Page 13 of Bewitched By the Headless Horseman (The Bewitching Hour #1)

Stevie lugged the trunk down the sidewalk toward her home, the fog now creeping around her ankles.

The trunk was heavier than she’d expected and definitely more than the twenty pounds a skeleton normally weighed—one of the facts she’d learned in an anatomy class that she never thought she would need to know.

If her science teacher could only see her now, she might’ve changed that B to an A.

She studied Kit’s tall frame, his broad shoulders, his narrow hips, his strong thighs.

He wasn’t a giant, only a healthy male ghost with a pleasant body that she needed to stop staring at.

She flicked her gaze away when he turned in her direction and she began whistling “Fifteen Men On A Dead Man’s Chest.”

“Yo-ho-ho, just getting into pirate mode here.” Stevie rolled her eyes to herself, her cheeks heating.

“Do continue. I won’t stop you,” Kit said.

“I was only offering the teaser version.” She hefted the trunk higher, concluding that either the metal was super-duper heavy or something else was packed inside with his bones.

Roxy bolted toward them from the yard, her mouth pulled back into a smile, happy for their return.

Stevie struggled to fish out the key from her pocket.

“You might not be able to carry the trunk, but can’t you be a proper gentleman and get the door?

” she grunted, the trunk tilting sideways while she waited on the porch.

“All you had to do was ask, Pumpkin. Don’t put yourself in these conundrums.” Kit shrugged and slipped into the house.

“Conundrums, he says,” she mumbled between gritted teeth as the lock turned, the door opening wide.

“My lady.” He motioned her inside with what she assumed was a mock bow. She really, really wished she could see his expressions.

“Thank you, good sir,” Stevie drawled and brought the trunk into the living room, sweat slicking her palms as she placed the metal beast on top of the coffee table.

She knelt on the floor while fiddling with the gold metal lock dangling on the front.

“Do you know how to pick this?” she asked, glancing back at Kit.

“No.” He took a seat on the couch and leaned toward the lock, his hand passing through it.

“Of course you don’t.” She sighed. “I’m the one doing all the work here for a man who has only thrown a couple of breadcrumbs of secrets at me.”

“I can’t reveal everything to a woman who so easily would’ve cursed me to the Hollow with a crucifix, now can I? You’ll have to gain my trust.” His voice came out sultry, deeper than usual.

She scoffed. “Were you this annoying when you were alive?”

He chuckled, ignoring her comment. “And what about you, Pumpkin? Do you know how to pick a lock?”

“Well, no. That’s why I asked you.” Stevie frowned, shaking the lock one more time, hoping it would just break off.

“Seems we’re even, so get rid of that line between your brows.” His gloved finger ran up the spot, and her response was more delayed to duck back than she’d expected. For whatever stupid reason, she’d wanted to find out if he would be warm or cool to the touch.

“Put that dirty finger of yours away,” Stevie grumbled.

She surveyed the room, thinking of something she could use.

There wasn’t a crowbar simply lying around, not that she knew if she could even use one properly on this.

She grabbed a knife from the kitchen and as she slid it into the slit of the trunk, then put her weight onto it, the blade broke from the handle.

Stevie was about to look up how to break a padlock on her phone but decided to just go next door to wake Lucia to spell it to open. As she walked to the door, Kit said silkily, “I do believe you can just unscrew the backing of the padlock.”

Her eyes bulged and she spun around, her gaze falling to the four screws that her idiot self hadn’t noticed. “How long have you known that ?”

“I assumed a tool was what you were getting from the kitchen and when you returned with a pitiful knife, I figured I’d wait and see how this played out. It didn’t go very well,” he replied, amusement in his voice.

Stevie shot him a glare. “You’re seriously driving me crazy. Hold on.” She riffled through the kitchen drawer, past junk and the tool kit her dad had given her, until she found a screwdriver. “Ah ha!”

Sinking back to the floor in the living room, Stevie worked on the first screw. She fumbled a few times, seeing as the little pest was in there tightly.

“So, where do you keep your jack-o’-lantern?” she asked as she finally got the first one out, the screw clinking against the wooden table.

“Hmm.” He tsked. “I call on him when it’s time to replace my head.”

“That’s weird. Sounds like witchy magic was involved in this.

I don’t think you’re a warlock though, so someone helped you before.

” Stevie blew out a breath as she removed the second screw.

He still hadn’t uttered a word. “Your silence means I’m right.

I’ll get your secrets out soon enough.” She would pester him about them until he told her or he was so annoyed he’d never come back.

“You think so?” A smile lingered in his voice.

“Oh, I know so.” She grinned, setting the third screw on the table. “How did you come across your horse?”

“Why?” he cooed.

“Because I don’t see any other ghosts riding horses.” Her hand slipped on the last screw while turning it. “Okay, these screws are getting on my nerves. I should’ve just woken Lucia.”

“You could’ve asked for my assistance,” Kit said.

Stevie arched a brow at him. “You could’ve mentioned that five minutes ago, and anyway, it wouldn’t have worked,” she grunted, pulling the last screw out.

The padlock easily came off, the scraping sound echoing off the walls. Holding her breath in anticipation, her heart thundering, she pressed her hands on either side of the metal lid and drew it open.

Stevie blinked as she gazed into the box’s depths, her breath slowly coming out, her eyes widening.

“Your head is in the way. Do you see my bones?” Kit asked.

A loud snort escaped her while she sifted through the trunk’s contents. “Not yet, but you’ve got to see this, Kit! Get over here.” She scooted to the side and made room for him to sink down beside her.

Stevie lifted a straw doll swathed in black clothing and a long cape, its head missing. She shoved the doll into Kit’s invisible face and grinned. “It resembles you perfectly.”

“That’s just appalling,” Kit muttered, taking the doll from her and rolling it over in his gloves as he inspected it.

Stevie reached in and fished out four bulky books and set them in front of him.

All different versions of the Legend of Sleepy Hollow .

A stack of pictures with a disintegrated rubber band around them came next.

They were of someone dressed as the Headless Horseman years ago.

Below that, a heavy snow globe showcased the Horseman on his mighty black steed inside the glass.

Adding to the collection was a film reel with a yellowed, peeling sticker on the front of the 1949 movie, a dinner set consisting of plates and teacups—the Horseman painted on them—and a sack full of handmade items.

“It looks like you had a hardcore fan,” Stevie snickered, then sobered as her fingers brushed a large wooden box at the bottom.

Beside her, Kit’s body stilled when she pulled out the box and attempted to open it.

But it wouldn’t budge. “I can’t get it open.

” There wasn’t a lock or anything on it, and she knew at once a spell had been cast on this too.

“Give me a second.” Stevie repeated her motions as she did with the basement wall by using Lucia’s brew and a drop of her blood.

A spicy aroma brushed her nose and smoke swirled through the air.

When she pressed on the lid again, this time it lifted, an earthy scent striking her senses, not reeking of death as she’d expected.

“Yep, these are definitely bones. And if you say they’re yours, then I’m going to take the risk and trust you on that.

” She scanned over the pale remains and her eyes glued onto what had to be a femur.

Most she couldn’t remember the names of.

“I don’t know if they’re all here though.

If you need me to count I can. Off the top of my head, I remember a skeleton has 206 bones, but I’m not sure how many should be here since a skull isn’t one bone. ”

“178,” he said, his tone assured, and so she would go with his answer and maybe verify it on her phone later. “Take them out and I’ll count to confirm they’re all here.”

Stevie rolled her eyes. “Yes, Your Headlessness.”

“You are amusing .”

The edges of her lips curled up as she moved the trunk onto the floor to give them room at the table.

She slowly took out one bone after the other while Kit counted aloud and she mirrored his numbers inside her head.

While she knew only a few of the names of the bones, he spouted off every single one.

She wondered if in his living days he’d been a doctor or something close.

Plucking the last one from the sack—another rib—she asked when curiosity finally got the best of her, “How do you know all these names?”

“My father was a physician,” he said. “178.”

“My dad’s a dentist, and I don’t even know all the names of the teeth. But guess what? All the bones are here!” she sang the last sentence, running her finger against the rib. Kit shivered beside her and her lips parted. “Can you feel it when I touch them?”

“Mm-hmm,” he drawled.

“Oh, sorry about that.” Stevie dropped his bone onto the pile, cursing herself for unintentionally caressing it. Thank the witches it wasn’t a hip or thigh bone.

“No complaints from me.” Kit’s voice came out gruffer than she’d expected, and he cleared his throat as he handed her the wooden box. “I need you to hide them here in your home until it’s time to use them.”