Demon Kissed - Katie May Page 0,3

and then pulls Stacy onto his lap. “Alright, man, hook us up,” David tells the dude, who’s flipping through a book with a pentagram on the front.

“What do you want?” the guy asks, lowering the book so I can see his black tortoiseshell glasses and thin nose.

“We want a love spell!” Stacy claps her hands together rapidly, almost bouncing out of David’s lap.

“Really?” Tortoiseshell glasses raises a dark brow.

“It’s for me,” I say flatly, taking a seat directly in front of him. I don’t get why he cares, it’s not like this shit will work anyway. What does it matter if he pretends to cast it on Stacy and David?

Glasses guy looks me up and down in a judgey sort of way that I don’t appreciate. I start to get a bit self-conscious. I check my low-cut black tank but don’t see anything wrong. I try to subtly check my hair, but there’s no grass or anything in it.

“Are you gonna do the spell?” I ask before I get so paranoid, I have Stacy check my teeth for food.

“I need you to spit on the ground, right here,” he says, pointing at a patch of dirt.

Really? That’s so lame. We aren’t gonna hold hands and chant shit?

“Right here,” he repeats.

“Come on, Kat, it’ll be silly,” Stacy pleads.

I spit, only so her pig-headedness doesn’t kick in. Then I watch as the guy references the book for a moment before he uses his finger to draw a pentagram around my spit.

Original. Hope this book didn’t cost more than five bucks.

“Now a hair,” the faux-wizard commands.

“What? Really? Don’t these Amazon kits come with spell ingredients? You know, rose petals or something for love spells?”

“No.” The wizard adjusts his glasses, and I get a total Harry Potter vibe for a second. It’s quickly gone when he frowns at me—he’s got a very Slytherin-y frown—and says, “Are you gonna do this or not?”

I scrunch my nose. “That seems like a rip—”

Stacy leans forward and rips a couple strands of hair off my head, and I yelp, casting her a scathing glare.

Wizard guy gestures toward the pentagram, and she tosses my poor mutilated hair onto the little star. Then he haltingly reads some old English from the book, making me grind my teeth and just stop short of reaching out and reading the spell aloud myself.

“Ye olde forces of the dark

Arise from the depths and cast thou a spark

Bring with thee the flames of the heart

To pierce another and force a start.”

His magnificent reading is interrupted by his sneeze. He does not cover his mouth.

Droplets of spit from some guy I don’t know coat my arms.

Candyland sounds more fun at this point. Playing with a four-year-old might even be more hygienic.

“And I’m out.” I shove up to my feet, give Stace and David a wave, push out of the willow tree’s wall of branches, and stride off to my car quickly, avoiding eye contact with everyone and wiping the tops of my arms off on the back of my shirt.

This is a disappointing end to the evening. Not quite as horrific as if I’d just left after the whole mouth-diarrhea debacle, but still bad, I think as I slip into the driver’s seat. I close the door just in time, because the wind picks up and starts to whip the trees in the graveyard. Storm clouds roll across the moon, making the night as black as my mood.

The idiots at the party just cheer and raise their cups. “Halloween, baby!” one idiot crows.

I grumble as I start the engine. “Fuck Halloween. And this stupid party. And Janie St. James. And stupid allergy guy. And Will—” But I can’t say it. I can’t curse my crush.

I’m just gonna be doomed to love him from afar forever like some creep, because real girls don’t get dream guys—that bullshit’s for fairy tales—and love spells and magic don’t exist.

2

I get home after midnight, and the storm is raging full blast. I have to park in the driveway instead of the garage because both my parents are actually home for once, so I have the pleasure of running from my car to the door. Yippee.

It’s less than ten feet, but I’m drenched and shivering when I slam down the button to close the garage and slip off my socks and shoes on the lame premise of trying to track less water into the house.

When I slip inside, I’m immediately attacked.

“Katty!” Adam barrels into me full force, and though he’s only four,