Page 49 of An Amateur Witch's Guide to Murder
Disappeared from right in front of him on the table.
He sits there, panting from the memory of pain, agog and uncomprehending. No clue how much time passes as he tries to process what just happened or how or where an entire evil book could go. He’d so definitely summoned something, connected with it just long enough to register that it wasn’t happy to see him there.
Everything else on the table is scorched all to shit. There’s a smoldering pile of ash where the statue was, and he has a sense the thing he’d summoned did that. He’d made her angry—which feels like a bad thing to do to something that felt that powerful—but he’d also made her scared.
More critically, did the book burn too? There’s no remnant of the pages, no ash, no paper stink among all the other stinks of charred remains and wood. He can’t even be scared that he’s absolutely fucked the surface of the expensive hotel table, a problem that would have sent him into hysterics not twenty-four hours ago. Losing the book is the worst thing that could happen.
Except it’s not.
Because he sees his hands next. He stares at them, heart kicking a chaotic beat of confused revulsion against a rib cage that feels different.
He gets to his feet and nearly goes right back down. Something is wrong with his legs. “The proportions,” he thinks wildly, stumbling into the little writing desk at the edge of the main room, scrambling to get himself to the bathroom, to understand what’s happening. He smacks his head solidly against the top of the doorframe, which is amazingly dense in this panicked moment and utterly incomprehensible.
He’s a tall guy, but not that tall.
He ducks, gets into the bathroom, but seeing doesn’t help. A brief look in the mirror is all he can manage, his normal dizzying reflection pulsing in a new, alarming way, and he can’t stand to look at it.
He’d gotten the gist, though.
It’s extremely bad.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Ophelia tears the price tag off the largest pair of lobby gift shop sunglasses she could find and hands them to Mateo. Little rhinestones that he’d normally be repulsed by line the edges, but he puts them on without complaint, and she considers him. “You just look famous and bad at hiding it.”
Bold-faced lie. She’s being positive, which is a sure sign that things are shit. He is tofamous person bad at hiding itas she is tosparkling and peppy.
“Think he’ll notice?” Mateo asks weakly and Ophelia cracks her shitty smile. She’s trying her best to act like this isn’t super bad so he’s trying his best to act like he believes her.
Of all the nonsense things he’s done in his life, trying a spell from his extremely evil mother’s extremely evil spell book that had recently lit him on fire was truly the most top-tier dumbassery. Every waking moment of his life he’s been afraid of the thing hiding inside him. Now it’s not hiding. He’d coaxed it out. Undeniably a dude with a demon problem—sitting on a couch in a hotel room wearing shades, a medical mask, a beanie, women’swool gloves, and a XXXL hoodie declaring his love for the vibes of San Francisco that Ophelia found up the street.
Andhe’s destroyed the little lady figure, maybe alerting something scary where he is, and lost the spell book.
A knock at the room door and Ophelia bounds over to get it. Another sign he’s living his worst life because she’s being exceedingly helpful.
Mateo’s customer service game is strong, maybe one of the best, but the way Quincy steps in, pauses at the sight of Mateo in a baffling assortment of face- and body-obscuring accessories, nods in greeting, and turns back to Ophelia without a series of frantic questions is a thing of legend. Topher better pay him well.
“Anything new?” Ophelia asks, which is good because Mateo’s not quite worked out how to talk well around all the teeth in his mouth.
“No.” There’s weariness in Quincy’s tone. “Christopher isn’t answering. Not that I think he’d be helpful. I called the law firm of the dead lawyer and got assurances someone else was sent to represent Topher, but that’s all they’d tell me.” No one wants to talk to the driver.
Ophelia wanders to the AC controls and blasts them, which Mateo appreciates deeply through his stifling layers and fogging up shades. “Any clue where Nystrom Senior is?” she asks.
“Usually work at this time of day, but his kid is in jail,” Quincy says with another glance at Mateo. He so super wants to ask. But again, Quincy’s too Customer-Service-powerful, and shifts his gaze back to Ophelia. “I stuck around the jail for a while, but Christopher never showed. Maybe I missed him, but—” He doesn’t finish. They all know. Christopher’s a dick, so it’s highly probable he didn’t come to his son’s aid.
Ophelia, phone to ear, holds up a hand for quiet. After a moment, in an impressive polite-society voice, she says, “Hello, I’m calling for Mr. Nystrom. This is Cynthia on behalf of McBrian and Associates Law. Mr. McBrian is on the line with an urgent matter.” Silence for a few beats and then, “Very good. Thank you.” She lowers the phone. “Left forty minutes ago.”
“Could be going home. Could be going anywhere,” Quincy says, looking despondent. He’d probably hoped their arrival would help, but at the end of the day, they’re all the hired help.
Careful to enunciate each word, Mateo asks, “What are you thinking, Phee?”
“That Christopher knows something, and we suddenly have a persuasive way to force it out of him.” She looks pointedly at Mateo.
Right. Mateo would absolutely love to scare the shit out of a middle-aged asshole like this. It’s a brilliant plan if they can find Christopher—but also, what’s Mateo going to do right after that? And right after that? He can’t fly like this, which ruins any plan about going to Puerto Rico and scouring the island for brujas who might know what his mother did. If it wasn’t so hard to use his phone with claws, he’d be researching container ships. Didn’t Dracula travel that way? Isn’t it bad that he’s narrowed his life choices to the same ones as Dracula?
Beneath the medical mask, his mouth is filling with black goo, the sensation oddly soothing, and he suddenly can’t remember why any of that matters, his thoughts drifting out of focus. What’s he supposed to be doing?Figuring out how to find and eat Christopher.
No. Wait. Shit.
