Page 23 of Wishing for a Werewolf (Ferndale Falls Forever #2)

Autumn

“Remember, you promised. No chewing!” I stare down at Babybelle before opening the door of I Touch My Shelf. “Especially not the books.”

“No chewing.” She dances back and forth, her hooves playing a happy tune against the sidewalk. “Promise.”

I swing the door open, and she scampers through it, going from zero to sixty in one second flat.

Babybelle zips around the room, amber eyes bright with glee as she decides what she wants to explore first. Whoever coined the phrase “curious as a cat” never met goats, because goats get into every effing thing.

“I love it! I love it!” She winds in and out of the bookshelves. “So many books!”

“No chewing!” I yell again as I carry the cocktail mixings over to the wooden sideboard that holds the coffee station. Grounds for Celebration has only been open a day, but I can already tell Naomi’s using the old coffee maker less.

“Oh, good, I’m glad you’re early,” Naomi steps out of the backroom. “I’ve got to get home to Faerie. Wranth is ‘surprising’ me with a trip to a new waterfall for dinner and more.”

“What part of that is a surprise if you know all about it?”

“The fact that he thinks he’s hidden it from me.” She laughs. “I’ll probably tell him right before I get him to chase me. It’ll make it even better when he catches me.”

A shiver goes through me at her words. “Chase?”

Naomi grins and grabs a book off a nearby table and presses it into my hands. It’s a wolf shifter romance by Lara Jade titled Primal Play. “Chapters nineteen through twenty-two, if you want to get straight to the spicy stuff.” She gives me a knowing wink. “Got to run. Have Hannah lock up for me?”

I nod, my eyes flicking back toward the book.

Naomi disappears with a faint pop, teleporting away. That will never not be cool. And teleporting sure sounds way the eff better than my glitchy wishing magic.

The door swings open, Hannah holding it so Skye can step inside, a tray of cupcakes balanced on her arms. We all chorus “Hi!” at the same time.

“Me! Me! Me!” Babybelle caroms from behind a bookshelf and arrows straight for my friends. When she tries to stop, her hooves slide over the slick hardwood floor, and she bumps into Hannah’s legs. “You haven’t said hi to me!”

My friend laughs and crouches down to pet the mini-goat. “Hello!”

Skye walks over to set down the cupcakes, and my impatient little familiar bounces after her, leaping up onto the sideboard. “What are those? Can I have one?”

“Nope!” I scoop her up into my arms. “Way too much sugar for you.”

A giggle slips from Skye as she pets the mini-goat’s head. “Can you imagine her on a sugar high?”

“Eff no. Don’t even tease. She’s even smarter now that she’s my familiar, and it’s only made her more rotten.”

“I’m not rotten! I smell good. I don’t pee on myself like Limburger does!”

“Thank eff for small favors,” I say, as Hannah breaks into a laugh, and I explain what Babybelle said to Skye.

I give my familiar one of her chew treats, wash my hands, and start making cereal milk cocktails.

Due to the fall festival and Halloween, we’re probably going to be too busy over the coming two weekends to have Witch Bitch Spicy Book Club meetings, so Skye and I decided to roll out our pumpkin spice treats this week.

While we work, I say, “So… I’m glad you two got here before everyone else. I slept with Rune.”

Skye gasps, her bright-pink lips making a startled O.

“It’s about damned time,” Hannah says.

“And?” Skye leans toward me. “How was it?”

I pause for a moment, teasing her—my friend is a die-hard romantic—then break into a grin. “It was effing amazing. We spent the entire day together, getting his house ready for his family to visit, and after dinner, it just kind of happened.”

“Just kind of happened?” Hannah parrots, then points at me. “I’m not sure I believe that.”

“Okay, so… I might have licked him to get the ball rolling.” I grin.

“You didn’t!” Skye sounds both delighted and horrified.

“Just his arm. Get your mind out of the gutter.” I pour another cocktail and use my most innocent voice. “I didn’t lick anything else for at least a good five minutes.”

They break into laughter.

“I’m happy for you.” Hannah wraps an arm around me in a sideways hug.

Skye joins in from the other side. “Me too.”

“Thanks. I really like him. And he seems really into me. He’s been drawing me and stuff.”

Skye lets out an excited squeal. “That’s so romantic!”

“I know!” Warmth fills me at the thought. “It’s so effing nice to have a guy really care!” I’d love to say I forgot what it’s like, but none of the guys I dated ever did anything this special.

The rest of the Witch Bitches pour through the front door of I Touch My Shelf in a rush, hurrying over to gather in front of the cupcakes and cocktails.

“We’re going full fall tonight.” I wave a hand toward the drinks. “I’ve made pumpkin spice latte cocktails. If you think you hate PSLs, no, you don’t! Try this one.”

Kayla looks over at me and rolls her eyes, but I see the smile tugging at her lips.

“And I made pumpkin spice cupcakes to match,” Skye says.

Babybelle dances around my feet. “I want one!”

“Too much sugar, remember?” I pull a ziplock bag out of one of my canvas totes. “I brought you goat cookies. Butternut is just like pumpkin! You’re basically having the same thing.”

“No!” She stomps a little hoof. “I want what you’re having!”

“I love butternut,” Hannah says, grabbing one of the goat cookies and pretending to take a nibble.

“Hey!” My familiar headbutts her calf. “That’s mine!”

My friend puts the cookie back. “Well, if you’re sure you want them…”

“I do!” The mini-goat spins in a circle in front of me, looking up at me the whole time. “I want them!”

I mouth a thank you to Hannah for her excellent use of reverse psychology. Then I lean over and give Babybelle one of her special cookies. “You get one now and one at the end of the meeting if you’re good.”

She snatches the treat from my hand and finishes it off in two quick bites.

In that short amount of respite, I grab a cupcake and cocktail and sink onto one of the sofas. The first bit of cake is moist perfection, the forward taste of cinnamon and ginger mellowed by the fruity sweetness of the pumpkin. “Mmm, Skye. These are divine.”

“I asked Aunt Betty to borrow her recipe,” my friend says.

Her grandmother used to be the town baker, and before she passed, she gave everyone in the family one of her secret recipes.

Skye got the famous vanilla cupcakes with buttercream frosting, which are great year round, but these PSL ones bring the perfect touch of fall coziness to our meeting.

“Ooh, girlfriend, this is good.” Jasmine toasts me with her cup.

I take a sip of my cocktail, letting the spicy coffee flavor roll over my tongue. I used my normal cinnamon crunch cereal milk in it, adding espresso vodka and pumpkin spice syrup.

“It is good,” Violeta says. “You should get the orcs to make these at the pub.”

“It’s not bad,” Kayla admits, which is the equivalent of a declaration of excellence from anyone else. Her purple slogan T-shirt reads: I’m not really here. You’re so obsessed you’re dreaming me.

“Can I have some?” Babybelle jumps up to put her front hooves on my knee, straining forward to smell my drink. “Please?”

“Nope, no tipsy little goats tonight.”

“But—”

I distract her by pulling out a chew treat, and she snatches it from my hand and starts destroying it.

“Tough enough for big dogs, my ass,” I mutter and take another sip.

“Since we’re starting our meeting late tonight, why don’t we get right to it?” Hannah says. “Anybody find anything to help Autumn?”

No one’s texted any discoveries, so it’s not that surprising when everybody says no.

“I’ve read more of the books that have come in. Everything’s about getting wishes or granting wishes, usually with some kind of lesson about ‘be careful what you wish for.’” Skye grimaces and flaps her hand. “I’m sorry I’m not finding anything on wish swaps.”

“Hey, this is so not on you.” I set my cupcake on my lap and wrap an arm around her. “This is all on me and my messed-up magic.”

“I don’t know that I’d say messed-up.” Kayla points at me. “Your magic worked pretty well at Slice of Life the other day.”

“I’m not sure making us eat lunch a second time qualifies as ‘well.’”

“Gonna disagree.” She shrugs and tosses a lock a purple hair back over her shoulder. “The wish did exactly what Skye asked for, so it worked well.”

Violeta and several of the others demand the story, and I sit back and finish my cupcake while Skye and Kayla tell everyone about how my magic wouldn’t let us leave the restaurant the other day.

“I’ve been thinking about our lunch a lot, and sure my wish was an oopsie, but we did learn something important.” Skye looks at me hopefully. “My wish ended as soon as we finished the second round of lunch.”

Light bulb moment! I snap my fingers. “So my wishes stop once the wish is satisfied instead of going on forever.”

“Which means even if we can’t break the wish swap spell, all you and Rune need to do is finish your fall festival activities, and the spell will dissipate on its own!” Hannah makes jazz hands.

“Not quite.” I wince. “He might have started his new business, but there’s still my… w-word to have a soap shop.”

“Don’t you mean Rune’s w-word for a soap shop?” Skye asks.

“Sure,” I lie, knowing there’s no point in trying to straighten it all out.

Magic is so weird—when we talk about the situation in general, my friends can remember that there’s a wish swap happening between me and Rune.

But as soon as anyone mentions anything that touches on the actual wishes, they all think I want to run a security business and he wants to make soap.

“There’s a lot of other stuff to figure out about your power.” Kayla tells everyone about the wish she made to hold her phone. “It worked perfectly. In fact…” She holds out her hand. “I wish my phone were in my hand.”

Magic pulses through me in a little electric thrill, and her phone appears on her palm.

Everyone gasps, then starts talking at once, all of them trying the phone wish.

My power hums along my nerves, lighting over and over.

They all keep asking for more things, different things: lost keys, peppermints you can only buy from this trendy place in New York City, a twenty dollar bill…

I’m just about to protest—because I can feel that my magic took the money from someone instead of creating it from thin air—when Babybelle leaps to her feet and yells, “I want a pumpkin spice cupcake!”

My magic arcs outward, and one of the spare cupcakes disappears from the sideboard to appear right in front of the mini-goat, who gives a happy bleat and faceplants into it before I can move.

“Okay, enough!” I yell, bending over to wrestle the treat away from my familiar. “No more wishes!”

The room falls silent, and I give up the cupcake battle as lost, since she’s sunk her teeth into it and refuses to let go, her little legs braced for tug-of-war. Looks like I get a sugar-amped mini-goat after all.

Straightening up, I say, “Everybody check your wallets. I’m pretty sure that twenty Madison asked for came from one of us.”

“It was me.” Destiny waves her wallet. “I’m missing one.”

Madison hands over the money. “Sorry!”

“I’m going to call a moratorium on wishes for now, because it seems like they can have a cost.” I nod toward Destiny and Madison. “Ones we don’t expect.”

“You need to practice, though,” Hannah says. “For example, do you have any control over whether a wish is granted or not? Can you refuse to grant a wish?”

“Huh.” I stare into the distance. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“I think that’s something you’ve got to figure out,” Skye says. “Because what if you’re walking down the street and a little kid says, ‘I w-word all trees were made out of cotton candy’?”

“Yummy,” Kayla says, her tone thoughtful. Then her voice firms. “But bad. Very bad. The environmental impact, etc.”

“No, you’re right.” I sigh. “There’s no way I can go the rest of my life accidentally granting all the wishes people toss out as a figure of speech.”

“All the angry teens w-wording their parents to hell.” Hannah grimaces. “I know I did that a few times. I would never want it to be freaking real.”

Lots of nods from around the room.

“Okay, then let’s practice blocking wishes.” Kayla slips her phone back into the mini-backpack she uses as a purse. “I’m going to w-word for my phone again. You try to stop it from happening.”

“I could try w-wording for another cupcake!” Babybelle jumps to her feet. “If one shows up, I get to eat it.”

“Nice try, little rotten.” I pick her up and deposit her on my lap. “Why don’t you come up here and help me instead?”

“Help how?”

My eyes flick to Hannah, the only other Witch Bitch with a familiar, but she gives a small shake of her head.

It’s Skye who provides the save that will help me minimize Babybelle’s mischief. “A lot of the histories say familiars help to amplify and focus their witch’s power.”

“Yeah, what she said.” I shoot Skye a thumbs up.

“Okay!” Babybelle jumps onto my lap, tucking her little legs underneath her until she makes a goat loaf. “I can do that. I’ll be the best familiar ever.”

I take a deep breath and try to find my calm, then nod at Kayla. “Wish away.”

She wishes for her phone, and magic zips through me, making it appear in her hand.

We try it again and again, the magic coursing through me, completing the wish each time.

I try gritting my teeth and straining, I try yelling, I try holding Babybelle tight to my chest to see if that helps. Nothing works.

“Timeout, I’m toast.” I fall back against the couch, panting. “I can’t do it. That’s it. I’m doomed to live like a hermit or run around wearing ear plugs all the time or something.”

“You can’t control your magic yet,” Hannah says. “Give it time.”

“And maybe we’ll find something that’ll help,” Skye adds, patting my knee. “Luke’s got that massive library to check.” Her eyes go dreamy.

I snort with amusement. “Yeah, you want to get your hands on his big… books.” I waggle my eyebrows.

“I hear he has two big books.” Hannah holds up two fingers.

Skye turns bright red, but her smile is eager, a hint of the spicy side hiding inside my librarian friend.

When Hannah’s phone buzzes, she glances at it and leaps to her feet. “Sprites are enchanting people on the green!”