Chapter four
Nora
The red dress I picked out is something Slava would never have let me wear. And what better way to tell him, subtly, to fuck off?
He's a jealous man. But he's not my man anymore. He's just a criminal—someone who'd put me and my sisters in danger just by existing near us.
I lean into the mirror, applying bright red lipstick as the final touch, then give myself a twirl. The stress has killed my appetite these past two weeks, and looking at how small my waist looks now, I can't say I'm mad about it.
"Wowza," my sister Inez says from the doorway.
Inez is one to talk. She's three years older than me, twenty-seven, and somehow still looks twenty-one—all soft and wide-eyed, like innocence just naturally drips off her.
Out of the three of us, she's always been the prettiest, hands down.
Huge brown eyes that swallow the rest of her face, dark full brows I've been jealous of since I was twelve, fair skin, and hair so long it nearly brushes her knees.
But because God's fair, she's also the weirdest of us.
"I need to do a protection hex on you before you leave. You look too good tonight, and I don't trust a single man out there not to lose his mind," she says, already lighting the sage because she knows I'd never tell her no.
My sister is what people call "woo-woo" or "delulu.
" But she also raised us. Our parents were both gambling addicts who did the absolute bare minimum, and Inez picked up every odd job she could find to keep a roof over our heads.
On the really bad nights, when our parents were screaming at each other downstairs, she'd lock the two of us in a room and tell us fairy tales until we fell asleep.
She funded my degree on the condition that I'd help fund our little sister's when I got a real job. That's exactly what we're doing now.
She's the glue that's kept the three of us together our whole lives. Even though she's only three years older, I've always seen her more like a mother than a sister. Even though we fight like siblings do, I respect and love her more than almost anyone else in this world.
I think all that responsibility, dropped on a fourteen-year-old who should've still been playing outside, is exactly what shaped her into who she is now.
She doesn't call herself a witch, but she's deep into manifestation, hexes, tarot—the whole thing.
None of us ever made fun of her for it because we all know exactly where it came from.
Two years ago, she went full-time into it as her actual job, and it's paying off—she bought this cabin outright.
"I don't look that pretty," I tell her, laying my head in her lap where she's pointed.
"Shut up," she hisses, tapping my forehead gently before she starts humming and waving sage smoke over my head in slow circles.
Do I believe in any of this? Hell no.
Do I ever let her see that? Also no.
"Have you heard from your ex?" she asks mid-hum.
I shake my head. I never told her more than we broke up and I needed somewhere to crash for a while. She never pushed for details. She never does. She's always been our safe place.
"I'm adding a repellent hex to the protection. To push him away," she murmurs.
I nod. "Please do."
After ten more minutes of humming and smoke, she finally waves me off, plants a few air kisses near my cheeks, and I tell her goodbye and borrow her car again. God, I will never be able to repay this woman for everything she's done and everything she's still doing.
Two hours of driving later—music blasting the entire way that I'd never admit to liking in front of another living soul—I pull in, park carefully away from the rest of the cars so no drunk idiot clips it on their way out, and head in.
The girls scream when they spot me, and I do a stupid little dance walking up to them.
We sit. Men buy us drinks. We laugh and dance. A cute guy two seats down has bought me three rounds in a row.
"He's hot," Darla says, elbowing me. She means it as a whisper. It comes out as a slurred announcement loud enough that the guy hears it and hides a smirk behind his glass.
"Oh my God, Darla," I hiss.
"What! I'm just saying what we're all thinking."
"I'm thinking it too," Emily chimes in from across the table. "Nora, go talk to him."
"I don't even know him."
"That's what talking is for," Darla says, deadpan, and the table cracks up.
She's right, he's hot. But Slava is hotter. Shut. Up. Nora.
He's blond. Slava's hair is so dark it's almost black. This guy's tan. Slava's fair. His skin looks smooth from here. Slava has more scars than I've ever managed to count, and I used to trace every single one of them. This guy's maybe average height. My Slava—
My Slava who?
He's not mine anymore.
"Okay, but seriously," Darla says, leaning across the table toward me, "stop being so socially awkward."
"Rude," I say.
"Accurate," Emily adds.
"You two are supposed to be my support system."
"We are supporting you," Darla says. "Right into that man's DMs."
"Oh my God, guys, he's coming over," Emily says suddenly, sitting up straight. "Fluff your hair, Nora. Fluff it."
"I'm not fluffing my—"
"Fluff. It."
Despite myself, I do. Because I want to forget. I want to forget Slava tonight, even though he seems to be burned permanently into the back of my mind.
I want to enjoy myself. Let loose. Prove to myself that I actually can move on.
So when he reaches the table, I dance with him. I let his hands linger on my waist. I laugh at his stupid jokes.
And after, I take him home with me.
And I hope, quietly, that it wasn't the wrong decision.