Page 22 of Haunt Improvement
Daisy rushed to the window, and her eyes swelled with terror.She swallowed a scream of her own before she found her voice.“Are those...snakes?”
Chapter 9
DYLAN STOOD AT THEwindow next to his ghostly father.They both seemed frozen in time, taking impossibly too long to make sense of what was happening outside.
“Well?”I hissed, still splayed on the floor with our daughter.The warm fuzzies were wearing off, and my body hurt all over.
“Those aren’t snakes,” Papa Ernesto said.
“Thank the Wiz—”
“They’re boas,” Dylan cut me off, dashing what was left of my rainbows.“Cuban boas.Withfuckingwings.”
“Not in front of bitty bat, Uncle D.”Asher placed his little hands over the baby’s ears, but she had dozed off, completely unbothered by our predicament.
“What do we do,” Daisy asked, voice quaking.A shiver rocked her shoulders, and she hugged herself.
Since no one else was stepping up, I gave it a shot.“Call the Country Club,” I told DeeDee.“Let Zelda know we have a serious problem and to send backup.”
DeeDee bound out of the room in search of a phone, leaving my petrified in-laws gaping out the window.Thunder rolled as the sky darkened once more, but it was a lazy rumble, muted by my exhaustion.My body wanted sleep.Lots of it.But my mind was crawling with too much dread to allow such luxuries.
More chaos echoed up from downstairs, and then Broomzilla zipped into the room, racing a frantic circle above us before realizing how much she’d missed—the baby, the ghost, the leftover cake.
“Margo is in no shape for riding,” Dylan scolded her.“And none of the bat Shifters are to go outside until Zelda gets here and takes care of this.Those areCubanboas,” he pointed out again.“Theyeatfruit bats.”
“We’re their main diet,” Ernesto added.“They form groups and hang in curtains at the mouths of our caves, waiting to snatch us out of the air.”
“Who needs a curtain of snakes when they have wings?”Daisy scooped up Asher as he tried to sneak past her to the window.
“I wanna see,” he protested.
“Is this room the safest one we could be in right now?”Daisy asked, ignoring her son’s griping.
“It won’t be for much longer,” I told her, digging deep to stir the storm cauldron.I handed my wittle witch to Hermosa and grabbed the corner of the changing table, pulling myself upright.My knees wobbled, and I almost went back down.
“Careful,mija.”Hermosa’s brow creased, but she tried to keep her voice low, not wanting to wake the baby.“You are not at your best.Let the Booboo Yoyo witch handle this.You need rest.”
