Chapter 2
Night whizzed past the windows as Simon’s Jaguar sped down the road. His ringtone interrupted Fleetwood Mac’s The Chain and Simon accepted the call on the touchscreen.
“How are you, my boy?” Everett’s voice blared through the speakers.
“I’m driving home now,” Simon said. “I’ll be there for the meeting tomorrow.”
“I wasn’t worried about that. You know I can call just to ask you how you are?”
Simon grinned. “Something did happen in Vegas I have to tell you about.”
“Mmm? Got any new ideas?”
“I would like us to try the new composite mix for 14A’s casing, but that’s—”
A bright light, the force of the sun at midday, blinded Simon. A truck, rounding the curve—on the wrong side—on his side—
“Yes?” Everett prompted, but Simon barely registered him over the truck’s honking and the blood rushing to his ears.
The blaring coming through the blinding white, Simon’s whispered “Shit,”—it was all contained in a fraction of a second as he wrenched on the wheel and veered away from the truck’s destructive path. But he also veered off the road and—
***
He was right.
There was a pentagram hanging above his head.
Simon wasn’t sure how long he’d been staring at it or how long he’d been awake, even. He was lying in bed, and above him, from the unfamiliar ceiling, hung an even less familiar silver charm, like one of those things babies would have in a crib to help them fall asleep.
“Leona, time,” he said, but not a single beep came from his digital artificial assistant.
He swung his head to the side, where his phone should be on the bedside table. And there was a bedside table—a cute one with a little crochet doily on top, the scratches on the white-painted wood making it the perfect furniture for a cozy cottage.
This was not his bedside table.
And this was not his bedroom.
As he sat up, a colorful patchwork blanket slid off him. He was wearing checkered pajama pants and a simple undershirt—not his, either—and as he stood up, his legs nearly gave out under him. Holy shit, this is one hell of a hangover.
But was it a hangover? He didn’t feel hungover. He was hungry, and his legs and arms were weak, but otherwise, he was fine. And he remembered everything clearly—
Wait. He was driving back to San Francisco. Everett called …
Something crashed in the room beyond. Simon flinched, then berated himself for such a cowardly reaction, and headed for the door.
This cutesy fairytale bedroom, with its lacy curtains, a little vanity table, and fluffy pillows, was definitely not his apartment, and he was getting two things—answers, and the way home.
Inching the door open revealed a living space: a corner with a patchwork sofa half-covered with a fuzzy white blanket and a wooden coffee table stacked with magazines, a glass bowl with colorful beads, and another bowl with a collection of succulents.
The space joined with a small kitchen and a round dining table on the other end.
At it sat a young woman, so deep into crochet handiwork her nose was almost touching the crafted object.
The sun shone from behind her, turning her loosely bound, ash-blond hair into a river of pale gold.
Simon had so many questions. Where was he, who was she, but also—“What the hell?”
She looked up, and a broad smile lit her round face. “Simon! You’re awake!” Her handiwork forgotten, she jumped to her feet and ran to him.
In the last second, he realized she was going for a hug and reached out his hands. “Hold on now.”
To her credit, she did stop. “Sorry. I’m happy to see you out and about. Finally in your real body and all that, you know.”
He shook his head. “No, I don’t know.”
“What do you mean?”
“First off—who are you?” He took a step back. “Did you kidnap me? I’ll have you know, I will not be paying any ransom because I don’t stand for those kinds of things, and everyone will be looking for me, so it’s in your best interest—”
“No, no, wait.” She extended her hand as if trying to calm a puppy. “It’s me. Shanna.”
“I don’t know any Shanna.”
Her eyebrows dipped and drew together. “You don’t remember me?” she said in a small voice that made him regret his harsh tone.
“No, I’m sorry. Look, I can pay you as thanks for letting me crash here, but I have to go.” He turned in a circle. He didn’t even know where to start. Where were his things? And why was he here? So he turned back to Shanna. “Actually, I wouldn’t mind an explanation.”
“What do you remember?”
“I was driving home. Talking to my financial adviser. There was a …” The sun—no, not the sun—the truck’s headlights.
“I think I swerved off the road.” That explained it.
His car was damaged, and it being the middle of the night, she must have offered for him to stay here until he could sort things out in the morning.
“Do you know if they picked up my car already?”
“Your—Simon, no.” She bit her lip, then gestured to a chair. “Sit, please. Will you have some coffee?”
He only nodded as he followed her directions. She seemed pleasant enough, so he was no longer worried about his safety. But his meeting … Oh, shit. He’d probably missed it already. “Could I borrow your phone? I have to call my company.”
“I think you should drink the coffee first,” she said gently.
She set the cup in front of him, onto a wooden coaster painted with flowers, then sat across.
Closer to her working space, he noticed the crochet work was actually wires—very fine, almost hair-thin wires, intricately woven into pendant-sized symbols.
The one she was working on was a symbol of three spirals meeting in the middle, made out of silver and metallic green wire.
“There’s a small problem,” Shanna said, redirecting his attention.
Oh, he saw where this was going. “Whatever damage I caused, I can pay—”
“Simon.” She reached out her hand, as if wanting to touch his, but stopped herself. “Your car accident wasn’t yesterday. It was three years ago.”
He coughed out his coffee. “What kind of joke is this?”
“You truly remember nothing? Not even the past few days?”
“The past few days were in Vegas. We had a conference, and I remember perfectly fine …” As he said it, another memory burst into his mind.
Not of Vegas, but of a darkened room, shelves full of books, herbal bouquets hanging from the walls, the heavy smell of incense filling his nostrils—or, so he thought, but was he really the one smelling it?
He sat at a round table covered with a purple velvet cloth. His vision was woozy, blurred at the corners, and across from him … sat himself.
Simon was no longer in his own body—because another man had taken it.
“Tomorrow, we’re doing a ritual that will save you,” the man in Simon’s body explained.
Jolting himself out of the memory, Simon grabbed his chest. A cold spread through his lungs, and just like that, was gone.
“Three years ago, you died as a result of that car crash.” Shanna’s expression was solemn, with a dash of pity.
“When you were in the hospital, I performed a ritual to draw your soul back into your body, but I made a small mistake and drew another soul into it, while yours got sucked in here.” She pulled out a tacky, heart-shaped golden locket.
“I wasn’t sure exactly what had happened, because I wasn’t physically present at the scene.
I thought you were fine, but I couldn’t get in contact with you.
It was only a week ago that I found out what the problem was, and with the help of the man in possession of your body and his girlfriend, we fixed it.
” Her expression cleared. “So now you’re fine. You’re you again.”
This was absolutely insane and made absolutely no sense—except that when he listened to her and thought about it, more memories came flooding back.
The man who took over his body. The man he was speaking with, in that darkened room across that round table.
The name returned, certain and easy. Raleigh.
And Simon knew, to the bottom of his oh-so-precious soul, that this random woman had tried so hard to save—it was all true.
“I died,” he repeated.
“But you’re fine now.”
He stretched out his fingers like starfishes. He rounded his shoulders and cracked his neck. Mind—working. Body—working. Mind-to-body connection … finally complete, it seemed. “What happened?”
“In the crash? I’m not sure. I never got the details.”
“Afterward.” Oh, no. That impostor! “My company! That idiot—Raleigh, or whatever his name is—was pretending to be me. He led my company!” Simon scrambled to his feet.
“I need to call them. I need to set everything back in order.” If there was a single thing wrong with Aries, he was going to hunt down that miserable piece of shit and make him pay.
In a normal or paranormal way, whichever hurt more.
“Wait.” Shanna rose. “Calm down. You must still be weak from the ritual that returned you to your body. Don’t overexert yourself. And your company is fine, I promise. I’ve been checking on it frequently. Your CFO …”
“Everett.”
“Yes! He’s still there. I saw him on the news recently. Had some big, exciting projects to share.”
Simon brought down his rapid breathing. Good.
If Everett was still there, Aries was fine.
Even if the impostor had tried to do something strange, Everett would have stopped him.
It didn’t put Simon completely at ease, but it was enough for now.
Enough until he acquired better clothes, a phone, and transportation back to San Francisco. Speaking of which … “Uh, where are we?”
“In my house.” Shanna frowned. “Oh! Montana.”
“Mont—aah. Why?”
“I like the scenery? It’s very peaceful, too.”
“Sure. Fine. Is there a town nearby?”
“Five minutes with the car.”
“Perfect.” He narrowed his eyes. If his memory was correct … “Wasn’t the ritual done in Louisiana? And you brought me all the way here?”
“You were really out of it afterward,” she explained. “I barely dragged you to the car, and you fell asleep like a baby. I didn’t know what to do, so I brought you home. To my home.” She folded her hands in front of her. “And I bought you some PJs.”
“How long ago was that?”
“A few days.”
Jesus. He really was out of it. “And what’s up with the pentagram above my—your—bed?”
“It’s a pentacle. Small difference—the pentacle is enclosed with a circle. It’s for protection. The ladies who performed the ritual were very competent, but since you kept sleeping, I thought an extra layer of protection wouldn’t hurt to ensure you’d come out of it okay.”
He stepped over to a wall mirror with a wooden frame, painted with a patina to give it a rusted look. At first glance, the house looked like a cozy cottage from a magazine spread, but the more details his freshly-geared-up mind processed, the more it started to look odd.
The strange shapes of the trinkets she was making.
The runes painted along the rim of the vase next to the mirror.
Another pentagram—pardon, pentacle—above the said mirror.
Simon scrunched up his nose at it. “So what are you, some kind of witch?”
“Well, yes. Some kind of.”
“Wait, what?” He whipped his head back to her. “Really?” Somehow, though, it wasn’t too hard to believe, after all the memories of rituals and body-switching.
Then the belated sight of his own face in the mirror pulled him back. He’d been out of his body for three years. With a heavy dose of fear, he inspected his own features. Raleigh could’ve done anything. Plastic surgery, piercings, tattoos, that stupid trend of changing one’s eye color …
A version of Simon he’d last seen during his college years stared back: a few days’ worth of a beard, dark bags under his eyes, but luckily, still unpierced, untattooed, and normal. Except for—
“What the hell did that bastard do to my hair?” He ran his hand through the long locks on top of his head. Who did Raleigh think he was, a twenty-year-old hipster? That town better have a barber.
“You’ll be all right.” Shanna lowered her eyes to the floor. “Disheveled or not, you still look great.”
There was one thing he hadn’t figured out yet. He understood the crash, his strange journey back to life, and he approximately understood his whereabouts. But where did she fit in?
“Why you?” he asked. “How did you know me? How did you know I had died? And why would you bother spending three years to get me back?” There were very few people who’d care enough for him to go to such lengths. Perhaps only Everett.
He took a few steps toward her, inspecting her face. Pretty pink lips. Wide, pale blue eyes, like the sea after a storm. Lightly arched eyebrows, a shade darker than her hair. He strained his mind, tried so hard to make it make sense, but no recognition came. “Who are you?”
She slumped her shoulders. “You won’t remember me, and why is a story in itself,” she said. “But I’m your wife.”