“You can’t make someone love you without putting in the work,” he continued, ignoring one of the girls when she tried to grab the back of his shirt and pull him away from Nelson. “And what about her? Have you considered what she wants? When you’re an adult you’ll realize that making the person you love happy is more important than getting what you want. You’re not there yet.”
Nelson balked. “I’ll make her happy.”
“She’s already happy. If you … hold on.” Landon kept one hand on Nelson’s chest, forcing him to remain flat on the ground, and pointed another at one of the girls when she tried to pinch his butt in an effort to force him to shift his body. “I will arrest you. If that happens, you won’t see Nelson anymore. Have you seen Orange is the New Black? That’s right. You’ll be looking for girlfriends instead of boyfriends if you’re not careful.”
“Don’t tell her that,” I chided. “That’s not very nice.”
“You’re telling me.” Landon grew increasingly flustered as he grappled with Nelson. “Girlfriends are work, Nelson. You have to be mature enough to handle it. You’re not there yet. Besides that, you know in your heart it wouldn’t be a real relationship, so why do you want it?”
“I … .” Nelson held up his hands in mock surrender. “Because I’ve seen you together and you’re always happy,” he blurted out. “This summer you were at one of the festivals and you actually paid money to go into the kissing booth. Who does that?”
“Smart men,” Landon replied, not missing a beat. “Whoever thought of that kissing booth is a genius. As for the rest, we are happy. You can’t force that. You have to work for it. You’re still a kid, Nelson. You have plenty of time to work for it.”
“But she’ll be gone by then,” Nelson gritted out. “It will be too late.”
“It’s already too late,” I offered. “I love Landon. That’s not going to change. I promise you’ll find a girl of your own. You might not find her here, but you’ll find her. You have to give it time.”
“But … that’s no fun,” Nelson sputtered. “I want a girlfriend now.”
“You have us,” the redhead cooed, stroking Nelson’s cheek. “We love you.”
Nelson made a face that only Aunt Tillie could understand or love. “I don’t want you. I never wanted you. I’m still not sure how this happened. I … you know how you said relationships are work? These chicks are nothing but work … and more work … and just when you’re ready for a nap they’re even more work.”
Landon pressed his lips together, giving the appearance that he was struggling mightily to refrain from laughing. “Every woman worth the fight takes a lot of work,” he said. “You can’t have my woman, though. I’ve already done the work. I’m still doing the work. You need to find your own woman.”
“Wait a second … .” The redhead – I was pretty sure her name was Sarah Galloway – narrowed her eyes as she stared at me. “You’re after our man, aren’t you?”
I immediately started shaking my head. “Definitely not.”
“She is,” Sarah said, squaring her shoulders as she swiveled. “She’s after our man.”
I sensed the shift in the atmosphere and when I risked a glance at the girls I found them all staring at me … and they didn’t look happy. “Uh-oh.”
Landon followed my gaze, his expression slipping. “Bay, you need to run. Go to the police station and lock yourself in.”
“But … I’m not leaving you.”
“Run,” Landon ordered, forgetting his fight with Nelson and moving to intercept one of the angry-looking girls. “Run!”
He bellowed the word, but I couldn’t force myself to leave. What if they turned on him once I was gone? “Landon, I … .”
“Bay.” Landon sounded desperate as he struggled to a standing position. “They’re going to rip out your hair if you’re not careful. Sweetie … .”
It was already too late. I sensed that when one of the girls made an odd sound like a cat and launched herself in my direction. I managed to dodge her, but the three who followed didn’t give me an opening and hopped on me at the same time.
“Oomph.”
“Bay!” I could hear Landon scrambling to save me, but all I could do was cover my face as the girls started screaming and clawing.
I did my best to shield myself, all the while wondering if I would be disfigured before everything was said and done. I felt fingers tugging my hair … and fingernails digging into my skin … and even a foot slam into my ribs, causing me to groan. I was badly outnumbered with no way out.
“Bay!” Landon sounded desperate to get to me, but I couldn’t help his endeavors. I was in survival mode and had no idea how long my strength would hold out.
Just when I thought I was about to lose everything, the attack ceased as abruptly as it started. I took a moment to catch my breath, gasping for oxygen, and to perform a mental assessment of my body. I risked lifting my head and found Landon at my side. He slid his arm under me and tugged me to him, his wary eyes trained on the girls.
For their part, the girls looked confused as they wiped tears from their eyes and murmured in low voices to one another, increasing the distance between Nelson and themselves. Nelson looked devastated. He stood next to the wishing well, his fingers poised over the opening.
“What did you do?”
Nelson looked defeated, as if the world had given him a good kick in the butt and then added fire for good measure. “I reversed the wish. That’s what you wanted, right?”
“What made you do that?” Landon asked, running his finger down the side of my face. I had a feeling I would have a black eye before the day was out – the top of my cheekbone was extremely sore – but things could’ve been worse, so I let it go.
“Something you said,” Nelson replied, his voice distant. “You said if you love someone, you put their happiness ahead of your own. You were going to put yourself at risk to save Bay. I saw it.”
“I was more worried about hurting teenagers than anything else, but I get what you’re saying.” Landon hooked his hand under my arm and helped me to stand. “Thank you for doing it.”
Nelson pressed his lips together and nodded. “I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt.”
“We know that,” I said, tenderly pressing my fingertips to my sore eye. “What happened with the wishing well isn’t your fault.”
“Whose fault is it?”
I exchanged a quick glance with Landon. “We’re working on that. We’ll be tackling that situation before the day is out. I promise you that.”
There are times I wish she was mine. Then there are times when I see her with her cousins and thank the maker that she’s not. Still, the times I wish she was mine far outnumber the ones where … oh, geez. What are they doing now? Is that a bottle rocket? Who would give those kids a bottle rocket?
– Chief Terry while watching Bay cavort with her cousins
Twelve
“Let me see.”
Landon was gentle as he removed the bag of frozen peas resting against my eye, his face full of sympathy as he pressed his lips together. I could tell he didn’t like what he saw. We’d returned to the inn after Nelson reversed his wish. My mother barely spared me a glance before tossing a bag of frozen peas in my direction. She was too busy glowering at Aunt Tillie, who made a big show of working on a reversal spell as she muttered under her breath whenever she thought no one was listening.
“How bad is it?”
“It’s fine.” Landon answered immediately, but the look Thistle shot me over his shoulder told me he was fibbing.
“Will people think I’ve been in a fight?” I was trying to look on the bright side of things. “It might up my street cred.”
“People will think you got your butt kicked,” Thistle replied. “That won’t up your anything.”
“I’m just worried people are going to think I did it,” Landon grumbled. “That’s what happens when a woman shows up with a black eye.”
“Not in thi
s house.” Thistle was enjoying my injury far too much. Her expression was almost gleeful, which proves just how evil she really is. “They’ll think I did it. I am the queen of the witches, after all.”
“You’re the queen of something,” Landon shot back, brushing a kiss against my cheek before putting the peas back in their spot. “Maybe we should take you to the hospital to have that checked out.”
“Because you’re worried everyone will think you beat me up? No one will believe that.”
“You’d be surprised. But I wasn’t suggesting that for my benefit. I suggested it for your benefit. I think this is going to look ugly by tomorrow morning.”
“We can add some mugwort to it,” Twila suggested, shuffling closer. “That would probably kick in the healing. That means it will turn that sickly green color sooner, but it will be totally healed much faster.”
“I’m willing to try anything.”
“Will it hurt her?” Landon looked legitimately concerned. “I don’t want her in pain.”
“Oh, you’re so cute.” Twila grabbed his cheek and gave it a good jiggle. “You love your Bay so very much, don’t you?” She talked to him as if he were two, which I thought would send him over the edge. I was wrong.
“I do love her,” Landon agreed. “I felt helpless when I saw those girls attacking. I didn’t know what to do. I’m not keen on punching a bunch of teenage girls.”
“You had no problem tackling Nelson,” I pointed out, grinning at the memory. “You flew through the air like one of those television FBI agents. All we were missing was a car so you could slide across the hood.”
“Ooh, like T.J. Hooker,” Thistle teased, her eyes gleaming.
Even though he was feeling serious, Landon mustered a smile. “I wanted to hurt that kid, so I had no problem tackling him.”
“He did right by us in the end,” I reminded him. “He reversed the spell.”
“He did.” Landon bobbed his head. “He didn’t do it before you got hurt, though.”
“Landon … .”
Landon held up his hand to quiet me. “I don’t want to turn it into a thing. I was just frightened. It’s okay.”
Thistle and I exchanged a weighted look. She could sense his unease almost as easily as I could, but neither one of us knew how to make him feel better, so we let the moment pass.
“Did you call Clove?” I asked, changing the subject. “We’re going to need help if we expect to turn around all of these wishes by the end of the day.”
“I called her, but I don’t think she understood what I said,” Thistle replied. “She kept asking me to repeat myself, and then I heard Sam in the background and she said she would be over just as soon as she was done worshipping him.
“Now, I figure they’re playing some sort of weird sex game that I don’t want to know anything about,” she continued. “If it’s something worse than that, I’ll have to punch him.”
“There’s a lot of punching aspirations going around today,” I teased, smirking at Landon as he studied my profile. “I really am okay. Believe it or not, this isn’t the first black eye I’ve ever had. I was blessed with several when I was younger.”
“All thanks to me.” Thistle puffed out her chest, proud. “I punch like a dude.”
“How marvelous for you,” Landon deadpanned, shaking his head. “I’m just glad it’s over. This is the only house in the world where a cursed wishing well is actually something to worry about. I can’t quite seem to wrap my head around it.”
“What’s vexing you?” Twila asked, serene.
“Vexing me?”
“What’s bothering you?” I corrected.
“I know what ‘vexing’ means,” Landon grumbled, shaking his head. “What I don’t understand is how these wishes work. Bay said that you can’t force someone to love you if they don’t feel it, but Nelson clearly made those girls feel something for him. And he was trying to do the same with Bay.”
“You can’t make a heart feel something it doesn’t feel, but you can trick a brain into believing something that’s not real,” Mom explained, narrowing her eyes when she saw Aunt Tillie attempt to steal a cookie from the counter. “No snacks until you come up with a reversal spell.”
“This is cruel and unusual punishment,” Aunt Tillie complained. “How do you expect me to work under these conditions?”
“You should’ve thought about that before you cursed the wishing well to mess with Margaret Little.”
“There’s such a thing as elder abuse,” Aunt Tillie pointed out. “I believe that’s what’s happening here.”
“It can get worse.” Mom’s tone was firm before turning back to Landon. She seemed to sympathize with his plight more than anyone else. I didn’t understand why he was so worked up. “Nelson couldn’t have made Bay fall in love with him … or out of love with you. That’s not how this works.”
“But Bay would’ve thought she was in love with him,” Landon persisted. “Isn’t that the same thing?”
“Not even close.” Mom wiped her hands on a towel before shifting closer to Landon. “Bay loves you with her whole heart. Her heart recognizes your heart. I know that sounds schmaltzy, but it’s true. Bay’s heart would’ve known something was wrong even if Nelson managed to make that wish. You don’t have to worry about that.”
“That doesn’t change the fact that Nelson could’ve taken advantage of her.” Landon refused to back down. “What if he’d wanted … sex?” Landon lowered his voice on the last word, as if afraid someone might overhear him.
“I’m fairly certain that Nelson wouldn’t know what to do with a woman if she did actually want sex,” Thistle pointed out, grabbing the cookie Aunt Tillie had been angling for a moment before and shooting a smug smile in our great-aunt’s direction as she bit into it. “He probably wouldn’t have gotten further than kissing.”
“That doesn’t make me feel better.”
“It all worked out in the end,” I said, grabbing his hand. “Please don’t work yourself up over this. We’re together. Everything is fine.”
“I know.” Landon mustered a smile as he rested his forehead against mine. “Sometimes this magic stuff throws me. I’m out of my element and worried I’ll fail you at exactly the wrong time.”
“You can’t fail me. It’s not possible.”
“Oh, geez.” Aunt Tillie made a disgusted face as she stared at the ceiling. “How am I supposed to work when the schmaltz twins are talking that way? I’m going to call that government agency that investigates elder abuse and force them to rescue me from this crazy house.”
“That sounds fine to me,” Mom shot back, blasé. “They’ll put you in a home and we’ll be free of people who would curse a wishing well to be mean. I think that’s best for everybody.”
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d seen her this angry. It had been years since she mustered this much venom for one of Aunt Tillie’s miscast spells.
“Oh, fine.” Aunt Tillie turned back to the notepad on her lap. “I think I might’ve used some wormwood essence.”
“We don’t need you to think,” Mom ordered. “We need you to know.”
“Yeah,” Thistle sneered, wiggling her butt in front of Aunt Tillie before hopping away from our elderly great-aunt when she reached out to grab a handful of flesh. “We need you to know.”
“Don’t push it,” Mom warned, wagging a finger at Thistle. “Why must you always push things?”
“I think it’s a gift,” Clove announced, taking everyone by surprise when she strolled into the room with Sam at her heels. Her face was flushed – as if she’d been enjoying a brisk walk outside – and her eyes were sparkling. “So what’s the big emergency?”
Thistle tilted her head to the side as she stared at Clove, her mind working overtime. “Why are you so … shiny?”
Clove balked at Thistle’s tone. She was smart enough to realize that Thistle didn’t mean it as a compliment. “I’m a happy person. Happy people are shiny people.”
“What cult told you that?”
“Okay, let’s not start by attacking people right out of the gate,” Sam said, stepping between my cousins and extending his hands. He and Clove had been dating for months, so he was used to the Winchester method of interaction. That didn’t mean he liked it. “Can’t we all just get along?”
“I think that’s a fine idea,” Clove said, grinning.
“I think so, too.” Thistle said the words but they weren’t tinged with the snark I expected. I lifted an eyebrow as I stared. She looked as surprised by her reaction as I felt. “I personally prefer it when everyone gets along.”
Landon snorted at the singsong way Thistle delivered the line. “You didn’t hit your head when no one was looking, did you?”
“I … no.” Thistle wrinkled her nose. “That’s not what I meant to say.”
“What did you mean to say?” I asked, genuinely curious.
“I meant to say that Sam is a dreamboat and he’s the smartest male member of our family,” Thistle replied. “If we could bottle his essence and sell it, we’d make a fortune.”
Thistle’s mouth dropped open as her words registered. “What the … ?”
“Huh.” I shifted the bag of peas and stared at Sam. Something odd was going on here … other than the obvious, I mean. “Sam, you didn’t by any chance stop at the wishing well and make a wish over the past few days, did you?”
Sam balked. “I … of course not.”
“He wouldn’t do that,” Landon scoffed. “He’s far too smart, brave and wise. That’s not in his nature.” Landon’s worry lines from a moment before shifted to anger trails on either side of his eyes. “Oh, crap.”
“Yeah, I’m pretty sure Sam made a wish,” I said, chewing on my bottom lip as I tried to keep from laughing. “I’m kind of curious to know what it was … and how he phrased it.”
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