt continued singing, the part about praying for Lefty as well as Pancho, and was off in his own world.

  “There aren’t many women producers, either,” Bryar added. “It’s been a fight to get where I am.”

  “And not just a figurative one,” Liza added. “Bryar’s got a couple of barroom showdowns under her belt.”

  “Yep, that’s the truth. Bitches be mean.”

  “She’s very talented,” Liza said. “She’s good at what she does.”

  Bryar glanced over at Colt and sighed. “I remember being a teenager and thinking I just wanted to work around music, around people like him. Sometimes the music gets lost in all the other bullshit. Artists want to much creative control these days that they can’t see the forest for the trees. They don’t listen to their producers. They don’t listen to their fans. And then they put out mediocre crap. This, though? This is nice.”

  “He coulda been a big star,” Filly said, a touch of wistfulness in her voice. “He used to win all the talent shows, even won the 4-H one and got to sing at the state fair once.”

  “What happened?” Bryar asked.

  “Stage fright mostly,” Filly whispered. “He don’t care to sing in front of other people. And he’s a little shy. Always talked himself out of things.”

  Liza felt it disloyal to add her own two cents to the conversation, but she suspected that a lot of it had to do with the fact that Colt simply didn’t want to leave Kudzu Valley. This was his home; dreaming got him to the bus but leaving was too far to go.

  The conversation drifted off then and they all fell silent, each lost in their own private thoughts. Colt changed tunes and began singing Willie Nelson’s “Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain,” a song Liza Jane remembered her grandmother playing when she was a child.

  Content with the brief reprieve of stress and snuggled between two of her favorite women in bliss, Liza smiled. A lightning bug darted past, the first one of the season. Then another.

  Liza was tired but using the last bit of her energy she clapped her hands and pointed at the dark area just off the front steps, close to where Bridle and Colt were sitting. Soon, the night was alive with tiny, dancing balls of fire.

  Filly’s eyes shone wide and even Mare looked impressed. Laughing, Bryar leaned over and rested her head on Liza’s shoulder.

  Chapter Twelve

  Liza had promised herself, and Colt’s sisters, that she’d stay off of Topix and other social media sites.

  “It will just upset you,” Mare had warned her.

  “Just a bunch of ignorant people being mean,” Bridle had agreed.

  Still, if they were talking about Bryar in town then she needed to know. She couldn’t help Bryar if she didn’t know what was going on.

  Late at night, once Bryar was tucked away in her room, probably clutching her phone, willing any of her associates to call her and offer encouragement (or a job), Liza sat down in her office and turned to her laptop.

  It didn’t take long for Liza to find Bryar’s name on Topix. In fact, there were no less than four threads about her. Their titles were pretty self-explanatory of the contents that fell under them:

  That witch is trying to kill us

  How do we get that witch out

  That Brier is awful

  Briyar is a heroin ho and needs to go

  Liza shuddered. What the heck wa
s wrong with people? The comments were even worse.

  “She come in here on her broom and thought she was better than everyone else. Get off your high horse and get a real job.”

  “Probably a welfare case like everyone else and now we’re going to have to start paying for her too. It’s not fair that the rest of us have to work for a living and our kids do without when people like that sit on their lazy asses and draw checks.”

  (Liza wasn’t sure what that one was about; it might have been posted under the wrong thread.)

  “Can we get rid of her or sue her or something?”

  “We could all just start making trouble for her. A few of us do it and she’d leave fo’ shore.”

  “Wut is rong with these women? They thinks they witches and can do magic shit. They just crazy and need a cray-cray check if u ask me.”

  “Witchcraft is the work of the devil. I hope this woman and her sister accept Jesus into their hearts and find salvation.”

  “Thanks Obama.”

  By the time Liza was finished, she felt like she needed a bath to wash away the ugliness. It was concerning to know that the people who wrote such things could be anyone from police officers to county officials and school teachers. What else was lurking behind closed doors? Why did people have to be so mean?

  What she needed to do was place a cleansing spell over the whole damned town. Wash the meanness right out of them.

  She didn’t have that much sage.

  * * *

  “HELLO, PRETTY THING.”

  With her hands covered in oil and flakes of shea butter, Liza lifted her face up to receive the kiss Colt had ready for her.

  “Hey yourself, hot stuff. What are you doing here?”

  Liza was sitting cross-legged in the middle of her kitchen floor, surrounded by empty Mason jars, bags of beeswax and shea butter flakes. Beside her were buckets of various types of plants. She’d been working for hours, trying to make new salves, essential oils, and poultices for the shop.