Chapter Thirty-Eight-Donny
Just as I got close to the stones, the sound of persons familiar to me stopped me in my tracks.
“What are—”
“—you doing?”
“Get away from that!”
Their twin voices came from the left, oily and sharp like a hex gone wrong.
My head snapped toward the woods where Candice and Denice Chickazola, former owners of my salon and occasional root touch-up disasters, emerged from the trees like low-budget Halloween villains.
Their outfits were identical—pumpkin-orange sacks that looked like someone had wrapped them in party streamers and glue sticks.
And their hair? Great Aunt Edna’s bunions, their heads were a travesty.
Crooked home-done dye jobs, half-scorched strands sticking out in tufts, one of them rocking a faux hawk that would’ve made Johnny Rotten weep.
They looked like the love children of a scarecrow and a punk rock nightmare.
I was too stunned to speak, and it got worse.
Grandpa Al, still hovering ghost-pale and hole-in-the-middle, groaned.
“The Chicky twins? You’re still alive?”
“Grandpa Al!” I gasped, appalled.
“You had to say that?” I hissed at him. “They already look like they crawled out of a cauldron backwards.”
“Yes, handsome Al,” Denice purred, her gravelly voice somehow both flirtatious and furious, hands on her nonexistent hips.
“—we are still alive. And we’re waiting for you to keep—”
“—your promise!” Candice finished with a pout that would’ve been cute if it weren’t laced with psychotic intent.
“We found out about your two-timing ways, Al,” Denice snarled.
“—and that was not nice!”
Al floated backward. “Beautiful ladies, I-I didn’t realize we were exclusive! It was just a bit of harmless fun!”
“Harmless?” they both shrieked. “We mourned you for years!”
“And now we’ve bound you to this place—”
“—to suffer as we have!”
A flash of power cracked the circle of stones at my feet.
Grandpa Al howled, his translucent form sparking and fading. My gut twisted.
Holy fork. His ghost nuts were being flash-fried.
And maybe, sure, maybe the old horndog deserved a little comeuppance. But this?
This was soul death. And for what—some over-the-hill grudge sex?
“Stop it!” I shouted, stepping forward even as the ground trembled under a new pulse of dark energy.
I flicked a look to Gryn, who stood quietly like a furry little general, waiting for my command.
“You can’t do this to him! It’s wrong. You’re not just binding him—you’re unraveling his very soul!”
Candice raised a gnarled brow. “So what?”
“Yeah,” Denice added with a venomous smirk. “You can’t stop us. You’re just a hairstylist.”
“Are you even that anymore?” Candice mocked. “Seems like you’ve lost a few clients.”
My chest cracked. My fists curled.
“You?” I whispered. “You’re behind those flyers?”
“Of course!” Denice bragged.
“You started poking around here—”
“—so we gave you something else to worry about.”
Petty. Vindictive. Cruel.
I almost hoped the Goddess would let me curse, just this once. But I held it in, barely.
“You’re attacking my business? Ruining my reputation? All to torture a Ghost because your mutual booty call never promised you a magical white wedding?”
“Al never promised either of you anything, did he?” I pressed, watching the flicker of hesitation behind their over-plucked brows.
Silence. Guilt. Bingo.
“And now you want vengeance because you regret it? Grow up.”
Evie, Bella, Jaxson, Conrad, and Ryan arrived just as I turned to Grandpa Al, who was flickering like a dying candle.
“Hold on, old man.”
Bella gasped. “Grandpa Al!”
“Stop this, please,” Evie pleaded with the twins.
“Never!” they cried in unison. “No one uses the Chicky twins!”
“Donny?” Ryan’s voice snapped my attention to the stone circle again.
I knew what I had to do. It was risky, reckless, borderline stupid—but it was right.
I whispered a prayer to the Goddess.
Protection.
Clarity.
No zaps to the butt, please.
Then I summoned my magic, unfiltered and fierce, and spoke the spell from somewhere deep inside.
“Goddess be fair,
I’ve cleaned up my chat,
Please give me a bolster,
To end this fake tit for tat.
The Chickys are wrong,
They deserve no reprisals,
Young love made willingly,
Now turned into rivals.
Help me survive while,
I stop this bad curse,
You are all powerful,
Don’t do your worst.”
Hey, it wasn’t Shakespeare.
But I didn’t say the F word, and that had to earn me points.
With a deep breath and a heart full of chaotic Gryffindor-esque energy, I dropped to my knees and shoved my hand straight into the cursed circle.
Agony. Searing, electric, reality-bending pain jolted through me.
“DONNY!” Ryan roared.
My skin glowed gold.
My bones buzzed with raw energy.
And still, I reached.
Until my hand closed around something hard and cold.
With a cry, I pulled my fist free.
The stone circle exploded outward, harmless sparks flying.
My arm trembled, black ash fluttering down.
Evie and Bella were at my side, steadying me as I opened my hand.
Inside?
A corroded metal ring.
The anchor.
The spell.
The lie.
Grandpa Al lifted his face, no longer howling, no longer fading.
He stared at me with something like awe.
“You did it,” he whispered.
And for once, the Chicky twins were speechless.
I exhaled, clutching the ring, surrounded by my Trifecta, my Shifter, and my gloriously deranged familiar.
“Let’s go home,” I said, uttering the first thing that popped into my mind.
But destiny wasn’t through with me yet.