Page 88 of Fresh Old Bounties

Dru made a shushing noise, and I assumed I wasn’t supposed to spoil her treasure hunting fun. When her investigation revealed nothing but fabric glued to a piece of hard carton, she repeated the action on the back cover.

“This has to be the key.” Dru went back to the start of the book and carefully read the list of names written on the first page.

The key to something, at least. “I think the man who tried to break into Ian’s is the same one who hired our robber.”

Dru glanced up. “Why would it be the same?”

Hard to explain without revealing the truth about Ian’s hitman ex-partner and his files and the file on Grandma. “Too much coincidence.”

“I doubt it. If that guy wanted the spellbook, he’d have come here, not the cemetery.”

“Maybe he did, but the dogs stopped him.”

“Then he’d try another day.”

It was killing me not to spill the beans about Grandma’s file, but that was one secret most definitely not mine to share.

“Whoever hired that man to rob us?—”

“The bastard,” Dru muttered.

“Whoever it was must think alchemy is real.”

“Or wants to sell it to someone who thinks it’s real.”

The shop’s landline began ringing, and I picked up the receiver automatically. “The Tea Cauldron.”

“It didn’t work,” a female voice whispered harshly from the other side.

I tried to place it but came up lost. “Excuse me?”

“The love potion. It didn’t work!”

Oh, good Mother. Holly the teen. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure! She drank the coffee and nothing happened.”

Considering the contents of the fake love potion, I feared for their target’s taste buds more than her chances of falling under a spell. “Does your friend have any love potion left?”

“I think so. Why? Did she not use enough? I used half of what you gave me and it worked. Did you mess up? Are you trying to scam us?”

I glanced at the shop, searching for inspiration. My gaze fell on the cabinet of horrors—Bagley’s old dark magic supplies cabinet. “Tell her to use it to bake cookies.”

“Cookies?”

“Yes. Use whatever is left to make cookies, then give them to whoever it is.” If cookies had worked for the evil hag to charm a whole town, it’d surely work for a single teenage girl to charm her crush.

“But we don’t know how to bake cookies.”

“Check a video online. Good luck!”

I hung up and returned to Dru. She had already gone through most of the written pages and was staring at the last entry, by yours truly.

“You added a grilled ham and cheese sandwich recipe to your grandmother’s spellbook,” she said without inflection.

My chest expanded with pride, and my smile widened to match. “It’s a family recipe.”

“It’s butter, bread, ham, and cheese.”

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