Cathy looks me up and down, her gaze lingering on my mustache, no doubt wondering if I’m lying or not. “I have something important to tell him about that woman he’s with. Something that could save his life,” she adds.
I rub my chin, pretending to think about it. “I’ll be sure to tell his twin brother.”
Her eyes pop wide. “Twin?”
“Oh yes. His name’sStan, and he’s around here somewhere. Went to play mini golf, I think. But who knows? He’s got so much money that it’s impossible to keep track of him.”
She frowns, folding her arms. “I’ve never heard of aStan Grayson.If Storm had a twin, I would know it.”
Cathy needs a push. I unleash Blair’s magic, closing my eyes so that her friends don’t see the change. “Stan Grayson is over by the Tilt-A-Whirl.”
Cathy blinks and slowly turns her head. “Yes. Stan. Tilt-A-whirl.”
She drifts off while Cherie and Sadie scramble to catch up. “What’s going on, Cathy? Where are you going? I thought we were going to ruin Blair,” they say, their words colliding and piling atop one another.
“No,” she replies, her voice flat like she’s been mesmerized. “We’re going to find Stan.”
Cherie and Sadie exchange a confused look but follow Cathy, because what else would they do?
Crisis averted.
I sit as Blair says, “I stopped working with potions when I started at the bookstore. It wasn’t supposed to be my shop, but my older sister didn’t have magic. So I was all set to inherit it. You can’t be worried about potions when you’ve got a bookstore to run. So I threw myself into the family business.” She tips her head, thinking. It’s adorable how she scrunches up her nose as she figures out what to say next. “But then Addison’s magic came in and now the bookshop’s hers, so…”
“So?” he asks.
She shrugs, smiles. I know what that look means. She doesn’t want to give him too much of herself.Yet. I consider it a win for me, even if we are friends.
Friends. I’ve officially entered the friend zone. I would’ve been happier staying in the enemies zone than being here. This is some sort of bullshit limbo, where I don’t know which way to turn. I wish I’d just told her that I didn’t regret that kiss. But then she told me that she did, so here we are—me in disguise and her on a date with a man I can’t stand.
“So,” she continues, “I guess that I just put potion making away.” She tips up her face and smiles at him. “I haven’t needed to think about it because I’ve been so busy with books.”
Storm stretches out his legs and crosses one ankle over the other. “Well, having your little books is good, too.”
Blair frowns, unsure if she should be insulted that he called the Bookshop of Magic a place of little books.
“I know what it is to be conflicted,” he explains. “Sometimes an invention calls to me, and when I get into it, I realize that it’s not the project that I’m supposed to be working on.”
“Really?”
“Oh yes.” He tosses his head back, flicking hair from his eyes. “I’ve been working on this anti-aging formula, and I’d set it asidebecause I wasn’t getting anywhere with it and then suddenly, voila! The answer came.”
Blair’s gaze cuts to me because we both know howvoilacame to Storm.
“Is that so?” she asks, licking the ice cream off her spoon in big, long strokes of her tongue.
I think I might die.
“Yes.” He crosses his arms, getting comfortable on the bench. “I was just daydreaming and bam! The answer came.”
She frowns. He doesn’t notice. “The answer just came to you?”
“Yes. That’s how inspiration can be.”
“Sure.” She sounds veryunsure.“I get it.” She sticks her spoon into the rest of her ice cream and rises. “Ready to keep going?”
“Want to continue on?”
“Actually I’m getting tired.”
