Page 66 of Strike It Witch

Ah well. Sexton was good for it. He’d be thrilled I found one so soon, too.

“Thanks. I’ll wire them the money after we get off the phone and send you your cut after the artifact arrives.”

“Good doing business with you,” he said. “And Betty?”

“Yeah?”

“Think about what I said before. The people at Siete Saguaros need you to stay. It’s what Lila would’ve wanted.”

I ended the call, wired the money to the seller, and ate my sandwich as guilt ate at me. I texted Sexton to let him know his artifact was on its way and that I’d be summoning a god in his cemetery tonight.

As expected, that netted me an immediate phone call.

“You intend towhat?” The power in his voice made my ears pop and my stomach ache.

“Please dial back your voice. It’s making my teeth hurt.”

“Explain yourself.Now.”

“I’m trying to, but whenever you speak, my ears start to bleed.”

“Then perhaps the pain will awaken you to how dangerous it is to summon anything from the otherworlds, much less a god.” He sighed, and my heart sped up like I’d downed a pot of double-caffeinated coffee.

“Sexton, please. Chill. It’s not what you think.”

I gave him the story in broad strokes, leaving out the finer details.

By the end of the conversation, he’d dialed back his voice, but my head still throbbed, and I was pretty sure he’d meant it to. Subtlety was not the gravedigger demon’s strong suit.

Despite his initial anger, he ended up not only giving me permission to use his cemetery for tonight’s events but alsoinstantly paying me for the artifact and the job.Instantly. As in, the notification came through the second he voiced his pleasure at my having found the lamp.

Some sort of demon ability, I supposed. I wasn’t interested enough to figure out how he did it. Sexton wasn’t my main focus at the moment.

A freshhealcharm, a long nap, and a quick dinner later, I locked up my trailer and made the short trek to my garden room. I stopped at Red’s grave along the way and took a moment to drop to my haunches and sink my fingers into the soil.

I desperately needed to feel a connection to my mother’s land. I’d been missing her so much lately. Our relationship had been a complicated one, but the big-picture takeaway was that I’d loved her and she’d loved me.

We’d just occasionally screwed up the details.

I pushed magic into the earth the way I’d done for the planters outside Wicked and Floyd’s bar. The soil in the planters had been excited to make contact with me, so happy to lend me magic even as it accepted mine. It had given me hope.

The soil here gave me the usual response.

A low hum of magic just out of reach. Magic turned in on itself. Magic that didn’t recognize my power.

Magic that hated me.

I reached for it again, pouring every drop of magic I had at my disposal into the soil. The saguaro roots reached for me, assuring me that the protection spell was strong.

The soil did nothing. It was far away. Weak.

Gone.

Frustrated, I jerked my hands out of the dirt and dusted them off. “You’d better hope the mage Beau told me about resonates with you.” A sob caught in my throat. “Because I can’t keep doing this. You’re killing me.”

Chapter

Seventeen

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