Page 4 of Untraced Magic
When she left, I rested against the doorframe of the entrance to my living room, my gaze veering once more to the boxes taking over much of the space. A place of my own, and somewhere I could finally call home. A new beginning and fresh start, where thesecret I held close to my chest would remain just that.
The sadness that had taken permanent residence in my heart seemed to dim, a warmth discretely filling its place. I walked over to my phone, syncing it with the speaker I'd purposely packed in my bag with me. As the familiar playlist filled the room, my hips moved to the beat.
A smile broke over my face.
These boxes wouldn’t unpack themselves.
Tyler
Dampconcretescuffedmyboots as I shuffled out from under the Camaro I’d been working on, the permanent lack of warmth in this town sinking into every inch of the already drab workshop I owned.
“Tools down. Let’s call it a day!” I yelled, swiping an oily rag off the workbench and running it over my hands.
Wes whooped beside me, steering his gaze to the clock on the wall that read 4 p.m.
“I could get used to this whole knocking off early thing,” he chimed with a grin.
“Don’t get any ideas. I couldn’t work alongsidethatface every day,” I joked, giving him a shove as I walked past.
He jutted out his lip in mock-insult, his hand palming the chest of his stain free coveralls I’d thrown at him earlier. It wasn’t the norm to have Wes around the workshop, as his hands were better suitedto a tattoo gun, but he knew his way around a gear box, and today I needed an extra set of hands.
I flipped over a retired oil drum sitting on top of its base. “You got a hot date or something tonight?” I asked, knowing full-well I’d be lucky to get an honest answer out of the guy, banter being his preferred response to everything.
He flashed me his pearly whites. “Can’t keep them off me. You know that.”
I shook my head with a knowing smile. His pretty-boy image had never failed him where the ladies were concerned. With dark hair, green eyes, and a jaw that could rival the angles my grinder cut, Wes always had women hanging off him.
I cracked open a beer on the side of the drum and passed it to him, then did the same for myself.
“Who’s the lucky lady this time?” my apprentice asked, fishing for details no doubt. I’d only employed Max a couple of weeks ago and already he’d proven worthy of his employment.
Wes tilted his beer in the youngster’s direction, leaning lazily against the work bench that ran the length of the building.
“Real men never kiss and tell,” he retorted with a smirk.
I chuckled to myself from behind my beer. The cheek of the guy. Wes had game, I’d give him that, but Max was none the wiser. I’d known Wes my entire life, having grown up together in the same coven, all but a few years of friendship cemented from a very young age.
I looked at the new guy sitting quietly, his gaze still fixed on my best mate.
“Don’t worry about him,” I said to Max while nodding in Wes’s direction. “Many a man have tried to figure out why women love a cocky guy. Even the elderly woman who lived next to us took aspecial liking to him.” I paused, raising a brow suggestively. “Said his bestassetwas his eyes.”
Wes raised his arms in the air defensively. “Who was I to correct her? She’d flip if she saw therealone.”
Max threw his hand to his mouth, laughter and swallowing his drink at once not working out so well for him.
A heavy chuckle left my lungs at his innuendo.
“Speaking of…” I looked over to Wes, taking a swig of my beer. “I see Betty sold her house. Any clue who the new kids on the block are?”
He shook his head. “I haven’t heard a thing. I’m sure going to miss her pumpkin pie, though. Never did ask her what the spice was she put in it,” he mused.
Betty had been our neighbor for years now. We didn’t see a lot of her, but she’d made a point of coming over with a fresh batch of pumpkin pie every so often, having always made an extra one for us. She was a kind woman, had always lived on her own, but I knew her and the nosey neighbor from across the road could start up their own column in the local news with the amount of gossip I’d heard from over the fence. It was sad to see her go, but she’d downsized to a more manageable section for her age.
Cutters Cove was not your average small town. Every supernatural being imaginable lived in or around here, but we flew under the radar for the most part. Witches, vampires, werewolves… You name it, we had it.
We lived where the veil between here and the Underworld was at its thinnest, and we guarded it with our life. There was an unspokenrule between most of us to remain undetected, to cause no harm to the humans who lived alongside us, oblivious to our kind.
There were a few vampires who conveniently forgot that, with human blood being their preferred main course, but the humans seemed none the wiser.
