“Can we remove it from here to study it?”
“Yes.”
Aunt Liz lifted the large black leather tome in her hands and clutched it to her chest. “Now to figure out what nefarious spell my mother is seeking.”
I closed up the room and moved the cabinet back in front of the door before sealing the vault.
“Do you go there often?” Aunt Liz asked. Her voice was steady, but the ice in her tone was unmistakable.
“That was the first time,” I assured her as we entered my office.
Aunt Liz cast her gaze over me, like she was assessing my truth. With a sharp nod she said, “Keep it that way.”
I sat in my chair and Aunt Liz pulled one of the visitor chairs around the desk to sit next to me. We opened the grimoire, even though this was a copy, the power still clung to the pages like glue.
I frowned at the first spell. “What language is that?” I wondered.
Aunt Liz’s brow furrowed. “Russian, maybe?”
“Do you speak Russian?”
“No.”
I pulled my phone out from my slacks pocket and typed the first few words into Google Translate. “Not Russian,” I muttered. “Kazakh.”
We glanced at each other, our eyes colliding in understanding. “Not me,” I said with a shake of my head.
Aunt Liz chuckled. “Yes, definitely you.”
Hudson burst through the office door. “I don’t have the time,” I countered.
“And I don’t have the patience,” Aunt Liz replied. “You are her favorite.”
I banged my head on the desk with a groan.
“Why are you doing that?” Hudson growled.
My head shot up and I leveled him with my gaze. “Because Great Aunt Sophia is about to receive a begging call from her grandniece, and it will probably cost me a little of my soul.”
“So dramatic,” Aunt Liz said. She was smiling now that I’d relented to do the task.
“You havemoreaunts?” Hudson said with a raise of his eyebrows as he slid into the remaining visitor chair across from mine.
“Sophia is my grandmother’s younger sister,” I grumbled as I scanned my phone for her number. When did we last speak? I glanced at the call list, two months ago. I’d missed our monthly phone call. Oh boy.
“Why are you calling her?” Hudson asked.
I waved at the grimoire in front us. “This is a replica of what my grandmother collected. The problem being that the spells are written in Kazakh, so we don’t know what we are dealing with.”
“And your aunt just happens to speak it?”
“My great-grandmother had an affair with a Kazakh prince. In order to protect her, she was sent to live on his estate. Kazakh was my Aunt’s first language and Kazakhstan her home country.”
“Your family has a very colorful history,” Hudson observed. A smile pulled at my lips. No one could accuse it of being boring. “Aren’t you worried your aunt will tattle to your grandmother?”
Aunt Liz snorted, a very unladylike move for the put-together elemental. “No, Aunt Sophia detests her.”
I pressed the call button and put the phone to my ear. Here goes nothing. The phone rang for a whole minute, and the hope inside of me grew that Aunt Sophia wouldn’t answer.
