Chapter 2 #2
“I’ll be back in time for brunch tomorrow,” Glinda promised, mounting her broom. I grabbed her wrist before she could take flight and waited for her to look at me.
“Be careful.”
Glinda’s tense expression softened, and she nodded. Then she glanced at the basket gripped in my other hand. “Tell Professor Horny Hops I’ll make it up to him tomorrow night. We’ll bust out the velvet-lined top hat and vibrating carrot—”
“TMI.” I shook my head, trying to dislodge the image she’d put there, and released her arm.
“Watch out for falling houses!” I shouted after her as she ascended into the dusky sky.
It had turned purple along the eastern horizon.
A nearly full moon slowly crawled up to join the few stars that dotted the sky as I watched Glinda’s inky silhouette fade from view.
I had a terrible feeling in my gut, and it wasn’t just cookie cravings this time. Glinda was still struggling to find her place. She had a job bartending at the Assjacket Country Club. She’d even bought a house and had a...questionable lover or two.
But wicked ways die hard, and family ties were complicated.
If our grandmother were alive, I’d probably be more upset about the West family disowning me, too.
Not that Gran would have stood for such a thing.
She’d been an outcast among the West witches in her youth, as well.
But wicked witches have shorter life expectancies, and she’d inherited the family home and fortune—and Almira’s legendary broom—after her two sisters had met their ends.
I hoped Glinda didn’t meet a similar fate, associating with the likes of Emmy. Angry villagers wielded more than pitchforks these days, and the good witches far outnumbered the wicked.
The party wouldn’t officially begin for another twenty minutes, so I had just enough time to dash inside and change.
During one of my shopping excursions with Zelda, I’d found a super cute maternity top that was perfect for tonight.
The stretchy fabric hugged my middle, giving the cauldron print a 3D effect.
Frog toes and eyeballs floated in the bubbly green soup, and even a little bat wing broke the surface.
I paired it with a glittery black tulle skirt and matching flats.
I’d promised Dylan no more heels until after bitty bat made her debut.
Glinda was still weighing on my mind when I returned to the backyard to finish winking the final details in place. But my worries soon shifted to the backburner as excited chittering echoed from the belfry and a few bats flittered around the roof. Asher was here.
I didn’t speak the language, but lately, I’d begun to recognize the nuances of the batty noises the colony made whenever familiar faces came and went.
I’d been here for several years now, so I tried to chalk it up to that and not dwell on it any further as my nephew bolted through the garden gate in a scarecrow costume.
“Auntie M!” Asher squealed, his cheeks swelling with his wide grin. He wrapped his arms around my belly but was careful not to smudge his face paint. “Do you think I’ll win the contest?” he asked eagerly.
“You’re the best scarecrow I’ve ever seen,” I said. “I’m not a judge, but I could award you with a candy apple—”
He tore off before I could get another word out.
“Just one!” Daisy shouted after him, readjusting a fluffy lion-mane headband over her blond locks. “Kids and their lollies, eh?”
Bitty bat delivered a kick of agreement, and I tilted my head toward the buffet table of sweets, inviting Daisy to join me as I took full advantage of my cheat day. Unfortunately, Dylan intercepted my hangry plotting.
“Nice repurposing of Ash’s costumes of daydreams’ past,” he said, nodding at the fluff-tipped tail dangling from Daisy’s snug leggings.
When the sky grumbled, he shot me a cautious frown.
But it had been months since my pregnancy hormones set off the storm cauldron over Dylan’s white knight treatment of his brother’s widow.
I returned his inquisitive stare with a tight smile.
“You’re standing in front of the pretzels, honeybat,” I said through clenched teeth.
Then I remembered that it didn’t take a wicked witch to circumnavi-wink up a plate of snacks. So I did just that, since Dylan was taking entirely too long.
“Sorry, carino.” He rolled his eyes and reached for a brownie bite on my plate, recoiling when the sky growled even louder.
“Full of bad ideas, aintcha, mate,” Daisy said, inching away from us as her eyes darted up at the thin clouds forming overhead.
“Force of habit,” Dylan offered apologetically.
I dipped a pretzel in cheese sauce and crammed it into my mouth, breathing deeply through my nose as I silently went through Roger’s meditation exercise. The sky quieted again, and Daisy and Dylan both sighed at the same time I did.
I crammed another piece of pretzel into my mouth and chewed furiously, daring my husband to say something. Hopefully DeeDee would be less problematic, but I wasn’t about to let either of them ruin my cheat day.
This was my party, and I’d gorge if I wanted.
Just try and stay out of my way.
A wicked cackled tickled the back of my brain, but it stayed there, because my mouth was too full.