Twisted Magic (32 page)

“Oh man, I guess the necklace was a flop after this gorgeous animal,” Hutch joked, running a hand over the puppies head.
The puppy
wiggled and squirmed licking and biting my hands. Dad looked pleased with his gift and my reaction.

Karsen and Kidd joined all of us.

“So what’s the beast
’s
name?” Karsen asked.

I rubbed his head my fingers colliding with
Hutch's as
we both petted the
gorgeous
animal. I thought for only seconds. “Blue.”

Everyone smiled.

Dad took Blue back and looked over at me. “Now that the party is done and Nona is
trashed. Why
don’t you kids go out for pizza or whatever it is kids your age do
.”

I looked at Karsen and Kidd. Karsen nodded in agreement eager to take off.

“We can find a beach party or eat pizza until we puke it would be fun!” She exclaimed.

I turned to Hutch unsure if hanging out with Kidd was his idea of fun. He grinned.

“It’s your birthday. Whatever you want to do tonight I am at your mercy.” He smiled, throwing an arm around me.

Karsen raised a devious eyebrow. “Did you hear that, Ho
pe. He said he is at your mercy, o
h the possibilities.”

Hutch returned the expression. “
I’ve been at her mercy once
before,
and I rather enjoyed it, i
f I could only get so lucky again.”

“We should crash the
white-tie party
down by Henry Park,” Kidd said.

Karsen fell back in step with
us;
she brushed sand from her dress. “Yeah
,
it’s
some big shindig. I guess the town is trying to raise money for some new church coming to Cherry. I guess they think they can save us all from evil by adding some
fancy
church.”

Kidd laughed. “Let the bible thumping begin. They will do anything to get rid of Henry Park and Evil kings. I say we check it out.” He looked at all of us. “It could be fun.”

Hutch agreed. “I’m always in for a good time. And besides, we’re all dressed up and nowhere to go.”

Karsen clapped her hands excited. Everyone was looking at me now. White tie meant every stuck up
“
do
gooder
”
in Cherry would be there. Including the mayor, I weighed the odds of our adventure turning bad and shook my head.

“I’m in,” I said.

The idea of crashing
some
swanky get together that was against everything I
had become
didn’t sound so bad. We had a lot more on our side
, and after the night I had it sounded like an okay time.

We all stared at the giant billboard staked in the sand of
the
fundraiser.

“Light and faith community center,” I said, reading the words out loud. I looked at Karsen and Kidd and then at Hutch. They all were just as amused and confused by it as I was.

“Like they don’t have enough churches already,” Kidd said. He threw his arm around
Karsen,
and they headed
through
the crowd. Karsen’s pale pink dress hardly fit in with all the white swimming around her. And Kidd’s black dress pants and
dark-
green dress
shirt had him sticking out like a sore thumb.
Nevertheless,
neither of them cared as they started dancing to the jazz fluttering around the fundraiser.

Kidd raised Karsen’s hand and planted a kiss
across
her knuckles. He touched her face
adoringly,
and they twirled and swirled through
the crowd
. Immediate eyes connected to them as they
danced around oblivious to the onlookers.

Hutch touched the small of my back and leaned down, whispering
into
my ear. “Do you want to dance?”

I shook my head, my eyes landing on the mayor-Tucker’s father-making his way through the crowd in a white suit tailored made and crisp against the moonlight. My stomach did a flip.

Hutch pulled me close
concerned, everything
alright?” I kept my eyes glued to Mayor Sinclair.

“Yeah, everything is fine.” I
was realizing how bad of an idea this was. We should have never decided on coming to such an event. The idea of running into Tucker’s father and possibly Tucker made me sick to my stomach.

I gripped Hutch’s arm tighter and pulled us through the crowd until we were perfectly nestled between a group of stuffy socialites and a large stone water fountain.

I caught sight of Karsen and Kidd swirling through the crowd, bumping into people as they glided from one end to another. The looks on
everyone’s
face proved just how unhappy they were with their antics.

“I didn’t know this was your kind of thing,” he said nodding his head at the elegant lighting and white decorations lining every nearby table. Fancy floating candles sparkled on the table tops.

“We were passing by.” I pushed
the
hair from my eyes allowing him to stare me down. “And no the church scene isn’t my kind of thing.”

Hutch cleared his throat. Tucker turned his attention to Hutch. He extended a hand.
However, unpredictably
Hutch didn’t accept. Tucker returned to his
original
stiff pose after swallowing down the rejection and the staring contest between the two of them continued.

“I don’t see any signs that say we aren’t
welcome.” Hutch’s
eyes flicked from one end of the shin dig to another. He held tight to my arm. “
Usually churches welcome
everybody. What’s the big deal with this event
anyways?
I never knew a church to have a grand opening.”

Tucker’s lips pursed, he seemed to be gathering his wits and weighing whether he should speak again. He finally did. “We welcome everybody.”

Hutch nodded. “That’s what I thought. So we shall be on our way then.” He started to make a move to get us away from
Tucker,
but the crowd was a lot thicker
than
the last time we hurried through.

This gave Tucker enough time to grab me by the elbow. I pulled away quickly, immediately angry. “Keep your hands off of me.”

Hutch stepped in front of me backing Tucker away from me. Tucker smirked. “Let me rephrase myself. W
e welcome everybody besides anyone involved in witchcraft.”

The crowd caught on to Tucker’s
words,
and it seemed all eyes were on us now. My cheeks heated.

Hutch leaned down to get more on Tucker’s level. “What is
it? You're
trying to say?”

Tucker rolled his eyes.
“Witches.
I’m saying
you’re
all a bunch of witches. And Cherry no longer is going to stand for it. So you can turn around and get the hell out of here.”

“Or
what,”
Hutch said, his fist clenched.

“Or suffer the consequences,” Mayor Sinclair said stepping in. He put a protective arm around his son and stared up at Hutch.

Karsen and Kidd butted through the crowd coming to a stand beside us. Karsen’s
cheeks were
bright pink from the dancing.
I
was clear they
too
knew what was going on.

“You guys sound like a bunch of crazies. There
is no such thing
as witches.”
Karsen giggled nervously, only I knew just how nervous she was. To everyone else it was just a bad case of the giggles. “And who sets up churches to rid their town of witches?”

Kidd let out an uncomfortable laugh. “Ape
shit crazies that’s
who.”

Karsen grabbed my arm. “Well, we want nothing to do with this. Hope’s grandmother is a major
asset
in this community. I will be sure to inform her of what is going on here.”

We all started through the
crowd, it
parted rather smoothly after
the word
swirled through that we were witches.

Tucker’s voice cut through the night. “Deny it all you want. There were reports of a strange ceremony last summer
at
the beach. One that should have killed you,
few people
survive
having a knife plunged through their chest. Explain that one, Hope.”

Karsen’s nail dug into my skin. She too was shocked. This was the first time she was hearing of this.

I shook my head and kept walking.

Nobody had spoken since we started across the beach into Henry Park.

Kidd pounded on Slade’s door and after a few
seconds,
the door opened. There he stood, shirtless and looked half asleep. He took a step down and looked everyone over before he spoke a word.

“What the hell are all of you doing
here,”
Slade asked. I was sure that wasn’t the welcome Kidd
was
looking for.

“Do you have any idea what’s going on down the
beach,”
Kidd asked. Karsen stepped closer.

“Or what the hell Tucker meant when he said he witnessed my best friend being stabbed
through
the chest last summer. And why I don’t know anything about this.” Karsen shot me a disturbed look.

Slade’s eyes drifted to me. Hutch stood behind me pretending to not be a part of our conversation.

I opened my mouth unsure of what was about to come out. “I don’t know how he knows.”

Slade ran a hand through his hair. “But he knows.”

Kidd sighed. “They all know. Or more or less suspect, they built an entire church to rid Cherry of witches. What do you have to say about that?”

Everyone looked at Kidd.

Slade dropped
down
the steps of the
rv
and his feet hit the ground with a thud. “What are you so upset about?
It’s
not something we haven’t heard before.” He shrugged it off.

Kidd was furious. “They never built churches before. They never had actual proof, or what seems like proof seeing there going around saying they saw what happened that night.”

“Will someone explain what the hell is going on?” Karsen snapped.

I was unsure of what to say again. I looked at Slade for help. He looked away.

“
You’re
not going to say anything?” I asked him. “I’m just left holding the bag?”

Karsen groaned. “Someone speak!”

“It’
s not my secret to spill,
” Slade said taking a seat on the steps.

I chewed at my lip. “We will discuss it later.”

“We will discuss it
now,
or I will go tell your dad.” Karsen threatened.

My blood boiled.
I stared her down. “You wouldn’t dare.”

Karsen crossed her arms. “Try me.”

I sighed, giving Slade an evil glare before I explained. “Last summer I was wrapped up in a big mess. It involves Tucker and his dad. And we all thought the best way to deal with them was to take them head on.”

Karsen kept her eyes glued to me.

“I was only hanging out with
Tucker,
so I could see Slade that night, but things went horribly
bad,
and I ended up being drugged by Tucker and his dad. Long story short they left me on the beach for dead. And Slade saved me.”

“By plunging a knife in your
chest,”
Karsen asked.

The door to the
rv
came open and Audrey pushed Slade out of the way to get down the stairs. He stood up letting her through.

“Slade had a pesky problem by the name of Ezra, his dead witch of a
girlfriend;
he used Hope in a ritual to rid himself of
Ezra,
so he could be free to be with
whom
he wanted.” Audrey explained.

“I didn’t use Hope.” Slade spoke up finally. “It wasn’t like that.”

Audrey laughed bored with the whole conversation, but she went on to fill Karsen in on the rest of it. “You see in order to rid himself of
Ezra,
he had to sacrifice someone. Hope was sacrificed.”