and I had a chunk of the Coca-Cola cake that Malene had made for me.
Lady had finished her bowl and stared up at me, her eyes full of hunger.
“Sorry, girl, but this food is poisonous to you. Otherwise you could have as much of it as you want.”
She turned away, and I could tell that she did not believe me.
Well, I would never lie—not when it came to death. Since eating a chocolate breakfast would be the best part of my day, considering that I had no idea how or where to get the twenty thousand dollars, I resigned myself to put on a smile and do my best.
Maybe I could strike a deal with the mafia where I paid them in installments. Liam probably wouldn’t be back at work yet, so it would be up to me to keep things moving at the barn renovation. Dooley was a stingy old tightwad, but he’d pay me what he owed. That much I knew.
As I washed my face in the bathroom, I thought about the small spell that I’d hidden in the cupboard. I paused in mid-scrub and listened, wondering if I could hear anything. The orb had bounced around so much last night that I thought the light tapping sound it made could be heard by anyone standing in the bathroom.
Though I cocked an ear toward it, I didn’t hear a thing.
Satisfied that my secret would remain hidden as long as I needed it to be, I finished cleaning up, dressed and grabbed Lady.
We hit Bender’s coffee shop first. I wanted to see if Rufus could help me out at the barn again. We’d made good headway yesterday, and with his help we could keep the renovation going.
Plus, I wanted to know where he was at all times. Like, of course I did. Had to keep him not knowing who he was, obviously.
Was that even ethical?
Probably not, right? Like, if you knew who someone was, you should probably tell them.
Well, that wasn’t going to happen here. My plan was to keep Rufus in the dark as long as possible and to also track his movements.
Hmmm. Maybe I should buy a tracking device and stick it on his pants. Think he would notice a small watch battery thingy sticking from his back pocket? Were tracking devices even that small? In movies they were always tiny. Like, you could put one on a person’s shoulder and they’d never notice.
Did I see that in Mission Impossible?
Yes, I probably did.
Given that I didn’t have a tracking device, the best way to keep someone in my sights was to stalk them. Nope. Not stalk. Just be around a lot. So I headed over to Bender’s to check on Rufus.
And oh, I found him, all right. Malene, Norma Ray and Urleen circled a table. He stood in front of them. Malene waved her arms about as if she were going to take off and start flying.
She spotted me and waved me over. “Hey, Clem, come here and listen to what we found out.”
Rufus glanced up at the mention of my name. Our gazes locked, and that same heat that I’d felt before charged the air. Suddenly it was like the world had slipped away and only Rufus and I existed.
Then the shop darkened and I was there—in a black room, my arms locked to my sides. I forced the fear back down, swallowing it into the pit of my stomach.
Rufus’s gaze filled with concern. What I relived must’ve shown on my face.
Forcing a smile, I reached the table and gripped the back of Norma Ray’s chair, helping to steady myself.
“You okay?” Rufus asked.
I waved away his concern. “I’m fine. Just a little foggy in the head.”
Lady padded up to Malene and tapped her nose on Malene’s leg. She patted my dog while nodding to Rufus.
“Clem, you are not going to believe this, but do you want to know what we just discovered about John, here?”
“What’s that?” The fog threatened to take over, so I exhaled sharply and gripped the chair harder.
“We discovered that he’s a spell hunter,” Malene said proudly. “He was telling us how he can see the orbs.” She clapped her hands with excitement. “He can see them—all of them, even the ones that Hannah hid.”
“We don’t know that for sure,” Norma Ray said.
“Why do you always have to be such a Debbie Downer?” Malene snipped. She pumped her hands in victory. “Do you know how long we’ve waited for a spell hunter to