His stoic face was a response.
That itch buzzed.
Why was he so unaffected?
"Perhaps the moon decided you needed a personal sentry," he finally replied with a smirk. "She's good at knowing what women need."
She watched as he gracefully reached down, plucking the thin book from where it had been dropped, and then frowned as he held it out to her.
"Did you want to finish it, or did you happen to read the last word before the car nearly took your life?"
Her glare could slice. But by the way that his eyes danced and one side of his mouth lifted, you'd think she had smiled at him. She quickly grabbed it from his waiting hand, the slide of his fingertips against her hand shocking.
"I've read that one," he said, nodding toward the book. "Would you care to join me in discussing it when you are finished?"
He sounded like a professor in a different time, with his careful words and austere sensibility. It was alluring, and she felt drawn to him. Which she would ignore.
"No?" he asked when she didn't answer him. "Shame. I would have loved to hear what I'm sure would have been interesting thoughts." His eyes pierced hers.
She hid the way that his words filled her chest and belly in buzzing by rolling her eyes and looking both ways, left, then dramatically right- twice- before she crossed the street.
She could feel his eyes on her back as she grasped the door of The Black Cat, but she resisted the urge to look back at him.
She would not look back at him, and she would not see his statue face move the slightest, his mouth turn up on the right side in a quirk of a smile as he watched her fling open the heavy shop door.
She had no idea that Chief Theo Landry was becoming more than intrigued by The Lost Souls' Tilly Nguyen and that he often found his eyes finding and following her whenever she was nearby.
He waited until she was safely inside the local coffee shop before he walked to the station, and when he got there, about to walk inside, two dark SUVs pulled into spaces meant for the SPD officers. He waited until the driver's door opened for a man of medium height and build to walk around the front and open the back passenger door for a woman.
A woman who stepped out with the kind of intentional power that made him nearly sigh, when he saw her sharp-featured face.
"Hey, Theo," she greeted. "We need to talk about some special residents of Salem." She didn't smile. He wasn't sure he had ever seen her smile. But the confident pull of her mouth meant trouble.
This was going to be a long day.
Tilly was frowning as she hovered in the doorway of The Black Cat. The woman and her shadows stepping out of a dark vehicle in front of the police department was alarming enough. But the way that Chief Landry's face spoke of familiarity when the dark-haired woman spoke to him, words Tilly couldn't hear or decipher from where she still hovered was concerning. Did he know her?
"Excuse me."
The annoyed voice pulled Tilly back to where she was and she gave an apologetic smile to a woman trying to leave the coffee shop.
The night before, they had peppered Crystal with questions about The Grand Coven, about the women there, very obviously, because of them. And Crystal had answered, barely. The womanwas keeping as much to herself as she could, and it had been the first time that their group felt a tension within.
It felt odd, out of place. They had each left without their usual ease, without the casual tokens of friendly love and 'see you soons.' Crystal, on the other hand, was a study in keeping a poker face. She was cautious with her words, picking them with a particular finesse that spoke of words and truths being held behind doors they'd always known were inside of her.
But what if those truths could hurt them?
No group texts had come or gone. Tilly imagined, much like herself, each woman was trying to find the right next step. Even Jen hadn't launched a brash inquisition, leaving the night before quieter than Tilly had ever seen her friend.
And Tilly herself was greeted with an influx of thoughts, worries. It had felt like having the answer to a question on the tip of your tongue, but just out of reach.
"Did you read this?" Tilly asked Eloise as she was finishing up a drink for a customer.
"What?"She held up the Crescent Courier, which had appeared in the shape of a bird next to her strawberry tart when she came back from using the restroom. She'd ordered her latte and treat before she ran off to gather herself when Bess said she looked flushed and a little wild. Her cheeks had been pink, her eyes wide behind her green glasses. A splash of cold water, and she hoped it would wash away her encounter with the chief.
But she was doubtful.
When she had returned to her velvet mauve seat at the bar, next to her plate had been the Crescent Courier, Salem's more magical newspaper with odd happenings and sometimes premonitions of what was to come.
