Page 22 of Grimoires & Glamoury

Simpler? I rolled my eyes at him. “And you wonder why we don’t like y’all.”

“Lorna,” he said patiently. “One of my first magickal teachers was a member of OBOD.”

“The Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids.” I nodded. “Sure, I’ve met more than a few Druids over the years.”

“My teacher had a connection to the natural world, and to earth magick unlike anything I’ve ever seen before or since. He was a wise tutor and a great man.”

“So, you’re telling me that you didn’t start out your occult studies with ceremonialism?”

“No,” he said. “I did not. For several years I walked the path of the Druid.”

Intrigued, I tipped my head to one side. “So what changed?”

His phone chimed and the unexpected sound of the text message made me jolt. He slipped it from his pocket and glanced at the screen. “Excuse me,” he said and proceeded to send back an answer.

While he did, I closed the pizza boxes.

Once he was finished texting, he looked back at me. “I need to go.”

I nodded. “Thanks for dinner,” I said as he rose to his feet.

“We’ll have to do it again sometime,” he said.

Wisely, I did not agree to that suggestion. Instead, I stood and escorted him to the front door, then pulled it open for him. “See you around.”

“Good night.” He nodded and stepped onto my porch.

As he went down the steps and moved over the sidewalk toward the curb where he’d parked, I stood there and pondered. So the man could be charming when he put some effort into it. He’d been easy company, and I could privately admit that it was nice to have someone else in the house for a change…

Catching myself watching and wondering over him, I shook it off, stepped back, and closed my door.

CHAPTER FIVE

Maybe it was simply fortuitous timing, but I had the next day off and was so relieved to have a break from the bookstore and the recent community drama that it bordered on comical. I woke early as was my habit, ate breakfast, and strolled around my back gardens afterward. Coffee in hand, I checked all the perennials that were popping up. The forecast was for partly sunny skies and temperatures in the high 70s so I planned to make good use of my time and head to the garden center. I wanted to plant up some vegetables and fill my containers with annuals.

At 9:30 I was rolling into the gravel parking lot of the Broussard Family Nursery and Greenhouses. Stepping from my SUV, I saw several other cars were already in the lot as well. I spotted a plant cart and snagged it immediately. Pulling the big metal wagon along behind me, I walked into the nursery with a smile on my face.

The smell of potting soil, growing green plants, and flowers rolled over me and lifted my mood even more. There was a huge table filled with colorful geraniums, and I headed straight for it. For the next half hour, I was completely absorbed in selecting my annuals. Typically, I went for a mixture of pinks and purples in my containers, but for some reason I was being pulled more towards oranges and reds this year. Lifting a container of red and yellow calibrachoa to my eye level, I considered it.

“This would be pretty with the reddish-orange petunias and the scarlet geraniums...” I said to myself. I turned around to eyeball the table of geraniums, mentally debating if I wanted to stick with red geraniums for the containers, and my gaze narrowed on a brilliant coral color. I moved to pick it up and was so intent on the flowers that I bumped into a child.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, reaching out to steady the girl. “Didn’t see you there.”

The girl couldn’t have been more than four, or maybe five years old. Her hair was a dark blonde and her eyes were a bright blue. She was wearing a pink T-shirt, denim shorts and purple sneakers.

“Hi!” She smiled up at me.

“Hey cutie,” I said, automatically looking for her parents.

While there were several shoppers farther across the annuals area and a few families, no one seemed to be looking for the girl.

“Where’s your Mama and Daddy?” I asked her.

“Dunno.” The girl shrugged and pointed at the geranium table. “I wanted to see the pink flowers.”

The child didn’t seem upset by the fact that she was alone. In fact, she was smiling up at me like we were old friends. “What’s your name?” I asked her.

“Chloe,” she said.