Page 28

Penny

RON IS WAITING UP WHEN PENNY GETS HOME AT MIDNIGHT.

“Are you rebelling?” he says. He’s sitting on the couch in his bathrobe, a sheet mask barely disguising his disapproval.

Penny rubs her temples. She’s never been great at lying in the first place, and now her eyes are dry, and her body is tired. “Naomi and I stopped at IHOP, and we lost track of time. I should’ve texted you.”

Ron sighs. “I’m not mad. But, hon, you look exhausted, and I think you need a little time off.”

Penny’s anxiety rears its head—the thought of rest is much worse than the thought of working. She doesn’t need more time to think. “I’m fine, Ron! Really.”

“Nope! As your gay dad, I officially declare that tomorrow is your day of rest. You’re not allowed within a ten-foot radius of the café.”

Somehow, Penny manages to hold back her scream until she reaches her room and unleashes it into a pillow. It takes hours to fall asleep. When she wakes up at noon the next day, she realizes maybe Ron was right. Her head feels clearer, and she’s not as jittery. Plus, this gives her an excuse to work on her verse in the curse-breaker spell.

Penny sits at the old diner booth in her kitchen, staring at a draft in her notes app. Choosing a token for her part of the curse-breaker was easy: She’s going to use a lock of her mom’s hair. Alonso said body parts will always make a spell more potent. The thought makes Penny nauseous, but at least it confirms that one of her mom’s blond curls will do the job. It’s writing the spell that’s been the biggest challenge. She was assigned the verse that represents the present, since it’s her mom in a coma right now. But Penny isn’t a witch; she isn’t even a poet. Every time she sends a new draft to Alonso, he rejects it with almost no feedback. It doesn’t “feel right.” The only other guidance he’s given her was to incorporate water imagery, because that has to do with healing and renewal.

Penny rereads her latest rejected verse silently:

Forty-six years the water stood still.

Now my mother’s soul is caught beneath the surface.

The curse must meet us in this earthly circle…

Then what? Penny sinks farther into her chair, phone close to her face. Maybe this is wrong because the curse isn’t meeting them. They don’t want the Shadow to suddenly appear. They want Alonso to find the curse across the Veil, and they want him to break it. Cut the threads , the grimoire of forbidden magic says. There are lots of sewing and stitching metaphors. The curse-breaker spell’s actual name is even The Unwinding.

“Come on,” Penny says to herself, but all she can see is her mom opening her eyes when this is all over.

She stops, thinking on that for a moment. It’s supposed to be personal, right? She doesn’t have to sound like Rainer Maria Rilke. She starts typing again:

After forty-six years of still water

my mother is in the curse’s ties.

Open the Veil, open her eyes,

show us the curse’s tangled web.

Give us the power to pull it apart

and change the world we know.

Penny whispers it to herself, and it sends a shiver through her. Maybe that’s good? She sends it to the Cozy Mystery Book Club chat anyway.

Thirty seconds later, Alonso messages back one word: Winner .

Penny sighs, letting her head rest on the chair in triumph. “I did it.”

Now what?

Penny drums her fingers on the table. The wall clock ticks the time away. They’re supposed to be investigating. Milton is doing his part by researching other covens, but what can Penny do? She can’t just sit at home all day.

Instead, Penny decides to visit the library.

The Idlewood Central Library has one branch, which is housed in an institutional-looking building that went up in the nineties. There’s a plaque beside the door thanking the Barrion family for donating money to pay for its construction.

The librarian sets Penny up in the periodicals and newspapers room and brings her a bunch of microfilm from 1979—the year Ellie Barrion and Giovanni De Luca died. Penny is prepared to say it’s for a research project, but the librarian doesn’t ask questions. She wishes Penny’s mom a quick recovery and leaves her alone.

Penny turns on the projector and starts scrolling through the film.

County fairs. New businesses opening, old ones closing. Farmland being sold to new farmers or companies like Barrion Heating has she ever been in the local paper? If not, will anyone even know she existed?

She pushes that thought away as she searches for news about the Barrions’ company, or even Ellie’s family. When she reaches the story about Giovanni’s death, she pauses.

There’s the face from her dream. Sharp cheekbones, eyes that are permanently suspicious. The headline: Man dead by suicide after suspected murder of former lover.

Penny doesn’t realize she’s walked up to the projector screen until she’s already there. It’s true that Giovanni and Alonso look alike. But there’s something sinister about Giovanni. Penny certainly would’ve described Alonso as sinister a few weeks ago, but now things are… complicated.

Because of the way Alonso looked at her in the car last night. The way he talked about the frogs, like he was mad on their behalf. The way he grabbed Penny’s headrest. The way he leaned in…

Alonso wasn’t going to kiss her. That would be impossible. But if he tried to—which he never would—how would Penny react? Would she let him?

Penny can’t answer that. Instead, she buries herself in microfilm. She goes back to the year before the curse began, then two years before, three years before. She’s not even sure what she expects to find.

Which is why she almost misses the photo.

It’s a feature from the Barrions’ annual gala, three years before Ellie and Giovanni died. Ellie and Charles Barrion smile at the camera as party guests mill around them. It’s black and white, which obscures the faces around them.

Except one.

In the background of the photo, mingling with guests, stands Giovanni De Luca. He’s watching Charles and Ellie Barrion, his expression dark.

Penny’s breath catches in her throat. She reads the caption:

Charles Barrion and his wife, Ellie, hug as they co-host their annual family gala at Meredith House.

Penny’s eyes find Giovanni’s face again. Wrong , her subconscious whispers. Something is so very wrong about this picture.

Because if this is really a photo of the Barrion gala, and if it was taken years after Ellie married Charles Barrion, why in the world would Giovanni be there?