“My aunt? Where is she?”
Then I see her. Ovie’s standing near the entrance of the garden, which is just like one of those fancy French ones with little pebbles on the footpaths and landscaped in tall hedges.
Ovie’s wearing a sun visor and, for some reason, a tennis outfit complete with pleated skirt. She’s also got a whistle around her neck. Someone’s taking their job as events coordinator a bit too seriously.
She blows the whistle. Yes, blows, and from the back, Chatty Cathy snickers.
I want to punch her in the face.
“Welcome, y’all. Thank you for coming to our little event of magical spell ball. We’re so glad that you could join us. There will be refreshments at the end, and I don’t expect the game to take too long, but you know how games can go. Sometimes they take a little while.”
She chuckles and no one joins.
That’s when I see Nana’s face peering out of the bushes a little ways off.
My stomach plummets to the ground.
Nana! Why can’t you stay away?
I’ve got to cover her before anyone else sees.
Somehow I manage not to barrel roll myself over to the hedgerow. Instead I do a very quick walk that makes me look like I’ve either got ants in my pants or that I have to pee a river.
Trust me, it looks bad.
I reach Nana and she spots me, immediately breaking into a smile as if it’s no big deal that she’s a severed head sticking out of a bush.
I stop in front of her and block her view.
“What are you doing?” she whines.Whines!“I can’t see anymore.”
This is the part where I talk out of the side of my mouth like an amateur ventriloquist who really, really wants to be great at this but is really, really failing miserably.
“You don’t need to see. You need to stay hidden because no one can find out about you.” I think it comes out like that, but itmight be a bit more like,Zhou mede shtay hid, brrcuss no one cun fffind oout abooot zhou.
She sniffs. The audacity! “I just wanted to see how things are going with you.”
How things are going? I’m stuck living with my worst enemy, that’s how things are going. But “Fine,” is all I say. “Now get home. I’ll talk to you later.”
She sighs dramatically, as if it’s all my fault that she can’t stay and pretend to be alive. “All right. I’ll leave, but keep me posted about Devlin. I mean, Storm.”
I turn around and catch her fiendish smile before she sinks back into the hedges and disappears, hopefully forever, but no one can be certain. Least of all me.
This whole time Ovie’s been talking, but I’ve drowned her out, so focused am I on keeping Nana’s appearance a secret. Contrary to most Southern families, we don’t showcase our crazy by putting them on the front porch with a fiddle and a spittoon. No, we hide our crazy away in the dark corners of our home.
Just like it should be.
“Ready, partner?”
His voice takes me by surprise. I glance up and do a double take. While I was deep in thoughts ofcrazy, Storm Grayson found his way over and is now standing beside me looking beautiful with his chiseled face and gray eyes. And that silvery-white hair! Is it natural? I love it!
“Good morning,” I say brightly, remembering Devlin’s suggestion to smile, which comes easy for me. He’s the only person I don’t smile at, and that’s because I hate him with all the passion that is within me.
“You look lovely,” he says, his gaze quickly flitting over my body, not at all in a suggestive way. He’s not drinking me in like a jungle cat about to eat a meal. No, he’s looking at me in a respectful manner as befits a billionaire.
“Thank you.”
I’m about to tell him that he looks nice as well, but that’s when Ovie blows her whistle like a frustrated junior high gym teacher who dreamed of coaching high school football but somehow got stuck with this gig.
