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“ I mbido-pardido-skipido!” she cried, waving her wand in the air.

Nothing.

A big, old, fat nothing.

“I’m the worst wizard in the world!”

“Cute, though.”

With a cry, she jumped in the air and turned to find Tobias standing in the doorway.

“How did you get in here?” she demanded.

He looked around. “Walked in.”

“I didn’t lock the door?” She could have sworn that she had.

“Was wide open, Cherry. Didn’t know this room existed.”

She nodded and glanced around. No one but their family knew about this room. It was her favorite thing in this entire house. The secret room behind the bookcase in the library.

The library and secret room were hers. And she normally always locked the main library door before coming into the secret room.

“No. It’s kind of a secret.”

He mimed locking his lips and throwing away the keys. She grinned, appreciating the sentiment.

“May I come in?” he asked.

“Sure,” she grumbled, setting her wand down on the wooden desk. The desk was so large it had to be taken apart to get in here then put back together.

But it was gorgeous and as soon as she saw it, she’d known that this was where it was meant to be. The walls were wall-papered with an image of a train. She had piles of spell books on the floor and a cage for Snowy that hung from a hook.

“Do you think I’m a complete weirdo?” she asked.

Tobias turned to face her. “Why would you say that?”

She shrugged, feeling awkward. “None of this is really normal, is it?”

He stepped closer to her and she glanced up into his face, swallowing heavily. Whoa. That should have felt intimidating. And it kind of was.

But it was also hot as heck.

The more time she spent with Tobias, the more attraction she felt toward him. The more time she wanted to spend with him.

This wasn’t good.

Yet, at the same time it felt right.

“Who gets to say what’s normal or not, Cherry?”

“Well, most people would say it’s not normal for a twenty-two-year-old to have a secret room filled with Harry Potter memorabilia and be practicing spells.”

“Who cares what they’d say? Only matters how you feel. Does this make you happy?”

“Yeah. It does.”

“Then do what makes you happy. It’s not hurting anyone else.”

Uh-huh. Sure. It wasn’t hurting anyone. She wasn’t casting spells to create warts on a certain person’s nose or anything.

“Immy? This hurting someone else?” he asked.

“Well, I might be trying to create a spell to put warts on the nose of my arch-enemies.”

“Your arch-enemies?” he repeated, sounding surprised. “Do you have a lot of them?”

“Not many. There’s Bella from high school. She was so mean to me. I’ve created the Bella spell for her. Then there’s . . . some others.”

Like Lauren.

Or Amaya. Who Jenner was out on a date with tonight. Sure, they were only dating because she’d bought him for the night.

But Immy still hated it.

She couldn’t help but feel like something more was going to develop. Jenner would see how gorgeous Amaya was. How talented. How good it would be to date her for his career.

Amaya probably never woke up all sleepy and zombie-like and needed people to feed her and dress her.

She probably didn’t forget her medication and end up ill and worrying everybody who cared about her.

Amaya probably didn’t have a whole ton of baggage from her childhood that she couldn’t seem to let go.

“Damn woman is perfect.”

“Did you just swear?” Tobias asked. “And who is the damn woman?”

“I didn’t swear!” she cried.

“Cherry, you said ‘damn.’ Don’t lie.”

“So did you. You said it twice!”

“Was just repeating what you said,” he told her. “That’s a dollar.”

“Drat,” she grumbled.

“Who is the woman you’re talking about? The one that Jenner is out with tonight? Do you not like her?”

Urgh. How did he guess?

“I don’t really know her. But she seemed nice enough. I’m just . . . being silly.”

“Nothing silly if they’re your feelings.”

She didn’t really think that was true.

“You care about him.”

“Of course,” she replied. “He’s like a brother to me. I don’t want to see him taken advantage of.”

“Sampson also has a date coming up with the woman who bought him, right? Guess you’ll be doing a spell on her too.”

“I guess so.”

“Unless you’re upset because you wish you were on the date with Jenner.”

Immy turned to glare at him. “When did you become so chatty?”

“I talk when I have something to say.”

She grumbled under her breath. “I think I liked it better when you were invisible and silent.”

“Can go back to that.” He stepped out of the room and instantly, she started kicking herself.

Her stomach tied itself up in a knot, making it harder to breathe. What was she doing? Why did she say that?

It was so mean.

And Immy was never mean. Not unless someone was nasty to her friends.

Cupcakes!

She took off after Tobias, her cloak swirling around her as she ran. Where was he?

Darn it.

Why did he have to move so fast?

It was unnatural.

Or maybe you should just work on your cardio. Because you’re huffing and puffing something crazy.

She headed toward the back door. Had he gone to the guest house?

Shoot.

It was dark out there. And she really didn’t want to go out there on her own.

But she had to apologize.

She’d hurt him. She had to say sorry. And she couldn’t wait.

Opening the door, she stared out into the darkness. There were plenty of lights around. The yard was actually well lit.

But there were dark patches.

Was there anything out there?

Don’t be silly, Immy. This isn’t really your fear anyway. You don’t like to be in dark, enclosed spaces.

Like the naughty cupboard.

Don’t think about that. Don’t think about that.

She stepped outside, glancing around. Something caught her eye. Was that movement? Was someone there?

Fear clogged her throat as she fought for breath.

Breathe, Immy.

There’s no one there. It’s just your imagination.

But she couldn’t seem to breathe and the world around her grew hazy. She could barely see where she was going. What was she doing? This was crazy.

“Immy! Immy, what are you doing?”

She spun and tried to scream. Who was that? Her eyes were so blurred that all she knew was that there was someone looming over her.

Then. Nothing.