Page 16

16

Witches and Missing Skulls

Didi’s BMW purred along Providence Row as we headed away from downtown Amberford. I shifted uncomfortably in the passenger seat and did my best to ignore the headache squeezing my skull. It wasn’t just my hangover that was getting to me.

My skin felt too tight for my body, my jaw ached from trying to stop what I suspected were fangs from sprouting from my gums, and my hair was threatening to go Shania-wild again.

The full moon was tonight and my inner wolf was evidently more than ready to greet the world.

“It’s the worst before your first shift,” Didi said, noting my discomfort. “Though I must admit, you’re handling it better than most natural werewolves.”

I thought back to the tense expressions I’d seen at the office that morning. Even Gavin had commented on how agitated the werewolves in Compliance had been.

“Speaking of handling things well,” the dragon newt said behind me, “how did the pack dinner go yesterday?”

I squinted at him in the rearview mirror.

“How do you know about the pack dinner?”

“Charlene tattled,” Didi said. “Hugh told her before he left the office yesterday.” She rolled her eyes at my indignant look. “You might as well make your peace with it. Nothing is sacred at Hawthorne & Associates.”

I pursed my lips.

The witch was right. I couldn’t spend the rest of my days being constantly surprised at what was considered normal behavior in the supernatural community, even if said behavior was wholly inappropriate in the human world.

My headache worsened as I relived the first half of last night’s dinner conversation. None of the Hawthornes could explain why I was adapting so quickly to being a werewolf or why I’d demonstrated abilities during my training with Samuel that should have been impossible for someone so newly turned.

Didi’s voice interrupted my troubled thoughts.

“Well?” the witch said with unabashed curiosity. “How did the dinner go?”

“The food was great and no one died,” I said flatly.

Didi’s mouth pressed to a thin line. “We don’t want cryptic, Abby. We want details.”

“I got a whole chicken to myself,” Bo volunteered cheerfully from the back seat. “And Abby got drunk, although I’m not sure if it was the alcohol, Samuel’s pheromones, or the persistent questions about their mating habits.”

Gavin sucked in air, his expression one of shocked delight.

Didi smirked. “So the pack wants you and the alpha to do the dirty?—?”

“How about we not go there?” I interrupted coolly.

Heat crawled up my neck as I remembered the latter half of the dinner.

Having lulled me into a sense of false security, the pack members had turned merciless over dessert and coffee. I still wasn’t sure which had been worse: the questions about my prior relationships and sex life, their comments on Samuel’s stamina, or their bold ideas on the exact sleeping arrangements of their alpha and his new luna, including how many times we should mate a week.

Bar giving me tired looks that said they’d warned me about this, Samuel and Victoria had been of zero help.

As for the mate bond, it had practically sung a hallelujah every time Samuel had looked at me or his hand had brushed mine during dinner. His scent had nearly driven me to distraction, to the point I had drunk far more than I would normally have under the circumstances.

Since he hadn’t had anything to drink, Samuel had dropped me and Bo back home and had promised to get Ethel over to the office sometime today.

I had a dim memory of making a fool of myself in his car on the drive to Parkside. From the way Bo was smirking at me this morning, I suspected the memory was accurate.

Luckily, I hadn’t seen Samuel that morning to confirm this.

“I heard Pearl actually acknowledged your dog’s existence,” Didi said. “That’s practically a miracle in itself.”

“Who told you that?”

“Caroline. We’re friends.”

I scowled. So she really didn’t need the details about the dinner.

“Pearl’s not that bad once you get to know her,” Bo protested.

We stared at him.

“What?” He thumped his tail irritably against the door.

Luckily, we pulled up outside Mystical Moments. The shop looked exactly as I remembered it, sitting between a bookstore and a beauty salon in Sycamore Grove: all crystal displays, glowing objects, and dream catchers in the windows. A Closed sign hung on the door.

I could see movement inside.

“How about we wrap up this interview in time for lunch?” Didi said briskly as she gathered her files. “Stake My Shake is having a crab special today.”

Gavin brightened. “I like their crab special.”

I swallowed a sigh. It was becoming clear the employees of Hawthorne & Associates prioritized gossip and food above all else. I exited the car with the witch and the dragon newt and did my best to ignore the irresistible siren call of the impending full moon as we crossed the sidewalk.

Didi rapped sharply on the shop’s front door.

Footsteps approached a moment later. A middle-aged woman with graying blonde hair and sharp green eyes appeared behind the glass. She frowned at the sight of Didi.

“We’re closed for business today.”

“We’re from Hawthorne & Associates.” Didi flashed her ID card.

Mrs. Owens stiffened. A bell jangled as she unlocked the door and hastily ushered us inside. Her gaze found me. She froze.

“Abby?!”

“Hi, Mrs. Owens.”

This was going to take some explaining.

The witch stared. “What are you doing here?”

“I work for Hawthorne & Associates,” I said awkwardly.

Didi, Gavin, and Bo watched our exchange with a mixture of curiosity and secondhand embarrassment.

The way Mrs. Owens stiffened told me she’d just gotten a whiff of my scent. Her tone cooled. “You’re the new Hawthorne luna.”

“Yeah.”

Mrs. Owens hesitated. “So, it’s true? You really got bitten by Hugh Hawthorne?”

I scratched my cheek self-consciously. “We, er, found him out cold on the front steps of our apartment building three nights ago. Ellie suggested we bring him inside so he could sleep off his hangover.”

Mrs. Owens frowned. “That girl has zero common sense.”

“To be fair, we were both drunk.”

Bo sniffed the air curiously. “This place reminds me of Mrs. Chen’s apartment.”

There was definitely something otherworldly about the shop’s atmosphere now that I knew what to look for, besides the fact that its owner was a witch.

“Wait.” I stared at Bo. “You’ve been inside Mrs. Chen’s apartment?”

Bo swished his tail. “Yeah. She makes a mean steak sandwich.”

“Your dog talks?” Mrs. Owens asked leadenly.

“It’s a long story.” I was beginning to realize Bo had a much better handle on the supernatural community than I did.

Mrs. Owens led us inside the shop. “About Ellie.” She glanced at me over her shoulder. “It wasn’t just the skull incident that made me fire her. She doesn’t know this, but she recently sold a human customer a love potion that was actually a foot treatment for pixies.”

My stomach dropped. “What?!”

“Wow,” Didi muttered. “Your best friend sounds like she should come with a warning label.”

“Luckily, there were no casualties.” Mrs. Owens sighed. “Though the customer did spend a week in the hospital with an interesting rash.”

Didi cleared her throat in the uncomfortable silence. “How about we get down to business? We would like information on the crystal skull that was taken from your shop.”

Mrs. Owens’s face tightened. “Follow me. We’ll talk on the way.”

She confirmed the story she’d told Samuel as she guided us through to the back. She’d found the crystal skull on her doorstep one night ten years ago. It wasn’t until she did some research that she realized it was a cursed artifact of considerable power.

“I knew some members of the Amberford Alliance would salivate at the prospect of getting their hands on the thing, so I decided to hide it in plain sight. I bought a bunch of other crystal skulls that looked identical to it and put them all over my shop.”

No wonder Ellie hadn’t known it was special.

“What’s the Amberford Alliance?” I asked.

Mrs. Owens and Didi gave me a blank look.

“I keep forgetting you’re new to this,” Didi said. “It’s the council of supernatural leaders. They meet once a month at the Chamber of Commerce. Samuel and Victoria are members.”

Bo gulped nervously as we passed shelves crammed with crystals, herbs, and what looked suspiciously like actual shrunken heads. A door marked Staff Only opened into a small office.

“I have the security footage from that day, though the quality isn’t great.” Mrs. Owens indicated a computer that looked like it belonged in a museum. “I’ve already put out feelers to my contacts in Amberford. So far, no one has heard of anybody trying to purchase a crystal skull.”

Gavin sat at the desk and brought up the security footage for that day. Didi and I leaned over his shoulder while Bo poked his head under Gavin’s arm.

A grainy video showed Ellie behind the counter, looking bored. A teenager in a hoodie entered the shop.

We watched as he nonchalantly looked around Mystical Moments .

“Samuel mentioned you’d stepped out of the shop to deal with an emergency. What was the emergency?” I asked curiously

“The salon owner next door messaged to tell me my car alarm was going off. I park in a private lot around the corner from here.”

The kid stopped in front of a display cabinet. It had a sign on the glass saying Not for Sale .

I frowned. “Was your car alarm going off?”

“Yes. Someone had broken into it.”

“Let me guess,” Didi said sourly. “Nothing was missing?”

“Bingo.”

Didi, Gavin, and I exchanged a guarded glance.

Samuel was right. Whoever was behind the missing skull had planned the job meticulously.

The kid pointed at something inside the cabinet.

Ellie frowned slightly and shook her head. The kid said something, his shoulders visibly drooping. He removed a wallet from his jeans and showed Ellie a wad of bills.

My best friend hesitated before reluctantly grabbing a key from behind the counter and going over to the display cabinet.

“Is she normally this gullible?” Didi asked.

“Yes,” Mrs. Owens and I murmured in unison.

I got my first look at the crystal skull as Ellie removed it from the display case. It glittered ominously as it caught the light, the empty eyes radiating a chill that was almost palpable.

Ellie was oblivious to it as she carefully wrapped the artifact and put it in a bag. The kid paid her and turned to exit the shop.

My pulse spiked. “Stop there! Gavin, can you zoom in on his clothes?”

The dragon newt clicked a few keys. The image enlarged.

My breath caught. The hoodie label was partially visible.

“That’s from Moonlight Couture,” I said. “Victoria took me there yesterday.”

Didi and Gavin exchanged a surprised look.

Mrs. Owens frowned. “That’s not the kind of place teenagers usually shop.”

“He was walking around with a whole wad of money.” Gavin scratched the back of his head. “Maybe he’s just a rich kid who got bored and fancied a crystal skull?”

“Can you play the footage again?” I asked. “I want to confirm something.”

Gavin obliged.

My scalp prickled as we watched the replay. “He made sure the cameras didn’t capture his face.”

“Definitely not an amateur then,” Didi said coldly.

I nodded. “We should pay a visit to Moonlight Couture.”