Forever: A Novel of Good and Evil Love and Hope Read online

  Darci had had a lifetime of people who loved to start arguments so she wasn’t about to take his bait and defend herself, or even explain. “If all you want me to do is wait in a hotel room, why did you hire me in the first place?”

  Adam picked up his water glass and drank deeply.

  Darci narrowed her eyes at him in speculation. “Are you being so nice to me because you plan to sacrifice me to these witches?”

  At that Adam nearly choked, and his water spewed all over Darci. She didn’t move, but he grabbed a handful of napkins from the dispenser and reached across the table to blot water off her chest, but then he thought better of that idea and handed the wad of napkins to her. She wiped her chin, then tossed the napkins onto the table.

  “I’m on to something, aren’t I?” she said, her voice barely above a whisper, her eyes never leaving his. “You’re going to do something about witchcraft this afternoon, aren’t you?”

  “What I do with my time is none of your concern,” he said, leaning so far toward her that his head almost touched hers.

  “You hired me as your personal assistant, so if you’re going to do something personal, then I’m going to assist you.”

  “You got the ‘hired’ part right,” he said, glaring at her. “I hired you, which means that you go where I want when I want and—”

  “You two wanta give me some room?” Sally asked. She was standing at the end of the table, big platters and a basket of food on her arms.

  “That was fast,” Adam said as he sat back on his seat. “We gotta couple of fire-breathing dragons back there. Makes everything cook faster.”

  As she set the plates before them, Adam glared at Darci to let her know that it was her big mouth that was causing this ridicule. But Darci’s eyes were on the plates of food.

  “I doubled everything,” Sally said to Adam. “I’ve seen her appetite so I thought you’d need the extra. And I know that if you can spend what you did today at the Dress Place, you can afford it.” With that, she left the table.

  “Everyone knows everything about us,” Adam muttered as he picked up his knife and fork, and by the time he’d cut his first bite, Darci had eaten half her platter full of steak, potatoes, green beans, and coleslaw. There was a basket full of slices of pumpkin bread and two tubs of butter, and another platter contained cranberry tarts and slices of acorn squash dripping butter and brown sugar.

  “It was my minor, wasn’t it?” Darci said, her mouth full.

  “Your what?”

  “My college minor. You hired me because of my college minor, didn’t you?”

  Adam blinked at her in consternation for a moment before he resumed eating. “Yeah, sure, you’re right. That’s exactly why I hired you. That was a great course of study. It was...?” He put a huge piece of steak in his mouth, then waved his hand for her to talk while he chewed.

  “Witchcraft.”

  “What?” Adam said, then made himself continue chewing calmly. He was going to murder that psychic Helen! Is this what she meant when she’d said that Darci wasn’t what she seemed? “You took college courses in witchcraft?” He hadn’t known schools offered such courses.

  Darci was looking at him in speculation. “You don’t remember reading that on my application, do you? So if that’s not why you hired me, then why did you?”

  “I’m sure it was your True Persuasion,” he said, smiling. Lifting his hand, he spread his fingers, then made a pulling motion, as though he were a sorcerer casting a spell on her. “You persuaded me to hire you.”

  Darci didn’t smile. “You called before I had time to apply my True Persuasion to getting the job. When you called my aunt, I was sitting on a park bench eating bananas. Are you going to tell me the truth or not?”

  “What do you know about the truth?”

  “I know that you didn’t read my application so you must have another reason for hiring me.”

  “Of course I read your application. I just forgot the details for a moment, that’s all. I think this coleslaw might be the best I’ve ever had. What do you think? Or what did you think?” he added when he saw her empty plate.

  “You’re here to search for a witches’ coven, you’ve hired an assistant who minored in witchcraft, but you ‘forgot’ what she studied. ‘Forgot.’ ‘For a moment.’”

  “So what did you study about witchcraft in college?” he asked, smiling. “By correspondence, that is? And where did you buy your newt’s eyes in Putnam?”

  “At Putnam Drugs, of course,” she shot back at him, not smiling. “So when do we start searching for witches?”

  “You’re not going with me,” Adam said, his mouth set in a hard line. “I work alone.”

  “I see. And what will you do when a witch puts a zenobyre spell on you?”

  “A what?” he asked as he reached for a slice of pumpkin bread, then waited for Darci to take one. He ate his plain while she put a layer of butter on top of hers.

  “A halting spell,” she said. “It won’t let you escape.”

  “That’s bunk. No one on earth can do that.”

  “Of course not. The continued failure of witchcraft is why the practice has persisted over the centuries.”

  Adam pushed a cranberry tart around on his plate. Maybe this is the real reason he’d been told by the psychic to hire her, he thought. Maybe she did know something.

  He looked up at her. “You don’t have anything appropriate to wear for where I’m going.”

  “Under the underwear you wouldn’t touch is a black Lycra leotard. It’s called a cat suit.” Smiling, Darci ate the last piece of pumpkin bread in two bites. “You think they have any dessert today?”

  5

  “SO HOW DO I LOOK?” Darci asked as she emerged from her bedroom wearing the one-piece stretchy black cat suit.

  Adam was annoyed, feeling that he’d been manipulated by two women, first the psychic, and now this scrap of a girl. He’d thought about trying to slip away from Darci, but he had no doubt that she’d do something like call the local police to search for him. And they’d already been told that the local police turned a blind eye to what was going on in Camwell. I’m going to send her home tomorrow, he thought. It was the only way. Later, when he needed her, he could get her to return.

  With a ferocious frown, Adam turned to look at Darci; then his mouth fell open. The clothes he’d seen her in previously had been too big and so down-at-the-heels that he’d not seen much else except her clothes. But now she was wearing a one-piece leotard that was as tight as her skin. She was curvy. No, she was very, very curvy, with round thighs, a little rear end that curved outward, a tiny waist, and small, round breasts.

  “You look like my ten-year-old cousin,” he said as he turned away from her.

  “Girl or boy?” There was a full-length mirror on the back of the door to the little coat closet in the living room, and she was twirling in front of it, looking at herself. Not bad, she thought. Not much up top, but the rest of her seemed to be in the right places.

  “What?” Adam snapped.

  “Is your ten-year-old cousin a girl or boy?”

  “Girl.”

  “You know, I think the Andersons’ boy is about twelve. Think he’d like me?”

  Adam laughed. “Come on, let’s go. If you can stop admiring yourself, that is.”

  “I can if you can,” Darci said brightly, and Adam snorted in answer to that as he handed her one of his jackets to put on over her cat suit.

  “If we see anyone, just act as though we’re out for a walk. And please do me a favor and don’t announce to anyone where we’re going.”

  “Since I have no idea, I can’t tell anyone anything, now can I?” she said as she walked out the door before him, then followed him once they were outside.”Left,” she said a moment later. “Sally said to go out the back door then turn left to reach the path.”

  “Right,” Adam said as he turned. “And it’s too bad you don’t know where we’re going.”

  She smiled at