Page 18 of A Warlock for Halloween

“Let’s get to know each other and see what happens, okay?”

Beautifully long and strong fingers tenderly grasp my face. When his lips cover mine, I kiss him back, pouring all my budding feelings into the kiss.

EPILOGUE

NATALIE

Okay, it didn’t take much to fall in love with my prickly warlock. I’m a regular, average human, but this soul mate thing is real and ever since I first saw him, I was drawn to him.

The more time I spent with him, the harder it became to be apart. Before long, it was painful for me to have him leave my house or me leave his and I would come up with excuses for him to pop by my work for lunch together- which he was happy to do.

That charming French restaurant he took me to? It’s in France and because I love it, he took me there every week on a date. The idea of dates was foreign to him as his kind instantly know their soul mate and pretty much immediately exchange heart vows. With me being human, exceptions were to be made and thankfully Ambrose was willing to show me his love and devotion as it took me a little longer to be ready to commit myself to him for all time.

And by longer, it took me two months before I could admit to myself that I was completely in love with a man almost four hundred years older than me. Good thing I’m okay with age gaps!

Another lovely twist is that it turns out monsters have pets too and there just so happened to be a part-time opening in the pet clinic on the monster side of town. Yes, there’s a monsterand a human side. Something I never in my wildest imagination thought was possible. It was eye opening for sure.

Not only was magic real, but so was the bogeyman. Great guy, really good work ethic, horrible breath though.

Almost any monster imageable was in fact real. And interacting with them on a daily basis, while at first daunting, became my new norm. They were just people…okay, maybe not people, but still, they were just living their lives and going about their business like everyone else.

Ambrose and his sisters run their shop, Trice Adored, and while I’m never going to be a witch, I love helping out and smelling all the amazing soaps, lotions, and creams they come up with. And gossiping with his sisters.

They are hilarious and his sister Patience was only slightly put off by my boring human status. Silvia, the youngest sister at two hundred and twenty-eight, didn’t care and embraced me as warmly as if I were a witch. I love going over to her house for game night. Even if I swear every one in their family cheats.

Ambrose finally did a better job of introducing me to Tom, his familiar. And yeah, he’s definitely opinionated and, at times, obnoxious, but he’s a cat, so that’s expected.

After I sold my house and moved in with Ambrose, I got a kitten of my own. Claire is like me, regular and average with not a drop of magic to her. When Tom took too much of a likening to her, I insisted he either get fixed or had to stay away from her. Ambrose took care of that issue so now I don’t have to worry about Claire having babies before she’s old enough to get fixed herself. That definitely relieved my mind and made me comfortable enough to not worry about her when both Ambrose and I are busy with work or out having fun.

Which is good because lately, Ambrose’s sisters have been letting me handle the shop by myself for a bit.

One Saturday, I’m there alone when an extremely disgruntled werewolf comes in. A werewolf with bright purple fur.

Charging into the shop like his tail is on fire, he sweeps out his long arms, knocking over a display case full of moisturizer before turning his attention onto the rows of carefully stacked bottles of lotion. Bottles that I just finished arranging.

“Don’t even think about it, buddy,” I snap, marching over to him.

Bright yellow eyes roll my way as his massive paw twitches less than an inch from the bottom row of bottles.

“Your fur conditioner turned my fur purple!” he roars.

“Which conditioner?”

Lowering his paw, he stomps over to another display and points a claw at a blue rinse one made to enhance silver hair.

“What color was your fur before?”

“Red,” he snarls as his big feet shuffle in place.

I grab a bottle and turn it around so the label is facing him. “Says right here only for use on silver hair.” I tap at the small print to emphasize my point.

“Give me that!” He swipes it out of my hand and brings the bottle close to his snout, his yellow eyes narrowing as he reads.

Smiling, I wait patiently.

His shaggy head lowers, and he carefully places the bottle back. “Umm… so it does. Sorry about that.”

“It happens. Would you like a clarifier to get the purple out?”

---