Deva and I hid our snickers behind our hands while Beth silently laughed and Carol slapped her thigh in amusement.
“Yep,” Beth said. “Book club.”
“Well, we just wanted to check in,” Noah said. “I hope you enjoy your boring Saturday night. Try not to get too crazy with all those books and wine.”
We all chuckled.
“I happen to like my books, thank you very much," Beth said in a teasing voice. "Anyway, we're about to start. Do you need anything before I go?
"Nope, just wanted to say hi!" Ava sounded just like her mom and it warmed my heart to think that somewhere out in the world there were two people who had the same goodness and strength in them that Beth did. I wondered if they had any abilities. I'd have to ask Beth the next time we had a chance to talk.
"Goodnight, sweeties. Be safe. Love you!” Beth tapped on the red end call button. For a moment after she hung up, she just looked at her phone, and I wondered if she was thinking about what had just happened with her ex and what her kids would think of it.
I knew I had the same reaction to a lot of the encounters I'd had with Rick since we split up. Eventually she just smiled and shook her head before putting the car in drive and pulling away.
“Boring. I wish. They really think anyone older than them just curls up around a fire, don’t they?” she asked with a laugh lacing her voice, sounding more like herself than when her ex had stopped by earlier. I wasn't sure why it bothered me so much, but I was sure that one of the things I had come back to Mystic Hollow for was to help my friends, and for Beth that seemed to be helping her see her self-worth again, and give her the ability to give her ex the middle finger if she wanted to. I wished someone had done the same for me and Rick, but if wishes were fishes and all that.
“My son is the same way," I said. "Travis seems to think I'm best at laundry and cooking dinner for him when he's home from college and not much else. At least not right now. I'm sure that will change as he gets older. At least I hope so."
“Eat this.” Deva handed us each a sugar cookie, which was a good distraction before my thoughts turned melancholy. “It should make any powers you already have even stronger.”
I bit into the treat and moaned. “How do you do this? I've baked a million cookies for school bake sales and none of mine ever turned out like this. You're a goddess in the kitchen, I swear.”
Deva beamed, her smile so wide she got dimples. “Every time you eat something I cook, it’s the best compliment ever.”
“Oh, here, I almost forgot.” Carol pulled out a baggie of ear plugs from the duffel. “These are the kind that they use for the shooting range. It’ll keep us from being swayed by the sirens’ songs.”
We all put them in, and the only person that it was at all noticeable on was Deva because of her very short hair.
“You better hang between us to try to keep them hidden,” I suggested.
“Or don’t put them in until needed,” Beth suggested with a shrug as she glanced in the rearview mirror at our friend.
Deva nodded her head. “They’re uncomfortable, anyway. I’ll put them in at the first sign of trouble.”
“That’s it, then,” Carol said. “Deva’s got another cookie for protection and I’ve got some necklaces for protection as well, but other than that, we’re ready. Probably best to eat the protection cookie when we get there. Same for putting the necklaces on. I want to make sure that we're all covered for as long as possible.”
I turned and nodded at Carol, agreeing with her before turning to face forward once more. “Let’s go get my brother.”
19
Emma
As we turned off the main road, the trees on both sides of us seemed to crowd the tiny road to the point that I worried we might hit low hanging branches as we drove. When the road circled closer to the ocean, there were breaks in the trees to the rocky cliffs beyond. They were oddly illuminated by the final rays of the setting sun.
Vaguely, I remembered what little I knew of this lake and the waterfall. It was said to be one of the most beautiful places in town. But even as a kid, my parents had warned me about going on these lands. It was private property, and trespassers were dealt with.
But as we continued on, the trees parted as we approached a parking lot. Ahead of us was a massive cliff, without the smallest trace of a waterfall or lake. I frowned, scanning the area, but found nothing of the beautiful place I’d heard described so many times.
“I thought it was a waterfall,” I whispered. We parked at the edge of the sand, in an empty, beat-up parking lot that desperately needed repaving. The concrete had turned gravelly, to the point that it was past saving and the whole thing would need to be dug up and redone.
The area the parking lot sat on was raised, almost like it was at the top of a little hill with the cliff face to one side and the ocean to the other, and the path down to the beach area was a steady downward slope between them.
There was a sad note to Deva’s voice as she said, “It’s been dry for years. But this is where they do their ritual on the full moon, where the river used to fall into the sea. You can’t really see it from here, but just around that bend,” Deva pointed to where the coastline curved slightly out of sight, “the beach ends and there’s a rocky area that used to be a pool for the waterfall before it met the ocean.”
The four of us got out of the car and shuffled toward the edge of the parking lot until we could see the water below and the spot that Deva had talked about. I glanced between the area that looked like where the waterfall had come from and where it would have pooled before meeting the ocean.
As I looked down the path, I saw several sirens already lined the rocky shore, even though it wasn’t fully dark yet. Even as I watched, the sunset seemed to fade until grey light was all that was left. But even beneath that light, I could see that the women were gorgeous. Like trophy wives with fish tails. Their hair was long and wild, yet somehow looked like perfection. I could swear it glinted in the remaining light like gold and silver. Honestly, it reminded me a little of fish scales, which made sense.
