‘Do you mind if I roll up the sleeves?’ The jacket arms were so long that she felt like one of the sky dancers outside the local car dealership.
‘Roll away. And let me pay for the dry cleaning. I feel terrible.’ He did indeed sound mortified. Rightly so, especially because mortification suited him. The flush brought out his cheekbones, and the way he was cringing in his tight shirt highlighted the outline of his biceps.
‘Don’t, don’t. These things happen,’ she said airily. ‘Especially owning a place like this. We like to keep things interesting. If you stop by tomorrow, you might spot me in a chicken costume. Or dancing on the bar.’
‘Careful, I hear health and safety frowns on that.’
‘Could you turn around for a moment?’
Bonnie made a twirling motion with her finger, indicating that Theo should avert his eyes. Then, keeping his jacket on, she wriggled out of her dress, grateful that there hadn’t been much to it in the first place. It hardly took being a magician to worm your way out of some spaghetti straps and a handkerchief’s-worth of stretchy fabric.
‘All right. You can turn back now.’
‘Oh,’ said Theo. ‘Um.’
‘Just call me Houdini!’
Scraping her hair back into a slightly foamy ponytail, Bonnie led Theo back downstairs, where things were starting to get rambunctious.
Hannah, spying Bonnie’s dishevelled appearance and change of outfit, wasted no time in jumping to conclusions. ‘Look atyou.’
Alana, who’d been helping Bobby out behind the bar, thoughtfully tapped a sprig of mint to her cheek. ‘I see you’ve made our guest welcome.’
Kirsty’s eyes narrowed slightly, and Bonnie inwardly preened. She loved Kirsty, she did. But the girl wassocompetitive. It was refreshing to put her in her place, which Bonnie strove to do at least once every day. It was what made a healthy relationship, of course.
And then there was Bobby. Dear, sweet, innocent Bobby. Bobby, who never turned her in for cheating during every pin-the-tail-on-the-donkey game of their childhood. Who’d happily corroborated the excuses she fabricated for the countless exams she’d missed during high school. Who, over the years, had escorted no fewer than three possums out of their house after Bonnie had left the back door propped open during her late-night exploits.
What would she do without him?
Get in a lot more trouble, probably.
‘Everything all right, Bon?’ Bobby hurried out from behind the counter, still polishing the glass he’d been cleaning. ‘I thought I heard the fire alarm, but these three said it was just figurative smoke.’
‘Rawr,’ purred Hannah, making a clawing motion with her extremely sharp, glittery nails.
‘More than fine.’ Bonnie grabbed an Old Fashioned off the counter – Alanawasa solid helper – then passed it to Theo with a wink. ‘Isn’t that so?’
Chapter 3
YOU PUT A SPELL ON ME
Effie
The upstairs reading room at the library had an excellent view of the downtown area, and Effie, who was preparing to close up for the night, could see that the party was still going strong at The Silver Slipper – of course. Bonnie had an innate capacity for stretching any social gathering to its limit. She was the queen of after-parties, and after-after parties, and all too often those parties came with her to the Chalmers family home, keeping Effie up all night and forcing her to fabricate pointed stories about poltergeist infestations to avoid addressing her sister’s shenanigans and how they disrupted her sleep. Not that Effie was shaming her sister. Bonnie was welcome to do what she wanted with whom she wanted, so long as it was consensual (and legal). But did she have to be quite so loud about it? Frankly, if you were able to be heard through double-brick walls, you were being a bit much.
‘Any good reading plans tonight, love?’ asked Bowow Walker, who was sitting at the large central table, her heavily made-up face – and habitually clashing attire – aglow under one of the green banker’s lamps. Bowow was not her real name, obviously, or anything even close to it. Effie wasn’t entirely sure where the nickname had come from, but it probably had something to do with the fact that Bowow was a founding member of the Yellowbrick Kennel Society, and also the local dog whisperer. If you had a problem pup,Bowow was your girl. Although not girl, really, given she was probably as old as the library, which was showing its years in the temperamental plumbing in the downstairs bathroom, and the ‘butterfly enclosure’, which, far from being a zoological wonder just meant that moths had got into the ancient periodicals. Thankfully, Effie’s magic had kept most of the more expensive problems at bay. Why, she’d won an award just this year for her fiscal stewardship and record number of days without a pigeon incursion. Which she could also thank her magic for.
Heading over to the side table by the window, Effie gathered a stack of discardedNational Geographicvolumes. She grimaced as she realized someone had cut out half the images. Great. The college kids were doing summoning circles again. ‘Always. I have a fabulous murder mystery series on the go – the protagonist is a cheesemaker. And yourself?’
Bowow’s eyes twinkled behind her reading glasses as she patted her usual foot-high stack of cowboy romance novels. ‘A night in with my boys. And the Pomeranians.’
‘Those yappy things,’ muttered Bruce Dickens, an old rocker type who seemed to think he was Bruce Dickinson, the frontman of Iron Maiden. Every now and then a tourist would mistake the two, and the non-famous Bruce would lean heavily into the fallacy, affecting a British accent and talking about his cosy little spot in Paris. Needless to say, Bowow had absolutely no interest in anything Bruce had to say. Especially since he did not actually own a cosy little spot in Paris, France, although hedidown a dilapidated cabin outside Paris, Tennessee. Which was almost the same thing. ‘Don’t know what you see in a dog like that. Cats. Now cats are where it’s at. Cats have boundaries.’
‘Unlike some,’ muttered Bowow, gathering her stack of books and setting them down in her wheelie basket (another of Effie’s additions to library operations). ‘Can I borrow these, love? Ooh, was that lightning?’
No, not lightning. Rather, a flash of purple magic from The Silver Slipper, reflecting off the library window. Effie groaned inwardly. Bonnie was at it again, trying to magic her way out of a situation – or worse, into one. Surely her sister had figured out by now that nothing good ever came of using magic onpeople(mild hair-frizzing spells aside). Magic was safest used sparingly, surreptitiously and as a process efficiency helper.
‘Just some bright headlights,’ Effie told Bowow. ‘All right, everyone. Fifteen minutes until closing. Could you return any books and periodicals to the cart and bring anything you want to borrow down to the front counter?’
