Page 41 of Never Been Witched (Starfall Point #3)

“It occurred to me that if Paige really wanted to marry me, she would say yes, and we could figure out the jewelry and logistics later, so I stopped proposing,” he said.

“Not out of anger or anything, but… I told you about the treatment process. I did a lot of therapy, got sober, stopped talking to my aunt and uncle, went back to school to get my MBA. I actually paid attention in class, which was a novel experience.”

“Oh, that hurts my soul,” she told him, making him laugh.

He threw up his hands. “I never said I was perfect. I was starting to have doubts about whether we were good for each other, not in a relationship context, but just health-wise.” He sighed.

“I’m not even sure she ever loved me, not really.

I mean, she’s fond of me. She enjoys spending time with me.

But I think she sees me as an investment.

She’s put too much time in to quit now, if that makes sense. ”

Alice shuddered. “That’s a little gross.”

“I don’t think she’s a bad person. She’s just not good for me,” he said.

“Are you sure about the ‘bad person’ part?” she replied. When he opened his mouth to object, she added, “I’m just saying my grandparents use the same word, ‘investment,’ and they’re not great.”

“Anyway, last year she showed up at my door with a ring she’d selected herself, telling me that she’d set up an engagement photo session to go with the announcement she’d already sent the Times .”

“Well, that’s bold!” she gasped.

“She said we’d waited long enough,” he said, pursing her lips. “She wouldn’t ‘accept any excuses this time,’ as if she wasn’t the one who turned me down a few years ago.”

“So, you let her down easy?” she asked. “Or you let yourself down easy…out of your apartment on a ladder made of knotted bedding? Because I’m picturing the second one.”

“I told her I wasn’t ready,” he said. “And I wasn’t sure that I was ever going to be ready. I realize now that gave her hope—because I didn’t flat-out say that I was never going to be ready—and that was cruel.”

“It can be difficult, ending a complicated relationship,” she told him. “Obviously, that is a concept I’m familiar with on several fronts.”

“You used magic to throw your ‘complicated relationship’ through a wall,” he deadpanned.

“Well, I don’t recommend that,” she said. “It was satisfying, but it has only made things more complicated… Is that part of the reason you’re here on the island? To avoid this woman?”

“No, I’d always planned on being here,” he told her. “But I can’t say that the isolation was a con in the pro-con consideration columns. My feelings for Paige are complicated, and it’s better for me to work through them when she’s not around.”

Did that mean that he was so drawn to Paige that he couldn’t think straight when she was present?

Alice wondered. And where did that leave Collin and Alice?

Had she thrown herself in with another emotionally unavailable man?

Only this time, instead of unintentionally acting as a saboteur for Clark, she was acting as some sort of relationship surrogate to help Collin process his feelings for someone else?

Maybe her grandparents were right. The only thing she attracted in life was tragedy.

Because this was starting to feel pretty tragic.

“I think Paige and I kind of used each other as an excuse not to have to commit to people or move forward with relationships. We could focus on our careers, which was good. But we also always circle back to each other in a way that isn’t healthy,” he said.

“Why do you think that is?” Alice asked.

“I have spent a lot of time talking to various therapists, trying to figure that out.” He sighed. “That’s my big secret. I’m covertly a fucking mess. I just cover it up with passable manners and nice suits.”

She reached for his hand and squeezed it. Yes, she liked the seemingly perfect man she instinctively wanted to rumple, but this was better. This man was human, not quite as intimidating. Infinitely more climb-able.

“Well, you’re not alone in that. I’ve clearly got my issues,” she told him. “And those suits aren’t just nice, they’re fantastic.”

“Thank you,” he replied, kissing her forehead. “For not running from the room screaming.”

“Well, you have accepted my house full of ghosts and weird friends,” she said.

“I like your weird friends,” he told her. “Dead people and all.”

***

Several days later, kneeling in the dark, digging at the base of the Shaddow House folly, Alice was grateful that Caroline had turned off the security cameras. This was not something she wanted recorded for posterity.

How could grown adults be so bad at digging?

“Caroline, I swear, you haphazardly throw dirt in my face one more time, I’m telling everybody that the ‘homemade house rolls’ your mom serves at the Rose pop out of a can,” Riley sputtered, wiping a spadeful of dirt from her cheeks.

“My mom’s homemade house rolls do pop out of a can,” Caroline said, shrugging.

“Yes, so people will believe it!” Riley exclaimed, pausing to spit dirt particles onto the grass. “Dang your devil-may-care shoveling!”

Alice snickered. It was nice, spending time with just the coven in the autumn moonlight—even if the magic they were working involved landscaping.

Ben and Edison knew better than to involve themselves in shovel-witchcraft.

Collin was having dinner with the construction team to try to foster goodwill before the crews realized they were stuck on the island when the snow hit, which was due any minute.

And frankly, Alice needed a little time with the coven to process what Collin had told her about his ex.

Alice couldn’t judge past poor relationship decisions, but she couldn’t help but wonder how “current” Collin’s feelings for Paige were. At best, it sounded like unresolved business. And Alice had spent enough time around ghosts to know how dangerous that could be.

“Just want to point out, we could be helping,” Josh called from a lawn chair near the gazebo. Mina sat nearby, reading her precalculus textbook by flashlight.

“You have school tomorrow,” Caroline reminded them. “Your dad was willing to let you watch us look for whatever thing creepy Stanford was burying here, but he didn’t want you to wear yourselves out before Mina’s precalc test.”

“That was before we knew you lacked the hand-eye coordination to operate a shovel,” Alice retorted.

“I’ve had a long day!” Caroline cried, waving her shovel at the moat they’d dug around the rounded stone curve. “We’ve hired a new cook at the Rose, and she and my mom are having an epic power struggle over, well, everything—including the rolls that pop out of a can.”

“Wow.” Riley winced. “I’m sorry I brought that up. But I’m glad that your parents hired a new cook to give your mom a break. I know how they feel about hiring nonfamily members.”

Caroline leaned against her shovel and caught her breath. “It was under threat of something very unpleasant to my dad.”

“As in violence?” Alice asked.

Caroline shook her head. “No, as in having to pay one of us overtime.”

Riley pursed her lips. “That would do it.”

“Have we considered that maybe Stanford wasn’t ‘digging’?” Mina asked absently, turning her book page. “It’s not like we saw a shovel.”

“Does anybody hear the rattling noise?” Josh asked, cocking his head, staring over Alice’s shoulder. She turned her head and saw a tall gray shape in the distance, approaching Shaddow House’s gate.

“Do you think Stanford’s coming back?” Caroline asked, squinting at the swiftly moving shape. “Maybe we can watch a little more closely this time.”

Alice watched as the shape came nearer to the fence, walking up to the gate and opening it. “I don’t think Stanford used the gate.”

“Aw, dammit, it’s Clark,” Riley sighed. “I thought we’d agreed he would leave us alone and, in return, I wouldn’t throw knives at his crotch with my brain.”

“You did what, now?” Josh asked.

“She didn’t hit him,” Caroline assured the kids. Behind Caroline’s back, Riley turned to them and measured “I came this close” with her thumb and forefinger. The kids snickered, making Caroline whip her head toward Riley.

Alice sighed. “It’s possible this is my fault. I provoked him with that story about a possible Welling heir burying family heirlooms in the ‘haunted cave’ on the east coast of the island.”

“The cave that floods regularly?” Caroline asked.

Alice nodded, biting her lip. “I heard the Coast Guard had to come rescue him.”

“Good, he deserves it,” Mina told her as Clark approached. “Dick.”

“Nice mouth. Your influence, I’m assuming, Caroline?” Clark sniped.

“I think you need to ask yourself, if Riley can throw a knife at your crotch, what could a teenage witch with rampant hormones, a loose grip on her temper, and spotty magical control do?” Mina asked, smiling sweetly.

“You don’t have spotty magical control,” Josh whispered out of the side of his mouth.

Mina’s smile turned ice cold. “He doesn’t know that for sure.”

“Clark, I thought I made it clear that you weren’t welcome on the property,” Riley told him.

“And I thought I made it clear that I plan on helping the Wellings do whatever it takes to undermine you,” Clark shot back.

He smiled, and his features looked eerily skeletal in the blue-white moonlight.

“It’s a wonder, Alice, how you manage to keep in their good graces, despite everything you’ve done. ”

He looked surprised when she laughed in his face.

“Oh, give it a rest, Clark. I told them, and no, they weren’t happy about it.

But instead of rejecting me, they forgave me, and they encouraged me to screw with you for the last couple of weeks.

Because they love me a lot more than you could understand.

You didn’t break me. You didn’t break us.

Like Riley said, you really, really suck as a supervillain. ”

“And you’re a lousy lay,” Caroline added. “I’m guessing. I never found out for myself. You know my rule. No locals.”