Page 32 of Hexed Up

I squeak again and nearly drop my phone. I didn’t think I liked dirty talk; now I realise none of the other guys were any good at it. Mr Hottie is good at it. Very good at it. But I can’t sit in the downstairs bathroom having phone sex with my fake boyfriend while everyone else is watching Poirot.

Do you think we can pause this for 20 minutes?

Pause what, Molly?

I know he’s teasing me.

This. I want to give it my full attention and I can’t while I’m watching TV with my mum sitting right next to me.

Especially as my mum has a bad habit of reading my text messages over my shoulder. Although, who knows, she seems pretty pleased I have a boyfriend ‘at last’. Maybe she’d approve.

Send me another pic and I’ll wait.

I can’t believe he’s going to want another shot of my cleavage so, without thinking, I reach under my skirt and take a quick snap. It’s not exactly artistically wonderful but I suppose it’s the connotation that’s the important thing. I send it and hurry back to the lounge.

The next fifteen minutes of TV are the longest I’ve ever experienced and I’ve never been so angry at a TV detective for taking so long to solve the damn mystery. Can’t he see it’s the deranged ex-wife?

As soon as the credits start rolling, I jump up and announce I’m tired and am heading to bed.

“Don’t you fancy a nightcap?” Dad asks me. “I have some of those chocolates you like too.”

“I’m seriously stuffed,” I say, patting my belly and fake yawning for added effect.

“Must be that boyfriend,” Prim says, nearly making me jump out of my skin.

“What?!”

“Your new boyfriend must be wearing you out,” she says. My dad roars with laughter and my sister’s face turns tomato-red,along with mine. “I didn’t mean it like that. I just meant that you’re probably–”

“It’s okay,” I say, giving her a hug. She has work first thing tomorrow and is returning to her flat tonight, although, as she has a transportation licence, that will take her precisely five seconds. I kiss everyone else too and, before my mum can give me any chores to do, hurry up to my old childhood bedroom in the attic. It’s full of my old dolls, toy cauldrons (even as a kid I had a love of creating potions), and my first few broomsticks. There’s no lock on the door, so I move my old desk across the doorway and flop right down on my old bed – still made up in unicorn bed sheets. You’d think my mum could have changed them. There’s no way I could bring an actual real life boyfriend here to stay.

I’m back!

Was that last picture what I think it was?

What do you think it was?

Your panties.

I crease up laughing on my bed.

Oh my goodness. You cannot call them that!

My phone starts buzzing in my hand and I answer it.

“What do you want me to call them, knickers?” he says, adopting a ridiculously posh English accent that makes him sound like a drag act impersonating the Queen.

“Anything’s gotta be better than panties!”

“Panties,” he growls in that American drawl and I’m feeling less sure of that last statement.

“Please repeat,” I tell him.

“Did you send me a picture of your panties, you naughty little minx?”

I fan my face, my entire body suddenly feeling overheated. This man may not have witching abilities but there is definitely something magical about him when it comes to the sex department.

“Did you like it?” I ask.