Storiebook Charm (A Spellbound Novel 1) Page 5

  The vision in her head seemed to pop, suddenly more vibrant. Her body shuddered, a release overtaking her. She gave into the sensations coursing through her, letting her body feel every nerve as if each had been singled out, isolated, and magnified.

  Her breath grew shallow, her knees weak, but colors splashed in her mind in Technicolor and she knew without seeing that, in a sudden burst, the flowers had sprouted in the planter boxes.

  But, as usual, the effort to use magic drained her. She felt weak in the knees, and dizziness swept through her. She drew in a bolstering breath to recharge.

  “So the rumors are true.”

  A male voice jolted her out of the moment, the prickling of her skin going cold, her powers instantly ceasing. A complete letdown. She knew who it was from his fresh-cut-grass scent, as well as from the rugged timbre of his voice and the faint Southern drawl that gave just a hint of gentlemanliness to it. She knew it before she ever turned around.

  Reid Malone.

  His simple statement sent her heart plummeting to the pit of her stomach. Had he seen her do magic? She’d barely hidden her powers from him at the lake that night, but now, had she blown everything—her future in Whiskey Creek—all for some flowers?

  She had no choice but to turn. But she threw her head back and faced him head-on. “What rumors?”

  One side of his mouth lifted in a sardonic smile. “Hell freezing over, and all that.”

  So maybe he hadn’t seen. She shook off the last remnants of the magic that flowed through her, sneaking a quick peek at the flowerbeds. The little magical astrids bloomed in profusion. Lavender and white daisies created a whimsical backdrop. It wasn’t finished, but it was a start.

  She put her hands on her hips, tamping down the bubbling anxiety in her chest and the wave of dizziness washing over her from the spell. Damn it, but Reid’s sudden presence made heat rise to her cheeks as if he’d caught her having an orgasm rather than doing magic—not that being discovered doing one was better than being discovered doing the other. “What are you talking about?”

  His smirk stayed firmly in place as he said, “I seem to recall you telling me that you were never coming back to Whiskey Creek. You didn’t say unless hell freezes over, but it was sort of implied, from what I remember.” He breathed out, slow and steady, as if the memory was flooding him. “And I remember that moment with perfect clarity.”

  Oh God. Of course, he’d bring up the lake the very first time he saw her again, even if it had been eight years since that day. The truth settled in—Reid Malone might sound like a gentleman, but he certainly wasn’t. He looked more like a hungry wolf ready to pounce, and she knew what that was about.

  Kathy Newcastle had warned her, and here he was, twice in one day. On the hunt.

  “I didn’t plan on coming back— ”

  “Yet here you are,” he said. “I could take this place off your hands. You can make a good profit and you wouldn’t be saddled here because of some investment your dad made.”

  “Not for sale,” she said, marveling at his nerve. What was he up to?

  “Everything’s for sale.”

  She most certainly was not for sale. “Thanks for stopping by,” she snapped, distracting her anger by turning to inspect the flowers in the bed. Except for one spot she’d missed (thanks to Reid’s inopportune interruption) and the vines she still needed to make climb up the columns, everything looked good.

  He glanced at the beds, his eyes narrowing slightly. She held her breath, waiting to see if he’d noticed the change, but he didn’t say anything.

  Which filled her with relief. Maybe he didn’t pay much attention to detail and hadn’t noticed anything out of the ordinary that day at the lake, either.

  She hurried away from the flowers, dug her keys from her pocket, and plunged one into the lock, pushing the front door open and stepping inside to the shop.

  As she turned to close the door, she thought she saw that dog again. She peered at it, her senses on high alert, her heart skittering. What was it? A small retriever? No. Some sort of terrier. She didn’t know why it bothered her.

  She shook off the feeling of foreboding settling over her. It was just a dog. Her reaction had to be from her proximity to Reid, pure and simple. He was mortal, and he and his dad had tried to railroad her father, but none of that mattered. The air between them was charged with electricity.

  The momentary distraction was enough to let Reid push through the door after her. “I’d heard you were back,” he said, “but I had to see it for myself.”

  “I heard that I shouldn’t trust you,” she shot back. In her mind, her voice shook, her nerves rattling her to the core. But, thankfully, to her ears, she sounded remarkably calm. Forceful, even. He was smug and cocky and had some nerve coming in here as though he had any right to. And he was too good-looking for his own britches.

  Reid laughed. Actually, he took off his cowboy hat, and then he laughed. His mirth didn’t spread from his mouth to his eyes, though. “I don’t know who told you that, but you shouldn’t believe everything you hear, darlin’.”

  “I don’t, darlin’, unless it comes from a reliable source. And, well—” She spread her arms. “There you go.”

  “Who’s the reliable source? Oh, no, wait. Let me guess.” He stroked his chin, the side of his thumb resting against his soul patch enticingly. Why, oh why did he have to look so good?

  Thankfully his acerbic personality kept her lucid.

  “I’d reckon Kathy Newcastle’s been talking,” he said after a pause.

  If he’d been paying any attention from behind the windows of The Speakeasy, it was a pretty easy job to guess it was Kathy doing the talking. Folks only stopped by to gawk, not gossip. “Guess you’ve been paying attention to what’s been going on around here. Why so curious, Reid? Don’t you have anything better to do than spy on me?”

  “Guess not,” he said, an amused smile playing on his lips. Full, kissable lips.

  No. She banished the thought and dragged her gaze back to the deep-blue granite of his eyes, debating her options. Did she show him the door and cut the conversation off now, or play along with this little game of verbal cat-and-mouse and find out what he wanted? Oh, how she wished she could go back to hiding in the stairwell to her loft.

  “Can I help you with something, Reid? I have a lot to do to get ready for the grand opening.” As if to punctuate just how much, she pulled her newest list out of her back pocket and waved it in front of him.

  “Nothing better to do at ten o’clock at night than work through your chores?” He shook his head. “Tsk, tsk.”

  Her anger flared as she peered at him. “Can I help you with something?” she repeated, resisting the urge to snap her fingers, magically lash his hands behind his back, and zip his mouth shut.

  “Not right now. I was just curious.” He moved toward her until the thinnest breath of air could pass between them. The air sizzled as he lifted his arm, and for a split second, she had the fantasy that he was going to slip it around her back and pull her to him as he had at the lake when he’d lifted her onto the hood of her daddy’s truck. Her breath caught in her throat, but she finally released it when his hand slid along the built-in bookshelves, the freestanding units, and the tables and chairs instead of along the contours of her body.

  God, what was wrong with her? She stilled her racing heart, gathering her bearings, but her thoughts took a sharp turn. He’d touched her body once before. His mouth had sucked on her nipples and his fingers had teased the heat between her legs, but he hadn’t kissed her. What would it feel like to finally have his lips against hers after so many years, to have that intimacy and that connection with him, mortal or not?

  As he walked through the front of the store and into the garden room, she forced her thoughts back to the café. She had indoor trees to bring in, twinkling lights, and outdoor furniture. In the winter, on cold days, people could stay inside the room, but on nice spring days, they’d open up the bay doors and
spill out into the actual garden.

  One more thing on her to-do list. She concentrated her thoughts, holding an imaginary pencil and writing the items in the air. They’d appear on her actual list, a bit of magic she’d discovered when she was eight years old and had scribbled in the air with her fist, angry over a nine-year-old bully who’d made fun of her. Thick black scribble marks had ended up all over his yearbook as a result.

  Her mind returned to her list. She wanted to plant a garden. Or maybe conjure one. Did it even have to wait until spring?

  Yes, of course it did. People would notice, and besides, she couldn’t afford the energy plunge a full garden would cause her. She had too much to do each and every day to feel worn out from casting spells.

  “So Buddy Garland’s doing the work?”

  Of course he already knew the answer, but she answered him anyway. “Yes, you know him?”

  “Everybody knows him,” he said. “When he doesn’t have a job, he parks it at The Speakeasy and doesn’t move for days.”

  “So I hear,” she said, steering him back into the front room, and hopefully right out the front door.

  He stopped short, turning to face her. She careered into him, her palm flattening against his chest. Heat flared between them. She jerked her hand away, her skin instantly turning cold once their connection was broken.

  He looked down at her, his voice lowering. “You really think coming back here was a good idea?”

  She stared at him. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

  He shrugged, but that cocky grin returned. “Because we have unfinished business.”

  The air between them sizzled again, but she backed away. “We have no unfinished business,” she ground out, but in truth, it was all she’d thought about since she’d found out he was still here in Whiskey Creek.

  He closed the distance between them again. “Oh, but we do. Ever since that day at the lake, I’ve had a question I wanted to ask you.”

  “And then you’ll leave?”

  “Sure, darlin’, if that’s what you really want.”

  “It is.” She bolstered herself, knowing what he was going to ask, but having no idea how she would answer it.

  “When we were, you know—” He paused, leaving the words hanging there and she gulped. “There wasn’t a storm in the forecast, but then, suddenly, one was brewing. Why is that?”

  Her blood seemed to ratchet into motion. So he had noticed the lightning crackling like a web of electricity across the sky. Being so close to him now, she could feel the same energy coursing through her, gushing into a pool of uncontrollable power. Oh, not good. If she didn’t keep it together, she’d blow and her magic would surface, just as surely as Old Faithful. “I’m not a weather girl,” she said.

  His gaze slid over her as if he were making his own assessment. “No, you’re a bookstore/café owner. Nothing to do with the weather.”

  Good. At least they got that cleared up. But damn it if he didn’t stay rooted to the ground where he stood.

  Waiting.

  “Why were you at the lake that day?”

  He wasn’t going to budge until she answered; she’d bet her life on it. “My dad and I used to go to the pier at that old fishing cabin,” she said. “I—I got some bad news that day. I needed to think.”

  His eyes narrowed. “What kind of bad news chased you out there? In the middle of a storm that wasn’t supposed to happen?”

  She swallowed. She’d summoned the storm to make herself feel better, but it hadn’t worked. Neither had nearly having sex with Reid right there on the lakeshore. The way he looked made her shiver. It was as if he knew about her magic but wasn’t telling. Or maybe she was just paranoid.

  Her mind froze. How was she supposed to answer that? I went to the lake to use my magic with the weather. It’s the one thing I could control that day.

  Uh, no.

  “What kind of news?” he asked again.

  “None of your business,” she snapped.

  She waited for him to utter some generic apology for asking. He didn’t.

  What a guy.

  She grabbed a stack of books from the nearest box and shoved them on the closest shelf, wishing again for that giant hook to drag him outside and far, far away from her and The Storiebook Café. “Anything else?”

  He paused for a minute, as if he were contemplating the possibilities. “Now that you mention it,” he said, “I have this picture of you in my head and I can’t seem to get it out. I thought maybe—”

  “What picture?” she said as calmly as possible, but her cheeks heated again, and her palms grew sweaty. She knew exactly what image played in his head. He was envisioning her naked. Or nearly naked.

  He moved like a wolf, lithe and graceful, advancing toward her. Instinct kicked in and she backed away, but she ended up flat against one of the built-ins. Trapped.

  “Oh, you know what I’m remembering,” he said. “White T-shirt and what was left of your blue jeans. Mmm mmm. I can picture it like it was yesterday.” His finger grazed the sleeve of her shirt. “Sopping wet, too, and pulled up just enough to—”

  “Reid Malone, you just stop.”

  With utter control, his gaze moved from her face to her body. “Stop what, darlin’? You’re not enjoying our little reunion?”

  “What do you want, Reid?”

  He looked at her with a heated expression that she couldn’t read, almost as if what he wanted, and what he could have, were two different things. He dropped his voice. “Maybe I want you.”

  Her shoulders tensed. “I’m not available.”

  “Not even for the right price?”

  She balked and bit back a laugh. Had he set out to get under her skin? “Are you propositioning me?”

  He shrugged. “That list of yours is awful long. We could trade a little labor for a good time.”

  Her body tensed at the idea of trading anything with him. She threw her shoulders back. “My list is not that long, and I’m not that desperate. Buddy’s working out just fine, thank you very much, and I’m not for sale.”

  He put his hat on. “That’s a cryin’ shame. Could have been fun.”

  “I get along just fine.”

  “You keep telling yourself that, but everyone needs a little merriment now and again, and you seem strung pretty tight.”

  She scowled, the energy she’d barely been controlling exploding. As quickly as she could, she concentrated on the inky sky outside so she wouldn’t blow out the windows. A split second later, thunder cracked.

  His attention diverted and he looked out the window. Enough of a distraction that she managed to drag in a raspy breath. “Stop picturing me. Stop thinking about me. Stop coming around,” she said.

  He turned back to her with a crooked grin that, damn him, ate her craw. “I don’t know if I can do that, Storie. Seeing you again has conjured up some…fond memories for me.”

  “Not so fond for me,” she said. The energy mounted, growing like a gathering wave, and then once again, a boom crashed in the sky outside.

  He whipped his head around, staring through the window. “What the hell?”

  She put her hands on his chest, ignoring the hard muscles underneath the cotton and the heat emanating from him. Ignored the zing and zap that felt like she’d just been shocked.

  She gave him a forced smile as another crash of thunder sounded. “You’re conjuring up memories for me, too, sugar, only they’re not ones I want to experience again, so unless you have some other business here, you can go.”

  “Now that you mention it,” he said casually, “I thought I might take a look at Buddy’s handiwork.”

  Now they were getting down to the truth of the matter. He definitely wanted something, and it wasn’t to relive their night at the lake. “Why’d you want to buy this place, Reid? Looking to expand your bar?”

  He laughed. “Not even close. My dad—” His jaw tightened. “Never mind. So you’re not going to let me look around?”

  “No.�
�

  One of his eyebrows arched. “No?”

  Like a mirror, she arched one of hers in response. “Hell, no.”

  “My, my,” he said with a wry grin, “such hostility.”

  Said the wolf to Little Red Riding Hood. “My, my,” she said, matching his sardonic smile, “such a player.”

  And then she gave him a good hard shove backward, using just enough magic to direct him out the door. Once he was clear of the threshold, she waved her hand, slamming the door with an invisible force and throwing the deadbolt.

  “And stay away,” she said under her breath.

  Chapter 4

  A six-shooter. There was no other way to describe Storie Bell. The woman was packing all kinds of gunpowder, and he’d just unleashed the smallest dusting of it. Tormenting her while he figured out how to search the building just might be the most fun he’d have for years to come.

  If it didn’t get him into a whole heap of trouble first.

  He stepped behind the bar at The Speakeasy and poured himself a draft before leaning against the mahogany countertop.

  She’d pushed him out of her café, and his chest still burned from the heat of her hands. And those eyes. They were as green as the hills in May when everything was fresh and the rain was falling. Emerald and lush, they’d bored into him as if she could read him just as easily as she could read one of the books on the shelves of the store.

  But mostly, it had been the fire that almost sparked from her fingertips and hovered on the tip of her tongue that intrigued him and had caused a longing to resurface, a longing that he hadn’t thought he’d ever feel again. What would it feel like to have that tongue slipping between his lips…

  Ah hell, if he wasn’t careful, he’d be telling her all about Gemstone Spirits and the Apple Pie Moonshine recipe. He’d hand the thing over if she asked him to with those lips.