Life's a Witch (2 page)

I scowled, frustrated. She had a point. I didn’t want to encourage her, though. “Is there a reason you couldn’t have packed this wine in three separate boxes? I would rather make three trips with lighter loads than one trip with a box that makes me think my back is about to go out.”

Aunt Tillie shot me one of her patented “I’m going to curse you if you don’t shut up” looks. “Why are you still talking?”

“I honestly have no idea,” I muttered, groaning as I strained to lift the box again. It was too heavy. There was no getting around it. I wasn’t strong enough to move the box from the foyer of The Overlook, the inn my mothers and aunts run, to Aunt Tillie’s truck in the driveway. I’m aware of my limitations and I’m not afraid to admit them. “We need help to do this,” I said finally, straightening so I could brush the sweat from my forehead.

Summers in Michigan vacillate wildly. One day can be seventy degrees and beautiful. The next can be ninety and so humid you feel as if you’re roasting in an oven. Today was an example of the latter.

My name is Bay Winchester and I’m a witch. No, you read that right. I can talk with ghosts and cast spells. The only things I can’t do are control my great-aunt and the weather. She can control the weather. I’m not powerful enough. I would take control over one of those things in a heartbeat right now. I’ll let you guess which one.

“You’re starting to tick me off,” Aunt Tillie said, wagging a finger in my face. “You’re young. You should be strong. Now … suck it up and lift with your legs. You’re really starting to bug me.”

“Aunt Tillie, it’s too heavy,” I whined. “I physically cannot do what you’re asking me to do. I’m sorry.”

“Fine,” Aunt Tillie sputtered. “Where are your cousins?”

That was a good question. It was Thursday night and Thistle and Clove were supposed to be here an hour ago. Unlike me, they must have realized Aunt Tillie had chores in store for everyone. I either missed that realization – or they purposely didn’t tell me what they suspected because they wanted me to do all of the heavy lifting. I leaned toward the latter.

“I don’t know where they’re at,” I replied. “We have a big group of tourists in town for the summer festival. Maybe they got a last-minute rush at the store.”

As co-owners of Hypnotic, Hemlock Cove’s magic store, my cousins often managed to use their business as an excuse to dodge Aunt Tillie duty. Because I’m the editor of the town’s weekly newspaper, I don’t have that crutch to lean on. Everyone knows my schedule. It’s a real drag sometimes.

“They’re hiding,” Aunt Tillie muttered. “I told them I needed their help and they’re hiding. I’ll curse their bottoms blue.”

I pursed my lips to keep from laughing. I had no idea whether that was possible – although she’d managed to pull off some truly inventive curses in her time. I was just glad I was putting out observable effort so I would hopefully be free from this week’s curse. “Can’t you curse them to make them appear and help? We need to get this box in your truck before Landon gets here. If he sees what we’re doing … .”

“If who sees what you’re doing?”

I froze when I heard the new voice, swiveling quickly to find my boyfriend, Landon Michaels, surveying us from across the room. He had a cookie in his hand, which meant he’d entered the inn through the back door and ran into my mother and aunts in the kitchen.

“Hi,” I said, pasting a bright smile on my face. “You’re early.”

“Uh-huh.” Landon’s gaze bounced between Aunt Tillie and me. As an FBI agent, he is trained to know when people are lying. I’m a horrible liar anyway. If I were ever held and interrogated I would give up everything and everyone in the first hour. What? I’m not good under pressure.

“I think he came early because he missed you,” Aunt Tillie said, opting to take over the conversation in her own way. “He gets little hearts in his eyes when he looks at you.”

“I did miss her,” Landon agreed.

His office was in Traverse City, so he spent at least three nights a week away from me. It’s frustrating, but we’re dealing with it. Any case that takes him close to Hemlock Cove – which is more than an hour from Traverse City in northern Lower Michigan – he gladly takes so he can spend the night with me at the guesthouse Clove, Thistle and I share. It’s on our family’s property but still far enough away to offer privacy. Okay, sometimes we have privacy. More often than not the older women in our family simply barge in whenever they see fit.

“I told you,” Aunt Tillie said. “Your love muffin can’t stand to be away from you.”

“I don’t think he likes it when you call him that,” I suggested.

Aunt Tillie shrugged, beyond caring. “He’ll get over it. Now … come on. Move that box out to my truck.”

I glanced at the box again, frustrated. I bent over to pick it up but Landon nudged me away with his knee.

“What’s in the box?” Landon asked.

“It’s private,” Aunt Tillie replied, narrowing her eyes as he moved closer to it. “You stay out of there, Fed. You need a search warrant to go through my private things, and even then I’ll curse you with ants in your pants if you try to touch my stuff.”

“Ants in my pants?”

“That’s what I said,” Aunt Tillie sniffed. “I’ll make them those red ones that sting. I don’t think you want stinging insects around your manhood.”

Landon snorted. I can never tell how he’ll react to Aunt Tillie and her threats. Sometimes he finds her funny. Other times he wants to throttle her. His face was unreadable now.

“Tell me what’s in the box and maybe I’ll lift it for you,” Landon suggested.

“It’s private,” Aunt Tillie shot back. She knew darned well Landon wouldn’t agree to help if he knew the contents. “It’s woman stuff.”

“Woman stuff?”

“You know … tampons and pads and stuff,” Aunt Tillie said, warming to her lie. “I need an industrial supply because I have estrogen issues.”

As far as lies go, it wasn’t Aunt Tillie’s finest effort. She labored under the delusion that all men feared a woman’s monthly cycle and you could terrify them with discussions about periods and cramps. Of course, with Aunt Tillie in her eighties the threat didn’t hold a lot of weight in this particular scenario.

Landon wasn’t about to be dissuaded by a bad lie. “Are you seriously trying to tell me that this box is full of tampons and that’s why Bay can’t lift it?”

“She’s a weakling. What can I say?”

Landon scowled and turned to me. “Do you want to tell me anything?”

He knew I was in a bad spot. I had promised to tell him the truth … even when it hurt. He was aware of our witchy ways and accepted them. He was aware of Aunt Tillie’s penchant for breaking the law and, well, “accepted them” isn’t the correct way to put it. Still, he takes her antics in stride most of the time. The problem was that Aunt Tillie was downright nasty and vindictive when put on the hot seat.

“You’re very handsome and I love you,” I offered, hoping my smile would be enough to distract him.

“You’re cute,” Landon said. “I love you, too. I still want to know what’s in this box.”

Crap! “It’s … .”

“I already told you it’s tampons,” Aunt Tillie said, cutting me off. “Why do you always have to stick your nose in stuff that’s none of your concern?”

“Because you keep doing illegal things,” Landon shot back, nonplussed. “I know there aren’t tampons in there. I also know you only said that because you think I’m afraid of tampons. Here’s a tip: Only boys under the age of twenty are afraid of tampons.”

Aunt Tillie wrinkled her nose, her hands on her hips as she stared him down. “Do you want me to show you the tampons?”

Landon swallowed hard. He was pretty sure the box was tampon free, yet he was equally sure Aunt Tillie could conjure a bevy of female hygiene products if she felt like it. Aunt Tillie can make almost anyone back down. Landon is one of the few exceptions. “Show me.”

Aunt Tillie sighed. “You asked for it.”

“Wait!”

Landon glanced at me, feigning patience. “Yes, Bay.”

“She’s got wine in the box and she’s trying to get me to load it into her truck so she can sell it at the festival this weekend,” I blurted out. “She doesn’t want you to know because you’ll try to confiscate it. I really hope you don’t do that, though, because I can’t spend another weekend trapped in a book.”

Landon nodded. “I had a feeling that’s what was in the box.” I watched him as he considered how to proceed. The last time he tried to stop Aunt Tillie from hawking her homemade wine she cursed us into a book of fairy tales. No one wanted to go through that ordeal again.

“That’s my wine,” Aunt Tillie said. “I can sell it if I want to.”

“Fine,” Landon said, giving in as he bent over and hoisted the box off the ground. He moved toward the front door and I hurried around him to push it open.

Aunt Tillie and I followed him down the driveway, watching as he pushed the box into the bed of Aunt Tillie’s pickup truck and latched the tailgate in place. When he turned, he seemed surprised to find us right behind him.

“That’s it?” Aunt Tillie cocked an eyebrow. “You’re not going to fight me on this?”

“I’m not going to fight you on it,” Landon conceded, pulling me in for a hug. “I did miss you this week, Bay.” He gave me a quick kiss and then moved back toward the inn.

Aunt Tillie scampered after him. “I’m going to sell it.”

“I don’t care.” Landon linked his fingers with mine. “What’s for dinner tonight? I’m starving.”

“They’re making kebabs, rice, hummus and some other stuff,” I answered, waiting for him to blow. He was too calm. He was never this calm.

“That sounds good.”

“I’m going to sell it and make a lot of money,” Aunt Tillie called to his back. “Then I’m going to roll around in it naked.”

Landon sighed. “I don’t care what you do with the money,” he said. “If you’re going to roll around naked in it, though, make sure you give us notice. I don’t want to see that. I’ll have nightmares.”

“Why aren’t you fighting her on this?” I asked, genuinely curious.

“I don’t want to get trapped in a book, and I figure if she’s selling alcohol at the town festival that doesn’t fall under the purview of the FBI,” Landon replied. “That’s Chief Terry’s problem. I have a three-day weekend ahead of me and I’m not getting involved in any of this crap. I want to relax, eat and spend time with you. That’s all I want to do.”

Landon is handsome in everyday circumstances, but when he’s romantic and sweet he doubles his appeal. “That’s sounds nice,” I said.

“Nothing is going to ruin this weekend,” Landon said, leading me up the steps and pulling up short when my mother appeared in the doorway. Her face was white and she clutched her hands together. “Yeah, I think I just jinxed us.”

I had a feeling he was right. “What’s wrong? Aunt Tillie has been with me. She couldn’t possibly have done something terrible.” I shot Aunt Tillie a worried look. “You haven’t, right?”

Aunt Tillie scowled. “When are you going to learn that I can do anything I set my mind to, including being in two places at once? That being said, I haven’t done anything bad in weeks.”

Landon arched a challenging eyebrow.

“Fine! I haven’t done anything bad today,” Aunt Tillie conceded. “What’s wrong, Winnie?”

Mom is generally good under pressure. She takes on all of life’s little oddities – and Aunt Tillie’s big transgressions – with an air of confidence and calm I often admire. She looked positively apoplectic, though.

“We got a call a little bit ago,” Mom said, hopping from one foot to the other. “I … well … we have two guests who will be arriving for ten whole days starting tomorrow.”

“The way you’re acting you’d think it was one of those oasis buggers over in the Middle East,” Aunt Tillie replied, already bored with the conversation. “If that’s the case, don’t worry. I’m sure I can handle them.”

“ISIS, not oasis,” I corrected.

“It’s worse than that,” Mom said.

What’s worse than that? “Mom, you’re starting to worry me,” I said. “What’s wrong? Who’s coming?”

“Aunt Tillie, you’re really not going to like this,” Mom said.

“Then you should’ve told them they can’t come,” Aunt Tillie replied. She wasn’t showing signs of being particularly bothered by Mom’s worrywart nature. “Stop being dramatic. Who is it?”

“Aunt Willa and Rosemary are coming to town for the festival, and they’re staying here,” Mom said. “I felt caught and I told them it was fine. I’m sorry. I … .”

For a moment, it was as if all of the oxygen had been sucked from the Earth’s atmosphere and we were about to implode. Then Aunt Tillie broke the spell and erupted.

“Over my dead body!”

Two

“Aunt Tillie, you need to calm down.” Mom was atwitter with nervous energy. “Pitching a fit won’t help matters.”

“Says you.” Aunt Tillie stalked toward Mom, but Landon snagged the back of her shirt and hauled her back before she could get close enough to slip her hands around Mom’s neck and start squeezing.

“Tell me why this is such a big deal,” Landon instructed, refusing to release Aunt Tillie’s shirt even as she bucked and yanked against his efforts.

“Let me go!”

Landon ignored her. “Is this the same cousin and aunt we met in the horrible fairy tale world?”

I nodded. “Aunt Willa is Aunt Tillie’s sister.”

“She’s the devil’s seed!” Aunt Tillie howled. “I can’t believe you invited that woman to my house!”

“Aunt Tillie, she asked.” Mom couldn’t stop fidgeting. “She was very pleasant on the phone. She said she wanted Rosemary to see Hemlock Cove – although she keeps referring to it as Walkerville – and I didn’t see the harm.”

“You mean you were spineless and refused to tell her where to stuff it,” Aunt Tillie countered, furious as she finally managed to yank her shirt from Landon’s grip. “I’m going to smite her to within an inch of her life.”

“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” Mom argued, regaining some of her composure. “Aunt Willa and Rosemary are taking only one room. That’s all we had. I hoped the idea of sharing a room would be enough to dissuade her, but it wasn’t.

“It doesn’t matter, though,” she continued. “We have other guests at the inn. You cannot pick a fight with Aunt Willa when we have guests. I won’t allow it.”