Page 20 of Never Been Witched (Starfall Point #3)

She could hear someone behind her, yelling her name.

But she didn’t stop as she tore through the waning early-autumn crowd, planning her dodges three and four moves ahead.

Why couldn’t the others feel her? What if she got to Shaddow House and couldn’t open the door?

The panic of that thought spurred her on even faster.

She felt one of her shoes stick in the grass of Ben’s yard as she cut the corner and ran up the steps.

To her relief, Riley opened the door and her arms, catching Alice as she stumbled over the threshold.

“Sweetie, what’s wrong?” she demanded, wrapping her arms around Alice. As soon as she crossed the boundary into the house, Alice could breathe.

“Grandparents,” Alice told her, struggling to keep her voice steady.

She sucked in a huge breath. Oxygen flooded into her lungs, and she could feel her hands and her feet again.

Behind Riley, Plover had materialized, wringing his hands.

Mina and Josh were standing with Caroline, Josh seeking out the protective curve of Caroline’s arm even as he stood nearly a foot taller.

Mina was holding something in her hand, the fused copper loops of a Welling lock.

Why was she holding that out in the open? Had they just found it? She nodded toward the lock. Josh reluctantly broke away and ran to the kitchen for a glass of water. Mina stepped forward to show it to her as Caroline knelt to help them off the floor.

“We just found it,” Mina said. “Under the corner of the atrium. Apparently, it was originally supposed to be the back half of the house. We were in here talking, and you know, we’ve never really spent time in here together as a group, just being together.

There’s usually some sort of crisis happening or we’re in the parlor or something.

But we could all feel it pinging from under the floor, which was different.

We had to break a few of the slate tiles to get to it.

Eloise is taking the whole thing very personally. ”

Alice heard a burbling noise from the atrium, where Eloise, the French ghost who died during an attempted elopement, peered sullenly over the lip of her Persephone-themed fountain.

Alice was oddly hurt that they’d found a lock without her, even though they’d found previous locks one at a time, without the presence of the whole group.

Maybe this was a sign of things to come.

Maybe as a group, the coven would be better off without her.

They were operating as a unit and she was just a distraction, crashing into the house with her drama and tears.

If anything, she was a vulnerability to the group, dangerous.

Maybe she should just leave the island altogether.

The coven was the only thing holding her here.

She could start fresh somewhere else. At the shop, she made enough to cover her food costs and clothes, but very little else.

Fortunately, she had few other expenses on the island.

She didn’t go out. She didn’t take vacations.

She had a little bit of savings that could help her make a new start, but not enough to sustain her if there was any sort of emergency.

She was sure that her grandparents wouldn’t help her if she needed it, and that was sadder than she could even fathom.

She hadn’t even considered life off the island before.

And even now, it hurt to think about leaving.

She didn’t want to live anywhere else. She loved it here.

She’d built a family here, more of a family than she’d ever known.

But she’d lied to them. This was the cost.

“Wait, so your grandparents just showed up?” Caroline demanded as she and Mina knelt close to her. “I thought they were supposed to stay in Florida for a few more months.”

“They put cameras in the shop,” Alice said, taking Josh’s offered water and sipping it slowly. Calm, she had to stay calm. “They saw me leaving with the candelabra thing. They thought I was stealing.”

“Well, that’s ridiculous,” Plover insisted. “You would never do such a thing.”

“Alice, are you all right?” Collin asked, following her through the door. “I saw you running across Main Square, but I got stuck behind Mitt with his pedal-bike and a dozen people and—”

Everything in the room seemed to stop at once.

All the living people just froze and stared at the newcomer.

The ghosts were similarly caught off guard.

People didn’t just walk into Shaddow House.

Alice doubted that Collin could see the ghosts, since they controlled that sort of thing.

But, given the look on his face, he knew something wasn’t right.

He glanced around the room, even as he moved closer to her.

Mina, having more presence of mind than the rest of the people in the room—as usual—hid the lock behind her back like an illicit cigarette.

“Alice,” Collin began as he knelt next to her.

Suddenly, there was a ghost crouched in front of Collin, screaming in his face. Well, Alice’s face too. It was a collective face-screaming, really. Alice was getting tired of having her face used as a screaming target.

“ Where is he? ” the ghost wailed.

The ghost had probably been pretty once, in a delicate, almost elfin way, before she died.

But now her lips were peeled back from her teeth in a permanent grimace.

Her eyes had once crinkled with mischief, but now they were just shadowed pools of anguish.

She was wearing a sky-blue “visiting dress” from the late 1890s, the high silk neckline stained with blood and the hem dirty and torn.

A brooch dangled from the neck of the gown, as if it had been partially torn from her.

The large ruby was set in a Byzantine gold setting made to look like a flaming sun.

This wasn’t a woman accustomed to disarray in life. But now, her hair was a wild dark tangle, hanging over her pallid gray face. She wasn’t like Eloise, who seemed to be made of sadness. This woman was suffering .

“Where is he?” the woman howled in Alice’s face. “I can smell him on you! You’ve been near him!”

It took all of Alice’s previous experience with ghosts, combined with her exhaustion from the day, not to panic. Collin, however, was clutching on to her as if he could haul her out of harm’s way. She patted his arm. “I’m all right.”

Plover sighed. “Really, Miss Victoria, this display is unseemly. And Miss Alice is already distressed. Could this not wait?”

Apparently, Plover had made himself visible to Collin in that moment, because Collin hauled Alice off the floor into his lap and used his long legs to push them away from Plover. “What the?”

“ Where is he? ” the woman screamed again, louder this time.

Alice could almost feel the ghost’s long curls dragging over her own hands.

Alice raised those hands and with a force born in the depths of her belly, pushed them forward in a “warding off” gesture.

It wasn’t quite a spell, but it was an instinctual measure to protect herself and Collin.

“Miss Victoria” practically slid across the floor, like she was dragged on a string.

“You’ll find that yelling in my face is something that I’m quite accustomed to, so it doesn’t affect me,” Alice replied, her voice icy and smooth as Victoria blinked in shock. “Now, who are you asking me about?”

“ Bring him to me! ” the ghost roared and then disappeared.

Collin fell back against the wall and pulled Alice’s weight against him. He took a deep, shaking breath through his nostrils.

“Are you OK?” he demanded as he wrapped his arms around her. He seemed to be checking her over for wounds and bruises, counting all her appendages. “What in the hell was that?”

Alice turned to Riley. Shaddow House was her legacy, her family secret to protect.

Alice couldn’t be the one to reveal it. Riley was staring at Collin, as if trying to determine whether he could be trusted.

And then, of course, Plover decided to break the tension and decide for them, kneeling into Collin’s line of sight and announcing, “That, sir, was a ghost.”

Collin’s eyes went somehow wider, and he yelled, “ What the fuck? ”

***

Step one was getting everybody off the floor. Step two was pouring heaping helpings of brandy for Collin and Alice as they collapsed on the couch in the parlor. Collin politely declined his and asked for water.

Alice felt a strange flush of guilt for not catching that, after Collin’s being so open about his past struggles. Collin always seemed so polished and perfect; hearing that he’d had a more complex past made him more human. Approachable. Less intimidating.

She was in very real danger of developing devastating feelings for Collin Bancroft.

“Your first ghost sighting can be a lot,” Riley told Collin even as Plover tsked over the wasted double of “Miss Nora’s favorite.

” Caroline happily sipped it to appease him.

Riley brought them a pot of spiced apple cinnamon tea and a plate of fruit, warning them of the potential post-adrenaline blood-sugar crash.

“I also feel shaken up by the appearance of an unknown and aggressive ghost,” Josh said, all guileless brown eyes and innocence as he nodded toward the brandy bottle. Riley simply stared at him. Josh bit his lip and looked away. “It was worth a shot.”

“That was such a pathetic attempt, it’s like you don’t even want to try alcohol,” Mina sighed, shaking her head. When Caroline’s brows rose, she added hastily, “Not that I have, obviously.”

“OK. One issue at a time,” Riley said, taking a seat near the huge stone fireplace.

Lilah, the ghost of a little girl attached to the brass match cloche on the mantel, appeared with a hopeful expression on her face. Riley shook her head. “It’s still too warm for a fire, honey.”

“Fine.” Lilah sighed and wiggled her fingers in greeting at Collin. “I’m going into the kitchen with Miss Natalie.”