Strangetown Girl (Welcome To Witch County Book 1)

  Welcome to Witch County

  #1

  C.M. Cevis

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  SMALLTOWN GIRL

  First edition. March 2, 2021.

  Copyright © 2021 C.M. Cevis.

  Written by C.M. Cevis.

  Dedicated to my daughters, Noelani and Rain. For being my reasons.

  Cover by the ridiculously talented Carol Marques.

  1

  ~*~

  The old revolver appeared in her hand again, the heft of it familiar. She remembered that gun. She remembered lifting it that night. Most importantly, she remembered who had given it to her and why. She checked to make sure it was fully loaded before slipping it into her purse. After a final glance in the mirror, she left the house.

  She’d been told not to come back until he was gone, and she had no intention of failing.

  ~*~

  LUNA’S EYES OPENED AS SUNLIGHT blasted across her face. It was always like that in her bedroom, and she never allowed herself to get annoyed about it since she had been the one who just had to have the gauzy yellow curtains to decorate her space in the bed and breakfast.

  It always struck her as funny that hers was the only house in all of Calidity that didn’t have a mature shade tree butted up to it. That ever-present greenness was one of the things that drew people to the small northeastern town. It was a haven for nature, fresh air, and four seasons that all seemed to show off when it was their turn on stage.

  The town of Calidity had a surprisingly good tourist season going, but not an overwhelming one. Not too many people knew about it, and the people who lived there liked it that way. Luna had ended up there years ago through circumstances beyond her control and had fallen in love with everything about the town. She’d never seen herself as a small-town girl, yet there she was, making the choice several times a week to walk down to the dock with a book and the intention of reading until it got too dark to see.

  The bed and breakfast had been something of an impulse decision after seeing the large and rather ornate house for sale. It had been on the market for a while, and the asking price had been reduced repeatedly. Luna had no idea why no one wanted the place. It was well taken care of and filled with an old and elegant sort of charm. She’d taken the status of the listing as a sign that it had been waiting for her and signed on the dotted line as soon as she was able.

  The business was named Luna & Liza’s, or L & L’s for short. Like the town, she did a pretty steady business. On nights where the load was light, she’d host game nights, dinner parties, and movies for the people in town. She loved hosting, and since everyone in Calidity was polite, the cleanup wasn’t usually too bad.

  As her brain began to wake up, Luna remembered her current guest, who was leaving that morning, had requested pancakes, eggs, and bacon as her parting meal, and Luna had no problem honoring the request.

  The kitchen of the house was one of the rooms that Luna had fallen in love with. It was one of those kitchens that looked like it was built for big families and entertaining. Counters hugged the walls halfway around the rather large room, and each had its own matching cabinet above so that there was never a reason to say you didn’t have a place to put things. The counter tops were older and had been a bit beat up when Luna took possession of the place, so she’d put down the fake stuff that looked like a big marble sticker in the meantime. Replacing the countertops was one of the things on her list to do, and she’d already picked out the tops that she wanted. Having the money to do it was another thing altogether.

  The entry to the kitchen was one of those old wooden sliding doors where the panels slid into the walls to hide away when not in use. They were made of real wood, so they were heavy and old, well used, and full of life. They made Luna feel warm and loved, as if every person that had grown up happily in that house was there and hugging her. She was never getting rid of those doors.

  The floors had been linoleum when she’d moved in, which Luna hated, and her first learning project was putting down wood flooring in there. She’d used the easy kind, where the slats slid into each other and snapped into place, so you didn’t have to mess with wood glue and all of the mess that normally would have ensued. The floor was holding up well, and she loved the feeling of sliding across the smooth floors into the room when she was having a good morning.

  She had two big, solid, gas burning stoves in one corner, a large, industrial fridge in the other, and counters and islands everywhere in between. She’d put a good size table on the far side that sat four, but no bigger since the island sat a few as well. There was a full dining room on the other side of the wall for when she had larger groups, not to mention several sitting areas, some around a fireplace and some around a TV. The last thing that kitchen needed was more sitting space. No, it needed to feel warm and alive It needed to provide comfort and good food when needed. It needed to provide happiness to anyone who wandered through Luna’s doors. And she’d been told on more than one occasion that the room did exactly what she’d aimed for it to do. That made the whole thing worthwhile.

  The countertops drove her mad, though. She was going to have to get that done as soon as she could.

  Twenty minutes after pushing herself out of bed, the coffee maker was filling, and pans warmed over the burners while Luna prepped ingredients.

  “Hey bestie,” Asher said, the sound of the back-porch door swinging open announcing her arrival.

  “You’re here early. You don’t usually show up until the food does,” Luna said as she set down the egg carton to hug Asher.

  “Someone decided six thirty was the perfect time to start mowing the neighbor’s yard. It’s a wonder I wasn’t sitting beside your bed waiting for you to get up.”

  Luna laughed. “Since you’re here, make yourself useful.” She handed Asher a package of bacon and pushed her gently towards the waiting griddle.

  “Aw, you’re making me cook the bacon? I hate cooking things that can harm me.”

  “It’s just grease, you big baby,” Luna said, snorting. “The griddle isn’t too hot; you should be safe.”

  “Do I at least get an extra helping, since I’m the one who’s cooking it?”

  “Sure.” Luna flicked a drop of water onto the pan for pancakes. Not quite hot enough yet, she thought as it evaporated.

  Asher had been one of the first people Luna met in Calidity. She was bubbly, adorable, and fiercely loyal to the people she cared about. There was something about watching her bright red hair bouncing up the street towards Luna’s house that made her smile every time.

  Asher came from one of the “old families” in town—they’d been here for several generations and didn’t seem concerned with leaving. When Luna had first met Asher’s mother, Melody, she had asked one simple question about the town’s history and received a flood of fascinating details. The town had a rich and complex past, filled with mysteries that had never been solved and people who lived too long. Many of those mysteries had puzzled Luna until she’d found out that Asher’s family were shifters. Wolves: the flavor that many in Hollywood had made their money exploiting, though they hadn’t gotten much about them right. When Melody—affectionately called Mom by both Asher and Luna—found out that Luna came from a long line of witches, she’d immediately said, “Good! You’ll fit right in around here.”

  Boots on old wooden floors brought Asher’s and Luna’s attention around to the kitchen entrance. The woman staying upstairs didn’t wear work boots or walk heavily. Which meant Luna had company she wasn’t prepared for. She hated that.

  �
�Good morning, ladies. It smells wonderful in here,” Wesley said, strolling into the kitchen, his thumbs hooked into his belt loops as he pushed out his chest. The sheriff’s badge pinned to his shirt caught the light, as Luna was sure he had intended.

  “Good morning, Sheriff,” Luna said, turning back to the pan. “Is there something that we can help you with? I have a guest to attend to.”

  “You seem awfully dismissive. Is there something going on that I should know about?”

  Luna and Asher shared a look that he couldn’t see.

  Wesley had been… aggressively paying attention to Luna for years. That was a nice way to put it. He stopped just shy of licking the side of her face and telling her what he wanted to do to her. He had gotten pushy enough that Luna was worried he’d come after her for rebuffing him, but he hadn’t. He wouldn’t. Because he was married, and the last thing he wanted was for word to get back to his wife, Georgia, who might make a scene. Why, it would tarnish his precious image.

  Or that’s what he seemed to think. The reality was that everyone knew he was a jerk with a vicious wandering eye, among other things. His wife acted like she didn’t know, but Luna couldn’t see how she’d missed it. She and Asher had decided the woman was just in denial. Which was a shame because she was a wonderfully sweet woman who was also drop-dead gorgeous. She deserved better.

  “I’m just busy. Like I am every morning that you walk into my kitchen without an invitation.” Luna splashed water on the pan again. The droplets hissed. She gave Wesley a wide berth as she passed him to grab the bowl of batter and start the pancakes.

  “What about her?” Wesley pointed to Asher. Was the man whining?

  “What about her?” Luna said, sighing. The smell of pancakes mixed with bacon filled the kitchen.

  “Maybe if you weren’t prancing around town in those tight jeans, getting everyone’s attention all the time…” he muttered.

  “Sheriff,” she said sharply, glancing at him. “I am in my own home. Don’t you have some law enforcement to get to? Your services are not needed.”

  Wesley’s jaw clenched. “You should be a little nicer to me, you know. I could be the one who saves you from some night prowler or something.”

  “I can protect myself, Sheriff.” She neatly flipped the pancakes onto a platter.

  Wesley pushed his lips together into a thin line.

  Asher stepped between them, holding up a plate with a few pieces of bacon like a sacrificial offering. “Why don’t you have yourself a piece of bacon, hm?” She always tried to diffuse tension, bless her heart.

  The problem was that Luna was not going to back down from demanding respect for herself. She hadn’t been raised to believe that she should bow down just because a man told her to, and nothing about life since then had made her think that the opinion should change. She deserved to be treated with respect, and Wesley was going to respect her desire for him not to belligerently hit on her, whether he liked it or not.

  “Sheriff, we’ve got a call.” The voice came through the doorway, followed by the rookie that had followed Wesley around for the past week or so.

  Luna smiled. Bless that rookie.

  “I told you not to interrupt me when—” Wesley started, ready to lay into the poor kid.

  “Didn’t he just say you had a call?” Luna interrupted. “It sure would look bad if the sheriff didn’t show up when someone needs saving.” She didn’t even try to hide the wide grin on her face.

  Wesley’s face turned a deep crimson, the anger creeping its way up his neck. He needed a tan or something. Luna thanked the world around her that she had melanin to cover up those pesky problems.

  “Here,” Luna said, grabbing one of the pancakes from the plate and a few pieces of bacon from Asher’s plate. “The eggs aren’t ready yet, but have a little breakfast, hm? It’s early, and you have a long day of justice ahead of you.” She handed the rookie the plate with a smile.

  “Thank you, ma’am,” the kid said with a wide grin and a polite tip of his police hat. Yeah, she liked him.

  “Hurry up, kid,” Wesley snapped, shooting a look at both Luna and the rookie before turning and stomping out the door. His radio crackled to life, which meant people were starting to look for him.

  Asher let out a breath as the men’s footsteps faded. “That man needs to chill out.”

  “That man needs to be taught a lesson,” Luna replied.

  “Did I already miss the morning excitement?” The deep, melodious voice belonged to Zelda, the guest who was checking out. She looked to be in her fifties but told Luna that she was a well-kept seventy-six. She loved traveling, drinking, and telling stories about her life. She’d had affairs with mafia hitters, almost robbed a bank with some friends who had long since passed, and generally raised hell with each trip around the sun. Luna loved her.

  “Unfortunately. Something tells me you’d have given him a run for his money,” Luna said with a smile as the woman grabbed a mug and got herself a cup of coffee. Luna had already learned her lesson about that: When she’d arrived two weeks ago, she’d fussed at Luna not to wait on her hand and foot, that she was perfectly capable of getting herself something to drink. Then she’d told Luna to grab a glass of wine and come join her on the porch for a cigar.

  Luna didn’t want her to leave.

  “I’m sure you gave him enough run on your own. You may be a good girl on the outside, but something tells me you’re quite the firecracker when you get riled up.”

  Asher choked on a laugh.

  “You too, red. I bet once someone gets you to show that side of yourself, you’d rip them to shreds.”

  “You have no idea,” Asher said softly, which just made Luna laugh.

  “I’m really sad to see you go, Zelda. I haven’t enjoyed the company of a guest this much in a long time,” Luna said. Zelda grabbed two more mugs from the counter and handed one to Luna and one to Asher.

  “I’m sad to leave too, but I have to. I’ve got a date that I can’t be late for,” she said with a wink that made both Asher and Luna giggle.

  “I hope I am half as exciting as you are when I’m in my seventies,” Asher said, fixing herself a cup of coffee.

  “Don’t be half. Be more so. Light this world on fire,” Zelda said in a whisper.

  “But don’t burn the bacon,” Luna added. Asher squealed and turned back to her pan, which had just started to smoke.

  2

  WITH BREAKFAST EATEN, ZELDA SEEN off, and the dining room cleaned, Asher bounded off towards her mother's house, forlornly stating that she’d promised to help with spring cleaning. They made plans to meet up for dinner, the three of them, around seven at Asher’s house. Luna was cooking, of course.

  She waited until Asher was out of sight before she went back inside and locked the door behind her. She normally didn’t lock anything during the daytime, but she had a call to make and the last thing she needed was for someone to wander in and find out something they weren’t supposed to know.

  Graham answered on the second ring. “You’re late.”

  “I’ve missed you too, sunshine,” Luna said, pouring herself a second cup of coffee.

  “You know I hate waiting.”

  “And you know that you’d hate it even more if we had to do this little tête-à-tête with an audience.”

  Graham sighed on the other end. “You had someone in the B&B today?”

  “Yep.” Luna paused to sip her coffee. “She just left, as did Asher. Once I was alone, I called, just like you asked.”

  “You know that I have to keep tabs on you. You’re still in danger.”

  It was Luna’s turn to sigh. They had this conversation almost every time that they spoke. “I know, Graham. I never said that I resent having to call you. Just that sometimes it’s a bit of a challenge to be alone on schedule.”

  “Hey, you’re the one that wanted someplace completely different.” Graham laughed.

  “You are correct, I did say that. I didn’t think this li
ttle town was what you all would settle me in though. I guess I should have thought a bit longer about what I was asking for.”

  “Maybe. But you’ve done really well for yourself there. And more importantly, you’re safely hidden.”

  “I am.”

  “So, let’s get through the official part of all of this, and then we can talk.”

  Graham had been Luna’s contact for years. At this point, they knew each other pretty well and considered each other friends. This was normal for their calls. They always got the business out of the way first, then had an honest conversation about how things were going. Graham had always been afraid that everything that had happened would scar Luna in some way. It hadn’t, from what either of them could tell. But he still checked.

  “So, about what brought you to Calidity…”

  “Yeah?”

  Then, nothing. Graham didn’t say anything else, as if he were waiting for her to say or do something. What, she had no idea. Was she supposed to talk about what happened? She couldn’t even remember… what happened. Why couldn’t she remember what happened?

  “Was there something you wanted to say?” Luna asked, breaking the silence.

  “Nope, we’re all done,” Graham said as if he hadn’t just started a conversation about her past and then immediately let it die.

  “All right then…”

  “Talk to you next time.” Graham ended the call.

  Luna stared at the phone in her hand for a moment with a frown on her face. That had been an odd call.

  Someone knocked at the door, and Luna heard her sweet, elderly neighbor, Mrs. Jacobson, call out, “Luna? Are you in there? I brought you something sweet.”

  “Coming!” Luna called back. She didn’t have time to think about Graham’s oddities. She needed to clean Zelda’s vacated room and decide what to cook for dinner and toss a few loads of laundry in the washer and…

  ~*~

  IT WAS DINNER TIME BEFORE Luna was aware that much of the day had passed. She’d finished most of what she’d wanted to get done around the house. Tomorrow, she was going to drive to downtown, which was not nearly as far as it sounded, nor as exciting, and hit the grocery store to stock up the pantry and fridge, before visiting a few small shops for some decorating she had been putting off.