Page 53 of Head Witch in Charge (The Sherwood Witches #2)

Leona…LeLe…Mrs.Sherwood-Svensen…Wife…

Three years later…

You ever have one of those family picnics when your brother-in-law keeps sprinkling manufactured fairy dust on Witchingdom’s biggest (in literal size and audience numbers) troll influencer?

Then you turn around and your personal nemesis (aka your sister’s rooster familiar Barkley) is gobbling down a plate full of speak-your-mind cooked rice fritters made by your oldest sister as a gag and so now he’s telling everyone exactly what he thinks in plain English instead of cock-a-doodle-doos?

And all of that is followed by the sound of your great-aunt Luna getting a howling lesson from her favorite werewolf-in-law, who may or may not be wanted in three states for a string of bank robberies that were almost immediately followed by customers’ loans being paid off in full by an anonymous donor?

Did I mention all of this is taking place on a meadow next to a lake where hippocamps are frolicking in the water under the watchful gaze of a farmer who is completely in the thrall of a pack of pixies?

No? You haven’t experienced that?

Well, then, I’m sorry, because it is exactly the kind of who-knows-what’s-going-to-happen-next chaos that doesn’t follow the rules that makes life as the Sherwood matriarch fun.

Trust me, it’s way better than the political elbow-rubbing that comes with the job, which is mercifully a lot less since the Council was exposed and gloriously decimated to the point that there isn’t even a metaphorical corpse of the organization to be buried in salted earth.

Bloodthirsty? Yeah, maybe I do have a little of that Effie vengeance gene in me when it comes to small-minded bullies with delusions of grandeur.

Exactly how did that happen? Well, it started with the werewolves, then the vampires got involved, and by the time Juniper got herself banished to The Beyond, where she hooked up with an outlaw band of witches, it was only a matter of time until the Council was done in.

My sisters will have to tell you their parts in it, but let’s just say, there’s no way for those authoritarian assholes to claw their way out of the ground again anytime soon.

A wolfhound’s happy yelps fill the air, and I look up to see an almost two-hundred-pound shaggy dog float by just out of reach of the ten-foot-tall troll hollering that everything will be okay while another troll livestreams the whole thing.

“If your brother makes Cupcake float up one more time,” I say as I stow away my phone after my weekly catchup chat with Witchingdom’s president, “Walter is going to start eating witches again.”

“Cy’s testing out the manufactured pixie dust he made up in the lab,” Erik says as he pulls me back down next to him onto the red-and-white-checked picnic blanket. “Don’t worry, I snuck some out of his lab so we could try it out in private later.”

I roll my eyes. “We’re witches, we can float on our own power.”

“But can we do that?” he asks, looking up at the wolfhound.

The air around Cupcake starts to vibrate and the dog starts kicking one leg as the air massage hits that one perfect spot.

It’s like a personal air vibrator that just knows exactly where to go and how hard to buzz.

“Not as of yet.” Suddenly hot and beginning to have all sorts of ideas, I fan myself with the stack of napkins embossed with an S intertwined with another S. “But I think I’m going to start researching the family spell cookbooks for just that option.”

Erik dips his head and whispers into my ear, “Or we can just go somewhere and try it ourselves.”

I look around. In addition to my family, there are some of Witchingdom’s most powerful people at the picnic, including the witches who are allied with the Sherwoods. They formed an impenetrable bloc against the Council and saved Witchingdom together.

I let out a sigh. The fact that I want to go with Erik so both of us can get just that happy is a given. However, I really should stay. Witchingdom still expects certain things from the Sherwood family matriarch.

It comes with the job.

But I am not only the job.

And as I learned, the only expectations that really matter are the ones I have for myself. The rest of Witchingdom can go take a ride on a hippocamp.

Already prioritizing what we should do first with that manufactured pixie dust, I turn back to Erik. “Let’s go.”

Looking every bit like the rogue he is, he snaps his fingers, and a blast of coffee scent fills the air half a second before we disappear.

Before I can blink, I’m standing face-to-face with a marble statue of a faun in a room decorated in jewel-toned velvets where the wallpaper offers up so many ideas.

“So tell me, wife,” Erik says, coming up behind me so close I can feel every inch of him even though we aren’t touching, “what do you want?”

I don’t even have to think about it. “You, husband.”

And, as always, that is exactly what he gives me.