Page 16 of Love Spell (Witches of London #3)

“You’re sure you won’t have anything?”

“I really did just have dinner.” Noah sat stiffly in the middle of the couch, feet squarely on the floor, hands on knees, looking like someone awaiting a mug shot. “Thanks, though. It smells good.”

“Wine? Tea? Make yourself at home.” Timo started to eat.

“I don’t suppose you have anything herbal?”

“Ginger. In the cabinet beside the fridge. Mugs in the next one over.”

“Thanks,” Noah said again and stood. “Kettle?”

“Instant hot water tap. The one on the left.”

“That’s genius.”

“I invented it myself.”

Noah laughed a little nervously.

By the time he returned to the couch, he still looked as comfortable as a lobster dangling over a boiling pot, but at least he had something to do with his hands.

Timo said nothing, only ate, smiling on the inside.

Everything was going to be all right now.

Whatever was happening to him was going to stop tomorrow because he had a meeting with the man in black over his lunch break and he was going to get to the bottom of this and see that it stopped.

He’d talked to Julian by text on Monday, set up the meeting at a coffee shop on Wednesday, and knew he had only two more days to get over this whole thing with Noah.

What and how and details didn’t matter. Somehow, someway, something had happened to him starting the night of the wedding and it was Julian’s fault.

Now he was going to get it sorted and the fact that in the meantime, in these last few hours of his own insanity, Noah was actually in his home, right here, about to sleep here, a couple rooms away from Timo, was totally unimportant and uninteresting because Timo willed it to be so.

Just thinking about the meeting was distracting enough that Timo hardly even noticed Noah here with him.

Right here. Right now. Much more interested in his dinner, in fact, than his casual work friend employee person who just happened to need a place to crash and Timo offered because that was what friends did.

Practically invisible as far as Timo was concerned.

He ate and Noah fiddled with the string on his tea bag and looked at the view.

The penthouse was quiet. Timo didn’t like quiet. He liked action, conversation, getting things done, seeing things happen and making them happen. Normally, he’d have on news or be listening to one of his audio programs over dinner, possibly texting someone or checking trades at the same time.

But no, he had a reticent guest and he ate and didn’t turn anything on.

Chivalrous. That was what Timo was. It was a good word. His picture could be beside it in the dictionary. Other relevant, interesting English words included imperturbable and valorous, which was one of the many words Americans didn’t know how to spell.

“I’m fine out here,” Noah said. “Really. I’d rather be on the couch than turf you out of your bed.”

Turf was an excellent example of the many English words that could sound the same, possibly be spelled the same, and mean totally different things.

Noah’s use of it was quite unusual in Timo’s experience, however.

Timo appreciated that. Day-to-day vocabularies tended to be so limited he needed his audiobooks to make sure his own did not sink to the same level as the average English football fan’s.

“If you’re sure,” Timo said, finishing off his dinner. “It’s entirely up to you. Wherever you like.”

Noah shifted, rubbed the back of his neck, turned the mug in his hands, and took a careful drink. He pursed his lips, tapped the mug with a finger, looked at Timo, then away.

Timo cleared his plate and took his dishes to the dishwasher.

“I do get up early, but it’s just to get out for my morning run.

I’ll be quiet. Then it takes about fifteen minutes to get to the office from here.

Please help yourself to anything in the kitchen and bathroom and plan your own schedule accordingly.

I’ll show you where the linens are. Use whatever you like to make up the couch. ”

Noah joined him to see where everything was, then they returned to the kitchen while Timo also got a cup of ginger tea.

“Are there any programs on British television you enjoy, Noah?”

From standing by the bar, again looking out the mighty windows, Noah rounded on him. “Okay, what is this? What are you doing?”

Timo pressed his tea bag with a spoon to extract the air bubbles and make it sink and steep. “Making tea? Hot herbal beverage if you want to be factual. Tisane , if you prefer.”

“Why are you acting like this?”

“How am I acting?”

“Like a normal person.”

“Am I?” Timo was startled. No wonder most people were so boring. Those must be the normal ones.

“Yeah, you’re like … calm and reasonable and all … mild-mannered.”

“You don’t like it?”

“No. I mean … I would if I thought this was just you. But it’s not.”

“How do you want me to be?”

That shut him up: looked like he’d walked into a glass wall.

Timo smiled down at his ginger beverage.

“I — it’s not that bad. It’s just that you’re obviously scheming, so that’s the problem. It’s not how you’re acting — it’s that it’s an act.”

“You’re saying you like me best when I’m my authentic self?” Timo squeezed out the bag with the string wrapped around the spoon. This was turning out to be more fun than he’d expected.

“I didn’t — I don’t —” Noah turned away. “You’re putting words in my mouth.”

“A strange expression.”

“Most of them are when you start to think about it.”

“Well, I’ll leave you to it. Feel free to watch TV. I’ll use earbuds so you won’t bother me, and I’ll be up for a while yet. Just knock if you need anything, or you can always text me.”

“Sure …” Noah watched him in apparently stunned silence while Timo walked away for the bedroom.

He’d only meant to keep his mind focused elsewhere, to keep reminding himself that he was going to do something to stop this whole disaster tomorrow.

He’d no idea the results would be so satisfying.

Indeed, by the time he’d retired, he half expected Noah to come knocking on the door, at least for an argument, if not to climb into bed with him.

Timo’s mother used to tell him to run at a dog if he wanted to scare it away; only run away from a dog if he wanted it to follow.

He’d been a small boy at the time and her advice was in no way meant to be metaphorical.

Now, though, for the first time in many years, the words came back to Timo as he settled his earbuds in place to continue his audiobook. How very interesting.

* * *

He’d almost allowed himself to become distracted last night, letting Noah get in his head, make him start thinking of new wooing strategies instead of remembering that he was going to put an end to this nightmare.

Then getting up in the morning for his run and protein shake and Noah was there, right there, T-shirt and boxer shorts to sleep, in Timo’s home, and he’d felt lucky to escape with his life.

If this continued — it just couldn’t. His profit/loss ratio suffered, his sleep was destroyed, his life was in chaos, and now the source of all the trouble was living with him while still holding him at arm’s length.

Surely all the troubles he’d been having with Noah before were nothing compared to this.

But there was one bright spot, one hope: Noah wasn’t the source of all this trouble, was he?

What had really happened to Timo? Was it possible, really possible, that Julian had somehow cursed him?

It was completely ridiculous. But so was his whole life right now.

Something was happening, something beyond Timo’s control, and this man in black who turned out to be an astrologer of all things, might possibly know something about it.

To save himself any slip-ups in his new casual attitude towards Noah, Timo left for work half an hour early just to escape. Even the smell of Noah’s shampoo turned out to be alluring.

The day cartwheeled past in a blur until lunch when Timo dashed to the Tube, then to the south London coffee shop several minutes early.

He started for the small queue to get his drink and wait, only to spot Julian, all in black again, already at a table, reading on his phone, coffee mug in front of him.

Timo thought he was going to keep calm for the chat.

He thought he was going to ask what was happening and keep an open mind and clearly but firmly state that it all had to stop.

Then he saw that man with his black boots, his amulets, and arrogant expression, chill and unconcerned as a tray of ice, and Timo knew in a flash that what he really wanted, deep down, was to murder him.

He dropped into the chair opposite Julian and sat forward, arms on the little round table, pulse pounding, chest hot.

“What the hell have you done to my life?” Timo growled.

Julian looked up from his phone. “Good morning. Fine, thanks for asking. I’m Julian.”

“Don’t fuck with me. You were at the wedding. You said you cast magic spells. I said that was bullshit. You said I’d see one, or you’d cast one on me or something. The next day my whole life was in tatters. What did you do?”

“Is that so? Sounds like you’re the one who needs to tell me what I did.” Julian sat back, taking his coffee cup with him. His expression was hard to read but possibly bored.

“No. You tell me what you did and how it works. What is going on with me?”

“I really couldn’t say, but I can offer referrals for professional help if you —”

“I’m not playing around. I want to know what you did and I want to know how you’re going to undo it. Now.”

Julian simply looked at him while Timo fought with his own tone and the burning anger that bubbled up against his throat.

He tried again. “Will you please tell me if you’ve done something to me?”

“What difference would that make? You said yourself my magick wasn’t ‘real’. So why ask?”

“I don’t know about that. All I know is that I was fine when I went to the wedding, then I ran into you and I started having problems.”

“Yeah, I’m going out on a limb to say, I didn’t cause your problems.” Julian took a drink.

“So you didn’t do anything? This is all in my head?”

“Did I say I didn’t do anything?”

Timo leaned in. “What is going on?”

“How should I know? You haven’t even said what’s wrong.”

“What did you do? ”

“Nothing sinister. Just demonstrating that bit of magick you were so eager to see. I’d have thought the effects were obvious, but perhaps one of us missed something.”

“Obvious how? What’s it do?”

“My spell? The spell I didn’t cast on you because there’s no such thing?”

“ What’s it do? ”

“What do you think it does?”

“Makes me obsessed, a single-minded addict, destroying my work, taking over my life, absorbing all my time, looping thoughts, recurring dreams dropped into sleepless nights.”

“Sounds about right. Also known as a love spell.”

Timo stared at him, silent for the first time. Julian took a drink, gazing back into his eyes. Although unsmiling, his eyes were dancing — laughing at Timo.

Timo spoke slowly and carefully, trying to make himself understand, to force this to be real and therefore fixable. “You put a love spell on me?”

“That’s right.”

“You somehow made me obsessed with my most junior employee , who has absolutely no interest, who is more than a decade younger and scared shitless of me, wrecking my whole life, to prove a point? ”

Julian grinned. “Nice. I only worded it to be someone totally and maximally wrong for you to fall for. I’d no idea who it’d be.”

“You think this is funny?”

“That you still don’t believe in magick while also claiming that your life was destroyed by it? Yeah, that’s pretty funny.”

“Take it off,” Timo ordered.

“Sure, but we’ll have to go in the back. Public decency laws in this city.”

Timo half stood, hands on the table, leaning towards Julian. “Take your fucking spell off me and Noah.”

“There’s nothing on Noah. You’re the one lucky winner.”

“Then take it off of me. Stop it, destroy it, burn it, whatever it is you do. Cancel that spell.”

“Or what?” Julian raised an eyebrow. “You’ll sue me?”

Timo looked down at the coffee cup.

Your Honour, this man put a magic spell on me and I demand that he remove it.

I see. What kind of magic spell?

The kind that drives a man mad.

Indeed. The court can see as much.

Slowly, Timo sat, only for Julian to stand.

“It’s been time-consuming running into you again, but I must be on my way.”

“You’re not going to leave? You haven’t even explained what’s happening.”

“I did. And you did,” Julian said coolly.

“I put a spell on you to drive you to fall for the most unsuitable person in your social circles. You’ve been managing all the rest brilliantly.

You, however, don’t believe in magick or energetic influences, do you?

So that’s that.” He drained the final swallows from his coffee cup.

Timo also stood. “You can’t leave me like this.”

“Why not?”

“It’s taken over my life. I don’t deserve to be tortured for no reason.”

“Sounds very character-building to me.” Julian pocketed his phone. “Now I must be off to actual clients. Yours is just a charity case.”

“Charity —?” Timo moved to intercept as Julian turned away. “That’s it then? I’ll pay you. I’ll pay you to undo whatever it is you’ve done. How much do you want?”

Julian directed a cold gaze at him. “You know, I didn’t like you from the moment I saw you. But I do love being validated on first impressions.” He walked out.