Page 78 of Dead Rockstar

I looked at Lydia helplessly. Her wide, shocked eyes stared back at me. “What did I do?” My voice was a croak.

“I don’t know,” she said, her voice shaky. “Fee…oh Fee…you are a very powerful witch.”

I stared at her in horror.

“Ma,” Lee spoke up, scrambling to his feet, offering her his arm. Had my power actually blown them backward into the door? Could I have really done that? “We need to get you inside. We need to call the police. He, uh…he’s still…”

“Give it a moment, son,” Lydia said, taking hold of his arm and rising on her shaking, weak legs. “See what she’s done.”

I was afraid to turn around. Instead, I stood there, trembling, watching as they looked past me, their eyes wide. I heard him before I saw him.

“Stormy Spooner.” My eyes closed at the sound of his voice, low and measured, but full of gravel. With a deep, shaking breath, I turned to face him.

Phillip was standing behind me, his newly shorn hair a messy halo around his head, his cheeks flushed red with life and vigor, his face absolutely murderous.

Lydia had hobbled back toward the door, pulling her oxygen tank behind her. “Lee, help me inside.” Her voice was a wail. “He’ll blame me for this, and I haven’t the strength…help me inside, son.”

Phillip's hair was in spikes all around his ears, still black as ink, but with a sheen it hadn't had before. He ran a hand through it, feeling it, realizing the scope of what had happened, and his eyes turned dark. “Listen to your mother, Lee,” he said, his eyes never leaving my face. “Quick. Before I change my mind.”

The door slammed behind them. I heard the deadbolt turn. The porch was suddenly eerily silent. I rushed to Phillip, gingerly stepping over the shorn braid, my exhausted arms ready to embrace him, but he stopped me with a raised hand. I might be the one with the magic, but his raised hand held all the power and fury of a resurrected god, and I stopped in my tracks, feeling my cheeks burn so hot they might as well have burst into flame. Phillip’s darkened face was full of barely controlled rage. He could pull a bolt of lightning from the sky and smite me with it, and I’d have no trouble believing it at all.

He took one last look at me, his eyes flashing with fury, his other hand clenched by his side, and wordlessly turned and walked down the steps, his heavy boots thundering on the old, rotting wood underneath. He walked past the pickup, his newly short hair whipping around his ears from the force of his movement.

I rose my shaking voice and called to him, feeling tears starting in my eyes. “Phillip, where are you going?”

He didn’t answer. He’d already reached the front gate and turned to walk out into the street. Fuck, he wasn’t going to take the truck?

Without turning, he reached into the pocket of his black jeans, pulled out a wad of metal keys, and tossed them backward onto the grass.

I stared open-mouthed behind him as he walked down the road, his black combat boots thudding against the concrete, hands jammed in his pockets. The brilliant, golden sunny sky of an hour earlier had gone; the horizon behind him had turned a cold, defeated gray, and a low, rumbling thunder had begun far off in the distance. Another storm was coming, right on time. Phillip disappeared down the sidewalk, fading into the trees as I stood there, still watching, seeing nothing but the gray sky. I turned toward Lydia’s front door, wishing stupidly that she’d come out and tell me what to do, offer me some comfort, anything. The curtain in the window moved ever so slightly.

“I told you he didn't want it, Fee.” Her weary, haggard face appeared in the dusty window, full of a million different expressions. “May the goddess have mercy on you. And me.” I took one last look at her, stepped off her porch with a sigh, and walked to my truck, alone, wondering if Phillip Deville would ever, ever forgive me.

Twenty

I sat in Jason Langley’s kitchen, clutching a cup of tea I’d made for myself. I didn’t want it, but I needed comfort. Nothing had gone as expected. Not just today, either. Nothing had gone as expected this entire time, ever since I’d done the stupid spell and set the whole mess in motion. Shit, if I really admitted it, things were going wrong even before that. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d made a responsible, good decision.

Every time I thought things might be going back to normal, something else happened, and it seemed that no matter how hard I tried to do the right thing, I kept doing the wrong thing instead. Was that the curse, the underside of all the magic? That I became a total idiot?

What had I expected, exactly? For Phillip to fall into my arms with gushing thanks? I kept hearing Lydia's small voice from behind me on the porch, “I told you he didn't want it.” She was right. Every fiber of Phillip’s being had made that clear to me. I’d disregarded his choice and brought him back anyway - used more black magic, which of course would have consequences - and now he probably hated me. I’d never forget the awful look he’d given me before turning to stalk off into the evening. I’d never seem him look like that, and never wanted to again: an overwhelming mixture of fury, disappointment, and absolute heartbreak. The way he had loomed over me, his fists clenched, his face dark. There had been no love on that face, not for me.

Maybe releasing Phillip had released the love we'd come to feel for each other. Or maybe he’d done it when he’d taken those scissors…

Or maybe it was just as simple as I’d disregarded his feelings and broken his trust, and that was reason enough.

I sat at the little kitchen table, my fingers working over themselves nervously, waiting. I’d been sitting here long enough to make two cups of tea that had both gone cold. Jason had come in and placed a kind hand on my arm, saying nothing, and had retreated out onto the porch, his usual hang-out place, realizing I didn’t want to talk. At least, not to anybody but Phillip. How long would he make me wait? It wouldn’t surprise me if he didn’t come back at all.

I heard voices on the porch and turned my head to listen. I heard heavy footsteps, then the unmistakable low, deep voice of Phillip. My heart began to pound, and I stood, walking over to the sink to rinse my cup, needing to do something, anything, with my damned hands, the hands that had taken over and done their magic and made Phillip hate me. I heard the front door open, his boots hitting the welcome mat, and the sounds of him rummaging around behind me. I sat the cup on the drying mat, squared my shoulders, and finally turned around.

Phillip was sitting at the table where I had just been, his head in his hands. I couldn’t see his face because his back was partially to me, but I could tell by the way his broad shoulders shook, the way he kept pushing one hand to his eyes in a furious, boyish gesture, that he was crying.

The silence was unbearable, but I stood by the sink silently, giving him time to collect his thoughts, giving him the space and respect I’d refused him before. I watched him as he sat there and cried, wishing I could see inside his head the way he saw in mine, wishing I could ease some of his pain. Finally, he stood and whirled to face me, and in the harsh light of the old-fashioned kitchen, he seemed even taller. His dark hair, newly shorn, fell over his ears in an unruly mess. It suited him, gave his eyes an even wilder look, framed his chiseled face in just the right way. He was so damned handsome, even trembling the way he was, even with tear-streaks on his rugged cheeks. I began to shake. I’d never seen him so wild, so undone.

“You brought me back,” he said. “Again. Why? Answer.” The way his voice boomed, the clipped intensity of his questioning, made me shake harder, but then I collected myself, raising my chin and eyes to face him head on, a sudden anger rising up in me.

“Don’t talk to me like a fucking child,” I said hotly. “And why do you think?”

“You knew I didn’t want you to,” he said, his gaze unflinching despite his watery eyes.

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