Page 60 of Love Spells: And Other Non-Refundable Magic

“What kind of green?”

“No sé, Flora. Verde. How many greens are there?”

Something about the simplicity of the answer makes me smile.

My phone pings beside my elbow, and I glance at it automatically. It’s become increasingly difficult to ignore every time I get a message, and the idea makes me itch, just a little.

New message from Primavera1959.

I haven’t heard from her since I sent the second assignment. I wipe my fingers against my jeans before opening it.

Primavera1959

1. Gold sun earrings.

That’s all. I smile despite myself.

“Flora,” my brother singsongs, and I look up to find him studying my face. I hope I’m not smiling like the idiot these messages make me feel like. “Who got you smiling like that?”

“Customers occasionally make me happy.”

He ignores me and gets up to put his empty container in the sink.

I look at Primavera’s message once more before setting the phone down. Gold sun earrings. Simple enough, especially after the amount of resistance she put up over the first assignment. I’d expected a paragraph at minimum, probably some argument about whether earrings counted or an explanation for why she’d chosen them, despite my very specific instructions not to explain anything.

“Flora.”

Fausto is watching me from across the table, one arm folded beside the trays of beads while the other reaches for the aventurine nestled in between all the other green stones.

“Don’t touch those.”

“I was just looking, calm down.”

“We look with our eyes, Fausto Andrés.”

He ignores that and reaches for the little silver crescent charm instead, stopping just short of touching it when I give him a look. I pick it up for him and hold it against the aventurine.

“This?”

“Yeah. She’ll like that.” There’s no hesitation in his answer. “I pay attention when she talks, you know.”

As though it were that simple.

For no particular, useful reason, my mind supplies Merryweather.

Maybe because paying attention when Merry talks requires significantly less effort. She fills silence like she thinks it might become dangerous if left unattended too long, moving from one thought into the next with enough openness that I’ve learned more about her in three accidental encounters than I know about some people I’ve worked beside for months.

I find that charming.

More charming than I should, probably.

I set the moon charm beside the aventurine beads before that thought has anywhere else to go.

“You doing anything for Halloween?” Fausto asks.

“Maggie invited me to a party.”

His head comes up immediately. “Maggie Maggie?”