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“You’re going to explain that later,” she insisted. “All I could hear him thinking was that his drink was ‘too damn cold’ but if he said anything, my mom would fuss at him. You owe information, witch.”
“Oh, yes, ’cause psychic powers are clearly something you’re uncomfortable with, mind-reader.”
“Leprechaun,” she shot back.
“Cow.”
6
When you are invited to partake in the rituals of supernatural creatures, it’s best to follow the lead of the closest human—if that human seems sane and somewhat likeable.
—Miss Manners’ Guide to Undead Etiquette
Using Jane’s computer, I sent a short e-mail to Penny reporting on my progress: “Fire’s lit. Update soon.”
The problem was that now that I had one of the Elements, I didn’t have a place to store it safely. My uncle Jack had built a canny little storage cabinet to keep the items “clean” once they’d been found and purified. The cabinet had arrived in Seamus’s shipment earlier that afternoon, along with what Penny called an “emergency witch kit”: an athame, incense burners, candles in various colors, tiny vials of herbal oils, a silver altar pentacle, and a carved wooden box (also Jack’s handiwork) that doubled as an altar.
But I didn’t have a safe location to store said cabinet. Considering its vulnerabilities to local angry wildlife, I didn’t think I could trust the house.
Jane’s shop had an old-fashioned heavy-duty safe. After I completed my “dance of joy” in her mother’s guest room, she offered to let me store my things there. Although I’d only known her a few days, I trusted Jane. She didn’t have to tell me her mother had the candle. She seemed content helping me complete a task that was important to me, because I would have been important to Mr. Wainwright.
Penny had highlighted purification rituals in Witchcraft for Total Morons for me, which I would have found insulting if not for the fact that it had so many helpful illustrations. After enclosing the candle in its compartment full of sea salt and securing the cabinet in Jane’s safe—along with Nana’s sketches—I went back to the Wainwright house and collapsed.
Jed’s windows were dark, and for that I was grateful. The man was an unpredictable, sexy storm cloud. I never knew if he was going to make pretty shapes or rain all over my parade.
I climbed into my bed and slept soundly for the first time in weeks, without benefit of herbal tea or soothing pharmaceuticals. I slept deep and dreamless for about an hour before my mobile rang. Grumbling murderous threats against humanity at large, I slapped my hand around on my nightstand until I closed my fingers around my phone.
“Jane, if this is you, I am not responsible for your father’s dental bills. I merely pointed out a problem. I never told your mother to take him to an all-night dentist,” I growled into the phone.
“Darling, how are you? Why are you threatening random callers? Is it that awful and primitive there?”
I bolted upright. “Stephen?”
“Don’t sound so surprised. I have left messages.”
“You have no idea how good it is to hear your voice.” I sighed. “I’m sorry I haven’t called, Stephen. I just didn’t expect the travel to be so hard on me,” I said, allowing a yawn to escape through and emphasize my “delicate” constitution. “Delicate” was a far more desirable quality in a girlfriend than “deceitful and forgets to call.”
“Well, you are a bit of a homebody,” he said. “So how are things there in the wilds of America? Do you need me to send you anything? Soap? Magazines? Cigarettes?”
“Stephen, I’m overseas, not in prison! And Boston is one of the largest cities in the country,” I reminded him. Of course, I wasn’t actually staying in Boston, but that was beside the point. “And it’s very pleasant, actually. Warm, nice people, interesting tea.”
“Interesting as in strangely prepared, or interesting as in that time your aunt Maisie gave me tea that made me see butterflies fluttering out of my own arse?”
I suppressed a giggle. Aunt Maisie had never warmed to Stephen, but she did love creative herbalism.
“The first one,” I said, remembering that Bostonians had probably never heard of sweet tea. “They steep it right in the cups, can you imagine?”
“Well?” he said expectantly.
“Well?”
“Don’t you miss me?”
“Of course I do,” I protested. “I’ve just been busy. That’s all. New apartment, new job, remembering to drive on the right side of the road.”
Again, I judiciously edited, because I didn’t think Stephen would be impressed by my finding long-lost vampire relatives or making friends with mercurial construction workers.
“Well, I miss you terribly,” he said. “Nothing is fun without you. There’s no one to put her ice-cold feet on the backs of my legs while I’m sleeping. No one keeps up a steady stream of trivia and interesting facts while I’m watching films. I actually had to resort to watching a DVD with the director’s commentary. It was demoralizing. And the bread! I’m wasting the heels of my bread loaves shamelessly without you around to toast them.”
