“If it’s important, leave a message,” I said to the now still phone before dropping it back into my bag. I took one last glance around the room, wondering briefly if I should grab one more item as a backup plan. I dismissed the thought with a shrug and turned back to the door.
“Okay,” I called out as I approached the door that was still ajar. “I’m done. Can I go now?” I stepped out of Roane’s bedroom and found myself back in the park, standing on the mound. I heard the door swinging shut behind me, but when I turned around, it disappeared before I ever heard it close.
“Guess that’s that then,” I said, shrugging my bag into a more comfortable position before heading out of the park.
Chapter 6
“So what are you going to do?” Ronnie asked as she counted the money from the cash register. The store was in half-light as she’d already pulled the blinds and turned the open sign to close. I sat on the other side of the counter, spinning Roane’s lopsided ring on the glass countertop, my bag of spelling supplies on the floor by my feet.
“Try for the seeking spell,” I said with a shrug. “But I mean, if the Dunhallows can’t find him with all their powers, I don’t know how they expect me to do it.”
“I’m not sure they actually expect you to,” Ronnie said darkly as she stacked coins into orderly columns.
“I don’t either, really,” I said, covering the ring with my hand to stop its spin before I put it back into the trinket box. “I feel like a mouse caught by a cat that’s just batting me around until it finally gets bored and then…” I dragged my thumb across my throat and make a squelching noise.
“You still have to at least try,” Ronnie said as she wrote something in her notebook before sweeping the coins into a zippered pouch.
“Oh, I’m gonna try,” I said. “I’m just not sure how much it’ll do.”
“Give yourself more credit,” she said as she dropped the pouch into the safe under the counter before moving on to the stack of bills. I couldn’t help the pang of envy I felt at the sight of the money. If only I’d had the ability to open a shop like this when I was twenty. But I wouldn’t begrudge Ronnie her success; it was her grandmother’s shop and she only got it after the old woman had died. Not exactly the nicest way to get something, and I’m sure Ronnie would give up the shop and all the money if it meant having her grandmother back.
“I’m not saying my spells don’t work,” I said, tearing my thoughts away from the money and Ronnie’s family life. “I’m just saying there’s something a lot stronger at work here than me if two Higher Fae can’t reach their own son, their blood. You know?”
“Yeah,” Ronnie said, dropping the second zippered envelope into the safe before turning the crank that dropped the deposits into a lower level that could only be accessed by Ronnie’s secret code and thumbprint that would break the freezing spell she’d set on it.
“Do you have any leads?” Ronnie asked as she straightened up. She grabbed her purse and slung it over her shoulder before coming around to my side of the counter.
“Just one,” I said, bending over to drop the box with Roane’s ring in it inside my messenger bag. I grabbed the strap and the handles of my shopping bag, but before I could stand up straight, Owen’s ring slipped out from the collar of my shirt, swinging wide on the cord it hung from.
“What’s that?” Ronnie demanded, but her tone told me she was sure she knew what it was.
“Nothing.” I dropped my shopping bag and clutched the ring in my fist, trying to hide it as I stuffed it back into my shirt.
“Nothing my ass,” Ronnie said, her hand shooting out to grab the cord and pull the ring out of my shirt again.
“Ronnie, leave it.”
“Is that the ring you gave Owen?” Ronnie demanded, still holding on to the ring.
“Don’t worry about it,” I said, prying her fingers open and turning away from her so I could tuck it away.
“Mattie,” Ronnie said as I bent to pick up my shopping bag again. I turned away from her and started for the front door. “Mattie!” she called out behind me, and I could hear her rapid steps as she rushed to catch up to me. She stopped me with a hand on my shoulder.
“Ronnie, please,” I said with a sigh. I reached for the handle of the door, but before I could get it open, Ronnie was in front of me, pressing her body into the door to keep it shut.
“Owen?” she demanded, leaning toward me. “You’re doing this for Owen?”
“No,” I said, letting go of the handle to cross my arms over my chest. “I am doing this to stay alive.”
“Then what’s with that?” She waved at my chest. “Where did that come from? I know you haven’t had it this whole time.”
“No, I haven’t,” I agreed, averting my eyes. “They sent it to me.”
“What?”
“The Dunhallows,” I said, looking her in the eye again, “when they sent me that letter, the ring was in the envelope.”
“Oh,” she said, her finely manicured eyebrows drawing together. “I thought maybe Owen had given it to you when he showed up that night.”
“No, I guess he didn’t make it home that night, and the Dunhallows thought threatening me with him would get me to do their bidding.” I sighed and turned around to lean against the door next to Ronnie, tilting my head back and closing my eyes.
“What? Like threatening your life wasn’t enough to get you to do it?”
“Eh,” I shrugged against the door, “maybe they thought I could perform a protection spell for myself against them, but if they already had someone important to me who they could kill, then I couldn’t say no, right?”
“Important to you?” Ronnie said, rounding on me. “What the hell do you mean important to you?”
“Of course that’s the part you grab on to,” I muttered. “You know what I mean, Ron.”
“No, I don’t, Mattie,” she argued, leaning into my space again. “You’re risking your life for a man who broke your heart. Are you freaking kidding me right now?”
“Ronnie, I am not risking my life for Owen, okay?” I took a deep breath, trying to calm the rising anger inside of me. “I know what Owen did to me; you don’t need to remind me. They’re gonna kill me if I don’t find Roane, alive no less. They just thought they’d threaten me with Owen, but that’s not why I’m doing this.”
“So why are you wearing that?” Ronnie asked, cocking an eyebrow at me.
“Because,” I started to say, but the words died in my throat. I lifted my free hand and placed it over my chest where the ring was hidden, feeling the cool metal pressing into my skin. I had no reason to wear the ring other than I wanted to. But why did I want to? I’d given Owen the ring when we were together and laid a protection charm into it because I loved him and wanted him to be safe. Then Owen had ripped my heart out and showed it to me before he walked out on me for another woman. Granted, that woman had the ability to control his free will, but if he’d never gone to see her that first time and shared blood with her that one last time, we might still be together to this day.
I squeezed my eyes shut, feeling the first prickling of tears, and shook my head, sending the tips of my hair swirling around my jaw. I didn’t need to follow that train of thought; I’d ridden that ride one too many times already.
“Because I wanted to and I’m an idiot,” I said after I was sure I could speak clearly. I dropped my hand, suddenly wanting to rip the cord from around my neck and throw the ring away. I waited for Ronnie to bawl me out again, tell me just how big of an idiot I was and that maybe I should look into a spell powerful enough to protect me from the Fae and forget about Owen and his fate, like he’d done to me. But she never did. I opened my eyes to see my best friend staring at me, a look of sympathy, not pity, on her face.
I lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug and she nodded at me. Ronnie had had her heart broken once or twice herself. Sometimes you just do stupid things when you’re hurting, and no amount of logic or lectures was going to get you to see
straight.
“Besides,” I said, “I think maybe Theo has Roane, and if she does, I’d like to be the one that catches her and gets to shove her into the oven and watch her burn.”
“Whoa, are you serious?” Ronnie blinked her wide brown eyes at me.
“Dead serious.”
“Well then,” Ronnie said with a slow grin, “why didn’t you say so in the first place?”
I gave her a quick nod and Ronnie reached out to link her arm through mine. She pulled the door open and led us out into the night. There were only a couple of hours left before sunrise. The sky to the East was already a lighter, brighter shade of indigo and the stars were starting to wink out. Ronnie pulled the huge metal grate down and locked it to the ground before setting her freezing spell. She’d offered to help me with the spells to start looking for Roane and, after the last couple of nights, I wasn’t in the mood to turn down any help I could get. I was just glad my best friend was a tricky witch like me and just as vindictive.
***
An hour later, Roane’s ring was steeping in a porcelain cup of wintergreen and vervain tea while Ronnie and I sat at my kitchen table inscribing talismans for protection and munching on some brownies. So far I’d been visited by both fairies and vampires. I could no longer act like this wasn’t a big deal.
Ronnie got up with a bundle of the charms in one hand and started to move about the apartment, setting or hanging them in each corner. When she’d set the last one, I felt the rush of power ring the apartment as the circle of protection was formed.
“Want me to get the ones outside?” Ronnie asked as I finished with the last wooden disk.
“No,” I said, pushing away from the table and gathering up the talismans. “I’ll do it, but could you put in the nails in the windows?”
“Sure, where’s your hammer?”
“Last drawer on the right.” I nodded to the kitchen before heading out the front door. The iron nails in the window frames and door threshold would keep the Fae from crossing into my home, but they wouldn’t do a damn thing to keep the vampires out. Unfortunately, I hadn’t ever had a chance to rescind Owen’s invitation into my home, so he could still come and go as he pleased. Any vampire that had shared blood with him carried the same charm, which meant Theo could waltz into my apartment whenever she wanted. Not that I thought she ever left her lair; last I knew, she hadn’t left her lair in over fifty years.
But Owen, her pet, was gone, and technically it was my fault, so she just might make an exception for me. The next time Owen was anywhere near my apartment building, I would have to make sure to rescind his invitation, no matter how much his blue eyes might still sparkle when he smiled.
“Stop it, Mattie,” I grumbled as I stalked down the hallway to the elevator. I pushed the call button, and while I waited, I wedged the first talisman under the metal threshold until only a tiny sliver of the disk still showed. The elevator binged softly just before the doors opened. The ride down was a rickety one, I always assumed that someday the cables would snap and someone, hopefully not me, would have a five-second ride to the basement with an unhappy ending. There was nowhere inconspicuous that I could set one of the talismans inside the deathtrap, but I figured just outside on my floor and some on the lobby should have me covered.
I stepped out of the elevator with that familiar wash of relief that I had made it out alive. I jammed another talisman under the metal threshold just before the elevator, managing to drop the handful I was holding. I scrambled to pick them up, tucking them into the pouch pocket of my sweatshirt. I swiveled this way and that on the balls of my feet until tiny prickles of pain shot through my legs from being crouched too long. When I stood back up with a groan, I nearly fell back on my ass.
“For the love of toads!” I cursed, my hand flying to my chest to keep my heart from bursting free. “Frankie, you scared the crap out of me!” The Were woman was standing right behind me, towering over me, her eyes snapping with poorly concealed contempt.
“Mattie,” she said, drawing out my name. “What are you doing?” I opened my mouth to answer her, but no sound came out. Should I just tell her the truth? Would she care or would she make me take the talismans back to my apartment after giving me a good smack for jamming one into the elevator threshold?
I blinked up at her, staring into her golden eyes that reminded me how close we were to the full moon. Her nostrils flared as she breathed in the scent of my fear. Her spikey blue hair was crayon red today.
“Mattie,” she prompted, arcing one red brow at me, tipping her head toward me.
“Sorry,” I whispered. Clearing my throat, I said, “Listen, I’ve pissed off some people, so I’m just putting some protection talismans in the building, you know, to keep ‘em out. I hope that’s cool.” The words rushed out of me so fast I wasn’t sure even I followed what I said. After a moment, Frankie furrowed her brow at me and leaned back, out of my personal space.
“Oh,” she said, “yeah whatever.” She waved her hand in the air, her finely manicured nails catching in the light. “Just don’t, you know, put anything permanent anywhere.”
“Wait,” I said, sure I had misheard her. “It’s okay? Really?”
“Honestly, Mattie, I don’t care,” she said with a shake of her head. She reached around me and pushed the call button for the elevator. The sound of the gears grinding in protest echoed into the lobby, the wheels screeching the arrival of the car.
“Great,” I managed just as the doors opened behind me. I jumped to get out of her way before Frankie pushed past me. “Thanks, Frankie.”
“Whatever,” she said with an eye roll before turning her attention to her cellphone as the doors slid closed. Only then did my heart finally settle back into my chest at a normal rate. A small laugh bubbled out of me. I rushed to place the talismans in the four corners of the lobby before taking the stairs to the street entrance. It was strange doing all of this without worrying about Frankie literally biting my head off. Maybe it was the proximity of the full moon coming that made her not care about me and my drama. Whatever it was, I was grateful for it.
At the bottom of the stairs, I jammed the last two talismans under the wooden threshold of the front door and whispered a banishing spell, feeling the power vibrate in the wood as the spell locked into place. Feeling a tiny bit better, I blew out a breath and headed back up to my apartment to check on Ronnie and the progress she was making with the nails in the windows.
I could hear the hammering as soon as I stepped out of the elevator. I was just grateful all of our neighbors where supernatural and probably still awake at four o’clock in the morning. The door stuck when I tried to open it.
“Hey, Ronnie,” I called out, pressing my face to the crack of the door, “a little help here.”
“Sorry,” she called back before she rushed over, the hammer dangling at her side. She pushed the door shut, nearly catching my nose in the process. I cursed, but the word was lost in the sudden hammering on the other side of the door. When the hammering stopped, the door opened easily, swinging right over the now flush nail head.
“There we go,” Ronnie said with a bright grin, clearly proud of her carpentry work.
“Um, thanks,” I said, staring down at the chaotic pattern of at least a dozen nails along the entryway.
“What?” Ronnie said, following my gaze to the floor.
“Nothing, its fine.” I shook my head, deciding it wasn’t that big of a deal.
“What?” Ronnie asked again, following me into the kitchen where I saw she had used the same psychotic abandon when nailing the windows. A couple of the nails were bent and some were sticking out every which way. It was a wonder that she got any of them flush.
“How’s the ring doing?” I asked, refusing to answer her since she was, after all, staying up late to help me.
“Good,” Ronnie said, setting the hammer on the counter. “But that kind of charm needs to brew for at least a full twenty four hours.”
“That
long?”
“Not a minute less.”
“Great, guess I have some time to kill then.”
Walking over to the tea cup, I picked it up by the saucer it rested on and moved it to the window sill, letting the last few moon beams and the first rays of the sun infuse it.
“Did you set the charms on the nails yet?” I asked Ronnie.
“No, not yet.” She slid the hammer back into the drawer, but I knew, as soon as she was at work tomorrow night, I’d be going over all of her nails. “Figured it’s your house, you should do it.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right,” I said, rubbing my eyes until I could see spots behind my eyelids, not caring about smudging my makeup. The long, stressful night was finally starting to catch up to me.
“So you realize that won’t be ready when you wake up tomorrow, right?” Ronnie said, pointing at the teacup.
“You mean when I wake up later today?” I said with a smirk. “Yes, I know.” I jammed my hands into the pouch pocket of my sweatshirt and rested against the counter.
“So what are you gonna do in the meantime?”
“I’m gonna try to get some sleep, that’s for sure.” I glanced at my cupboards and wondered if I had any leftover sleeping stones or if I’d given them all to Whelan.
“And then?” Ronnie asked.
“I was actually thinking of trying to find Theo’s lair.”
“Seriously?”
“Well, if she’s got Roane, I might as well, right?”
“And if you find it?”
“I’m gonna ask her for Roane back.”
“What makes you think she’d just hand him over?”
“Because of Owen,” I said. “Maybe she doesn’t realize they’ve taken him. I think if she knew, she’d do what she could to get him back.”
“I’d think she’d be angry if she knew they’d taken him.”
“Which is why I don’t think she knows they have him,” I said. I pushed away from the counter and started looking through my cabinets. “I think if she did know, we would’ve seen it on the news by now. You know, crazed vampires attack the sacred fairy mound of Carraway Park,” I said in my best, cheesiest news anchor voice.
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