Chapter 13
Prim woke up alone in her bed for the second day in a row.
It was crazy how quickly she’d gotten used to having Dante in her home and how empty it felt without him.
She stared at the side of the bed she’d started to think of as his and sighed.
She missed his distinctly male scent. His morning kisses.
And the coffee he’d made while she was in the shower.
Groaning at herself for being pathetic, she climbed out of bed and got into the shower. Thirty minutes later, when she was taking her first sips of coffee, her phone chimed with a text from Dante. Dinner tonight?
She let out a little gasp of happiness. Sure. Where and when?
My place. Six p.m.
I’ll be there. Can I bring anything?
It took a minute, but he finally typed back. Just you and your gorgeous face.
Prim’s grin was so wide it made her cheeks ache a little. It seemed it was going to be a good morning after all.
"Ma’am, I told you that you’re in the way,” McKenna barked at one of the Tangled Up in a Spell customers.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” the older woman said, clutching numerous skeins of yarn to her chest. “I just need to get one more skein and—”
“You’ll need to come back later,” McKenna said. “We’re busy here.”
Prim’s nostrils flared. “It’s okay, Helena. I’ll get it for you.”
“What part of we need to start filming did you not understand?” McKenna demanded as she turned to Prim, piercing her with a stare.
Prim bit her tongue, trying to stay professional in front of her customer.
McKenna had told Prim the day before that they wouldn’t be filming until after she’d closed on Sunday afternoon.
But then she’d unilaterally changed the schedule to start filming an hour after she opened at noon and hadn’t even informed Prim until five minutes ago when they’d started bringing in the stage lighting.
The customer had been in the store for a good forty-five minutes, deciding on the colors for her next project.
Prim wasn’t going to kick her out before she was done.
“We’ll be out of your way in just a moment,” Prim said, grabbing the final skein and then taking the yarn from Helena and leading her to the register.
“I’m so sorry, Prim,” Helena whispered as Prim bagged the yarn. “I didn’t realize I was in the way.”
“You were fine,” Prim assured her and had the urge to hit McKenna with a nose wart.
Helena was one of her sweetest customers who came in the store at least once a week, purchasing yarn for her next knitting project.
She was one of the clients that kept her in business.
“The filming crew just had to rearrange their schedule today, and everyone is a little stressed. It will be all right.”
“No, it’s not all right, Prim Easton,” McKenna corrected her.
“I need this space, and since you signed a contract with the studio, I’m entitled to it whenever I need it over the next two months.
You should have closed the store down when I informed you we needed it today.
This better not happen again. Understood? ”
“Maybe I should just come back later,” Helena said and then turned for the door.
“Wait!” Prim reached out for the woman, but she was already shuffling out the door.
Prim turned to glare at McKenna. “Can you keep your barking to a minimum when my customers are here?”
“If you’ll stick to your end of the bargain, I won’t have to bark.” McKenna turned away and headed toward the back of the store.
“Wow. Someone is a little high strung,” a soft female voice said.
Prim spun and spotted Lynn, the pretty redhead who’d been in a few days earlier to purchase a bunch of plants for her herb garden. “Oh, gosh. I’m so sorry about that. Tensions are a little high here today.”
“No need to apologize,” the woman said. “I just stopped by to see if you had any lavender bundles. I wanted to make a healing potion, but I don’t want to decimate my plant for it.”
“Oh, sure. Let me grab them.” Prim slipped from behind the counter just as McKenna turned to glare at her and the customer.
Magic crackled over Prim’s fingertips as her anger spiked so hard that she nearly choked on her own spit.
Curling her hands into fists, Prim took a deep breath, steadying herself.
She focused on her dinner plans with Dante later that night and how he always made her feel safe when they were together.
Immediately, the magic faded, and she mentally congratulated herself for not hexing the producer.
She grabbed a couple of lavender bundles and was just about to turn around when she heard a loud crack, and something crashed to the floor.
A shriek echoed off the walls as someone else let out an audible gasp.
“Holy hell!” one of the assistants shouted. “McKenna! You almost died!”
Prim ran flat out over to McKenna and came to a skidding stop when she spotted one of the overhead store lights had crashed to the floor right next to the producer.
Glass had shattered and was scattered over the carpet while ripped electrical wires hung from the ceiling.
“Oh, no. Oh, no. Oh, no,” Prim muttered as she glanced around, terrified that she might have caused the destruction.
But she’d had her magic under control, hadn’t she?
What if she hadn’t?
Tears pricked the backs of her eyes, but she quickly blinked them away. This was not the time to break down.
“It’s all right everyone,” Prim called, trying to take control of the situation. “We’ll just get this cleaned up and—”
Electrical sparks lit up the ceiling where the wires were hanging, sending off a second round of shrieks.
“Turn the power off!” someone called.
Prim went on autopilot as she went in search of the breaker box in the back room. It took her a moment to move a few boxes before she could yank it open, and when she did, she nearly cried. None of the breakers were labeled. Immediately she started flipping them all, leaving everyone in the dark.
“This is completely unacceptable!” McKenna cried from the other room.
Prim ran back in. “I’m so sorry! I’ll get someone here right away to get this fixed. I honestly have no idea—”
“You have five minutes to get this fixed and the lights back on, or you’ll be in breach of contract.
You’ll be lucky to ever see a dime out of the studio.
As for this”—she pointed to the broken light fixture at her feet—“I should be suing you and the owner of this shop for emotional distress. If I find even one small tear in my clothes, or have even one tiny nick from the glass shards, I’ll—”
Yarn balls that were in a basket right next to McKenna flew up into the air. One of them lodged itself right into her mouth, effectively muzzling her.
McKenna clawed at the yarn ball as she desperately tried to pull the wool from her mouth, but it appeared to be stuck. She tried screaming around it as her eyes shot daggers at Prim.
Standing stock-still in shock, Prim stared at the woman in complete horror.
What was going on? Who was causing this?
Because the only thing Prim knew for sure was that it wasn’t her.
She’d have felt it, and there was nothing sparking in her veins.
Prim spun around, scanning the shop, but it was too dark to see anything useful.
All she saw was the whites of the eyes of the film crew, all staring back at her.
Prim jumped into action, running behind McKenna and wrapping her arms around her waist. With one hard thrust, she tugged her hands back, performing the Heimlich maneuver.
Nothing happened other than a grunt from McKenna.
Prim tried again, this time imagining the yarn ball flying out of McKenna’s mouth, and when she yanked back, the ball flew across the room and thumped against the glass of the front window.
McKenna bent over and hacked for what seemed like forever, while Prim rubbed her back, trying to make soothing noises. When the producer finally stood, she turned on Prim and in a low, menacing voice, said, “Get the hell away from me.”
“I was—” Prim started.
“Trying to kill her!” one of the assistants cried.
“Schlong Pox Girl strikes again!” the other one called.
There was complete silence as everyone took in that accusation. Prim opened her mouth to defend herself, but to her complete horror, before she could get any words out the rest of the crew all started chanting, “Schlong Pox Girl! Schlong Pox Girl!”
Prim ran outside, unable to breathe. How had they known about that?
She shook her head violently. How could they not have known about that?
Probably someone at the inn had gossiped about her when they found out the crew would be filming at the yarn shop.
That didn’t matter anyway. What mattered was that she needed to get back in there and do damage control.
But first she needed an electrician. Stat. She reached for her phone that she usually kept in her back pocket but came up empty. Dammit. She must have left it at the checkout counter.
With her head held high, she went back into the shop, ignored the renewed chanting, and searched for her phone.
After a few minutes, it was clear she wasn’t going to find it.
Without saying a word, she walked out of the shop, went down the street, and walked into Brooms that Vroom.
The moment she saw her sister Indigo, she burst into tears.
“What happened?” Indigo asked as she rushed over. “Is someone hurt?”
Prim shook her head. “No. I don’t think so, anyway.”
Her older sister guided her into the storage room and waved at a chair, but Prim didn’t take it. Instead, she swallowed her tears and said, “I need an electrician immediately. Do you know of someone?”
“I’m sure we have a contact somewhere.” Indigo pushed her raven hair back and started tapping the keys on her computer. “What do you need them for?”
Prim quickly explained the light fixture coming down and the sparks, but she left out the part where the production team decided to blame her. It was embarrassing enough; she didn’t need to humiliate herself further.