Page 1

Hannah

High-pitched giggles shriek past the side of my head in a blur of movement, and I fumble the cookies I’m carrying as I jerk to an abrupt halt. My mental list for the town-meeting agenda evaporates as I snap back to the here and now.

A few feet away, a flutter of bright-blue wings darts around the corner of the town bookshop I Touch My Shelf.

“What the heckity heck was that?” It moved like a butterfly on a caffeine bender but was way too big. “A bird?”

“No bird,” a cooing voice says, echoed by two others. “No bird.” “No bird.”

“Who said that?” I spin. One of the reasons I can walk down Main Street without paying much attention to my surroundings is that my sleepy small town has gone downright catatonic in recent years. The sidewalks are empty but for a few mourning doves, pecking at the pavement in perpetual hope.

The tiniest shiver of magic ripples through the air. It’s a feeling I’ve been getting off and on for the last month, ever since fae and magic returned to Earth. Things have been fairly quiet since then, but what if the big butterfly is something magical?

My ballet flats slap the sidewalk as I dart forward. The alley beside the bookshop stands empty, and I sag in relief. It’s probably some kids playing with a drone. Ferndale Falls can remain a peaceful little town without magic or fae causing problems.

I fish out the seed cracker I saved from lunch, crumble it, and scatter the crumbs for the doves, who waddle over, dark eyes bright as they descend on the treat.

My phone chimes an alarm. I’ve got five minutes to make it to the town meeting, and I hate being late.

It’s hard enough to be Ferndale Falls’s youngest mayor, and I never want to give anyone reason to doubt voting for me.

I brush my long brown hair out of my face and run a hand down my tailored pink shirt, smoothing it back into place. Then I hurry down the sidewalk.

The buildings lining the street are cute as can be, with lots of colorfully painted wood siding and gingerbread trim, but far too many of them stand empty and closed.

The bustling tourist hot spot of my childhood is long gone, stolen when a new highway rerouted traffic away from this part of the state.

Nothing I’ve done to halt Ferndale Falls’s slow slide into becoming a ghost town has worked, and it makes my heart hurt.

I cut across the town green, the name ironic now that it’s more of a dirt plot than a mini-park.

The town cut the budget for its upkeep two mayors ago, and all my attempts to seed grass on my own have failed.

Grass, it turns out, is a complete pain in the butt, growing everywhere you don’t want it and nowhere you do.

At least Town Hall still looks grand, the burgundy siding trimmed in fanciful blue curlicues of wood. It’s the only building in town with a third floor, which houses the giant clock that looks out over Main Street, the movement of its ornate brass hands counting us through our days.

I cross the lobby to enter the wood-paneled meeting room, already set up with folding wooden chairs.

After all my worry about being late, I’m still the first here, but not by much.

Rustles of cloth and footsteps sound behind me as I spread the oatmeal chocolate chip cookies out on a plate.

Once everything’s ready, I fill a paper cup with coffee.

A powerful pulse of magic sizzles through the air, zipping across my skin in a buzz of electricity.

I yelp and drop the coffee, splashing the front of my dark jeans.

Shit! Thank god one of the burners in the old coffee urn stopped working a year ago.

My thighs are mildly warm instead of scalded.

RIP my caffeine addiction, though. A tight budget only allowed me to make enough coffee for the usual number of people who come to the monthly town meetings.

“Hannah, are you okay?” Skye hurries over, concern turning her usual smile upside down and washing the color from her light skin.

Short and plump and platinum blonde, my friend totally makes it work for her by dressing like a 1950s pinup girl.

She pulls a napkin out of the flared skirt of her bright-pink dress and hands it to me.

Smart to bring her own. Napkins are another thing I had to axe from the budget last year.

“I’m fine.” I dab at the worst of the spill.

My dark jeans barely even show the damp.

Even though I always try to look nice, it’s not like the town expects me to dress up as mayor.

Hell, half the time, I’m on a ladder somewhere changing light bulbs or tightening screws so I don’t blow any money on repairs.

My college class on governmental fiscal responsibility sure never covered becoming the town’s handyman.

Autumn edges up on the other side, looking casually elegant in one of her boho-chic peasant blouses and flowing linen trousers.

Excitement fills her pretty, freckled face.

“Did you feel that?” she asks, bouncing on her toes and making her long, wavy red hair sway.

She throws an arm wide, her golden bangles chiming. “What was that?”

“You felt it, too?” I ask, keeping my back to the room to try to create a bubble of privacy.

They both nod.

Damn. A month ago, a visiting fae told me there are lots of witches in Ferndale Falls and I’m one of them. I kind of brushed it off, since I sure haven’t manifested any magical powers.

But this new pulse of magic is way too big to ignore. How am I supposed to deal with magic in my town? And what if the rest of the world finds out? I’ve seen the movies—those sorts of things never end well, with the government or a big corporation coming in and shipping everyone off to a lab .

“Hannah, what are you thinking?” Autumn says. “You’ve got ‘oh no’ face.”

I take a deep breath. If I’m going to find a way out of this, I need help. Who better to start with than my besties? “I think it was magic,” I murmur.

“Magic!” Skye’s perfectly lipsticked mouth makes a round O.

“Is that what I’ve been feeling this past month?” Autumn asks. “Like electricity in the air?”

I nod and throw a glance over my shoulder. Townspeople file through the open doors of the meeting room, and several head toward the coffee table. “We can’t talk about this here. Let’s chat after.”

Reginald stomps up to the table and grabs a cookie, his tan, weather-lined face set in the perpetual scowl he’s perfected as the town grump. “Not homemade.”

“Sorry.” I give him a sheepish smile. “I didn’t get my grandmother’s baking gene.”

He frowns harder. Here it comes, the question he asks at every meeting. Autumn rolls her eyes behind his back, and Skye fights down a giggle.

“When are you going to get more tourists for the town, young lady?” Reginald grumbles. “In my day, Ferndale Falls was busy and popular.”

My smile slips. I’ve worked overtime for years, trying everything I can. “I—”

“Hannah!” Jared yells, then catches himself and adds my title.

“Mayor Wylde! You have to come quick!” He races up the central aisle and vaults a wooden chair Mrs. Greely left in the way, the thick muscles of his thighs straining his black lycra cycling shorts.

That’s not exactly shocking—anytime he isn’t glued to his racing bicycle, he moves quickly, as if he’s so addicted to speed he can’t stand to walk like a normal person—but the panicked look on his perpetually sunburnt face is new.

“What is it, Jared?”

“A palace!” He shoves his fancy wrap-around sunglasses up onto his head, leaving him with a reverse raccoon of pale skin around his eyes. Jared jabs a finger toward the north, in the direction of the waterfall that gives the town its name. “It appeared out of nowhere! It’s massive!”

What the hell? Forget worrying about big butterflies and feelings of electricity in the air. There’s no way I can hide a whole freaking palace!

Shock spins me around so quickly a lock of hair gets stuck to my lips. I push the strands away as I dart forward. In no time at all, I’m back outside.

Before I make it more than a few feet, Jared stampedes past me, only to come to a dead stop. I crash into his spandex-covered back and bounce off. I’m tall at almost six feet, but Jared’s thighs alone have more muscle mass than I have on my entire body.

“Oww, Jared.” I rub my smarting nose. “That hurt.”

Instead of offering any kind of apology, he points into the sky.

I squint upward into the bright blue of a clear summer day.

The rest of the townspeople from the meeting fill in behind me. Someone gasps, “What’s that?”

After blinking a few more times, I finally make out a dark dot that grows larger the longer I stare at it. Black wings furl wide on each side of the body, but…

“What the hell is that?” I ask, forgetting to say heckity heck, the kid-friendly phrase I normally use in public. “That’s no bird.”

I expect tsks and titters for the strong language, but none of the town elders say a thing , which says a lot about how shocked everyone is.

A man descends from the heavens like a dark and sinful god, smoke wings cupping the air to either side.

His cheekbones are so sharp they can cut glass, and the wind lifts his long black hair until it flows around him with a life of its own. Damn, he’s got great hair. I always thought I had pretty good hair, but his is on a whole other level.

He’s dressed in skin-tight black leather pants and a white shirt that’s unbuttoned so far down the front it looks like it would fall off if it weren’t for the pinstriped blue waistcoat molded to his broad chest.

Whoa. Who knew waistcoats could be so hot?

He’s rolled the shirtsleeves to his elbows, showing off muscular forearms, which are covered in flowing tattoos, dark against his fair skin.

Matching tattoos also decorate what I can see of his chest. Is he tattooed everywhere?

What does a girl need to do to find out?

I volunteer to lead the exploratory team—for science!