Page 14 of Her Ghostly Embrace
Despair clawed at her.
She had to retrieve her body. How had she escaped theThornfield compound and ended up trapped in this damned room? It made no sense.
Aurora called on her magic but found nothing within. She shook, an icy sensation enveloping her every time she tried.
She should have access to her magic. Why didn’t she?
Damnation, she’d fucked this up, even if she wasn’t dead. Her body was still alive—suspended by her spell and waiting for her return—otherwise she’d be in the Realm of the Damned. But even if she was still in the Human Realm, she’d been separated from her body for too long. Her lifeless form would have been found, and she didn’t know what her family would do with her.
SEVEN
GIA
Edward Ramirez hadway too many candles for a lawyer. They lined the windowsill. His desk. The many shelves. New candles. Half-melted candles. Little stubby wax ends that most people would have thrown away.
Even more worrying were the odd, unlabeled bottles littering the room. It all added up to a bad omen. Fuck, Gia didn’t even believe in omens. She wasn’t superstitious. She believed in no higher power. But something about being here sent her mind down a fantastical path.
Was this what sleep deprivation did to a person?
Gia was bound to get a migraine soon, but before she could address self-care, she had to get the hell out of Ramirez’s creepy office.
Really, he’d been nothing but kind. Unless he’d beentookind? Gia couldn’t help second-guessing. Nothing seemed simple after that strange car ride.
Ramirez placed a key on his cluttered desk. “Now all the paperwork is taken care of, here’s the key to Susan’s condo, and these”—he placed a ring of keys next to the first—“are for the theater.”
“I can’t thank you enough.” Gia slipped the keys into her hoodie pocket. She needed a shower and a change of clothes as badly as she needed to get away from this man and all his candles.
Ramirez gave her a warm smile. “We’re happy to help. I know you must be exhausted, but there’s more to go over.”
“More?” Gia grabbed the stack of manila folders he’d given her. “Wait. Whatweare you talking about?”
He wasn’t giving organized crime vibes, but who knew how they did things on the West Coast?
Ramirez leaned back in his chair. “We as in the Lockwoods.”
Gia almost laughed in relief. He meant her newfound family. “Are you part of the family?” Maybe he’d married in.
“No. I mean the Lockwood Coven. My membership isn’t obvious since I use my legal last name for business, but I’m a Lockwood too.”
Gia stood, her chair scraping backward.Coven?No. No way.
“It’s cool if my Aunt Susan was Wiccan or whatever, but I’m not interested in hearing about your religion.”
Ramirez chuckled. “It’s not a religion. Not for us anyway. Witches and Wiccans aren’t the same. Susan wondered if we’d need to fill you in.”
“No, really. I don’t need to be. I’m good.” Gia took a step toward the door.
She wouldn’t lie, she was relieved Susan hadn’t been involved with a gang or something criminal in nature, but she did not need this guy to try to recruit her to his cult.
Witches. Did he think he could do spells? No wonder he had so many candles.
Ramirez opened his mouth, but Gia cut him off. “I need to sleep and get organized. I can hardly think straight right now. If I have any questions, I’ll call.”
“Okay.” He sounded reluctant, but didn’t push.
Was he respecting her boundaries? He was one of the few people in her life who bothered, and that was fucking sad.
As novel as basic respect was, Gia still wasn’t hearing Ramirez out. She did not survive the emotional turmoil that Catholicism had brought into her life to get sucked into something else, regardless of what Ramirez said about his coven not being religious.
