Chapter Four
Chapter
Four
There’s no way I heard Elle right the first time. Her forearms must have distracted me.
I blink up at the pair of them. “You want me to what?”
Elle’s posture stiffens, knuckles turning white as she grips her hips. “We need you to bring ghosts to the building. Polite, sociable ones, obviously. We’re going to run an authentically haunted bed-and-breakfast.”
“You can’t be serious.” I shift my attention to Xander. “Please tell me you’re kidding.”
Xander shrugs. “Nope. Louie’s adamant. So are the investors.”
“It’ll set us apart from all the competition in the travel space. With Airbnb and Vrbo and all the other rental options these days, we need a unique hook. There isn’t anything like this in a three-state radius.” Elle studies me, a hint of challenge in the tip of her chin. “So, can you do it?”
I shove down the prickle of curiosity building at the back of my head.
Toying with unknown forms of magic has gotten me in trouble more than once.
Ignoring Elle’s question, I climb the steps, grab Xander by the arm, and drag him inside.
“Have you lost your mind? You can’t seriously think haunting your own business is a good idea. ”
“She ran the numbers, Pip. The marketing plan seems sound.”
“The marketing plan is sound.” Elle follows us inside and closes the door against the autumn chill. “And we’ll obviously put safety measures in place to protect our guests. All we need you to do is bring the ghosts here.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Alex said you were good at your job.” Elle crosses her arms, the movement flexing the muscles in her shoulders and biceps. My stomach dips with desire despite the frustration building in my chest. “He said you were the most creative witch he’d ever met.”
“I am.”
“But you can’t figure out how to attract a few ghosts to our location?”
The mere suggestion has my brain spinning with possibilities, combinations of sigils popping into my brain, but that isn’t the point. “It’s not whether I could figure it out. It’s whether I should.”
“Are you misquoting Jurassic Park at me?” Elle raises one eyebrow, and the expression is so similar to Xander’s it widens the chasm in my chest. Is that something she picked up from him during their lifetime of friendship?
“Not intentionally,” I snap. Every word out of her mouth makes my skin burn with irritation. “But my point stands. I won’t prevent souls from moving on so you can turn a profit.” I glance at Xander. “No offense.”
He shrugs, like the increasingly heated argument between Elle and me doesn’t bother him in the slightest. Like he knew this might happen.
“Offense very much taken,” Elle cuts in.
I bite back several inappropriate retorts. In my head, I imagine Deanna talking me down. Telling me to salvage this and turn it into a paying gig. I take a deep breath and reach for the magic always waiting for my call. It washes through me, soothing the sharpest corners of my emotions.
“Look, there are safer ways to provide a haunted house experience. I can enchant different objects in each room to give the same effect. Mundanes won’t know the difference.”
“Who says witches won’t want to stay here?” Elle asks, hands braced on her hips again as she scowls.
“Witches are five percent of the population, at most. I doubt they’ll make up that much of your business.” I press my palms tight against my outer thighs in an attempt to stay calm. It…doesn’t help. “If witches want to see ghosts, we can do that without wasting money to stay at some B&B.”
“Hey now!” Xander protests, but before I can apologize, Elle cuts in.
“Forget the demographics.” Stubbornness rolls off Elle in waves. That single line in her brow deepens, and the corners of her lips tip down. “The whole point is that the haunting is authentic. I refuse to sell a cheap gimmick.”
“Oh, my enchantments aren’t cheap.”
“If you can’t do this, Ms. Ainsley, we’ll find someone else.” Elle flicks her wrist toward my bag, where it sits on the floor by the stairs. “Don’t forget your…knickknacks.”
God, the nerve of this woman. “There’s not a single witch on the East Coast reckless enough to do something like this.
But go ahead. Waste your time looking.” I grab my bag, swing it over my shoulder, and storm toward the door.
I turn back at the last second to address Xander.
“Call me when you talk some sense into her. I can work up a proposal for assorted enchantments that will more than do the job.” I reach for the door handle. “Don’t be a stranger, Xan.”
He cracks a smile. “I’ll call you later.”
I spare one final glance for Eloise Thompson, who’s staring at me like she wants to commit murder and trap my ghost on the property, before yanking open the heavy door and leaving them both behind.
By Monday morning, Xander still hasn’t called.
He texted Saturday to make sure I got home okay and apologized for ambushing me with the request.
Lou really wanted to be the one to pitch it.
It was her idea. The investors love it.
Spirits were people once. I love you, but I won’t force them to work with you.
?
I tried to let it go. Tried not to think too much about any of it.
I hate knowing that Xander is disappointed.
Hate how attractive I thought his best friend was before I knew their connection.
Hate that she’s still—technically—hot as hell, even though her personality is grating and her business ideas are borderline unethical.
I spent Sunday alternating between reading the latest Jennifer Dugan romance novel and tinkering with the creativity spell that I’ve been trying to crack for ages.
If I can get it right, it would help clients tap into their most creative selves, help them design their next architectural masterpiece, come up with a perfect-for-them novel idea, or whip up a new recipe that feels like home.
It would open a whole new line of potential clients for the business. I’m not sure it’ll replace the connections we’ve lost within the real estate market, but it’s certainly a start.
Monday morning, Deanna beats me to the office.
The bells above the door chime when I come in, the musical notes humming in the air around me.
Every inch of this office is spelled in one way or another.
The bells are designed to help clients feel safe and comfortable in the space.
The enchantment doesn’t interfere with their free will—nothing I do violates a person’s autonomy.
Instead, the sound’s frequency simply eases any nerves and helps them feel grounded.
It’s the exact kind of nontraditional magic my parents hate.
When witches first came out of the broom closet in the middle of the nineteenth century, taking advantage of the growing acceptance of the Spiritualism movement among mundanes, those old-timey witches wanted to ensure the general public wouldn’t fear—and therefore wouldn’t persecute—them.
So they focused exclusively on the benefits healing magic could have for mundanes.
As a result, traditionalists like my parents uphold healing magic as the only honorable use of our power. Anything else is frivolous at best and a potential threat to our continued acceptance at worst.
Unfortunately, healing is the only magic I’m completely inept at performing. My parents—and the constant ache in my back—are both disappointed by that.
“Morning, boss.” Deanna’s voice cuts into my thoughts as she steps into the reception area holding a coffee mug covered in Pride-flag-themed gaming dice. “How was the trip out to Oak Spires?” When I groan, she raises a single eyebrow. “What happened? Was there an active portal there or something?”
“No, it’s not that. The work itself was easy.” I drop my bag in my office and return to Deanna, who’s taken a seat at her desk. “There were only a few leftover energy trails. Nothing major.”
“Then why the face?”
“Xander’s best friend is his business partner.”
Deanna studies me over a sip of her coffee. “We already knew that.”
“Yeah, well, Louie, turns out, is actually a woman named Elle.”
“And?” God, there are so many ways I could end that sentence.
And I spent the first twenty minutes touring the house distracted by her muscular shoulders and forearms. And her smile felt like staring at the sun. And I wondered—for a fraction of a second before I got ahold of myself—what her hair would feel like wrapped around my fingers.
And I feel like I’m being replaced, even though I know that’s ridiculous.
“She didn’t want me to clear the house of ghosts,” I say at last, landing on the true root of the problem. Or, at least, the part that isn’t painfully embarrassing. “She wanted me to haunt it.”
“Huh.” Dea makes a noncommittal sound in the back of her throat before setting the coffee on her desk. She wakes up the computer, her attention fixed on the screen, fingers flying across the keyboard.
I wait, silent seconds ticking by until impatience gets the better of me. “That’s all you have to say? Did you hear me? She wants me to fill their business with restless spirits.”
Dea doesn’t look up from the computer screen. “Did she specifically request restless ones?”
“Well…no.” I sink into the chair opposite her. “But it’s not a good idea to have any ghosts wandering around a business like that.”
“Why not?”
“Because!” I find myself sputtering indignantly, which is not how I thought this conversation would go.
“There are so many reasons! The liability of it all, for one thing. I don’t think our insurance would cover us if instead of clearing houses I haunted one.
What if someone got possessed? What if a ghost knocks shit off a shelf and injures a guest?
Plus, there’s the whole consent piece. I can’t force someone to work without pay—even if they’re dead. ”
“Huh,” she says again, giving me nothing to go on.
“Come on, Dea. You know I’m right. You only managed to live with a ghost for two weeks before Xander had me get rid of her for you.”