Hexed (The Gwen Sparks Series Book 4) (5 page)

When Amara directed me to Gwen, I never would have imagined the effect she would have on me. I felt like I needed to walk away, but my feet were unwilling to move. I wanted to wring Amara’s neck for all of this. More than that, I wanted the unwelcomed feelings to cease, and yet, I yearned for more of them. It was hell incarnate inside my head, and it was all because of the pretty little spirit walker I called cupcake.

I parked my bike outside of the crumbling stone wall surrounding the cemetery. A tall wrought iron gate choked in wild vines welcomed grievers. I could sense the death lurking beyond the barrier. Moving through the gate, I smiled to myself as ghosts disappeared into their graves in fear of me. There was only one reason why I visited graveyards, and it wasn’t to check on the ghosts well-being.

“Eddie,” I called out, walking toward a grave I knew he frequented. Gwen and I had found him haunting a bed and breakfast in Massachusetts, and he had followed us home. I cringed that I’d just included
us
and
home
in the same sentence. Shaking off the misnomer, I sent out my feelers for the ghost. There was something lurking beneath the surface of death, something unnatural. Most people fear dying, look at death as something dark, but it’s just as natural as life. Over the millennia, I’d seen the torment people had gone through by losing their loved ones. They cursed me for taking their family and rejoiced when a baby was born. They would never understand that without death, you couldn’t have life. Even the trees lost their leaves to grow new ones. It’s a circle, an unyielding system that all balances the universe. I just happen to keep the death side balanced. However, there was something very off about that power tonight.

Life brings warmth and death cold. Today, the cold overpowered the warmth. I had never experienced anything like it. In all my existence, there had never been a problem with the balance before. I continued to move through the cemetery, focusing my attention on connecting with my power. It whooshed through my chest and swirled like a tornado before it passed through and scattered.

“What the hell?” I mumbled to myself.

“You feel it, don’t you?”

I looked up to find Eddie hovering just a couple feet in front of me. He died in the seventies and was forever clothed in bell-bottom jeans and a t-shirt that read
Volvo
across the front. His muddy hair was long and shaggy, tied back with a leather cord. I sometimes used him as a messenger or spy. Since ghosts could hide their presence, he was the perfect man for the job I had in mind.

“How long has this been going on?”

Eddie floated closer. “We noticed a shift a few weeks ago, but it was so slight that we didn’t pay much attention to it, man. It’s getting stronger.”

How had I not noticed it?
I’ve been too damn distracted by Gwen.
Now that I was aware of it, it sent me on edge. The problem was, I didn’t know who to confide in. It wasn’t like I had a mentor to go ask questions. The only person who might have an idea as to what was happening was Amara.

“I need you to do something for me,” I told Eddie. “There’s a new bakery in town—Twisted Treats—I need you to tail the owner. You’ll know it is her by the retro garb she wears. I want to know if she’s conversing with anyone suspicious and what sort of magic she’s practicing. Got it?”

Eddie nodded slowly, a lazy look crossing his face. “Yeah, man, I got it.”

“This is top priority, which means if you don’t take it seriously, I’ll book your ass on a one way trip to the realm of the dead.”

Eddie held up his hands in surrender. “Chill, dude. I said I got it.”

I nodded, turning around and heading back down the path that would lead me out of the graveyard. Just as I reached the gate, I caught sight of fading colors hovering around a bush along the stone wall. Pixies. They zoomed around the dying shrub, their little bodies bleeding bright colors into the early morning gray.

Kneeling down, I inspected the leaves they were trying to bring back to life. I watched in awe as they turned bright green, only to wither before my eyes. Now I understood why the pixies were in such a frenzy. It was in their nature to breathe life into dying plants, and this one wouldn’t stay alive. The more they flitted around the bush, the quicker it withered.

Standing, I stared down at the relentless pixies. There was something very, very wrong in Flora, and it was my job to fix it.

I CRADLED MY coffee cup in both hands, absorbing the warmth, and stared down at a collage of photographs. Bending at the waist, I inspected a picture of a young girl and me with our arms wrapped around each other’s shoulders. She had the same dark hair and light eyes as me. A relative maybe? Standing up, I moved down the wall, my eyes taking in all the décor in the living room. Desperation soaked through me as I tried to connect something, anything. This not remembering crap was getting old. I knew this apartment was mine, but I felt like a stranger invading someone else’s space. Nothing called out to me.

“Coffeeeeee.” A female voice said behind me. I jumped, almost spilling my coffee, and spun around, finding a blonde woman padding across the kitchen floor toward the coffeepot. Had Dorian mentioned me living with someone? I couldn’t remember.

“Who are you?” My eyebrows drew together when she half turned to look at me. She was pretty with big green eyes and a Cupid bow mouth. Something occurred to me at seeing her in a red tank-top and boy-shorts. Maybe Dorian’s room was the one across the hall and she had spent the night with him.
Boyfriend, my ass.

“Gwen?” The woman said, blinking the sleep from her eyes. One of her hands came up and rubbed a path across her porcelain face. “What are you doing up this early?”

My eyebrows crawled up my forehead, eyes widening. “You know me?”

Where my face showed surprise, the woman’s reflected confusion. “What? Of course I know you.” She turned back to the coffeepot and got to work at pouring her a cup. “Let me wake up before you pull whatever game this is. Have you even slept yet or has Dorian kept you up all night?” She looked over her shoulder and gave me a knowing smile. I wasn’t going to dignify that with a response. Thinking about Dorian and me having sex birthed carnivorous butterflies to gnaw at my stomach lining.

The woman spun around, coffee cup in hand, and sat at the table. She rested her head in her hand and closed her eyes.

“Are you okay?” I walked into kitchen and stood beside the table, unsure if I should sit or not. It was obvious this woman was familiar with the apartment and knew Dorian and me.

“Ugh,” she mumbled, peeking up at me through one eye, “Ethan and I hit up a party in Hemlock last night so you and Dorian could have some alone time.” She did that knowing smile thing again. The butterflies stirred. “Ethan may seem reserved, but that boy knows how to get his party on.” Both of her eyes snapped open, and she sat up straighter. A slow smile stretched across her lips, revealing sparkling white teeth. “And the sex…Oh. My. God. Get a couple shots in him, and he’s like Dr. Jeykl and Mr. Hyde.”

I stood awkwardly in the kitchen, unsure what to say. It was evident that she didn’t know that I had lost my memories, but then, how could she? Before she went into the details about this Ethan person and his sexual prowess, I blurted, “I don’t remember anything.”

A wrinkle formed between her eyes. “What do you mean,
you don’t remember anything
?”

I pursed my lips and shrugged. “Dorian said someone hexed me, taking all of my memories.”

The woman slapped her hand against the table, causing me to jump. “No shit? Why am I just now hearing about this? When did it happen? Have you guys talked to Micah? What did he say.” Through the plethora of questions, she stood. Her eyes went frantic as she thought about something.

“I think I may have a spell to counteract it,” she said, though I could tell she was talking to herself and not me. She chewed on her lip in thought. “Mind spells are tricky. Ethan may know how to handle it. Actually, it may be better to have him deal with it; he’s more practiced than I am. With my luck I’d end up adding the wrong ingredient, and you’d turn into a slobbering vegetable.”

My bottom lip fell so that my mouth formed an O. The woman reminded me of a hummingbird, flitting about the kitchen in a frenzy.

“Ethan!”

I flinched when she yelled his name and found myself wishing for Dorian, if only so he could explain who the woman was and whether I should opt for trying one of her spells. I smiled a little and shook my head that my subconscious trusted him enough to seek his refuge in this confusing time.

A man with dark blond hair stumbled out of the room across from mine and padded down the hall. He rubbed a hand over his face and blinked over at me before turning his attention toward the blonde woman.

“Where’s the fire, Fiona?”

“Right there.” Fiona pointed at me. “Someone put a spell on her so that she doesn’t remember anything. How do I fix it?”

It was nice to finally put a name to the excited blonde face.
Fiona
. I swirled the name around my brain, testing for familiarity. Nothing. I let out an aggravated huff, and both Ethan and Fiona shot me a look.

“Something happened to Gwen?” Ethan asked in an exaggerated tone. “Must be Tuesday,” he finished with snark. Looking at me, he asked, “Who’d you piss off this time?”

I shot Fiona a look and shrugged at Ethan, which only annoyed him more. It didn’t take me long to find out that he didn’t like me. Just as Fiona was about to reply, the front door swung open and in walked Dorian. That strange feeling swirled through my stomach and traveled up through my skull. I had to stop reacting like this toward him.

“Everyone caught up?” Dorian asked as he shrugged out of his jacket. He moved past me and toward the coffeepot.

“Why didn’t you call me?” Fiona complained, crossing her thin arms and trying a look that I assumed was supposed to be threatening.

Dorian’s back faced the three of us as he stirred sugar into his cup. “Didn’t know I had to. Besides, I’m taking care of it.”

“She’s my best friend,” Fiona said in exasperation. “Of course you should have called me. More to the fact, I’m a spell-caster. You didn’t think ‘hmm, maybe Fiona would know a counter spell’?”

My eyebrows formed arches as my gaze volleyed between Dorian and Fiona. For some reason, her lack of fear of him settled my own. I slid a sidelong glance in Ethan’s direction to find him leaning against the wall with his arms crossed and a bored expression on his face. Apparently, he wasn’t as upset as Fiona. My lips wrinkled as I thought about Fiona’s blunt confession of his sexual prowess. Out of all the things I wanted to know, that wasn’t one of them.

Dorian turned around and leaned against the counter. Slowly, he raised his cup to his lips and took a drink while we all stared at him.

“Excuse me for not seeking the advice of a novice spell-caster,” Dorian finally said. He took a deep breath, his chest expanding and deflating rapidly. “I think we have bigger issues to worry about.”

Fiona and I gaped. What was bigger than retrieving my memories? How much longer did I have to wait to remember my life before he took this seriously?

“Like what?” I asked, borrowing some of Ethan’s snark. “What’s more important than someone stealing my memories, Dorian?” The grin that lifted one side of his mouth only ticked me off more.

“I didn’t mean that finding a solution to your problem wasn’t important,” Dorian explained. “You know that saying
things could always be worse
?” At my blank stare, he continued. “Well, I think they just got worse.”

“How?” Fiona and I both asked.

Dorian took another drink, his shoulders sagging a little as he prepared himself to tell us what was so dire. I stared down at my hands and realized I was still holding my coffee, and then frowned that it was now cold. During Fiona’s little freak-out, I’d forgotten all about it.

“As Death, it is my job to keep the balance,” Dorian started. “It’s my job to make sure souls reach their expiration date so that new life can be born. When things run smoothly, the balance between the two is a steady stream of energy.” Dorian sat his mug on the counter and crossed his arms in front of him. My eyes took notice of the way his t-shirt gripped his biceps before I diverted my gaze to the floor.