Page 20 of An Amateur Witch's Guide to Murder
Topher’s face does something it’s obviously never done before. It’s like in Bambi when baby-Bambi tries to stand and then walk, but it’s happening with Topher’s mouth in the form of a smile trying to figure out how to exist. “Nothing bad. I got back to the hotel without any accidents. I even ate in the hotel restaurant for dinner, and nobody choked.” Cool to clock another thing he should be wary of.
Shit! Had they solved the curse? Disappointment wars with being a decent human being while this sad guy offers the worldhis very first smile over not getting people murdered. But even if the curse has been removed, they still don’t know who cast it, so there’s still a job here. Remind him. “That’s great. We can set you up with a local place that has all the cleanse ingredients. That’s important while we don’t know who’s responsible.”
Topher bobbles, his newborn smile solidifying. “Okay. Yeah. Okay.”
Smiling-Topher might be more alarming than looking-freaked-out-Topher. Mateo doesn’t know what to do with the raw positivity being directed up at him. Stringing Topher along aside, if that cleanse really did do the trick, he’s a little pleased with himself. Not to be petty, but somewhere his mom is hating this for him, so he smiles too.
And Topher smiles even more.
Too much.
It gets weird fast, and now Mateo’s playing smile-chicken.
Luckily, a dead-eyed flight attendant moving through the motions of buckling, oxygen masking, and inflating a dirty yellow vest interrupts them. It’s rote warnings, repeated since time immemorial, but it feels like it’s a little hard to breathe in there. Do they limit air in cabins? Is that a plane thing? It’s okay. He’s fine. Because it would be amazingly unprofessional to freak out on a plane next to your client who you asked to fly you to San Fran—one of three offices the dad could have been at. Thank fuck he wasn’t a five-hour flight away in New York.
Ophelia catches the flight attendants’ attention as soon as he’s done with his spiel. “I’m going to sleep but I want any and all food and drinks. Just make a pile. Beer.” Message delivered, she slumps in her seat, and the plane starts moving.
Mateo enacts a The Thinker pose, pretending he’s not in a tube about to rocket into the sky. Everyone says you’re morelikely to crash in a car than a plane. Except cars can’t fall out of the fucking sky, and most people don’t have a death-causing-curse guy strapped in beside them.
“You can hold my hand if that’ll help. I mean, because sometimes that helps. It might help. When I was little, that helped,” Topher offers, those wide eyes trained on him in concern.
Mateo wants to say that’s not necessary, but then loud hell noises start up and the plane lurches forward, gaining horrible speed. It’s not a decision so much as a necessity, and Mateo two-hands Topher’s arm like he’s been tasked with keeping the limb in place or dying. They ascend for approximately ten years before stomach-lurching sensations finally level off.
“Sorry,” Mateo says in a strangled voice, prying his fingers off of Topher. He glances to Ophelia and for once thanks the whole goddamned universe that she’s got her legs bent over the seat beside her, head lolling against the window, dead to the world.
“It’s okay,” Topher whispers.
It’s not lost on Mateo that Topher’s just said the thing he keeps saying to Topher. And that’s twice now—first time was the Dagger Lady situation—this wraith of a guy has been more together than Mateo in a stressful situation. It feels out of character, but Topher did seek him out and fly to another state to hire him, which kind of makes him an industrious man of action, as insane as those descriptors are when he’s looking at Topher’s cat-that’s-seen-a-cucumber gaze. And it’s really emphasizing what a shit job Mateo’s doing maintaining his just-fabricated professional persona.
But at some point, the plane needs to land and there’s a cursed guy beside him, so Mateo might as well make it thrice. “I’m absolutely gonna need to do that again on the way down.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Having never been further than Mount Rainier National Park, a two-hour drive from his house—forty-five minutes if Ophelia’s driving—Mateo squints in acute goth pain as glittery water and too blue sky make themselves known outside their arrival gate. Ophelia’s gigantic shades have transformed from hangover-obscuring to correct for the environment.
They follow Topher, who power walks them to the pickup area in front of a line of identical black cars. His head bobs around on his skinny neck with purpose until a tall, well-built man in a suit steps out of the wall of vehicles. He introduces himself as Quincy. Amazing lashes and a startlingly dulcet speaking voice. His suit is department store off-the-rack but tailored. The kind guys own only on the off-chance they’ll get invited to a wedding. Nice but notnice.
Quincy collects Topher’s expensive-definitely-leather backpack, holds out a hand for Mateo and Ophelia’s very-not-expensive-definitely-vinyl backpacks, and then herds them into a big, organized-crime vibes SUV. Doesn’t miss a beat when Ophelia holds out a hand like an old-timey starlet wantingassistance and doesn’t react to her gremlin-crawl into the backmost seat.
“We meeting your dad now?” Ophelia asks as Mateo and Topher settle into the seat in front of her, which is super regrettable. Mateo had been hoping not to sit next to Topher, not sure what to do with himself after the cumulative twenty minutes of handholding. Not that there was even a reason to be weird about it. Just two business professionals holding hands while one desperately prays to any gods of aviation he can think of. Standard guy stuff.
Topher’s not making it weird. He’s fighting his seat belt.
“My dad said he’d be available sometime between one and five.” Topher’s putting all his concentration into seat belt buckling because he’s said something insane.
“That’s a four-hour window, hours from now,” Ophelia is incapable of not pointing out.
“Yes. Well. Yes. But he’s busy. I mean, he’s always busy,” Topher flusters. “But he said he’d meet. And I said it was important. Really important. So. So he’ll probably talk to you. I mean, if he’s not too busy. But he’ll really try to, I think.”
Maybe the dad doesn’t believe the curse stuff, but the idea of this frantic baby ostrich of a guy goggling in distress at a parent and getting a four-hour window is pretty shit. Two data points on dad: Wall Street and this. Huge asshole energy. “We’ll make it work,” Mateo soothes.
Quincy pulls smoothly into the line of cars leaving the airport, and Mateo relaxes a little. The cleanse is keeping things in check, and asking a few questions can’t be that difficult. Looking around Topher’s house for clues also feels like an obvious thing to do. Bonus, there’s no chance any of them will get stabbed here, since Dagger Lady’s a state away.
And sure, his mom’s spell book is in his carry-on bag where he’d stashed it last second, but it’s not as irresponsible as it sounds. He’s not going to use it. It’s just not smart to leave it exposed in an unattended house. Everyone’s safer if it’s with him.
“Can you get jetlag from a two-hour flight?” Ophelia asks as they ride the elevator to the lobby.
“They call that a hangover,” Mateo says, double checking that his tie is straight.
