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Gabriel was already shaking his head. “No,” he said, lightly but definitively. “There are places I’d still like to see, for sure. Things I’d like to experience that I haven’t gotten to yet. But I’d be happier sticking to shorter travels with somewhere definite to come back to in between. I think I was always missing things about this place—the estate, and the town—while I was on the road. Missing just having a home base that felt like it was mine. I guess this isn’t really mine, so—”
“Itis,” I broke in. “As long as I’m here on the estate, as long as you want a home here, you’ve got it.”
He paused, gazing back at me, as if he hadn’t expected to get that much vehemence in response. Then the corners of his lips quirked up. “And how could I leave for very long when you’re here now? If you’d been here back then, I don’t think I’d ever have taken off.”
The fluttering came back, stronger this time. I wet my lips and made myself focus on my glass for a moment. “Keep flirting like that and you’ll put Jin out of a job.”
Gabriel laughed again. “That’s not flirting,” he said. “That’s just telling it like it is. I’m not asking for anything from you, Sprout. But even before I left here, I was missing you. You’re part of what makes this place home.”
He said it so straightforward and honest an ache formed in my chest. I swallowed my lemonade, but the sensation didn’t leave. I made myself look up at him again. “It didn’t feel right without you here, either.”
Our gazes stayed locked for a long moment. Gabriel cocked his head. “Good thing I came, then.”
“Yeah.”
He turned his head—casually, but I thought his shoulders had tensed a bit. “So you and the other guys… That whole ceremony you did—it’s pretty serious, isn’t it.”
The ache turned sharp. I didn’t know how to tell him that I wished he’d been there then without it coming out all wrong somehow. Pressuring him or presuming too much.
“We’re basically married,” I said. “In the witching sense of the word. Which is a little more serious than the regular sense, since we’re sort of tied together now.”
“Four husbands.” He glanced back at me and raised an eyebrow. “You never did back down from a challenge, did you?”
I had to smile back. “It’s not like that. I… I love all of them. I couldn’t have just picked one.”
I wanted to say, “I love all ofyou,” but I couldn’t really, not yet. Not with Gabriel just back. I’d meant what I’d said to Philomena about us needing to get to know each other again. We were only just getting started.
But it already felt like it would be so easy to fall back into loving him.
“So how is that all going to work once you’ve gotten the ‘marriage’ all approved or whatever?” he asked. “They’ll all move in, and…”
“And I guess we’ll have to get a really big bed,” I said without thinking, and my face flushed hot. Gabriel choked on a laugh, but something in his eyes made me feel even hotter and more pained at the same time.
Before I could figure out how to recover, an engine growled outside. The electric gate hummed open. I frowned and got to my feet, catching myself from pulling back the curtain.
Gabriel went instead. He peered outside. “Dark sedan. Looks like a Lincoln. You weren’t expecting company?”
“No.” But someone had been, or the gate wouldn’t have opened so fast.
“I’ll have to go down and park the car.”
“Right. Of course. I’ll wait here.”
I stood near the open window as he went down. Voices filtered in from outside. Dad had come out to meet our guest.
“Matilda,” he said in his warm, even voice. “I’m glad you were able to move up your schedule.”
“It sounded like you were in dire straits, Mr. Hallowell,” a dry female voice responded. “Frank will be coming along tomorrow as planned.”
Matilda. My body froze. Matilda Gainsley. The new estate manager Dad had hired. She wasn’t supposed to be arriving until tomorrow morning.
I should have been glad. With her here I could go forward with my plan to surreptitiously present Dad with evidence of Celestine’s treachery, to see how he’d respond. But now she was between me and where I was supposed to be.
Luggage thumped out of the trunk. The engine started again as Gabriel must have brought the car around to the empty spot that had used to belong to Meredith’s pale green Chevrolet. The voices faded as my father escorted Mrs. Gainsley to the house.
Gabriel came hurrying up the steps a minute later. He took one look at me and frowned. “What’s wrong?”
“That’s the new estate manager,” I said. “She’s a witch. I don’t know… If I use magic to slip back into the house, she might notice.” I hadn’t gotten much practice at hiding it. I’d never done any major magicking in front of a fellow witch yet.
