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Finally, Sid says from the counter. Someone open the door before I lose my mind.
"You want out?"
I want out.
I go down the hall in wool socks, still laughing a little, and pull open my front door.
Cold comes in.
So does the smell. Burned sugar and grave dirt, thick enough to taste, and the porch beyond it is empty except for the fog rolling flat across the boards.
"Maren." Gage is already behind me. "Step back."
"Why?"
He reaches past my shoulder and pushes the door slowly shut so we can see the outside of it.
The whole face of it is scorched black.
A circle, huge, running the full width from hinge to lock. Split top to bottom by three straight lines burned so deep the wood has split around them, still smoking faintly at the edges, still warm enough that the frost has melted in a ring around my welcome mat.
It wasn't there an hour ago. It was made while we sat on the kitchen floor talking about coffee and covens.
Gage goes very quiet. He leans in close to the burn and breathes in.
And then his whole body changes, and he says, in a voice I've never heard him use, "That's not possible."
15
GAGE
STILL EIGHT DAYS UNTIL HALLOWEEN
"Gage." She's close enough that her sleeve drags my arm. "What's not possible?"
The wood is still ticking as it cools. Frost has melted in a ring around her welcome mat, a clean wet circle in a yard gone white.
"It's fresh," I say. "An hour. Less."
"I got that part."
"Someone stood here that whole time. While we were twenty feet away arguing about coffee."
She goes quiet. Not the good kind of quiet.
"That's still not what I asked."
I've never once lied well to this woman. I tried anyway.
"I'm working on it."
Her jaw sets. She's got a bruise fading under it, and every time I see it my hands want something to break.
"Pack a bag," I say.
"Excuse me?"
"Clothes. Whatever you need for the shop. The cat."
