Whatever Andre said to that was lost in the spasm of panic that shot straight up my spine. Because facing the windows, I had a front row seat of Kenzie Chase: vlogger, influencer, and general pain in the neck, strolling up to the door of my shop, her phone already out and filming before she even set foot inside.

  “Oh, God, Andre, I’ll have to call you back. I’ve got a code blonde over here.”

  “A code what?”

  I’d have to apologize later for hanging up on him, but the idea of even part of my conversation with Andre getting filmed and overheard by however many thousand followers made me sick to my stomach.

  “And here we are in Haven Hollow’s own quaint little potion shop, called Poppy’s Potions.” Kenzie smirked into her phone. “Here, they allegedly sell ‘magic potions’ to tourists, so it should be interesting to see if there’s anything of substance.” She turned her camera to pan the room. “Admittedly, it does look like it could be haunted... by the ghost of a nineteenth century dentist’s office.”

  I tried not to bristle, knowing that Kenzie was just trying to get a reaction. From reading the group chat, she’d been getting more and more antagonistic to anyone she talked to, apparently trying to get them angry enough that they let something slip. It had been a good thing that Fifi was in the Half-Moon when Kenzie had breezed in, or Roy might have launched her straight out of town like a javelin.

  That didn’t keep her comments from hurting my feelings, though. I’d worked hard on my shop, and I was proud of what I’d accomplished here. I wasn’t about to let a nasty girl with a camera tear it down.

  Kenzie swung the camera my way. “Are you the owner of this place?”

  The years might have been long behind me, but I’d been a twenty-something girl before. So, I recognized the gleam in Kenzie’s eyes, like a coyote watching to see if their bite had drawn blood. A little girl acting up for an audience. She wanted me to flinch, to get defensive, she ‘won’ if I did.

  So, even though I wanted to boot her behind right out the door, and maybe give her a piece of my mind in the process, I just slapped on my very best customer service smile and folded my hands on the counter. I would be the bigger person. “I’m Poppy, yes.” And then I used the phrase that Henner had taught me, magic words to deal a mortal blow to the horrible little gremlin. “And I don’t consent to being recorded.”

  Instantly, Kenzie’s smirk disappeared and her face soured like spoiled milk. She glared at me as she shoved her phone back into her pocket. I’d have to thank Henner for that little nugget later.

  She might still be recording, but with that one little phrase, she wouldn’t be able to post any of it online or she’d risk getting sued. That would have to be good enough for now.

  Her face still set in petulant lines, Kenzie glared around the store. Then she shot me a look. “Okay, but for real. The potion thing is just marketing, right? What are they actually, perfume? Essential oils?”

  “There are essential oils in them, yes, and some do smell very nice. But no, they aren’t perfume—just as the shop sign says—they’re potions.”

  Kenzie rolled her eyes in the way that only those who had recently been teenagers could. “Okay, sure.” She picked up one potion from a display in front of her. “Confidence,” she read the label, before looking back at me. “So, what, I drink this, and it makes me feel more sure of myself, is that it? Nice placebo effect.”

  My smile got a little tighter, and my fingers twisted together. “I wouldn’t suggest you drink it, unless you want some serious stomach issues. All my potions are meant to be worn on the skin. And as for that one, you could anoint your throat with it, especially if public speaking scares you.”

  She set the potion back down on the counter a little too hard, and I just barely held back my wince. “Sure. Let’s see, potions for sleeping, potions for energy, potions for dreams. All nice and vague, so the power of suggestion can do its work. Typical.” Then she snorted.

  Against my will, a flush started in my chest and crept up my throat into my cheeks. And that power within me began to boil, began to leach from my core, down into my extremities and it was all I could do to keep a lid on it, to keep it under control. But I managed, thank God.

  “It’s not just the ‘power of suggestion’, actually. You–”

  “So, what exactly about them makes them magic?” she asked, talking right on top of me. She picked up another bottle, a delicate purple one with a potion guaranteed to encourage sweet dreams inside. She popped the cork and took a curious sniff, lavender scent ghosting into the air. “Is magic one of the ingredients? Water from some mystic spring? A special cauldron, maybe?”

  “No,” I answered.

  She smirked, and half-stuffed the topper back into the bottle, then set it carelessly back on the shelf. The bottle wobbled precariously, and I had to lunge out from behind the counter to catch it before it could shatter on the ground.

  My heart shot up into my throat as I clutched the potion bottle, still not quite believing I’d caught it in time. The memory of the last time someone had dropped a potion in Haven Hollow was still pretty darn vivid. Yeah, sure, Wanda had gotten a pseudo daughter out of the deal, but the resulting explosion had also taken out the entire front of her store, and her shop window. I wasn’t taking any chances.

  “How about you head back out the door, since it’s clear you’re not interested in anything I sell.”

  Kenzie actually laughed.

  The power hiding behind my rib cage fluttered and stirred, like something waking up from hibernation.

  “No, but seriously.” She leaned against my counter, rolling another potion bottle across the wooden surface negligently with two fingers. “Magic potions—this is a joke, right? Just something for the tourists? You must rake in the cash from naïve idiots. But props to you, I respect the hustle.”

  If I ground my teeth together any harder, I was worried I was going to wear my enamel down to dust. It took everything in me not to smack her hands away from the potion, or pluck it out of her loose grasp and set it back down safely. “Maybe you should try one before you dismiss them as a hoax, or a joke.”

  For someone who built up her brand chasing down paranormal events, Kenzie seemed to be a pretty hardcore skeptic. I wondered how much of this act she was putting on was just for her audience. But then I reminded myself that she couldn’t post any of it. Could she post the audio? Hmm, I wasn’t sure about that. I’d have to let Henner known asap so he could scrub anything she attempted to upload.

  The bell above the door chimed, and Taliyah Morgan stepped into the store. She was wearing her glamor, so she looked like a no-nonsense, middle-aged woman with gray streaked hair and lines around her mouth and eyes.

  Even through her sunglasses, I could tell she was glaring at Kenzie. “Miss Chase, I’ve been getting a number of reports about you harassing townspeople and local businesses. I’m not sure how things work wherever you come from, but we have rules and laws in this town and one of them states that you’re not permitted to interfere with people’s lives and their livelihood. Especially not for your little videos.”

  “Well, she was just leaving,” I said and then gave Kenzie a look that said if she knew what was good for her, she’d do exactly that.

  Instead, Kenzie scowled and crossed her arms. Her hip jutted to one side. “Oh, I get it.” She gave us both a narrow-eyed look. “You’re both in on it.”

  “In on what?” Taliyah nearly spat the words at her.

  “The conspiracy happening in this town. You’re just trying to shut me down.” She laughed, a nasty sound. “Well, it’s not going to work.”

  “There is no conspiracy.” Taliyah’s face screwed up with the words, and I knew she hated to say them. She, and her brother before her, the previous Chief Morgan, had been convinced that there was a cult operating in town. It wasn’t until Taliyah’s seal broke that she learned the truth, and realized just what the town was hiding. Cain never had—well, not until he possessed Darla and learned the truth.

  “You’ve already been warned, so now you need to move along, unless you’d like to spend the night behind bars. I don’t think you’ll find much there to amuse your followers.”

  Kenzie stalked towards the door, glaring at both of us. “You’re probably being paid off by whoever’s in charge around here.”

  I winced, and Taliyah’s face darn near turned to stone. She didn’t take accusations of corruption lightly, and by the way the temperature was dropping in the shop, she was about three seconds away from making Kenzie Chase regret her words.

  Kenzie paused, her eyes wide and darting around as she held out her hands to either side of her. “Wait, do you feel that? It just got way colder in here! There might be a paranormal event occurring!”

  She then fumbled for her phone, and I used the distraction to wipe a streak of frost off the counter.

  “Out,” Taliyah and I barked in unison. I even pointed towards the door.

  So, potions were hokum, but ghosts and ‘paranormal events’ were real? Hmph.

  Eventually, and with a lot of bad grace, Kenzie stalked out the door. “This isn’t going to stop me. I’m going to get to the bottom of whatever is going on in this town.”

  “Keep doing what you’re doing and the only thing you’re going to get to the bottom of is your own jail cell,” Taliyah answered.

  The bell jangled angrily as Kenzie slammed the door, and then she was gone. I came out from around the counter to stand beside Taliyah as we watched the girl stalk off.

  “Not that I’m not grateful for the rescue, but how did you know to show up?” Taliyah normally had really excellent timing, but this was a little bit too excellent, even for her.

  “Andre called me,” she said without looking at me. Her eyes were still plastered on Kenzie, who strode across Main Street, clearly heading for Wanda’s Witchery. “He said you might need someone to scare off our brand-new nuisance.”

  A bubble of bright happiness rose up in my chest. I’d have to thank Andre the next time I spoke to him. Taliyah was exactly the person I’d needed, someone official enough to run Kenzie off without looking suspicious.

  “Thank you.” I watched a bit longer. Kenzie was definitely heading for Wanda’s shop. “Um, should we stop her?”

  A tiny little smirk curled Taliyah’s mouth, ruining her scary cop face. “Nah. Maverick’s working today.”

  I could see the tall shadow of Wanda’s cousin lurking just inside the door to the shop. He waited until Kenzie was just about in arm’s reach of the door, and then he reached out, flipped the sign on the door to ‘closed’, and turned the lock in her face.

  Kenzie gave the door a few futile tugs before scowling and storming off.

  I, meanwhile, almost pulled something trying not to giggle. Even Taliyah seemed to be fighting back a laugh.

  Then her phone rang, and after she answered it with a short, “Chief Morgan,” her smile vanished like frost in the sun.

  Chapter Twelve

  Since Taliyah stalked out without expressly telling me not to follow her, I flipped the sign to closed, locked up, and hurried out of the store after her.

  She must have been okay with that, because she just grunted when I caught up with her.

  “Is everything okay?” I asked, slightly out of breath from jogging to keep up with her longer stride.

  Taliyah’s mouth tightened. “There’s been another incident.”

  I winced, giving a furtive look around to see if Kenzie was still in the area, but I didn’t see even a glimpse of blonde hair, so she must have found someone else to terrorize. “Is whatever the object is big? Maybe we should call Roy, in case we need help moving it?”

  A complicated series of expressions passed over Taliyah’s face, until it finally settled on tired and stressed. “I don’t think that’s going to be possible.”

  She wouldn’t say any more until we reached her cruiser.

  “I’m coming with you,” I said as I reached for the passenger door.

  “Suit yourself.”

  A short drive later, I understood what she meant with a sinking heart.

  Trellway fountain had existed pretty much since Haven Hollow was founded. It was the centerpiece of one of the larger parks in the area, with its three tiers and sparkling white basin. People liked to throw coins in it, thinking doing so brought them good luck. I didn’t know much about the luck part, but I’d always enjoyed seeing it whenever Finn and I stopped in to play frisbee, or have a little picnic dinner when the weather was nice.

  Normally, the fountain filled me with a soothing calm—listening to the cheerful burble of the water trickling down from its tiered basins. But all I felt at the moment was dread when I caught sight of the white stone which had been turned to brilliant gold.

  It wasn’t just the fountain itself that had turned to gold, either. The water in the basins, and a thin jet of it rising into the air, had also solidified into a gaudy, shining mess. The whole thing, top to bottom, was now gold. Thank goodness the park wasn’t normally busy at this time of day, or there would have been a gaggle of people clustered around, taking more pictures and posting them online, and drawing the attention of a persistent blonde vlogger.

  Instead, there was only one woman waiting anxiously by the north entrance of the park, with her little dog that was sniffing here and there, completely unconcerned. I’d seen this particular woman around town before, but I’d never spoken to her. As she stood there, she wrung her hands together and reminded me a bit of a mushroom; short, stocky, with a cap of sleek white hair and watery pale eyes. She was bundled up in a thick pink coat, even though it really wasn’t that cool outside.

  Her dog looked a bit like a bristle brush. He was a tiny thing, with his coarse, dark hair sticking out at every angle—not like he was unkempt, but more that his fur seemed to have picked a direction and grown that way. He looked like a big guinea pig, until he raised his little muzzle from the ground, and his little ears perked up. And that little face was enough to warm anyone’s heart.

  As soon as we were in range, the woman started babbling.

  “I’m so sorry to trouble you, your Highness—”

  Taliyah raised a hand. “Please, call me Chief Morgan.”

  The woman nodded. “Well, Chief Morgan, I didn’t know who else to call. All sorts of humans use this park, and I know there’s been trouble lately, and this... well, this is beyond my ability to fix.”

  Clearly, the woman, whatever court or flavor, was a faerie. No one else would ever call Taliyah by her winter court title.

  “You did the right thing, Dottie. Thank you for calling.”

  Dottie’s slightly pasty cheeks flushed pink. The little dog eyed us, and deciding that I was probably not a threat to him and his owner, squared up to Taliyah. He let out a squeaky little growl, and Dottie immediately scooped him up, holding him close to her chest.

  “Reginald,” she scolded. “Be polite to Chief Morgan.”

  Reginald didn’t look repentant in the least.

  Taliyah, meanwhile, eyed the fountain like it was radioactive. Then she swept her suit jacket back with her wrists as she propped her hands on her hips, putting her badge on display either deliberately or through habit. “When did you first notice the fountain?”

  Dottie chewed her thick bottom lip. “Well, Reginald and I like to come here in the mornings, early, so about eight o’clock?”

  “Eight?” Taliyah turned to stare at her. “That was hours ago. Why did you wait so long to call?”

  Dottie blanched, all the color draining back out of her cheeks. She clutched Reginald to her chest, and the little dog sneezed at Taliyah.

  “I’m so sorry. I didn’t want to be a bother. And I thought that maybe the fountain would just turn back on its own, some things have turned to gold have turned back on their own, you know. But then it didn’t, and there are a lot of people here in the afternoons, especially once the school lets out, and I wasn’t sure what to do.”

  She was right. We weren’t far from Finn’s school and school would be over in about fifteen minutes. Probably a hundred kids would soon be cutting through the park on their way home. Finn would have been one of them—well, if he weren’t home sick, that is. And on that note, I glanced at my phone as discretely as I could. There was still no answer from my last text, and a jittery, anxious feeling was coiling tighter in my stomach.

  It was pretty obvious that Taliyah was counting to ten in her head, trying not to snap. I thought if she said a harsh word to Dottie, the older woman might actually wither up and blow away.

  “I understand,” Taliyah said carefully. “But the longer this... gold fountain is out in the open, the more likely it is that someone else will stumble across it. Human someone elses. And then we’ve got a real mess on our hands.”

  Dottie visibly brightened, setting Reginald back down on the ground where he took up a protective stance in front of her. “Oh! No, I know, that’s why I hid it.”

  I glanced between Taliyah and the beaming Dottie. Taliyah seemed to be having a moment, so I asked, hesitantly. “Hid it?”

  She nodded so hard that her white hair flew around her face. “Yes, I hid the fountain.”

  Taliyah and I both turned and looked at the huge, gleaming, obvious gold fountain that was still squatting in the middle of the park. It wasn’t very hidden. At all.

  “You did?” Taliyah asked, her voice dry.

  That seemed to fluster Dottie a little. “Oh, well, not from you two, obviously. But I hid it from the humans.”

  I was arguably human, but I guessed I had enough magic not to be included in that category. But I didn’t see any barriers, or arcane symbols like Wanda or the rest of the coven might have used to hide such an enormous object. Dottie hadn’t even thrown a big blanket over it or anything similar. “Hid it how?”