want me to show you around?” Libby asked as she handed me a paper cup of coffee.
I loved coffee—it was like mead—and I guessed I might have drunk mead if I’d come from Above. Maybe?
“I think I’ll just take it all in, if that’s all right with you. Go and do what you must. I like watching you walk away from me.”
Blowing me a kiss, Libby sashayed down the aisle, her hips swaying and the fringes bouncing. She wiggled her torso in that sexy groove that made things on me very hard. I needed to talk to CJ soon. I wanted to get my hands all over that woman’s bounce, yet when I did, things came up. Things that felt great yet, I knew, required further research.
I strolled past a table that sold various vials of blood in all gradients of crimson. Werewolf blood, vampire blood, faery ichor, kitsune blood and black demon blood. Mermaid blood was a tint of green. What were the uses for such things? Did I really want to know?
Sipping the last of the coffee, I turned abruptly and bumped into a tall, thin woman clad in frumpy black with snow-white hair that fell like silk about her shoulders. She spun, revealing pointed teeth and a pale face, and hissed at me.
That hiss disturbed me so much I flinched and stepped back.
She tracked me backward until my shoulders hit the wall and a tendril of dried garlic bobbed at my head. When she stuck a finger in the air before my face I felt as if I’d been struck by invisible magic. Hell, who could know in a room full of witches?
“You’re different,” she said with a craggy voice that belonged buried under tangled tree roots. “Not the same as you once were.”
That summation was difficult not to question. “What do you know about me?”
“I see it. Your aura. It’s all colors. Never see that unless it’s an angel, don’t you know.”
I clamped my jaws shut before blurting out my truth. How she’d guessed such a thing was beyond me. Yet I supposed it wasn’t a big secret. Could those with paranormal proclivities see what I had once been?
“I can feel your yearning.”
“I—don’t yearn.” Yet, in fact, I did just that.
“You do. And for more than what men yearn for.”
“Is that so?” Because I’d learned that most men did yearn for the red sports car.
“You want what was once yours.”
Damned good guess. Did she also know I desired Libby? “And...just how would I get that? What was once mine.”
“Ha! Knew it.”
I leaned in closer, lifting the coffee cup beside my cheek to shield our conversation from anyone who might hear, though the room bustled and everyone was occupied with their own doings. “And what if I do yearn? Can you help me with that?”
“Nope.”
My shoulders deflated. Just as well.
“But I know someone who can. You go see her and she’ll read you and tell you if she can release the, uh...lingering power that dwells within you,” she said with dramatic flair.
“I have power?”
“I can see it blasting out of you like a heat wave, handsome. Bet you attract the womenfolk like bees to honey.”
I glanced around, but didn’t catch sight of Libby’s bright red hair. The womenfolk were attracted to me?
“You bond with your soul mate yet?” the witch asked.
“Uh...no?”
“Good. She’ll be pleased I’ve found such a rare—er, pleased to help you. You need to go to the sixteenth quarter.”
“I’m not sure where that is. I’m new to the city.”
“Yes, you are, aren’t you? I’ll write it down for you.” She hobbled over to her table, which was littered with crystal balls and vials of various potions, some marked “for the low, low price.” She handed me a paper with an address, then slapped a vial of dark substance onto my palm. “Five euros.”
Potions and magics were not my thing. I could get whatever I needed from Libby’s arsenal of witchcraft supplies. And I’d already secretly checked for “angel cures” and “wing restorers” only to be disappointed. “I don’t think I need whatever this is.”
“Oh, you do, or you won’t be able to see the person you need to see. You rub this ointment under your eyes to see beyond this realm and into theirs.”
“You want me to look into another realm?”
She nodded and held out her hand in wait of payment.
Having a few euros that Libby had tucked into my back pants pocket to buy whatever caught my eye, I paid the woman and she shoved me away as if my presence offended her.
I turned right into Libby’s smiling yet wondering green eyes and discreetly shoved the vial into my shirt pocket before pulling her into a hug. “Get everything you need?”
“Mostly. I have one more table I need to stop by that sells dragon’s breath. Won’t take but ten minutes.”
“I’ll wait for you here.”
“Can’t wait to be back by your side, lover.” She kissed my cheek, curling the heat to my skin as quickly as my smile. “You’re so cute.”
When she had left, I tugged out the vial and inspected the sparkly black contents. A glance to the elderly woman who’d sold it to me found her—missing. Her table was no longer there.
Turning about, I wondered if I’d mistaken her location, but I didn’t see the odd white hair anywhere. She had been right there.
“Witches,” I muttered. “They creep me out.”
Save for the ones who planted skin-warming kisses on me. I did like kissing. Much better than vacuuming.
Ten minutes later, I had been compelled to listen to an elderly witch’s explanation that she could bespell the frown from me (really? I didn’t frown. Maybe? Hmm...), had watched a set of blonde twins perform allotriophagy—they’d made each other spit up butterflies—and had decided that mugwort stank and I preferred frankincense as a scent.
Libby’s boisterous voice carried above the hubbub of chatter. I noticed a thin dark-haired man approach her and lean in close. As he spoke, the frail and poor example of male touched her wrist.
Marching toward my red-haired goddess, my fingers curled tightly and my chest expanded. I growled. The man looked at me, gaped and stepped away from my woman.
Libby turned, and just as I swung up a fist to connect with the idiot who had touched her, she stopped me with a smack of her palm over my knuckles.
“What are you doing?” she asked forcefully. “Reichardt?”
