“This lampoon of ceremony will undoubtedly culminate in another calamity of errors involving corporeal congress of the most abhorrent kind,” Hellcat drawled from the back of the couch. Unfortunately for all involved, I’d decided I wanted his extra magic so he was present for the spell.

  “Put a paw in it,” I muttered.

  “If my counsel carries any import regarding this tragic misadventure, you would not give a care whether this devilish brute loses his mind (and I question whether such a mind is even present in that rather oafish cranium) and beg your illustrious kin for their protection. Living in Tacoma would allow you separation from this corpse and protection from his wayward attempts to demote you into a vampire, quite a heathenistic endeavor, if I do say so, myself.”

  Lorcan snorted. “Devilish brute! Why, thank you for the compliment, Hellcat! I don’t believe I’ve ever received such high praise.”

  I rolled my eyes upward. “Just try to ignore him.”

  “Ignore me at your peril, foul enchantress, but heed my instruction if you desire the restoration of your former condition.”

  “If you don’t shut up, I’ll throw you in the shower!” I fired back, knowing how much he hated getting his fur wet. “You spent the last five attempts barking instructions about this and that and all five attempts have failed. I’m starting to think we might have better luck without you!”

  Hellcat pulled his head down between his shoulders and hissed at me. “Profane accident of the mystic race! Obscenity of pestilence! You forget who and what I am and you forget the lineage of my family name!”

  “There’s a lineage of the family name ‘Hellcat’?” Lorcan puzzled.

  “No, you fool!” the cat raged at him. “Hellcat is not my given name!”

  I sprang to my feet, lunged for the couch, and seized the awful familiar by the scruff of his neck, supporting his bottom in my other hand. He hissed at me and then tried to scratch me but I extended both arms to hold him at a distance. Then stalking to the door, I wrenched it open, and deposited the cat in the hall, throwing the door shut again and locking it.

  “You require my presence to complete the spell, you onerous letch!” he called from beyond the door. I didn’t respond. One last squeal of indignation reached my ears which was then followed by silence, blessed silence.

  Lorcan puffed out his cheeks. “Thank goodness that’s the end of that.”

  I nodded but then sighed, shaking my head. “Irritant though he is, he also might be right.”

  “About my being a devilish brute?” Lorcan asked with a shrug. “Well, that goes without saying.”

  “No, not about that!” I glared at him but he only grinned back up at me. “Hellcat might be right in that we may still need him to complete the spell.”

  “I doubt that, darling. The foul little wretch hasn’t given us any advantage yet and Betanya said nothing about a familiar, correct?” I nodded. “Thus, she designed this spell to be completed without a little ingrate, so we don’t need him.”

  “As I keep reminding you, Betanya never succeeded in breaking the blood bond that turned her into a Blood Witch. Maybe if she’d had the added power of a familiar, she might have been able to do it?”

  “You had the added power of the little tart and the spell still hasn’t proven successful.”

  “True.” I sighed again, shaking my head as I rubbed the back of my neck and felt sorry for myself. “We don’t even know if this spell is going to work at all.”

  “Then why are we busting our humps to complete it?”

  “Because the alternative is to give up and I… just… I can’t give up.” I crossed my legs and sat down in front of him. I held out my hand. “Let’s try it again.”

  His lips twitched, but fortunately he didn’t smile. I just couldn’t take his seemingly jovial mood any longer. Not when I was in the foulest of moods and growing more and more concerned about our impending deadline.

  “Very well.” He held out his hand and placed his long fingers in mine.

  “At least we won’t have Hellcat’s constant tirades.” I focused on the candle between us. “First, we anoint the candle with three drops of Magus Oil and five drops of Uncrossing Oil….”

  “Are you sure it isn’t the other way around? Last time you used five drops of Magus Oil and three drops of Uncrossing Oil.”

  “No, I didn’t. I did it just as I mentioned.”

  Lorcan shook his head. “I’m quite sure you did it the other way round, my dear. I distinctly remember…”

  “Do you mind!” I bellowed. “We’re supposed to be concentrating on the blood bond, not on how many drops of which potions I used!”

  He simply nodded and lowered his eyes to the candle. I drew in a steadying breath so I wouldn’t put too many drops of each oil on the candle. Lorcan didn’t say another word, thank the goddess.

  After anointing the candles, I placed my other hand in his. I ignored the way he massaged my wrist and, instead, concentrated on the blood bond between us and, more importantly, dissolving it.

  Heat rushed up my arms from his hand. The warmth flooded my mind and I felt myself sway. My pulse beat in my temples and I had to remind myself to stay in the moment, to focus on the spell, to ignore the incessant desirous need that was already snaking through me. Instead, I began to chant the incantation from Betanya’s journals.

  “Great Guardians of light and dark, of death and birth, I call on your power and your strength. Grant me the sword’s blade to cleave this death magic from within my blood. Help me to release the vampire’s stain within my earthly body and be reborn as the witch I once was.”

  I braced for the inevitable explosion that would blast against us. Every sentence brought the burst closer, and this time, it might be bigger and more destructive than before. I trembled and Lorcan tightened his grip on my fingers. I held onto him and finished reciting the incantation…

  “Lend me your strength and allow it to curl within my breast, growing stronger, until my true nature bursts free from the Blood Witch I have become.”

  And…

  Nothing happened.

  I recited the incantation a second time, crushing my eyes together as I forced myself to focus fully and intently on the words.

  My voice trailed off and we sat in silence. After another few seconds, I pried my eyes open. The candle flickered and the potions filled the room with a spicy aroma.

  I looked up to find Loran studying me. “Was something supposed to happen?” he asked.

  Nothing had happened. I looked around myself and then succumbed to the feeling of disappointment that was already welling up within me. “It… it didn’t work… again.”

  “Hmm, well, at the very least, the spell didn’t do any damage this time.”

  That was true, but I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. I tried to feel the magic within me, tried to judge whether or not it was still tainted as I wondered if the fact that the spell hadn’t done anything was actually a good sign? But, no, I was definitely still a Blood Witch. Lorcan’s blood was still doing a great job of scorching a fiery path through my entire being. The spell hadn’t changed anything. Not a damned thing.

  “It’s all right, dearest,” Lorcan murmured, clearly tuning into my disappointment. “Better luck next time.”

  I couldn’t stop staring at the candle. This… this nothingness was worse than getting smashed in the face with my own power. I didn’t know what to do. The spell couldn’t just do… nothing, could it?

  The answer was looking me in the face.

  “Perhaps we needed Hellcat after all?” Lorcan asked.

  I shook my head because I didn’t think that was it. Even without my familiar, I was still a witch—I still had power and magic. And yet, when I’d performed the spell this time, I might as well have been a nullish mundane with no power at all. It was as though my magic had packed up and moved house.

  Or maybe the reason was something else entirely? Maybe we actually had perfected Betanya’s spell and in perfecting it, this was the result? Maybe perfecting Betanya’s failed procedure culminated in this… in nothing. Instead of a blast of my own magic shooting right back into me, maybe this was the proper finale of the spell. And if such was the case, that was the worst possible outcome because it meant Betanya’s spell was a flop, it meant it was useless.

  Lorcan blew out the candle and got to his feet. “I had better get going, my dear. Seeing you in the buff and having you so near me is becoming too difficult to ignore.”

  I moved over to the couch, but my brain refused to function. I blinked down at the candle. A thin wisp of smoke danced up from the cold wick.

  Why hadn’t the spell worked? Why hadn’t I felt so much as a blip of magical energy? What was I doing that was so wrong? Was it the nature of my magic? Was my magic now so perverted with death power that I couldn’t even get it to work a spell?

  But, no, I didn’t imagine such was the case because I could still feel the magic simmering just below the surface of my skin. And, besides, Betanya possessed the same death magic I did and she… she…

  She hadn’t been able to make the spell work for her either.

  Apparently thinking better of leaving, Lorcan sat down next to me and put his arm around my shoulders. “We’ll find a way.”

  “How?” I croaked as I looked over at him, shaking my head. “What hope do we have if we can’t get the spell to do anything?”

  “There’s always hope.” He leaned in and kissed the side of my face. “Don’t give up. Giving up means quitting and Wanda Depraysie doesn’t quit.”

  He kissed me again and then started for the door, opening it and then closing it behind him again. I didn’t stop him. I just stood there, half of me feeling like I wanted to scream while the other half wanted to collapse against the couch and cry out all my frustration.

  When something isn’t working, that’s a sign to try something else.

  The words suddenly raced through my head. It was the same thing Astrid had tried to tell me the other day and I wouldn’t listen. And now I had to ask myself: why was I resisting trying a different approach? Did the connection to Betanya Tayir mean so much to me? Would I turn down a solution if it came from a different source, one other than Betanya?

  Clearly, Betanya’s solution really wasn’t a solution at all. It was a failure. So, why was I so stuck on something that plainly wasn’t working and never had worked?

  What else would you even try? I asked myself. It’s not like there are a million ways you can cast this spell. There’s one spell and you’ve tried it numerous ways and it doesn’t work. And that’s that. It. Doesn’t. Work.

  But, no, I couldn’t accept that logic. Lorcan was right—I didn’t quit. I wasn’t a quitter. If this approach didn’t work, something else would. It just… it had to!

  I squared my shoulders and stared down at that candle. I might be down, but I wasn’t out. And I wasn’t going to give up. Not yet. Not when I still had a little bit of time to figure this out.

  I picked up the candle and turned it one more time in my hands. My resolve hardened and I made up my mind right then and there.

  I’d keep working on this spell as hard as ever, but I wouldn’t keep trying the same old thing that only kept failing. Instead, I’d search for alternatives, just like Astrid said.

  No, I wouldn’t put all my eggs in Betanya’s basket. Now, it was time to start thinking outside the box. It was time to start thinking like the witch I was.

  As soon as I made up my mind, I started to suffer the pain and withdrawal that came from being separated from Lorcan. My entire body felt like it was shutting down and my need for him became an all-out conflagration. I fell down atop the couch and pulled my legs into my chest as I rocked myself back and forth and tried to calm myself, but all I could think about was how much better I’d feel if I were in Lorcan’s arms.

  Chapter Ten

  The intruder had shown up yet again.

  I stood at my worktable, staring at the TV screen of Henner’s contraption. The soap opera played on the first channel as usual, but I didn’t hear or see the show. Instead, I searched through the channels, checking the footage, trying to find some answer, anything that would shed some light on this unknown intruder. But, as with last time, there was nothing. Whatever or whoever this person or thing was, it was using magic to conceal itself—of that, I was now sure. But that still didn’t solve the problem of how someone else’s magic was able to overcome the hexes and wards supposedly protecting the store.

  I spent a slow morning going through every ward, protection spell, and hex I’d previously put on the building. Each one turned out to be as strong and effective as the day I’d cast it. The intruder hadn’t tampered with or weakened a single one of them.

  I extended my hand to the TV to switch the channel even though I’d already gone through every feed and all the footage a million times already. I took hold of the dial when the doorbell jingled, announcing I had a visitor.

  I turned to greet my first customer of the day and sagged when I saw it was only Bridezilla, Gemma McClain. She approached the counter and I noticed she was alone. “Where are all your bridesmaids? I hardly recognized you without your bevy of admirers.”

  She didn’t laugh, but amazingly, she didn’t scowl or snap, either. “I just came to pick up my dress. I didn’t need them here for that, so I came by myself.”

  “Oh, well, would you like to do a final fitting?” I asked, starting to walk around the desk.

  “No,” she said and shook her head. “We’ve had enough fittings and I’m sure you got everything just right.”

  I frowned, because this didn’t sound like Gemma, she was usually a control freak and thensome. “Are you sure?”

  “Yep. Plus, I’m in a hurry.”

  Okay, that made more sense.

  “I just came to pick up my dress and to make sure you got your wedding invitation. Ronda was supposed to have dropped it off.” She paused for a moment and then smiled over at me placidly. “Did she?”

  I was surprised and couldn’t hide it, as my eyebrows reached for the ceiling and I frowned at her. “Yes, she dropped it off.”

  “Oh, good, then are you going to come?”

  “Well, I was planning…” I started.

  “It’s really important that you come,” she interrupted and then gave me a smile as she softened her approach. “I mean… I really want you to come. I asked Ronda to hand deliver your invitation to make sure you got it.” I didn’t get a chance to respond because Gemma quickly looked around the store and saw the scratches on the floor—now they were covering nearly every square inch of the floor. “What’s that?”

  I shook myself out of my stupor. “Just scratches from moving all the clothing racks around.” I figured it was better not to tell her something magical was breaking into my store and leaving mysterious shapes etched in the floor. Instead, I ducked into my office and returned with her dress. “It’s all finished and ready for you.”

  I laid the dress on a section of the worktable not covered by the contraption’s tubes, wires, and tentacles. Gemma didn’t seem to notice the monster anyway. Instead, she watched as I unzipped the protective plastic bag and then she admired the dress and smoothed down the taffeta.

  “And the enchantments are already on it?”

  “Sure are.”

  I helped her pull the dress out of the garment bag and then she took a couple steps back as she held it up by the hanger and let the skirts drape to the ground. “It’s really… beautiful.”

  I tried not to gape at her, tried not to reveal my shock but I wasn’t sure I was successful. I just… I didn’t understand what had gotten into her. Without fail, Gemma had revealed herself as someone who always had something to complain about, and yet… I chose my next words with care. “I hope you and Winston are very happy together.”

  She cast another irresolute glance around the store, but she didn’t seem to see whatever it was she was looking for. Then she faced me again. “So… I don’t think we finished our conversation.”

  “Our conversation?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, about the wedding and whether or not you were going to come?”

  “Oh, right, that conversation.”

  “You should come—I’d really like it if you did.” This was strange, certainly. I’d had a handful of brides I’d worked with since opening Wanda’s Witchery, but not once had any of them invited me to their weddings. Not only had Gemma invited me (and made sure my invitation was hand delivered), but now she was here in person, making sure I was going to attend?

  “Well, thanks,” I started. “I’m honored you invited me.”

  “Were you planning on attending?” she pushed. “I… just wanted to make sure so I have a final count for the caterers and we also have to get a bunch of little placeholders printed with all the guests’ names.”

  “Right.” I took a breath and couldn’t shake the fact that something odd was going on. I just wasn’t sure what that something was. “Yes, I was planning on coming.”

  “Oh, good!” she said and clapped her hands together as I continued to wonder what in the hell had happened to the awful Gemma I’d gotten to know so well over the last month or so. Maybe she was bipolar? Multiple personality disorder? Possessed?

  “Don’t forget to bring a date,” she went on. “Do you have a boyfriend or a husband?”

  I forced a smile. I didn’t have a boyfriend or a husband but I had a Lorcan. “Something like that.”

  She looked over her shoulder again. This time, she left the dress lying on my worktable and walked into the middle of the store. She sauntered among the racks, lifting a few garments, examining them, and then putting them back again. She read the labels and checked out a few handbags. Then she looked up at me.

  “I’m almost finished with my article for the magazine about Wanda’s Witchery.”

  “Oh?” I wasn’t sure whether or not that was a good thing.

  She strolled back to the front desk, still scrutinizing the racks as she passed. “Yep. I’ll definitely recommend you to anyone who needs anything custom made.”