1. Distraction #2
Hanging out with Honey has perks. Her mate is the top wolf in Moonburrow, but her shop is a nexus for every gossip in town.
I don’t have to venture off Main Street to know what’s going on.
Heck, half the time Roxy slips in through the back, helps herself to the pastries in Honey’s case, and tells us what she heard from her ‘birdies’.
But while I enjoy spending time in the bakery—and I’m happy to taste-test Honey’s magic-free treats—I don’t want Honey to think that she has to entertain me.
She’s already letting me stay in the attached apartment so I see her daily, but when I feel like I’m being too much, I take a drive around town in the silver car that I still haven’t returned.
Today, I’ve taken a ride over to the library. I enjoy how quiet it is, how peaceful, and even if it isn’t as large as the coven library back in Salem, it has more than enough books for me to find something to read.
It’s even more quiet than usual when I walk inside. Though it isn’t considered a hotspot for the small supernatural town, there are usually a few readers browsing the stacks. Not right now. In fact, I don’t see anyone at all at first. No readers. No staff, either.
A shiver runs down my spine as my anxiety kicks up to eleven. Is it closed? Did I miss a sign on the door that says they’re not open currently? I mean, the door was unlocked… but was that a mistake? Am I supposed to go—
“Penelope,” calls a male voice out to me warmly. “It’s so good to see you.”
Turning to greet him, I’m stunned enough that I can’t help but think: wish I could say the same.
The first time I met Ashton Morgan, I couldn’t see him.
I sensed he was there, and I caught a hint of black shadow surrounding the space where Roxy told me he was.
I knew instantly that he wasn’t cursed; otherwise the black shadow would’ve been neon green.
That he was trying to materialize and couldn’t…
odds were that he wasn’t a ghost, either.
I was right. Roxy brought me the compact when I mentioned I needed a magnifying glass to check out his ‘dead’ body.
I recognized it as Morrigaine’s mirror, but while one side of the compact is intended to help amplify a witch’s magic, the other side—which is supposed to help cast the most powerful spells with ease—did act like a magnifying glass.
That’s how I found the pinprick hole on the bottom of Ash’s blackened heel.
Performing a little surgery, I removed the silver needle, and Ash’s soul hopped right back into his body.
At that point, he’d been ‘dead’ for more than a week, sleeping in the bed in Roxy’s guest room almost that long, and he kind of looked it.
Surprisingly, poor Ash looks even worse now than he did then.
The opossum shifter usually has a very preppy, clean-cut style to him. His white-blond hair is always styled, his clothes neat, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him with so much as a wrinkle in one of his preferred button-down shirts.
Today, his hair is sticking up in the back. His sleeves are rolled unevenly to his elbows, his collar is open, and there’s a faint smudge of something along one cheek.
I’m instantly reminded of how the first thing that happened when Ash came back to life was that he recognized Roxy as his fated mate.
The next time I saw her—after Riordan locked me in the holding cell and I finally found my voice in order to plead with Max that I needed to talk to Roxy—she was already his bonded mate.
Considering I know both of them well enough by now, I take one look at the way his white-blond hair is sticking up on end and ask, “Is Roxy around?”
“Roxy?” His purple eyes dart over to the entrance like she might appear if he says her name loudly enough.
“No. She had a couple of customers coming to visit the shop, then she was planning on checking out the dumpster on the south side of town. I haven’t seen her since I left for work this morning. ”
Oh. I would’ve guessed that she stopped by for a quickie with her mate, leaving her mark so that everyone in Moonburrow knows that the gentle opossum shifter is off-limits.
“Then what’s up with…” I gesture at his disheveled appearance. “Is everything alright?”
For a moment, Ash looks confused. Then he lifts his hand, trying to tame his spiky hair. “Oh. This. This is what happens when you get a sudden promotion to head librarian because there’s no one else who works here.”
I blink. “What happened to the rest of the staff?”
“I wish I could tell you. I’ve been here for two months and the only one I ever saw working here was Garnet.
The former head librarian,” he explains, though there’s no need.
I met Garnet Brooks shortly after I first arrived in Moonburrow.
She ran the Moonburrow Library, but as a witch with seniority, she was also in charge of the local coven’s meager archives. “Now that she’s gone, it’s just me.”
“Garnet is gone?”
That’s news to me. And while it’s true that I’ve purposely kept my distance from the coven after what happened with Olivia, between Roxy and Honey, I’m tapped into the gossip scene in town. I hear everything about the witches that they already heard and neither one mentioned Garnet leaving.
Ash nods as he goes behind the circulation desk.
He moves to the computer, clicking at the mouse for a moment before he shrugs.
“She left a note on the counter for me, congratulating me on taking over the library for her. Since I was the only other one on staff, she seems to think I’ll do the job now that she’s gone. ”
I guess that makes sense. From what Roxy said, Ash went to school to be a librarian.
I didn’t even know that was a thing, but it was his life’s goal to run his own library.
He probably expected to have a staff when he got that opportunity, but while he seems a little frantic, there’s something about him that says he’s up for the challenge.
“That’s kind of sudden, don’t you think? Not you getting the job or anything, but Garnet leaving. I hope nothing bad happened to her.”
Considering my experiences with some of the Moonburrow witches—including how Olivia tried to convince me to steal the compact and give it to her before she retaliated for me refusing by framing me for her fake death—I wouldn’t be surprised if the mean witches were the reason why she gave up her position at the library.
Ash drops beneath the counter. When he pops up again, he’s holding a stack of four books.
“I got worried so I placed a call to the coven house. Garnet gave me the number in case of emergencies when I first started working here. I spoke to the head witch herself. Delilah said that Garnet’s been planning on relocating to another coven for a while now.
A spot opened where she could take over their spell archives and she took it.
It was last minute, though, which is why she left the note, but I get it.
All Garnet ever talked about was reading up on ancient spells and lost artifacts that would help all of supe-kind. ”
That sounds like Garnet. I’ve spoken to her a handful of times when I came to borrow a book or two from the library.
She was one of the witches—like Delilah—who were effusive in their apologies after a handful of their sister witches made my life difficult shortly after I arrived in Moonburrow.
She was a sweet witch and a total bookworm, obsessed with the history of witchery.
I can totally see her jumping at the chance to work at a coven library instead of one that’s open to all supernaturals.
No wonder Ash is a little frazzled. He’s probably trying to do everything at once while trying to run the library.
I give him a smile. “Does Roxy know she’s mated to the head librarian now?”
Ash’s face cracks with his own grin. Sure, he’s frazzled, but he’s proud, too.
“I called her first thing when I saw the note. Told her about Garnet and my promotion.” A soft chuckle.
“She asked if that means she can waive her own late fees. As if she wouldn’t have just kept any book that caught her eye anyway. ”
I’ve been to Roxy’s antique shop multiple times. She has some impressive tomes on her shelves. Something tells me that she already has done that.
While Ash comes around the side of the circulation desk, obviously intent on putting the four backs in his hands away, I tuck a lock of hair behind my ear. “I understand that you’re the only one working here. Is the library still open, or…”
“No. We’re open. It’s just kind of dead today.” He glances my way, suddenly remembering who is talking to. “Dead, but I doubt we have any ghosts haunting the stacks. Though, if we do, make sure to say ‘hi’ to them while you’re out there browsing them.”
“Will do, Ash.”