Page 45 of Never Been Witched (Starfall Point #3)

“I know, I just— Don’t go anywhere,” he told her, backing out the door before Paige decided to come through the front door. “I want to talk when I get back. There are things I need to say. But I’m just too…flapped right now.”

Collin rushed out of the manor house before she could answer. Paige was not happy to be escorted to the guesthouse, given the way she kept telling him to just take her back to the manor house, insisting that she didn’t mind a little construction dust.

“What is this place?” Paige demanded as he unlocked the front door. “Why haven’t you told me about it before?”

She sounded offended that there were Bancroft family secrets she wasn’t privy to, like the family didn’t have the right to them. Like she was more than that family, now that they were mostly gone.

“It’s a space that’s available to special guests. If you need anything, I can get it for you in the morning,” Collin told her.

He was almost to the door when he heard her say, “We need to talk.”

“About what?” Collin asked.

“Collin.” She sighed, pouting and pulling at his jacket.

“It’s time. Our families expect us to get married.

They expected us to get married years ago.

We’ve put them off for long enough. I was just talking to Lawrence and Cynthia the other day, and they were telling me how concerned they are about you out here all alone.

They think you’ve taken on too much, and you know what happens when you feel overwhelmed.

I would just hate for you to damage your family legacy with your self-destructive tendencies. ”

He swallowed heavily. She would bring that up.

The drunken scenes. The stupid stunts. The time he got arrested for taking a cow into a bespoke tailor shop in Mallorca, because he thought it needed a dinner jacket.

It made sense at the time. Alice said she didn’t care about his checkered past—not even when the Jet Ski story came up—but Paige would lay it all out for her, in far more unflattering detail than a Google search would accomplish.

“I think you should just forget about running the hotel and come back to the city,” Paige said. “Just sign the hotel over to Lawrence and Cynthia. They need a project. Why not just let them take their rightful place and you can find something else you want to do?”

“This is what I want to do,” Collin told her hoarsely.

“You’re only saying that because of some childhood dream,” she insisted. “You think you’re honoring your family’s memory, or something. But this isn’t going to bring your parents back. You need to just let this go.”

“Let go of the same family you’re sure would want me to marry you?” Collin asked.

“Yes, because I’m good for you, Collin. You need me to guide you. Look at what you do when I’m not around,” Paige told him.

She gestured to the guesthouse, like it was wrong, something to be ashamed of.

“Stop,” he said softly.

“And what was that ridiculous scene in front of your assistant?” she demanded. “Just another sign that you’re well on the way to another catastrophe. It’s only a matter of time.”

“She’s not my—what does Alice have to do with anything?” Collin asked.

“Why is she still at your house? Why does she get to go inside this construction war zone, when I don’t?” Paige demanded.

“She’s an antiques expert. She’s helping me pick out appropriate pieces for the house,” Collin said.

She rolled her eyes. “At ten o’clock at night?”

“Our meeting ran late.” Why was he making excuses? He didn’t owe her an explanation. How did she always do this to him? Stupefy him with embarrassment and regret and head games.

“Paige, you and I aren’t together anymore. You don’t have the right to show up here and act like we’re still a couple,” Collin said.

“I don’t have the right ? After giving you years of my life, I don’t have the right to have a simple conversation with you?” she hissed. “A conversation, let me remind you, that we could’ve had by phone had you bothered to pick up more than once.”

“Forgive me, that came out wrong,” he insisted. “Listen, there are things we need to talk about, but I really don’t have the time or the energy right now. We’ll talk in the morning, OK? And then we’ll charter a boat to take you back to the mainland.”

“The mainland?” she scoffed. “Is that really what you call it? Like this is a real island?”

“It’s a landmass surrounded by water,” he noted.

She gave a dismissive roll of her eyes. “But it’s hardly Saint Barts, is it?”

“I’ll see you in the morning,” he told her, closing the door behind him with a decisive slam. He’d hoped Alice would be there when he walked inside the manor house. But she was gone, having left a little note that said, “Shaddow House.” No “dear” and no signature, just those two words.

Meaning she’d walked alone back to Shaddow House, in the dark, with a murderous ghost pet on the loose, rather than stay with Collin.

Shiiiiiiit .

***

Collin did not sleep well, even after Alice very thoughtfully texted him that she’d arrived safely at Shaddow House, with an additional confirmation text from Riley.

Because, as Riley noted, In the unlikely event Margaret managed to kidnap Alice, she probably wouldn’t be able to get both of our phones to fake a text.

How had Collin’s life gotten to the point that this all seemed reasonable?

And while grateful for the peace of mind, Collin was not cheered by Alice’s text responses when he informed her that Paige was secured at the guesthouse. She’d texted, K. Not even an OK, but a K .

That was bad. Alice hadn’t even participated in the text chain where Riley begrudgingly caught him up on the events of the evening before.

Collin had to pretend that everything was normal.

That he and every person in Alice’s coven weren’t under some sort of supernatural threat from a menacing grandma, lurking somewhere on the island.

Then there was putting on a show of appropriate mourning for a “beloved” local like Clark, even if Collin was relieved that threat was removed from Alice’s life.

And damned if Collin didn’t have a videoconference scheduled with his marketing team for the spring relaunch first thing this morning.

It was the sort of meeting that a responsible adult would not skip because his sort-of girlfriend was mad at him.

Of course, said sort-of girlfriend’s coven didn’t know about the videoconference, so they felt free to interrupt it by walking in en masse, Julie at their heels.

“I tried to explain about the meeting. But…um, the teenager scares me?” Julie told him before dashing back out the door.

“It’s fine. We were wrapping up anyway,” Collin said, waving to his New York team before they signed off. He closed the video program and his laptop with a decisive snap. He did not want to accidentally leave a video window open and expose his marketing gurus to ghost talk.

Also, Alice was not with the group. He did not want to think about what that meant.

“What did I do?” Mina asked, watching as Julie booked it down the hall. Josh shrugged.

“I told you, all adults are afraid that teenage girls will figure out their secret fears and weaknesses, then exploit them,” Caroline explained.

Mina replied, “Well, yeah, but we have to have a reason to deploy our primary weapon. We don’t just go around mocking people willy-nilly.”

“That has not been my experience,” Josh told her.

“All right, all right.” Riley huffed. “Hi, Collin. We come bearing not gifts, but protective…items.”

There was a businesslike briskness to her tone, like she was there to conduct an audit, not pull a box full of really weird holiday decorations out of her bag.

“Are those glass Christmas ornaments…filled with salt?” he asked.

“And herbs,” Riley told him. “Think of them as ghost hand grenades. You have to throw them at the ground close to that awful Chester thing. The Denton journals are really unhelpful regarding what sort of magic Margaret might have used to put him together. I guess because it’s unprecedented magic, which is terrifying. ”

“I’m still having a hard time wrapping my head around the Story Time lady being an evil sorceress,” Collin said, shaking his head. “I remember her big purple Mother Goose hat from when I was a kid.”

“I don’t know if I would call her a sorceress ,” Josh said. “More of an evil fairy-tale poisoned-candy-house vibe—”

“Josh,” Mina said, shushing her brother. “We agreed, no friendly chat with Collin.”

“We don’t know that he did anything wrong,” Josh insisted quietly, as if Collin couldn’t hear them. “Bro code dictates that I give Collin the benefit of the doubt, even if I want to staple his stupid tie to his desk for upsetting Alice.”

“Wait, wait, is Alice OK?” Collin asked. “She wasn’t in a great mood when I saw her last, but…”

He’d never had four people with magical powers glare at him simultaneously. It wasn’t an experience he wanted to repeat.

At his left, his desk phone rang.

“She says she’s OK, which we all know is bullshit, because that’s what she said when Clark and her grandparents were—” Riley shook her head and didn’t finish the thought. “No, she’s not OK.”

“And that’s on you,” Caroline told him as the phone continued to ring.

“Oh, we’re just going there?” Josh said, glancing between the others. “I thought we—all right. Women change conversational lanes quickly. No, dude, she’s not OK! She’s upset and hurt!”

“She’s pretending she’s OK,” Mina told him. “She’s acting like everything is normal and we don’t have a ghost-wielding grandma out to get us or that her boyfriend isn’t wearing his own ass as a hat.”

“Easy,” Riley warned him.

“Thank you,” Collin replied.

Riley shrugged. “Collin wouldn’t wear his ass as a hat. A fancy ascot sort of thing, maybe.”

Collin was lost. Were they using magic on him right now? Some sort of confusion spell? He picked up the phone and answered rudely, “What?”

“I’ll try not to be offended by the greeting, since you’re clearly under duress,” Julie said through the receiver. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but Lori from housekeeping has a question.”

“Can’t you take care of it?” Collin asked. “I’m a little busy at the moment.”

“I really think it’s something you’re going to want to weigh in on,” Julie replied.

“Julie, I trust your judgment. You’re a pro. You know this hotel better than anybody. Whatever you and Lori think is appropriate,” Collin told her. “You’ve got this.”

He hung up and Caroline immediately asked, “Did you really let your ex stay in the guesthouse? After you told Alice that she’s a destructive and manipulative influence in your life?”

“I don’t think that’s how I phrased it, exactly,” Collin protested.

“The ex you’ve proposed to multiple times?” Riley added. “Giving her the impression that you might panic and propose at any given moment?”

“Well, it was technically multiple times, yeah, but—” Collin said.

“Trust me, don’t ‘yeah, but’ them,” Josh told Collin, shaking his head. “They don’t like it.”

“Paige just showed up in the middle of the night!” Collin exclaimed. “With no way of getting her back off the island. What was I supposed to do, build her a boat out of cardboard and wish her the best?”

“Find some other place for her to stay?” Caroline suggested.

“Tell her to figure it out for herself, since she put herself in the situation?” Riley countered.

“You’re stupid rich!” Josh exclaimed. “Summon your helicopter or hovercraft or whatever, and tell her it’s a one-way ride.” Josh glanced at Mina. “Nothing to add?”

Mina shook her head. “No, that was a good one. That’s our new suggestion. Collin, summon your hovercraft and export the source of Alice’s hurt from the island.”

“It’s complicated with Paige,” Collin said, making all three ladies in the room cringe. “I know, I know how that sounds!”

“What?” Josh asked.

Caroline turned to the boy who was her stepson in all but legal papers, and reached up to cradle his face.

“I want you to promise me, when you get older and you are a bright, beautiful man capable of epic affection, you will never utter the words, ‘It’s complicated’ unless it’s in reference to the inner workings of a hadron collider. ”

“Or international politics,” Riley added.

“Or how Caroline’s brothers manage to burn coffee every time they make it,” Mina groaned.

“It’s not complicated,” Riley told Collin.

“It’s just difficult. You and Paige have a lot of history and hurt.

Telling her that you’ve moved on is going to suck.

And you don’t want to do it because she is most likely going to have a negative reaction, and that makes you feel like the bad guy. Nobody likes feeling like the bad guy.”

“You don’t—” Collin began and then pursed his lips. “That is fair.”

“And I’m sorry, but we don’t have time for you to procrastinate over having awkward conversations with your ex. We have a crazed ghost-hamster-wielding grandma to contend with,” Caroline said.

“So, in the nicest of terms available,” Mina said, “figure your shit out.”

“That was the nicest of terms?” Collin asked dryly.

All four answered, “Yes.” In unison. It was unnerving.