by Amy Boyles
“What’s gotten up your craw?” she asked.
“You have, that’s what.”
She smacked her lips and jutted out her mouth in defiance. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
I clicked my tongue. “That’s fine if you don’t. It doesn’t matter to me, but by the end of this conversation you will.”
“Are you getting attitude with me?”
I folded my arms and glared at her. “I certainly am.”
“No granddaughter of mine—”
“Stop it. Right now. Or I’ll send you home to scan newspaper articles with Amelia and Cordelia.”
Betty huffed before collapsing onto the bed. The springs groaned under her weight, and she frowned, not liking the sound of it.
I took a seat in a rocking chair. “Betty”—I crossed one knee over the other and threaded my fingers over the joint,—“I don’t know what’s gotten into you, but you’re acting like you don’t know how to behave around civilized people.”
She scratched the base of her neck, and her gaze flicked around the room like a cornered wild animal. “I don’t know what in the tarnation you’re talking about.”
I shook my head. “I’m sure you do.” I gestured out the window. “What was that all about? You know these people aren’t witches, so why are you acting like one of them might spell you? What do you want, to let the entire world know we exist?”
“Of course not,” she snapped.
“Then what is it?”
Betty pumped her jaws as if she were chewing gum. “It’s nothing.”
“It’s something. Now, what is it?” When she didn’t answer, I warned, “Amelia and Cordelia.”
“Fine,” she snarled. “I’m just—I’ve been all worried since this thing with the heart happened. I’m afraid, Pepper.”
That may have been the first time my grandmother had ever admitted to being afraid. Worse, the fact that she was scared terrified me.
Betty Craple was the strongest, most fearsome woman I knew. “You’re scared?”
She closed her eyes and pulled out her pipe. I started to protest against her smoking but then changed my mind. Why take this away from her? If it made Betty feel better to suck on her corncob pipe filled with tobacco, then so be it.
My grandmother took her time tapping out a nugget of tobacco and filling the bowl. She lit it with a flame that emerged from the tip of her finger, and took a long, luxurious pull.
“Of course I’m scared. We’re looking for a needle in a haystack in a world I’m not familiar with. Oh, I know all about the human world. I’ve spent time here. I know what it’s about, but it ain’t the same—none of this is the same. This ain’t my home. It’s not Magnolia Cove, the place I love and hold dear. I don’t know what the heck this place is. It’s some strange hillbilly world. They like ghosts here? Think they want to see them, huh? Well, what these humans don’t realize is that ghosts are the least of their problems.
“They need to be worried about the real stuff—about vampires and witches, werewolves and other creatures that might want to hurt them. Instead they think ghosts are funny, cool. They probably think witches are, too. What sort of moron thinks they shouldn’t be afraid of witches?”
I hated to tell my grandmother, but Hollywood made witches out to be very different than we actually were. Most of the time witches were evil, their faces ugly and their hearts black.
Yes, I’d known some witches who were like that, but most of us were a decent lot.
“Betty, I’m so sorry,” I said. “I had no idea how you felt. Would you rather go home?”
She shook her head.
“I understand if this is too much for you. It’s hard, I know, dealing with all of this. I mean, it’s strange, being in a foreign town, having to ask people you don’t know for help, not being able to work your magic for fear someone will notice.”
“Speak for yourself, kid. If I need to work my magic, I will. I don’t care who sees.”
I shot her a skeptical look.
Betty squirmed. “Fine. No magic.” She shot me a pointed look. “Unless it’s an emergency; then I get to use it. If that happens, all bets are off. I’ll be pulling out my power and throwing spells every which way.”
I relented. “Fine.” I raked my fingers through my hair, scratching my scalp in frustration. “But promise me that you won’t do anything crazy unless there’s no other choice.”
She stared at me, her eyes glittering.
“Betty,” I growled.
“Fine, I won’t do anything outrageous unless I absolutely have no choice. But I expect, if this gold man is still in town, that it will come down to me having to work magic.”
The rocking chair I sat in suddenly felt very small. I stretched my legs out, enjoying the feel of my muscles elongating. “What makes you say that?”
Betty thumbed her nose. “When you get to be my age, you listen to your instincts.”
“I already listen to mine,” I countered.
“No, you don’t,” she said.
My hackles rose. “Of course I do.”
She waved a hand at me, suggesting I settle down. “Don’t get your panties in a wad. Sometimes you listen to your inner voice; sometimes you don’t. That’s how it is with all of us. As you get older, that changes; you start to listen more, much more.”
“Well,” I said pointedly, “what does your inner voice tell you?”
Betty stroked her chin. “My inner voice tells me that before we find this piece of the heart, that Blake Calhoun will show up in Haunted Hollow. I’ll have no choice but to use my magic and the gold man…”
I was learning forward, enraptured in the prophecy she wove. “What about him?”
Betty took another long drag from the pipe. She tipped her chin to the ceiling and blew several squares of smoke that dissolved into the atmosphere.
“The gold man?”
“Yes,” I answered.
Her eyes glittered. But they didn’t do so out of mischief. They didn’t even glitter from excitement or interest. Deep within Betty’s eyes, I saw worry, worry and sadness.
Her lips slowly parted, and my stomach curled into a knot. “The gold man,” she explained, “won’t fare well, I fear. I worry that by the time all this is said and done, he may be dead.”
“From who? The vampire?”
I didn’t know anything about the gold man other than the fact that he was selling magic to people. That wasn’t good. It was never a good thing to make money selling ordinary people things that were created from magic. In Magnolia Cove I didn’t have to worry about this, but out in the rest of the world, that was a real thing to be concerned with, a real problem.
Betty shook her head. “I don’t think it will be a vampire who kills the gold man.”
Well, that was even worse. Who would it be, one of us? I wasn’t interested in harming this man. Not unless he harmed someone I loved first, that was. And even then I wasn’t aiming to end his life. I had absolutely no interest in that.
“Then who?” I asked. “Who will hurt this person?”
Betty’s mouth parted. I could feel the weight of her words before they were even out of her mouth. I could feel the heaviness blanket the room, pushing down on me, making my spine bend.
Part of me wanted to hear what she had to say but the other half of me wanted to cower, for I was afraid of what intuition had whispered in Betty’s ear. Whatever was going to happen to the gold man, his death, as it were, I didn’t want it to be at my hand, and I worried that’s what she was going to say.
But those weren’t the words that escaped Betty’s mouth. Instead when my grandmother spoke, she said, “Why, I have a feeling the gold man will die by his own hand.”
My throat constricted. “That would mean?”
She nodded. “He’ll turn himself into gold.”
Gary
Gary had never been a fan of antiques. He didn’t like old things, not at all. He preferred things that were sparkling new an
d fancy.
He also preferred gold. Ever since Gary had acquired his talent, he had a new appreciation for gold. The shining stuff was much prettier than he’d ever imagined. It reflected light in a way that some might even call magical.
That made him laugh to himself. Gold was magical? He wouldn’t have been surprised if it was. The gift he had received was definitely magical, if not God-given.
Gary had never been a man of God his entire life, not even when he was a kid. But now that he’d been bestowed with this gift, he started to think that maybe, perhaps maybe, he did believe in God. Not only did he believe in God, but he was doing God’s work in a way. By giving others the gift of gold, he was certainly giving others a wonderful, wonderful thing—hope and joy.
The looks of wonder that folks gave him reinforced that. People always had such big eyes when he showed them that their button had been turned into gold. Some people said it was miraculous, what he did.
He would have to agree. There was definitely something similar to a miracle in the power he now had. Oh, he didn’t like to brag about it. He didn’t want to be known as a man with a power. He wanted to remain humble, stay true to himself.
But still…there were temptations. Before, Gary had considered women and drink to be two of the best parts of life. He smacked his lips, remembering what a drink tasted like.
But now he saw things differently. His was a higher calling. He was a conduit, a miracle worker, as it were. People didn’t just seek him out to watch a simple gold transference. They asked him to heal their sick children or to give them hope.
He had declined the offers to help the sick children. That was not what he wanted to do. After all, how could turning something to gold help a person become well?
It couldn’t and that was the truth. But when it came to offering faith, he did have something to give. He had cupped a woman’s hand and prayed with her. In the end she had seemed happier, her hope restored. To Gary, that had been worth something.
A woman looked up from the counter. “Yoo-hoo! What can I get for you today?”
Gary considered her to be somewhat pretty. She had the clear skin of youth and wore red-rimmed glasses and red lipstick. It was the sort of lipstick that only weeks ago would have drawn him in. The hue was the color of crushed maraschino cherries—vibrant and tangy on her flesh.
The color tempted him the same as her open smile. He closed his eyes tight. He did not want to be tempted. He’d not come all this way, done all this good, worked what people called miracles, to be tempted by a woman.
But she kept talking. She wouldn’t leave him alone.
“What can I help you with today? Tell Gigi what you are looking for and I will find it for you, yes?”
“I’m looking for…”
Why had he come in here? He wasn’t a fan of antique stores; he’d already established that. But why, why had he walked in?
Gary had heard something about this store being haunted. He’d wanted to see for himself. He’d wondered if his newfound powers would help him to see that, to see a spirit.
Something in him felt divine, like he’d been handpicked by God to bestow his gold touch on people. He wondered what else he could do—what else the chunk of rock in his hand would lead him to?
The woman came around from the counter. Her smile hadn’t faded at all even though Gary hadn’t responded to her. In fact, it seemed to bloom brighter, which made his heart constrict.
He had refused women since the power had been bestowed on him, but now, looking in her eyes, he felt a longing within him stir.
“We have a wonderful collection of antique candleholders, if you’re interested in those,” she said. “Or if you like, I can give you a tour of the shop and show you all the wonderful things we have. Mind you, even though the store is in a haunted town, the things we have are not haunted, yes? So please don’t ask.”
Where was her accent from? He couldn’t place it. Was it Eastern European, maybe? Italian? It was almost impossible to decipher.
She strode past him, and he got a whiff of her perfume. She smelled of the beach—of coconuts and sand, of sunny days spent bathing on the shore.
He felt something within him snap as she prattled on. He felt his own urge for her, his own interest pique as she gestured to a candlestick.
Gary realized what within him had snapped. He hadn’t felt the thing in weeks, but now it bloomed in him bright and hot. The thing was desire.
He felt desire for this woman, and it bothered him. It made him question the holiness of his gift. He hadn’t entered this store to be tempted by the flesh. He’d simply come in to see if he could witness a ghost—see if his power of gold was becoming stronger.
“Now, this is a wonderful little piece. It’s from the 1800s.” Gigi ran her hand over the glossy top of a table. “Very heavy. Quite sturdy.”
He slowly approached, coming closer. Getting close enough to Gigi to smell her perfume again. Yes, it was the beach, and it smelled like heaven.
But his temptation bothered him. Gary did not want to be tempted by this woman, by this succubus who would suck him dry and leave him without his power.
What was she doing now? She was showing him object after object, smiling and laughing, being nice and flaunting herself. She was flaunting every bit of her—sashaying this way and that.
All of it made him extremely angry. The fact that she would be so nice, that she would flaunt herself in front of him, a man with power, one who had given up temptation, made him irate.
Who did she think she was?
Gigi flicked her hands nonchalantly. “Look around the store. If there’s anything you see that you want, let Gigi know. I will get for you.”
There was something Gary saw that he wanted. He wanted Gigi. It made him so angry that he reached out for her and grasped her arm. The look of shock on Gigi’s face made him smile. He could almost smell her fear, and he liked it.
He opened his mouth to say something. At the same time, from his pocket, he felt the power of the rock stirring. He couldn’t control it. He couldn’t stop it.
He didn’t want to.
A brilliant flash of light erupted in the small antique shop located in Haunted Hollow. It was quick, so quick, a passerby would only notice if they were paying close attention.
If they were, they might also have noticed that a little while later, the man claiming to turn everyday objects into gold fled the store.
Blissful
I helped Roan make an incredible dinner that night. I know, I actually helped, which was amazing, given that my experience with cooking went as far as opening a can of sauce and tossing it over al dente noodles.
No, I was not a cook of any sort, but Roan was. Even though I wasn’t a culinary master, there was something I was incredibly good at, and that was minding instructions.
Trust me, Roan had plenty of those for me to follow.
“You’re going to lightly flour the slices of beef,” he said, “and then gently lay them in the oil.”
I dredged a medallion of beef over a plate of flour and dropped it in a pan. The oil hissed and spat.
“Gently,” Roan chided. “I’d like to survive tonight without having to put out a grease fire.”
“That was gently,” I argued. “I can’t help it that the oil is hot.”
Roan smiled as he shimmied his way into my work space. “Tell you what—why don’t you come over here and slice the lettuce for the salad?”
I swiped my flour-coated fingers over the soft white apron that Roan had let me borrow. “Thanks,” I said, tossing him a smile. “I didn’t want to do the hard stuff anyway.”
Roan’s full lips curled into a smile. “I had a feeling you couldn’t be trusted with the meat. Now, swap sides.”
I took up my new position and started chopping lettuce and veggies.
“I invited Ruth and Alice to dinner,” Roan said. “Oh, and Mr. Hodges.”
My eyeballs nearly fell from my head. “You did?”
> He nodded. “He was the person who told us about Axel in the first place, remember? So I figured he knows a little something about Axel’s power, or at least he has a hint. I thought it would be nice to invite him.”
I rolled my eyes. “Roan Storm, I have the feeling that what you’re really doing is spying on Alice’s relationship.”
Roan chuckled as he laid a round of beef in the pan. “There you would be wrong, Blissful Breneaux. The last thing I am is nosy, especially about other folks’s relationships. You, on the other hand—”
“Watch it; I have a knife,” I reminded him.
He laughed. “One that I’m betting you won’t use.”
“No, I won’t. But I resent the fact that you’re suggesting I’m nosy when it comes to other people’s relationships.”
Roan planted an arm on my shoulder and gently tugged me until I faced him. “Of course you’re not nosy. I know you’re not. I was only trying to get you riled up.”
I cocked a brow. “Why?”
“Let’s just say I enjoy it.”
I scoffed. “Who knew torture could feel so good?”
“Blissful.” Roan’s dark eyes were soft, overflowing with emotion. I felt my throat close as the intensity of his emotions filled me. “First of all, you know I’m joking. I do enjoy getting you riled up, of course; that’s not a lie.”
“Of course not,” I murmured. I could barely speak, barely edge the words from my lips.
“But I know you’re not nosy.” Roan took my hand and brushed his lips across my knuckles. “You’re perfectly you, and that’s why I love you.”
My lungs constricted. This moment had started out so light, had suddenly become filled with love of all sorts.
“I love you, too,” I said.
“You’re the best girl I know,” he said.
“You’re the best man I know.”
His mouth quirked. “Sounds like the two of us should get together, but only if we can fight demons and send ghosts into the light. Otherwise I don’t think we’ll have much in common.”
I threw my head back and laughed. “And only if you have a spirit trapped in your basement.”
