Page 33 of Never Been Witched (Starfall Point #3)

“That’s probably why we haven’t been able to feel your magic,” Riley sighed. “You cut yourself off from us, and your magic followed suit.”

“You think I caused this?” Alice asked, sounding something more than miserable for the first time since this heart-wrenching conversation started. She sounded offended. And that was good. Collin figured they could work with offended.

“Not on purpose,” Caroline assured her. “But when I was going through my troubles with my ghostly pain in the ass Rose, it manifested in weird ways magically. The dreams. The possession. Our power is rooted in emotion. It makes sense.”

“Possession?” Collin turned to the other men, who simply shrugged like this was a super-normal thing to say.

“OK, so you’ve told us,” Riley said. “Is there something else?”

“He sort of ambushed me today when I was walking home,” Alice admitted.

“Demanded my cooperation or he would tell you all sorts of lies about how I was helping him—which I never did. But honestly, I think at this point, it might be better if I just left the island. Clark thinks my being near you gives him access, and that makes him dangerous.”

“Well, honey, that’s just not fucking true,” Riley told her, making Mina snort. Plover gasped. “I’ll put a dollar in the swear jar, Plover.”

“She’s right,” Caroline said. “Nothing good comes of us splitting up.”

“It’s one of the first rules of horror movies: stick together,” Mina added. “We’re stronger. And this sounds like some messed-up programming from your asshole grandparents, telling you that we would never forgive you for something you didn’t even do on purpose. Because they’re assholes.”

Plover cleared his throat.

“I will also put a dollar in the swear jar,” Mina told him.

“It’s possible that was an idea that I picked up from my childhood,” Alice mumbled as Caroline held her close.

“We don’t work without you, Alice. And we don’t want to,” Riley told her, laying her head on Alice’s shoulder.

“Would you please open your magic up again?” Mina asked, kneeling in front of Alice and hugging her middle. “It hasn’t been the same without you. Even Josh feels it.”

“I’ll try,” Alice promised. “I don’t even know how I closed it in the first place.”

“Just remember how much we love you, and how much we want you here with us,” Caroline said. “No matter what your asshole grandparents told you.”

Plover threw up his hands in despair.

“Everybody was cursing. I felt left out,” Caroline told him, making Ben snicker.

“What did you do when Clark confronted you?” Riley asked, swiping at Alice’s wet cheeks.

Even without magic, Collin could practically feel Alice’s relief rolling over him like an ocean wave.

She’d told them and they hadn’t thrown her out of the house.

It spoke well of her friends. Collin could see that they were upset, but he could also see their awareness of Alice’s fragile state.

She couldn’t bear their anger right now, so they put her needs first. He wished more people in Alice’s life did that.

“I threw him against the wall outside the T-shirt emporium, using my magic,” she said, making a shoving gesture with her hands.

“I’m not even sure how I did it, considering that he’s a living person.

Maybe he had a haunted object on him? Left a little bit of a dent in the siding. I may owe the owners an apology.”

“I approve,” Plover told her.

“You did what?” Collin exclaimed. “You didn’t tell me that!”

“I was sort of caught up in the moment and the nudity and it slipped my mind,” Alice told him. Plover’s eyes narrowed at Collin and he picked up the tray.

“Stop it,” Mina told him. Plover put the tray aside and bared his teeth in Collin’s direction.

“We’ll figure this out,” Riley swore. “But you can’t hold yourself apart from us anymore, OK?”

“We love you,” Caroline assured her. “We miss you. We need you. Now stop believing stuff that assholes tell you.”

Alice snorted and responded by squeezing them to her in a big group hug. “I love you too. I’m sorry. Not for the sex with Clark part—that was in good faith—but for the lying.”

“Also, your grandparents suck. Have I mentioned they suck?” Mina asked.

Alice hummed. “Yes, you have.”

“You know, we could use this to our advantage,” Caroline said.

“Nothing my grandparents do is for our advantage,” Alice replied.

“No, she has a point about Clark,” Mina insisted. “You could pretend that we don’t know about the Clark thing, give him bad information, and keep him busy chasing fake leads all over the island instead of bugging you.”

“This is your fault for letting Caroline and Mina live under the same roof,” Edison informed Ben. “They’re starting to think alike.”

“They’ve always thought alike,” Ben retorted.

“I threw him against a wall,” Alice reminded them. “I tried to throw him through a wall. Magically.”

“I approve,” Plover said again.

Collin turned to Plover and silently mouthed the words, “Me too.” Plover gave him a firm fatherly nod.

“My point is that Clark’s not going to want to talk to me, at least not until he removes the shards of wall from his back,” Alice told them. “And I doubt very much that he’s going to believe anything I tell him.”

“Alice, you managed to lie to us and we share magic telepathy with you,” Riley noted. “I think he’ll believe you.”

“Ouch.” Alice blinked at her. “That’s a little harsh.”

“I said we forgive you, not that we would never talk about it again,” Riley replied, hugging Alice to her side. “We still have some processing to do.”

Alice shrugged. “That’s fair, I suppose.”

“And we should probably let Collin come in before he wears a hole in the floorboards,” Caroline added. “Sir, you are not a subtle eavesdropper.”

“Never claimed to be,” Collin shot back, making her snort. He considered that a victory.

***

Collin stood in the Cowslip Suite, watching the construction crew haul in a large crate through the door. Barely.

So far, construction on the hotel was going as well as one could expect.

In the past month, Collin’s lawyers had sent some very sternly worded communications to Lawrence and Cynthia, which boiled down to “ lol no ” but in more civil, legal language. He made sure Clark received a copy. Because fuck that guy.

Fortunately, the Cowslip Suite hadn’t required much in the way of structural change.

It had been stripped down to its original hardwood floors and painted a cheerful yellow to match its namesake.

Wide french doors opened to a bathroom that had been tiled in pristine white.

The starkness of it would set off the shipping crate’s contents to its best advantage.

It would be timeless, elegant, and comfortable.

The overall design made him think of a Shakespeare quote Alice mentioned—something about how a fairy queen’s faithful servant would hang pearls from every cowslip’s ear.

Yeah, he had it bad.

“You didn’t think about measuring the door before you ordered this, did you?” Hudson Ward, the construction foreman, asked as two of his guys edged the hand truck through the casing with surgical care.

Tall, tanned, with hands the size of frying pans, Hudson was a very talented construction manager Collin had somehow lured from New York to supervise the Duchess renovation.

He’d worked on several of the family’s business properties over the years, seeming to appear from nowhere.

Given the thick Jersey accent and almost-intentionally bland name, there were times Collin wondered if they’d found him through some sort of witness relocation program, but he figured it was rude (and counterproductive) to ask.

Collin admitted, “No, I didn’t. I was just so excited to find a company that made these, I put a rush order in… With enough money, you can find basically anything on the internet.”

“How ungodly expensive was this damn tub?” Hudson marveled.

Collin scrunched up his face. “That’s one of those questions I can’t answer without making myself look like a tool.”

“Fair enough.” Hudson snorted. “Most nonsensical thing I’ve ever seen.”

“I know, isn’t it awesome?” Collin said.

Hudson’s dark eyes narrowed. “This is about a woman, isn’t it?”

Collin nodded. “Yes, it is.”

Hudson stared at him for a long moment. “I hope she’s a nice girl.”

“She’s the nicest girl I’ve ever met,” Collin told him solemnly.

Collin helped the crew uncrate the tub and they checked it for damage. It wasn’t exactly like the treasure they’d seen in the antique catalogue, but it was better because Alice would use it. He knew his girl. She wouldn’t be able to relax if she thought her bath was about to flood the whole floor.

His girl.

When exactly had Alice become his girl? He had no clue. Also, he wasn’t sure he would say it to her face, because he didn’t know how she would feel about being called a “girl.”

And yet, she was his girl. Well, maybe it was the other way around.

He was hers. Undeniably. She’d left her mark on him, like a tattoo only visible to him, with her stubborn, quiet strength.

Even when she thought she was showing weakness, it was because she was trying to depend only on herself, to protect the others from what she considered unforgivable.

There was a sort of dignity in that…and he wished she would cut it the hell out.

“Well, it’s going to take some time and some skill to install this thing,” Hudson told him as they moved the tub into its relative position.

“And I want you to know I doubled the waterproofing under the floor for when this thing inevitably breaks. And when it does break, and you need it fixed, I’m charging a twenty percent ‘I told you so’ fee. ”

“Understood,” Collin said. “Thanks, Hud.”

“Your impractical funeral,” Hudson replied with a shrug.

Collin’s phone buzzed with a text from his pocket. It was from Paige.

I’m going to see you soon.

Why did that seem like a threat?

“Collin?” Alice poked her head in the suite. “Julie told me you were up here. Oh, hello.”