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"No, nothin' like that. I'm good," I nodded. Then, looking back at Nate, I winked. "That girl of yours sure is strong."
"You know it," he snickered. "Molly packs a wallop when she wants to. It's one of the things I love most about her."
“Oh, Great Heavens,” Chris groaned, nudging my elbow with his own. “Please don’t get him started, Noel.” Giving me another bump, he winked mischievously. “Hell, for that matter, don’t get any of ‘em started. They’ll go on and on about the joys of being Mated and how they’ve never been happier. They’ll never shut up. It’s enough to drive a sane man crazy.”
“Says the guy who’s been searching high and low for his Mate for almost a year now,” Liam chuckled.
“I have not.”
“Sure, that’s why I caught you sneaking around Eleanor Brown’s house.”
“I wasn’t….”
"And before you deny it, I heard her talking to Ella about you and a certain Brown Witch who no one can locate. They all believe she is the Witch made for you. Eleanor told Ella that you'd been over there asking questions, and she was helping you with the search," Liam teased.
“I was not over there trying to findher.”
“Sure, you weren’t,” Nate chimed in.
“Well, if you must know, I was there because Eleanor calledme. She said she needed me to look at something she found in one of her books and couldn't discuss it over the phone. But it doesn't matter. I still don't know because when I got to her house, she was talking to some tall guy dressed in tails and a top hat that she called Dr. Bombay. They were very serious and whispering. When she saw me, Eleanor asked if I could come back another time. She acted so weird, even for her, that I just left." He shrugged and then gave Liam a brotherly punch in the arm. "So, there, Mr. Know-It-All. Like I keep tellin' y'all, I don't want a Mate, and she damned sure doesn't want me."
“Y’all know I would love to stand around and catch up, but I really need to talk to Molly.” Looking one way then the other, I turned toward Nate. “Where the hell did she go? Did we lose another Brown Witch? Was I really out that long?”
“No, we didn’t lose anybody else,” he snickered, shaking his head. “And don’t worry, you were only out for a minute or two. As for Molly, she took off as soon as she was sure you were okay. Said she couldn’t wait any longer, that she needed to get to her Aunt Tabitha’s before her cousins arrived. They’re going to use some old Spell or something to try and find Lucy. Apparently, the Wild Magic is making it impossible for them to track her through normal, Witchy methods.”
“Normal, Witchy methods?” Chris scoffed. “As if there is anything normal about what they do.” He barked out a laugh that I ignored. I needed to hear what Nate had to say. I would have to apologize for being rude later.
"Molly said she remembered something she read in one of their ancient grimoires a long time ago," Nate continued. "Apparently, one of their Ancestors said something monumental would happen right before the Brown Witch of Magical Deliciousness, Special Memories, and the Holder of the Golden Spark of Warmth and Happiness found her Mate.”
“And what exactly is that?” I asked, trying to act cool and not give anything away as my palms got sweaty and my heart skipped a beat.
“Well, why don’tyoutell me since I’m pretty sure you’re Lucy’s Mate.”
“Wait. What…?”
"Don't even try it. Why else would you have shown up here today? You didn't even make it to Christmas dinner, but here you stand big as the day is long." Putting the palm of his hand just inches in front of my face, he added with a snicker, “And I know you're not here for the Brown Witch Celebration. Don't forget, I know your aversion to all the hoopla."
"No way. I'm not… How did you…? No, you can't think that… Come on, you know me better than that, Nate. If I knew something, I would…."
"Act like a kid who just got caught with his hand in the cookie jar?" Nate countered with a grin.
"Or stammer and stutter and try to come up with an excuse for showing up on the exact day Lucy goes missing? Give it up. You're a horrible liar, Noel," Chris teased with a smirk and a raised eyebrow.
"You seriously are. You have so many tells. You have no poker face at all. Remember how you blushed when we caught you giving the very same Lucy Brown a bouquet of dandelions you picked on the way to school when we were little kids? You tried – and failed – to deny that, too," Mick snickered. "Even when we caught you flower-handed."
"Or how about when you stole a kiss behind the barn out at John Henry MacElfresh's farm, and Lucy smacked you so hard you had her handprint on your cheek for almost a week?" Liam added. "It's still called the slap heard around the world by everybody who was there that day."
“Holy shit,” I spat in utter shock. “How did I forget all that? How did I not remember how much Lucy meant to me all those years ago? We were both so young neither one of us thought about being Mates. Hell, what kid does? I just knew I was drawn to her and wanted to be with her every chance I had." I shook my head, barely noticing my cousins were doing the same. "But you know what's even weirder than finding my Mate at ten years old?" Not waiting for an answer, I kept right on talking. "I haven't thought about her - or almost anything from before we got the Isle of Skye except losing my mom and dad - in forever. Like over seven centuries."
From one second to the next, everything and everyone stopped. There was utter and complete silence, and not even one of my cousins took a breath. Not even the Wild Magic howled. All eyes snapped to mine, and all jaws dropped.
Shaking my head, I stammered and stuttered, "N-No, it c-can't be. Can it? Something must have happened when I was taken to the Isle of Skye, right? Maybe Uncle Diarmuid flew too close to the sun or something." I shrugged. "But no, we left here at night. But something happened, right? I damn sure didn't lose my mind and then find it again. Hell, I didn't even know it was gone."
"So, you're saying that something – the same thing- happened to us all?" Chris asked, his wide-eyed look saying he wasn't buying it any more than I was. "Oh, come on, you know, I know, we all know who it was. It has to be. There's no other answer. There's no such thing as coincidence."
Eyes flying from one of my cousins to another, it took until I got back to Chris before I could add, "You're not saying…? No, you can't mean... You're wrong. They wouldn't. They couldn't."
“Oh, yeah, they would, and they could,” Mick growled.
