He’d also reminded Alex that Alex really hadn’t had sex—other than the self-stimulated kind—with anyone in his nearly twenty-six years.
But still, it hadn’t been an auspicious beginning.
Alex’s natural pessimism began to take over his thoughts, and the garter snake stopped its quest for the hydrangea bushes and began to follow them around the block again.
FIFTEEN minutes later they were back at the cul-de-sac, dropping Kate and Josh off at their house first. “Coven Friday?” Kate said to make sure.
“Absolutely,” Jordan said. “Barty and Lachlan will be here too.”
“I think Lachlan gets more excited than you do,” Josh said, half laughing. “And he’s not half bad.”
It was actually a little disheartening. On the few times Lachlan had been called into service to do the morning or evening rituals, he’d been able to call up his portion of the cone of power, something it had taken Alex months to do. Well, Lachlan was like a big kid—maybe that kind of optimism and excitement just lent itself naturally to magic.
“I think Lachlan and Dante would get along really well,” Jordan said, and they all fell silent, casting furtive, half-hidden looks to the house next door. There were lights on in the living room, flickering, as the two residents of the house crisscrossed in and out of time doing what seemed to them to be ordinary, average, everyday sorts of things. It was only to people outside the house that their world looked haunted by two men who were very much alive but not fixed in space and time.
“Maybe this weekend we should all go in,” Alex said, reluctant to make a suggestion without clearing it with Jordan but feeling like they needed to go try to ground their friends for the dozenth time.
“Good idea,” Jordan said on a sigh. He grimaced. “I wish I could make us go in tonight, but… God. Not without Bartholomew.”
Bartholomew, for all his shyness, was such a comforting soul. It hadn’t been until the last two weeks when he’d started having sleepovers that Alex really realized how much they’d all depended on him for that comforting butter/sugar/vanilla presence in their lives.
“Yeah,” Kate said. “I can’t do that again—not without him.”
“Okay, then, it’s a plan.” Jordan gave a little wave. “Night, guys. Go make a baby!”
“That’s what I’m talking about!” Josh laughed, and they disappeared into their home.
Alex and Jordan kept walking, and Alex’s heart sank a little as he saw Jordan’s shoulders droop.
“We’ll figure it out,” Alex said softly. “C’mon, J, it’s not like you did that all by yourself. You had a lot of help from people who—apparently—have plenty of experience lying to themselves. Including Dante and Cully, because I’m pretty sure whatever is going on in that house has more to do with the two of them than it does with any of us.”
“What do you mean?” Jordan asked, watching as the lights flickered on and off again. There was a person standing in front of the window, and each time light flickered on, the silhouette of the person changed. Dante’s big, broad shoulders and bold nose were very distinguishable from Cully’s slighter silhouette with his delicate features and fly-away hair.
“What do you think their word was?” Alex asked, because he’d been thinking about this for the two weeks since the spell had gone awry. “Because I would bet…. I would place actual money on it being—”
Jordan held up his hand. “Don’t say it,” he told Alex, sudden authority in his voice. “I think it’s better that we don’t say the words. If we define it for them, they can’t define it for themselves.”
Alex paused and nodded. “Fair enough,” he said as they passed Dante and Cully’s house and yard and came to a stop in front of Alex and Bartholomew’s.
Alex sighed and looked next door to the little witch’s cottage that Jordan had occupied since the witch had pretty much willed it to him. “I wish you could stay here,” he told Jordan baldly.
Jordan nodded. “Yeah, I know. Damned cats.”
There were nine feline familiars. Nine. And one large sand pit in the backyard that—when spelled properly once a day—self-cleaned. As long as someone slept in the cottage itself, claiming ownership.
If Jordan so much as skipped a night of sleeping in the damned cottage, the self-cleaning sandpit cleaned itself into the neighbors’ yards. The few times it had happened, the neighbors had been… unamused.
And Jordan claimed that after those nights he’d slept at one of the other houses, he’d noticed random things being moved in the cottage—books, vials of essential oils, thread, candles. Once he’d come in to find seven candles lighting themselves, and only Jordan’s ability to light and extinguish candles with a thought had kept the draperies from catching fire and burning the whole place down.
It was really better that he slept in his own house that night, as spooky as it was.
“Do you want to come in for a few?” Alex asked instead. “Television, a beer? Bartholomew or Lachlan usually cooks and leaves food for us when Barty’s doing a sleepover.”
Jordan’s thin, intense features lightened a little, his stark blue eyes taking on a sort of glow. Alex was forced to remember that the whole reason they had their circle of friends, their coven, was because Jordan Bryne had grabbed each one of them by the collar and said, “Come! Let’s go on adventures!” because he really did have that much charisma and magnetism and wanted the best for the people he cared for.
“I could swear I smelled tater-tot casserole this afternoon,” Jordan said wistfully. “Lachlan must have cooked because you know if Barty had done it, he would have made potatoes au gratin.”
Alex actually started to salivate. “Excellent. It’s trash night, though. Bartholomew already got ours,” he said, indicating the recycle and trash bins on the curb. “I’ll get Dante and Cully’s, and you go get yours. Meet you inside.” Dante and Cully may not have existed in the same time and space that the rest of them were in, but they still made trash. Cully was a costume designer for pretty much all the local theater companies, and sometime in the last two weeks, he’d gotten big shipments of fabric and supplies. They’d all noticed the boxes stacked neatly on the side of the house, and yes, had agreed to make sure somebody got Dante and Cully’s bins while they were otherwise occupied.
“Deal!”
Each of the little houses had a good fifteen feet between them, separated by a fence. The recess next to the house was a good place to keep a trash bin, but it was also… secretive. Everybody had motion-sensor lights, but the lights didn’t quite make it to the trash-bin alcoves. Still, Alex made his way to the side of Dante and Cully’s house to grab the bins with Glinda still attached to the lead at his wrist, trotting as happily as she always did.
She really was a sweet little creature, Alex mused, as the loud plastic trash bin echoed forbiddingly down the curb. She didn’t bark too much, didn’t shed too much, and only licked people’s chins when they held her too close to their faces. Alex had rather enjoyed her as company in the last couple of weeks, and Bartholomew obviously adored her. He’d started looking up dog adoption websites for small dogs for when—not if—Dante and Cully were more able to take care of their little friend in the future.