But if I said I’d rather have my irritable bowel syndrome kick in while stuck in a crowded room with no lavatory in sight than go home—I wouldn’t be joking.
The door to our office creaked open a sliver as Maggie slipped in.
“What are you doing?” Maggie’s voice startled me where I’d been hiding, surrounded by unfinished paperwork and unorganized receipts.
“Is that guy still out there?” I nodded toward the shop, pressed against the wall as if it could hide me further.
Maggie tilted her head. “The one with a scary gaze and satchel who came in right before you barreled in here and slammed the door shut? Yes, he is. Do you know him?”
“He’s from my hometown.”
When her eyes widened, it was obvious she knew exactly how dire this had to be if he’d come out to hunt me down here. “The hometown you accidentally set on fire?”
Ah, there was that. You accidentally burn down one town center and get labeled an arsonist. “Yes,” I whisper-yelled. “That would be the one. And it wasn’t me, it was the hellblazers.”
The fire-spitting chickens.
“Well, what does he want?”
Grinding my teeth, I slumped into the wall with a sigh. I’d run from this for three years, but it seemed my past had finally caught up with me.
“He’s the business commissioner, so most likely, nothing good,” I said, skittering around the question.
Maggie popped a hip. “Reece,” she demanded, “what is he here for?”
I glared at her, arms crossed. A long, awkward silence passed, both of us locked in a standoff of wills. An unyielding staring contest only fueled the smothering tension between us.
I finally conceded.
“You aren’t going to like it.” No lies could be found; she wouldn’t want to hear about my leaving, either.
Scrunching her brows, my friend wasn’t backing down. “Do you think it’s possibly something important? Considering the lengths he went to to come here in person?”
I swallowed, rocking on my feet as the idea bounced around in my mind, yet it did nothing to subdue the nerves. I knew it must be urgent if he came here from Honey Brooke, but that didn’t make me any more eager to speak with him. But I needed to. “Perhaps.”
Maggie rolled her eyes. “I’ll be back.”
Only she didn’t come back alone. His voice came from the shop, a cold and short “thank you” as she opened the door.No, she didn’t. But yes, she did.
Face-to-face with Alaric himself, I bit back my displeasure and kept my murderous glares for Maggie between glances. My stomach churned like butter. I plastered a fake smile over my face, and I tried not to vomit.
“Alaric Parrington,” I greeted him. “Fancy seeing you here.”
He didn’t blink. No twitch of the mouth. No pulsing muscle in his jaw. The commissioner stood there, emotionless and stern. “Reece McCarthen, we have business to discuss.”
I gave a sorry, pathetic, tight-lipped grin and nodded, closing the door to the office, which happened to be equivalent to trapping myself in a cave with a hungry vulture.
Let’s see, would it be about the incident with the fire-spitting chickens burning a building to ash three years ago, ormy estranged father… or his sanctuary for magical creatures? Something else?
Quickly shuffling through memories I tried to keep locked away, I scoured for anything that might’ve led to this. Obviously, the incident with the chickens, yes, but what else? There was that one time at school with the chemicals and the kid’s brows I’d accidentally burned. Or when I’d worked at the local market and mixed up the sleeping elixir and the pain-relieving elixir. I took half the town out before we realized what had happened. Or maybe it was about—
“Are you going to ask me to sit?”
Lurching forward, I nearly choked on my words. “Yes.” I gestured to the chairs in front of our thrifted wooden desk, stumbling over my feet. “Of course, please.”
Our office wasn’t anything spectacular… if you didn’t know it was an office, you’d probably never guess. The walls were covered with clippings of our shop in the town’s newsletter, the desk was devoured by preorders, and the folders stacked on top were overflowing with Maggie’s color-coded tags (which I knew nothing about).
Crossing my legs and perching myself taller over the surface, I folded my hands and turned my panicking eyes cold. I was innocent, no reason to act otherwise. Or at least I told myself as much. “You said there was business to be discussed?”
