Page 48 of A Ghost’s Guide to Haunting a Witch

Roy grinned. “Kylie Minogue.”

“Well, stop it.” Augustine covered her face with her hands. “I don’t need to be interrogated with Kylie Minogue.”

“Kylie Minogue isn’t interrogation, she’s emotional first aid. Kylie faced the world and cancer in metallic hot pants. Find that kind of energy and talk to me.”

“Fine.” Augustine let out a long sigh through her fingers. Where did she even begin? In just one day, she’d salt-circle tested a perfect stranger, discovered he was a ghost, developed an entirely inappropriate crush on him, and then somehow time travelled into his girlfriend.

She took a deep breath. “So, the man came back.”

“Right.” Roy didn’t even blink. “The conventionally attractive one.”

“I can’t believe that’s all you took from that conversation, but yes.”

“Hey, the hot guy returned. I’m interested.” Roy sat forward. “And what happened?”

“I used Maddy’s magic to salt circle check him, and he came out clean.”

“Magic, magic, magic. Ancient family powers. Mystical salt circles. Yada, yada, yada. Got it. What then?”

“He asked me to read the cards.”

Interest sparked in his eyes. “And did you?”

Augustine nodded mutely.

Roy sat back again, clearly settling in for a story. “And after that?”

Augustine opened her mouth, then closed it again just as quickly; her cheeks continued to flush a deep shade of red.

Which Roy — damn him — noticed almost immediately. “Oh, this is going to be good, isn’t it?”

Augustine glared at him. “No. Nothing about this story is good.”

“It will be for me.” He grinned. “Don’t miss a single detail.”

She groaned and flopped back against the sofa cushions. “While reading his cards I kind of . . . accidentally transported myself into the body of his girlfriend.”

Roy blinked once. Then twice. “His girlfriend,” he repeated carefully.

“Yes.”

“You transported yourself into her.”

“Yes.”

“And you’re sure this was accidental?”

“Yes! I mean, what kind of person do you think I am?”

Roy looked puzzled. “It’s just that I didn’t know you could do that. I thought that where witchy things were concerned you were, you know, like the vanilla version.”

“What? You mean entirely flavourless?”

Roy nodded. “Yeah. You know, like witch-lite. Diet Witch. I-can’t-believe-it's-not-witch. That sort of thing.”

Augustine sighed. “This has never happened to me before. I didn’t know I could do it. I didn’t even know what was going on, really. It all felt so real though. Everything about her . . . It felt like it was happening to me.”

“Really?” Roy’s eyes narrowed slightly. “I guess I have to ask then — what exactly were you doing while occupying the body of the girlfriend of this conventionally attractive man?”