Chapter Eight-Evie
The Day After Everything Changed
I leaned in closer to the mirror, one hand braced on the sink while the other gingerly peeled back my eyelid.
“Oh, holy shitballs,” I groaned.
It was worse than I thought. I looked like I’d gone ten rounds with a peppermint stick-wielding raccoon and lost.
My left eye was an angry, puffy red, and my lashes were clumped together like they'd been dipped in mucus and shame.
“I told you it was bad,” Donny said, still dramatically gasping like she wasn’t the one who once set her own eyebrows on fire trying to enchant a curling iron.
“You should glam it,” Maribella suggested helpfully, coming up behind me and placing a soothing hand on my shoulder.
“Just a little glamour. No one has to know your optic nerve had a spa day with Listerine.”
“Can’t,” I moaned, pushing a clump of soggy hair behind my ear. “Glamours don’t work right when the sight’s acting up. I’ll end up looking like a pirate with a lazy eye. Or worse, I’ll look like I went three rounds with Dick Daniels.”
Both women gasped.
“You take that back,” Donny snapped, clutching her chest like I’d personally insulted her houseplants.
“You’re right,” I said, rinsing my face again and patting it dry with the nearest towel. “That was uncalled for. I apologize to your houseplants. And to pirates.”
Donatella grumbled under her breath, then flopped dramatically onto my couch like a fainting Victorian duchess.
“We need to talk about the Shifters, Evie.”
“Oh, don’t you think I know that?” I groaned. “I spent the whole night dreaming about that smug, muscled menace licking brownie batter off my—”
“Too much info!” Maribella sang, slapping her hands over her ears. “Seriously, I will never look at brownies the same way again.”
Donny sat up. “You’re not denying it, though.”
“Denying what?”
“That you felt the pull.”
I bit my lip.
“Of course I felt the pull. You could power the whole damn Eastern Seaboard with that level of chemistry. But that doesn’t mean I’m ready to hop aboard the mating train and ride it to O-Town.”
“Well, maybe it’s not about you being ready,” Maribella said gently, her eyes suspiciously soft. “Maybe it’s about fate being ready.”
“Oh, gag me with a spork,” I muttered, crossing my arms. “Don’t get all poetic on me. You know I can’t handle that before coffee.”
“Speaking of,” Donny stood and headed for the kitchen. “I’m making a pot. You look like death and sound like denial.”
“Thank you, always such a ray of fucking sunshine.”
While she clattered around with my kettle like she owned the place—which, to be fair, she kind of did half the time—I sank into the nearest armchair and pulled a throw pillow onto my lap like it could shield me from the clusterfuck of my life.
I had way too much shit to deal with as it was. My to-do list for the day was making me twitch.
I had:
1. One angry principal and a horde of panicked parents blowing up my inbox.
2. A town paper claiming I was leading full moon orgies in the forest.
3. Three sexy-as-sin Shifters stranded on my turf.
4. A very strong suspicion I’d been singled out by one of them without so much as a how-do-you-do.
5. A literal pink eye from hell.
And it was only 7:17 AM.
I needed a plan.
A solid, responsible, definitely-not-panty-melting plan.
Something mayoral. Something mature.
“So what’s the move?” Donny asked, dropping a mug of hot coffee into my hands like a lifeline.
I took a sip. “First, I fix my eye.”
“Then?”
“Then I handle the cemetery situation and tell the Shifters to keep their ridiculously hot, magical, possibly mate-claiming selves far, far away from the Trifecta.”
Maribella raised a skeptical brow.
“You gonna say all that to his face?”
I paused, thinking about silver eyes, molasses drawls, and the way his biceps flexed when he crossed his arms.
“No,” I admitted. “I’m gonna send an email.”
Donny snorted so hard she nearly spit her coffee.
“Coward,” she said fondly.
“Realist,” I countered. “Besides, I’ve got a town to run. And there’s no way some sinfully handsome Wolf Shifter is gonna derail that.”
At that exact moment, my phone pinged with a text. I glanced at the screen.
Jaxson “Hottie” Reid
Morning, Darlin’. You dream about me? I sure as hell dreamed about you. How about you come on over for a little breakfast?
My stomach flipped.
My eye twitched.
And somewhere, deep down in my soul, my magic whispered.
Evelyn Castor, you’re so screwed.
I turned my cell phone upside down and pushed all thoughts of his furry hotness out of my head.
Then, I closed my eyes and focused on a healing spell.
Or, well, I tried.
“Evie! No!”
I stopped mid-chant and grabbed the compact Bella was holding to look at myself.
“Holy Befana! Oh, my Gaia!” I spat, staring at my reflection in abject horror.
I’d invoked both the ancestral Witches of my foremothers, La Befana, and Gaia herself.
The myth of my family’s Old World Village Witch was still talked about even in mortal circles as the Witch who gifted good children with presents during the holidays.
Of course, the Befana I knew was hundreds of years old and gorgeous as ever, think an eternal Sophia Loren.
These days, she lived in a multimillion-dollar brownstone in Little Italy and was in charge of all magical beings in the Northeast under the Morrigan herself.
Among her several holdings was one of the world’s largest Italian pastry franchises.
Mama B’s Pasticceria.
Her cannolis were fucking fabulous.
Still, she wouldn’t catch wind of the profanity spoken in her name.
Gaia, however, was another story.
But who could blame me for cursing, possibly pissing off the great benevolent Gaia herself?
I looked like a traffic accident.
Did I mention she was perfect in all ways?
I peeked up at the ceiling and window and noted no storm clouds.
Hopefully, she missed my little faux pas and had no plans to zap my ass.
Mouthwash in the eye was enough of a physical trial for one morning.
“Dammit, Donny, I’m late as it is, just fix it already,” I grumbled.
“Fifteen minutes,” Donny announced like she was a Fairy Godmother on a deadline. “That’s all you get. I have a hair appointment with Emily at noon and a vendetta against my nosy neighbor, Mr. Adams, that won’t plot itself.”
I grumbled something unintelligible as she waved her hands over me, muttering a glamor incantation that sounded suspiciously like it included the words for the love of all things holy, get it together, Evie.
The pink eye disappeared in a shimmery flash of gold, and then—because Donny was a perfectionist—my hair sprang into fat, shiny waves that bounced like I’d just walked off a Pantene commercial.
“Don’t say I never do anything for you,” she said smugly, tossing a brush into her purse like a mic drop.
“You’re a goddess. A terrifying, foul-mouthed, miracle-working goddess.”
“Damn straight.”
I kissed her cheek and bolted, leaving her to terrorize my kitchen cabinets for something sweet.
That woman had a sixth sense for hidden cookies.
Outside, the summer air was warm and thick with the scent of honeysuckle, and birds chirped like they weren’t living in a town full of magical chaos.
I tugged my sunglasses over my newly fixed eye and adjusted the strap on my oversized purse.
Then I started walking.
To the cemetery.
Because that was the totally normal, definitely-not-spooky destination of choice for any small-town mayor with a haunted inbox and a libido in full rebellion over a sexy Wolf Shifter.
Seriously, if someone had told twelve-year-old me that adulthood meant haunted clock towers, horny Wolves, and municipal scandals involving off-kilter hydrants, I’d have packed my bags and applied for Fairy Godmother school.
But no, here I was.
Mayor Evelyn Castor, trying to solve supernatural mysteries with a half-melted protein bar in my bag, zero backup, and the lingering memory of a Southern drawl that made my ovaries chant like Gregorian monks.
Miss Spritely’s complaint had been pretty straightforward—kids were showing up late to school, dragging their feet, and looking pale.
But no one was sick.
No buses were late.
No magical curses detected.
Just kids stalling out near the cemetery. Which, by the way, had been quiet for decades.
Until now.
And the phrase junkless wonder? Still a mystery.
I picked up the pace and tried to shake off the creep factor.
This was Castor’s Corner. Weird was the status quo.
I mean, we already had a slew of madness I could barely keep straight—and I was mayor!
For example, Castor’s Corner was renowned for having:
A sentient apple tree that only produced fruit if you complimented it first.
A ghost who haunted the DMV and could only be appeased with glitter pens.
And a recurring magical event every decade where the entire town relived the same exact day for seven straight days. We just called it Déjà Voodoo Week.
Honestly, this town was exhausting.
But it was mine.
And if there was something going down in the cemetery—another prank, a ghost, or, Gaia forbid, some cursed crypt creature trolling for juvie souls—I’d deal with it.
I just hoped it didn’t involve more naked rituals or encounters with panty-melting Shifters.
Because I was fresh out of clean underwear, and emotionally?
Let’s just say I was one more sexily drawled Darlin’ away from hurling myself into a salt circle and calling it a day.
With that incredibly comforting thought in mind, I reached the cemetery gates.
They creaked open all by themselves.
Of course they did.
“Castor’s Corner,” I muttered to myself, stepping through. “Where the weird never sleeps, and neither do I.”