But now Delilah wasn’t so certain.
The two sisters had always been very close. Before.
Juliet had been her best friend. Or so she’d thought. Then again, in many ways she truly had been a good friend for a long time. They always enjoyed driving around the city on sunny days. Especially in the winter when the Santa Ana winds came and the days were warm. The smog was blown away and you could top a hill and see Pasadena in the distance without seeing the layer of grayish-yellow that lay across it, or even simply enjoy that it no longer looked like the world faded away just beyond the freeway.
Days like that, the sun would come out and it could even be ninety in January. The sisters would take Juliet’s coupe out and put the windows down and drive and talk about anything and everything. They would stick their hands out the windows and feel the air change to ten degrees warmer as they crossed from Hollywood to the Valley. When drivers flicked spent cigarettes out their windows, Juliet and Delilah would try to outdo each other getting back at the littering smokers.
Juliet could pick the cigarette up off the road and send it swirling on a gust of air right through the driver’s open window. That was fun to watch. Invariably the person had no clue why their trash had come back at them. Delilah didn’t have that kind of skill, so she had smoked half a cigarette herself one day and collected the ashes for just such a purpose. She’d put them into Juliet’s ashtray, waiting. For her turn she would put her fingers into the gray soot and rub them together. The driver up front would suddenly suffer from ashes raining down on his head. Inside the car. Usually there was arm waving and sometimes the sisters could hear cursing if the cars were going slow enough or were close enough together. Delilah always hoped that the people would quit flicking their cigarette butts into the streets, but it was good fun, too.
She smiled at the memory of laughing with Juliet the way they always did when they went driving.
They had grown up further away, north of LA, and out of the big city feel. They’d moved into town when Delilah started high school and Juliet was in junior high. Things had gone well for Delilah.
Delilah was pleased to find that for once, her memories of Juliet were pleasant. And clear. She stirred the berries and sugar as they reduced to a thick glaze and let her mind wander off again.
The high school in LA had been recently remodeled and nicer than what she’d been looking at locally, before they’d decided to move. There were magnet schools here that allowed her to study what she wanted, and find other students with similar interests. There were even other students who’d declared themselves Wiccan and gone goth in the process.
Delilah didn’t put much faith in them. She didn’t find anyone who’d been raised in the craft the way she and her siblings were, so she’d kept her mouth shut. Aside from working a few binding spells on students who were trying to do something stupid or dangerous with their tiny magicks, she stayed out of it. Even when they’d come back and said they’d bought their materials from her mom’s new shop. Delilah always just shrugged it off.
High school had been her chance. She’d been ready to reinvent herself and she’d been able to do it. She was no longer the quiet little girl with the strange parents. In LA, her mom and dad were mysterious and therefore fairly cool. She’d gotten a new, better haircut, something other than her mother trimming the ends of her long heavy hair that just hung there. Her mother always left it that way, very hippy-ish and very untended. But Delilah found her own style then. She’d found friends, traded her button down shirts and long skirts like her mother’s for jeans and sandals, cute t-shirts and flirting.
LA had been good for her. But not for Juliet. Juliet hadn’t been ready to change, to break out of the comfortable mold their sixties-era mother had made for them. She’d been ridiculed. Junior High had been hell for her. When she had decided to put Delilah in charge of her image, it was already too late. She couldn’t shake the labels she’d been tagged with. She was behind the crowd always playing catch-up, or trying to. And it wasn’t what Juliet wanted, how she wanted to look, and Delilah didn’t know enough not to try to clone herself in her younger sister, much as their mother had done to them.
Juliet had been uncomfortable in her own skin. Her anger and hurt at her fellow students’ rejection had caused her parents to put a number of binding spells on their youngest. She’d even gone to Delilah for help. Delilah did what she could, cast a few things here or there to keep people off her little sister’s case. But she didn’t do much more despite Juliet’s pleading. She was afraid of her sister winding up in some scenario that might have looked like it was straight out of Stephen King’s Carrie, so she didn’t cast anything resembling a revenge and kept most of her work on her sister’s behalf to a minimum.
A sharp smell hit her senses pulling her back into the present, and Delilah looked down to see that the berries had turned into a thick bright magenta sludge. Exactly where she needed them. Running the goo through a fine mesh sieve took her mental as well as physical presence and she managed to keep her brain in the kitchen for the remainder of the night.
The only thoughts she had that weren’t about food, were moments of satisfaction that those memories of Juliet had been seen through fresh eyes. Her thoughts stayed positive for the rest of the night, even including a few self-bolstering thoughts that she would tell Brandon what she’d done. And he would forgive her for it.
Later as she was just taking off her chef jacket in the office, Margaret, the executive chef/owner, came in.
“Lilah!” She offered a huge smile, just the kind Delilah needed to see right then.
“Hey, Mags!”
The two women hugged and stood against the wall, exchanging the usual pleasantries, until Maggie asked about the circles under Delilah’s eyes.
Delilah could only snort in return. “Man troubles.”
“Well, since this is the first I’ve heard of you having ‘man troubles’ you must dish!”
For some reason, maybe because she’d been holding back, Delilah spilled the whole thing to her boss. Starting with David and Juliet.
Maggie hired her knowing that something bad had happened. But she hadn’t pressed and Delilah appreciated that considerably. The two had gone out for drinks several times, always clicking and always understanding each other. Still Maggie never asked about Delilah’s past. Their job schedules being what they were prevented the two from spending more time together, something Delilah had always regretted. She’d always felt Maggie could be the only true friend she’d made since the explosion that had changed everything.
Maggie sat with her chin propped in her hand, eyes wide as she listened to the whole thing, with the witchcraft part edited out. But Delilah told everything, right up to Brandon and how she hadn’t heard from him. How she was starting to get nervous that he wasn’t going to call.
Delilah figured Maggie would give her the old just wait him out and don’t worry, answers. But she didn’t.
“Look, this world is full of couples playing games and waiting on each other and never finding out what’s going on. Personally, I think it’s better to know. So I think you should call him now and set up a date. If he wriggles out of it then you’ll know. That’s got to be better than sitting around for days just waiting.”
It sounded so easy when Maggie put it that way, that suddenly she had the phone in her hand and was scrolling through her contact list with Maggie looking over her shoulder.
Just then, the phone rang. Delilah jerked, almost dropping it.
Maggie grinned. “Is it him?”
Nervous now, Delilah blurted, “I can’t tell. I’m stuck in my contact list!”
So she took a breath and answered it. Tentatively. “Hello?”
“Lilah? Are you all right?”
She grinned, recognizing his voice easily. Taking a bit of Maggie’s advice, she told him. “You just startled me. I had the phone in my hand and was pushing the button to call you to ask you out.”
“Were you really?”
There was wonder in his voice, and Delilah realized she’d truly achieved the air of indifference she’d been going for. Brandon really had no idea how she felt about him. That was going to have to change. “Yes, I was.”
“Excellent. Does that mean you’re available for lunch?”
“Yes. I am.”
Chapter 19
Brandon sent Delilah off to bed with a kiss. He needed to get back to work, but enjoyed her willingness to kiss him right there on the street. It was nothing but a small touching of their lips, even though he’d wanted it to be more. Still it sparked him more than such a simple touch should have.
He smiled, thinking of her, tucked into her bed, sleeping the afternoon away while he worked.
Later, when he and Dan finished their presentation a bit early, the investors immediately said they’d seen enough. Brandon read the same defeat in Dan’s eyes that he felt in himself. Before they could thank the father and son team for coming out, the two merely said they had another appointment and pulled out pens, asking where they needed to sign.
For a moment, neither Dan nor Brandon were able speak. The two men had simply followed them around the office and sat through game demonstrations and development graphs with very few questions. Mostly they nodded their heads as though they understood but weren’t very interested. That they were ready to sign—and wanted to hurry the process along—came as a shock. But he and Dan shook out of it quick enough and produced all the necessary paperwork.
Dan wanted to go out to celebrate. But Brandon couldn’t quite commit to an evening out with beer. He wanted to call Delilah. That, in itself, was new to him. To want to share his work success with someone other than Dan. Then again, there was something magnetic about Delilah.
He settled back into his office chair thinking that it was nice to have someone to tell everything to. Then he stopped himself. He hadn’t told her everything.
At lunch, he mentioned that he’d gone with his sister and her husband to the kids’ school fair the night before. Both Taylor and Madison performed along with their entire second grade and kindergarten classes. Then the five of them wandered around the cheap, fund-raiser fairgrounds.
They’d stuffed their faces with popcorn, bratwurst, and kabobs. Gone fishing for candy. Bowled down plastic bunny pins for more cheap prizes. Brandon and Madison even managed to stay in the boogie-off until the semifinal round. All in all, it had been a great night and he kept wishing Delilah was with him.
Until he’d gone into the psychic booth. Bethy had shoved him in, wanting to get the scoop from the psychic since Brandon wasn’t telling her. He was a bit surprised that they even had a psychic at a catholic school fair, but maybe it was okay because she was billed as a ‘fortune teller.’
The whole family went into the purple tent and Brandon forked out all the money, glad that it was helping the art program. The psychic was sweet and cute to the kids, telling them that their lives were open and they could be whatever they wanted. By the time she got through stroking Bethy’s palm, ‘Madame Jennifer’ had firmly established herself as a hack.
So he was surprised when she took his hand but looked straight at his face. “You have a new woman in your life.”
He nodded. He figured he looked like a single guy, so that wasn’t a big stretch.
“She is afraid.”
“Okay?” He didn’t know what to say to that. The woman was right, but again it was an easy guess.
“She doesn’t want you to know.” Madame Jennifer’s eyes clouded, as though she were looking at some world other than this one. She blinked a few times before focusing again on this plane. Her gaze strayed to Bethy and her family standing behind him, anxiously awaiting his fortune. “You might not want the children to hear this.”
That shocked him. Before he could say ‘no, it’s okay,’ Bethy hustled them out of the tent, leaving him there alone.
The psychic leaned forward, her face a mask of concern for him. Brandon just figured she was putting on a good show. Her voice was her own though, not the over-inflected, slightly gravelly voice of Madame Jennifer. “She’s hiding something from you.”
Duh.
He’d pretty much already figured that out. He told the two-bit psychic exactly that.
But she shook her head vehemently. “No, not that.”
Of course she said ‘not that.’ If it were about ‘that,’ then she would be wrong. “She’s hiding something else. Something dark. Something you should look into before you go any further with this relationship.”
At that point he’d had enough. Pulling his hand away, he said so.
She reached for him, clutching at his fingers. “Look, I do this for fun, but sometimes I really do see things. You should be careful.”
Her eyes had been a little wild, a little soulful, as though she really did fear for his life. And he almost believed her—until she handed him her card and blew the whole thing. She was just drumming up business.
He shoved the card back at her, and the expression on his face must have said exactly what he thought, because she got angry. “You can ignore me if you want, and I’m sorry I don’t have any more information for you, but whatever’s in her past is dark. Blackmail, murder, that kind of dark.”
“Okay.” It was the only word to come out of his mouth, even though it wasn’t okay. She’d ruined a perfectly good evening out with the kids. And managed to badmouth Delilah even though she didn’t know a damn thing about the woman. Brandon held onto his righteous anger, even if Delilah still did have a few things to answer to.
He’d turned around and stalked halfway out the tent when she blurted out, “You told her about your mother leaving. About the fact that your Pop only made bad macaroni and cheese. And this woman, she can cook. It’s like, it’s like I’m in a bake shop—I can smell brownies and cakes and custards. And pumpkin cakes. There’s something about pumpkin cakes.”
He’d just kept going, walked away, freaked out by those last words tumbling out of her mouth.
When Bethy asked what the fortune-teller had said, he only replied, “Nothing.”
But he was shaken. Madame Jennifer had ultimately been very convincing. Maybe too convincing.
He spent the rest of the evening ignoring the things she’d told him. It had all been so much mumbo jumbo until the part at the end. Then he shrugged it off. He told himself she guessed the pastry part because he smelled like cake, just a little. Delilah often did.
He ultimately decided the whole thing was silly. But if it was so silly, why hadn’t he told Delilah about it at lunch? It would have been so easy: this funny thing happened at the school fair last night. But he hadn’t said it. Why couldn’t he forget about it?
Brandon knew it was just one of those psychic’s tricks. Whatever they say that’s closest to your truth gets a reaction from you, so they keep going with it. But she’d hit some of it dead on. It wasn’t like he hadn’t been having concerning thoughts about Delilah’s ex and his mysterious death.
Brandon did what he’d done before and pushed the thoughts to the back of his head. Still, they waited there for him. When he finished whatever task he set for himself, they would burble up again until he managed to get into the next item on his list. But always they lingered.
Eventually he gave up trying to fight it, and he gave up trying to stay focused on work. He did an internet search, trying out the name David Goodman. He looked for obituaries and found three. One was for an infant and the other two were for men in their seventies. The timing wasn’t right on any of them.
After a handful of searches that turned up hundreds of thousands of links, none of which were useful, he tried ‘Delilah Goodman.’ There were several old pieces about scholarships she had won. But nothing much helpful. At least he enjoyed reading the articles about her. He knew he’d have to confess later that he’d checked her out online. Quickly he made a mental note to check himself out too, just to see what might have turned up had she done the same.
First he finished the article. Her sister Juliet was mentioned in one of them. Delilah had been a previous winner and Juliet followed. There was something about the ‘Goodman sisters’ that grabbed him, until he realized that Goodman was her family name, not her husband’s. She’d either not taken his name, or had reverted back when they divorced. Brandon had no idea what the mysterious philandering David’s last name might be. That would make it harder to find him.
But, his brain crackled a moment, it would make it easier to find Juliet.
Sure enough, when he typed in ‘Juliet Goodman’ a series of articles came up and a good handful were about the correct Juliet Goodman. Those generally had ‘death’ or ‘car accident’ in the title.
Mostly they were short and uninformative. Juliet and David had been ‘running errands’ according to one article. David Burnham. Now he had a name. All the information seemed to agree that the car had taken a curve too sharply and slid off the side of the road down into one of the many canyons in Malibu. Several mentioned that the two were survived by Delilah Goodman, his wife, her sister. None mentioned anything untoward going on between the two and there was nothing, no matter how hard he looked for it, about a divorce.
He wasn’t sure how much later it was that Dan popped his head into the room asking if Brandon was finished for the day, and were they ready for tomorrow? Figuring he’d seen enough—Brandon sure didn’t want to read all fifty-two thousand links the internet provided—he agreed and finally followed Dan out for a beer.
They hit Gin’s again. As though if he kept coming back it would prove that he hadn’t been here just to see Delilah. Of course, she was working and he knew he wouldn’t see her. He managed to relax for a while and forget what the psychic had told him.
WishCraft Page 13
