Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
“Jesus H. Christ,” I swore. Well, kind of swore. A cuss if you’re a Christian, I suppose.
“No, I am not He, but you may address me as Rafe,” the pirate leered, his eyes drinking in my nakedness.
Rafe seemed short for a pirate, at least from what I could tell.
Things got a little blurry around the point where his legs should have been meeting the ground and weren’t.
He wore a pirate hat – no eye patch though – and a white shirt open to the waist. Dark flowing hair and a broadsword completed the picture, and Rafe tugged on his beard as his eyes flitted between the two of us.
“Luna, what the hell?” I whispered to Luna, moving closer to her.
“You broke the circle while I was invoking water. You can’t break the circle. Ever,” Luna hissed at me. “Now we’ve pulled this ‘Rafe’ from the water.”
“So send him back,” I hissed back.
“I can’t. You can only undo what’s been done at the precise time and moon phase. We need an entire month before the next almost-full moon cycle,” Luna said angrily.
“Get. Out.” My mouth hung open in shock.
“I will not ‘get out,’ not when I have two such beauties at my fingertips. Though I much prefer you, my curvy wench. A man likes to run his hands over a senorita’s soft curves when the nights are long.” Rafe winked at me and I shuddered.
“That’s it, clothes are going back on,” I said.
“Stop. I have to close the circle,” Luna ordered and I paused, waiting on her. My eyes followed Rafe as he floated around us, his delight in our naked bodies clear on his face.
“I give thanks, harm none on your way.” Luna put her hands down and stepped back from the circle, eyeing Rafe.
“That’s it?”
“I abbreviated. We have bigger problems. The circle is closed for all intents and purposes.”
“A witch!” Rafe hissed and floated around to stare down at Luna. She straightened her back and looked up at him. I moved to her side, ready to do battle but not sure how.
“I am, at that,” Luna said, never breaking eye contact with Rafe.
“In my day, you would have been burned,” Rafe observed.
“Then I guess it’s a good thing it isn’t ‘your day’ anymore,” Luna said. Her words were met with silence as Rafe considered her carefully.
“Fair enough, pretty witch. I will be watching you closely, though. Now, introduce me to your lovely companion.”
I groaned as Rafe winked and smiled at me.
“I am Luna, a white witch and one of great power,” Luna warned, before throwing me a glance. “And this is Althea, a great sorceress who can see the future.”
“A sorceress,” Rafe breathed, floating over to hover right in front me, his dark eyes searching mine.
“Bang,” I said, clapping my hands suddenly in front of his face.
“She-devil!” Rafe screamed and flitted across the beach.
Luna and I looked at each other and tried to contain our laughter. It was a wasted effort, though, and we were soon both doubled over, struggling for breath.
“God, Thea. Sometimes I just can’t with you,” Luna gasped.
“I’m sorry, I don’t know what is wrong with me,” I gasped back.
“You’re going to get us in real trouble one of these days,” Luna said, packing the candles and incense back into the velvet bag, since she was already bent over.
“Think he’s gone?”
“I most certainly am not, daft wenches,” Rafe said from across the beach, and I shook my head.
“So does he stay with us for the whole month or what?”
“I suspect he does.”
The thought of Rafe hanging out with me for a month instantly sobered me.
“You take him.”
“I will not. This is an excellent learning opportunity for you,” Luna sniffed, and turned to me.
The hair on the back of my neck stood on end and I grabbed Luna’s arm, yanking her to me.
“Don’t speak,” I ordered, closing my eyes and using my other senses to scan the beach.
A wave of malice rushed across the beach and hit me like a freight train, and I knew we had to get out of there. Something bad was about to go down.
“Run, now,” I said out of the corner of my mouth.
And so we ran, the evil wave pulsing at me as we scrambled and gasped our way down the lane, trying desperately to be quiet. I bit down on my lip as the gravel dug into my feet and belatedly realized that I’d forgotten my flip-flops on the beach.
“My shoes,” I whispered to Luna as we reached the car.
“Screw your shoes,” Luna said, and I had to agree. They were just flip-flops. The passenger door wasn’t even closed when Luna gunned the Bug down the lane, keeping the lights on her car off, bumping and careening recklessly around the curves.
“Was it a spirit?” Luna bit out, trying to focus on the road but desperately wanting to know what was going on.
“I don’t know. Evil, just pure evil washed over me. I don’t think it was a spirit but I just felt this impending evil.”
“To us? Or to someone else? Do we need to call the cops?”
I thought about it for a moment.
“I honestly don’t know. I don’t think so…”
The new sheriff in town was one I actually liked, unlike the last one who had tried to kill me.
You know, a minor detail. Chief Thomas had worked with the Coast Guard and was now getting his land legs beneath him as he took over patrolling Tequila Key.
Though he was a fair and equitable sheriff, I just didn’t know how to explain this one to him.
“Where are you taking me in this fine, strange chariot, ladies?”
Thank God Luna’s windows were closed and she’d put the top up, because our screams would have woken the entire neighborhood we were now slowly cruising through.
“Rafe! You cannot do that to us,” I exclaimed, turning my head to eye the pirate in the backseat.
“Do what? The witch told you I’d be around for a while. Well, here I am. Pretty lady,” Rafe said, reaching out to run his hand down the back of my neck. I felt a light shiver over my skin and the softest brush of a touch, almost like a kiss.
“Hands off, buddy. I’m spoken for,” I said hotly, craning my head away from him.
“We’ll just have to see about that, won’t we? I like taking things that aren’t mine.” Rafe looked at me, his smile wicked in his face.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I groaned, burying my head in my hands.
“Maybe we don’t drink and try to do spells,” Luna said, her saccharine voice grating at me.
“Damn it,” I said.
“Yeah, I can smell it on your breath,” Luna said.
“Thanks, Mom. Got it,” I grumbled. “Just get me home.”
Luna leveled her gaze in the rearview mirror.
“Rafe, if you step a foot out of line with Thea, I’m going to banish you to the darkest corner of hell,” Luna said, her bitch face in full effect.
“No need for such a threat – can a man not have a bit of fun?” Rafe protested.
“I mean it,” Luna said as she pulled to a stop in front of my house.
“Wait, you mean he’s coming with me? I thought you were just kidding,” I protested, my eyes darting between Rafe and Luna.
Luna shrugged, smoothing her unwrinkled white dress.
“There are some things I can’t control,” Luna said.
“But, I can’t have a ghost come live with me.” I glared at Luna.
“Then perhaps you shouldn’t have invited one in.”
Maybe she had a point, but it wasn’t like I’d directly asked for a ghost to come visit me. I wasn’t summoning anything. It had been purely an accident.
“We’re so fighting,” I grumbled, grabbing my purse.
“No we’re not. ‘Cause otherwise you won’t know how to send him back.” Luna blew me a kiss and I sighed, knowing she was right.
Luna’s always right. Though you won’t ever hear me admit that. Well, maybe once in a while. But we can’t have her getting a big head now, can we?
“Milady,” Rafe intoned, bending at the waist and gesturing towards my door.
I shook my head as I moved to the door, wondering just how I was going to put up with a lecherous pirate ghost for a month. “This is my life,” I said out loud.
“At least you have one,” Rafe quipped as I pushed the door open.
I couldn’t argue with that.