Page 30 of Enchanted to Meet You

He looked startled. “She’s telekinetic?”

“That’s what I’m assuming. Or she knows a spell that allows her to move objects with her mind whenever she needs to. But I’ve never seen a spell like that.”

“It’s high magic,” he murmured. “Such spells exist in scrolls and manuscripts from ancient times, but I’m not sure how she’d have been able to get her hands on one.”

“Right. But she’s definitely interested in the Craft. She was reading a book on the history of the persecution of witches.” I slid his cup of coffee in front of him. “Let me guess. You take it black.”

“I do.” He sipped, and looked moderately impressed. “This is good, thanks. Did she say why she was reading that?”

“Because Rosalie got her interested in the subject. One of Rosalie’s ancestors was accused of being a witch. She’s using that fact in some of her Tricentennial publicity—enough so that she’s got Esther outraged that so little of what happened here back then is taught in school today, especially when it was caused by so many issues that still exist: ignorance, greed, poverty, misogyny—”

“‘The imbalance between rich and poor is the oldest and most fatal ailment of all republics.’”

When I only looked at him blankly, he said, “Plutarch.”

“Oh, right. Your book from the car.”

Derrick nodded. “And don’t forget that the Puritans also loved a good conspiracy theory. Any chance they got to blame a bad harvest or a baby dying on their neighbor having made a pact with the devil, they went for it.”

“Oh, yes, of course. That’s probably why Esther can’t understand Salem getting all the attention for their witches when we had our own witch hysteria here forty years earlier.”

“More people were executed for witchcraft there than in Connecticut, though,” he said.

“Well, Massachusettsisthe Puritan state.” The microwave pinged. I transferred the contents of the bowls onto two white plates, grabbed some silverware from a drawer and a container of freshly grated Parmesan from the fridge, then brought it all over to the counter at the pass-through, pulling up a stool so I could sit across from him. “And on that happy note—buon appetito.”

He looked down at the mess of spaghetti and garlic bread on his plate a little apprehensively, as if he wasn’t sure what to do with it. But when he saw me jab a fork into my long pasta noodles, twirl them into a bite-sized portion, then pop them into my mouth, he did the same—then got a pleased look on his face.

“Hey,” he said. “This is really good.”

“Um, yeah.” I took a swig from the ice water I’d poured myself. “What did you think I was going to do, poison you?”

He frowned as he bit into his garlic bread. If there was such a thing as a self-defensive bite, that’s what he took. “No. Well, maybe. It’s just that I’ve been here in West Harbor a few days now, and the food I’ve had so far has been... disappointing.”

I laid down my fork and stared at him. “Derrick, I could have told you good places to eat around here if you’d stuck around and asked, instead of peacing out with that ‘blessed be’ crap. There are dozens of good places. Mama Giovanni’s is only one of them. There’s also the Country Gourmet—”

“I’m not in West Harbor to eat,” he interrupted, although the rapidness with which the food on his plate was disappearing disproved his claim. “I’m here to save it. And you. Tell me more about Esther.”

“Okay, fine. She’s smart. She wants to be a psychologist.”

“Good.” He nodded as he sopped up what was left of his sauce with his remaining garlic bread. It was hard for me not to stare at his forearms now that he’d taken his jacket off. They were impressively shapely. “That’s a positive sign. It shows she has empathy.”

“That’s what I thought. She was sitting alone, but only so she could read. She has friends, as well as what I’d call a lot of Big Sister Energy. She was able to get a classmate who was climbing on a table to do exactly as she said and get down—though partly only because she shook him down.”

Derrick stared at me. “That’s why she shook the cafeteria table? To get the boy down from it?”

“Yes. Why?”

“The Bringer of Light shouldn’t be using her powers for violence—unless of course she’s battling the forces of evil.”

“Trust me,” I said. “This kid might not have been evil, but he was super annoying.”

He grinned a little. “Anything else?”

“Well, there was one other thing....”

He glanced up from the meatball he was about to bite into, suddenly apprehensive. “What?”

“She read—with complete accuracy—my astrological chart, without my having told her my birthday.”