“Because now is the right moment,” he said. “It wouldn’t be right to wait until I’m on my last leg, and having my boy take care of me. And you would.” He turned to Sam. “Now I’m still fit enough to have some fun with my old pals. Valerie Vine and I have been talking about it for a good while.”
“But your house? Your garden? You spent a lifetime lavishing love on every inch,” Reina said.
“And it won’t be wasted, not if Sam moves in, or I find a nice little family paying a bit of rent.”
“You’ve thought it all through, without talking to me?” Sam swallowed.
“You’d only have dropped everything to be my live-in helper. This way, we both have our freedom, and you can come visit just as much as you do now.”
Ms. Vine took over. “He’s right, you know. I’ll do the same thing when the time has come for me. Doing the things we love and learning new skills is going to keep us young, and when that isn’t enough anymore, we’ve had a chance to make a home atSerenity Springsinstead of being uprooted at a stage when we can’t adjust any longer.”
She gave me a poignant glance. Did her attitude have anything to do with her decision to find and train a replacement soon? I wished she would tell me, but theBlue Moonwas not the ideal setting for a heart-to-heart.
Sam took his dad’s arm. “Is it okay if I take you home now, for a real talk?” He gave me an apologetic shrug. “Call me if you need my assistance again.”
“Sure. And thanks.”
“That’s what friends are for.”
Jimmy struggled to rise off his chair, until Ms. Vine handed him his cane.
Linda watched them leave. I wondered how much longer it would take her husband to pick her up for their dinner. Hopefully soon enough to make the spell last all through their meal. Linda was a pain in the backside, but so was menopause.
Garth Chiltern sauntered in when Ange and Nick returned from the dancefloor. I thought I saw him register their intertwined hands. For an instant, he looked sad, before he smiled at his wife. Was Linda’s husband wanting what Ange and Nick had? In that case, he and their couples’ therapist had their work cut out.
I set off home, too. Sleuthing and spells took their toll on me.
Chapter 17
True to my word, I prepared Linda’s tea while the cookies were in the oven. I’d reached the stage where updating Cosmo while snipping, shredding, and measuring herbs and dried petals were no longer mutually exclusive. The road to witchcraft mastery might be long and winded, but I’d left the starting blocks far behind.
“Is that a little smugness I detect?” Cosmo asked when I’d ended my report and wrote out a label with instructions for the tin. I’d checked my aunt’s notes for the highest allowed dosage, when the hot flashes threatened to melt the brain.
“I think I’m allowed to be proud of myself once in a while. I spent what felt like an eternity with Linda last night and not once did it cross my mind to be anything but kind and helpful.”
“A remarkable feat of self-control.” He sniggered. “It seems like only yesterday when you cast your first spells and bounced chestnuts off her head.”
I shrugged the memory off. “You can’t blame a newly minted witch if she gets carried away, and I’ve kept myself in check ever since, haven’t I?”
“You have indeed, more or less. And you’re making remarkable progress with your learning.”
To my embarrassment, I couldn’t help but stand a little taller. Cosmo Merlin de Beaufort was not prone to idle compliments, and praising me twice in a a week must be a record.
I ended the instructions with a small flourish, with seconds to spare before I had to yank the cookie sheets out of the oven.
While they cooled off, I changed into a flour-less sweater and jeans.
Cosmo raced ahead of me to the library, but he didn’t have to balance two boxes with cookies and a tin with tea. In hindsight, a carrier bag might have been useful.
I refilled the jars and put the one with the magical treats safely out of sight. Only the ordinary jar stood openly available in the coffee and tea corner. I’d been playing around with different layouts, to put my personal stamp on the library, and to maximize Cosmo’s comfort.
The easier he could jump onto the counter while staying far enough from the mugs and plates to satisfy pernickety customers, the better he liked it. Personally, I’d become used to the occasional hair on my plate. After all, all pets were magical beings in their own right.
I was testing the library stamp on a piece of paper to see that the inkpad wasn’t drying out when Linda stalked in. The spell had worn off completely, as expected, and the hot flash appeared to have returned with a vengeance. Sweat beaded her temples and her mascara had smudged, as if she’d applied it with an unsteady hand.
“You need tea,” I said.
“That’s why I’m here. Where is it?”
