Page 1 of Curses & Cold Brew
1
RAMONA
The old man had finally croaked.
At last, it was time to collect his despicable soul.
I had to give Saul his due for making it this long. At the ripe old age of eighty-seven, he’d committed plenty of sins worth an eternity of the most delicious punishments. The boss would be pleased.
I fixed my cufflinks while I strode down the picturesque Harvest Grove Drive to No. 38. With a tune on my lips, I walked straight through the old man’s triple-locked front door and into his disorderly living room. The wealth and status for which he’d so willingly traded his soul had been squandered ages ago. Where there should have been mourners or flowers, there were only cockroaches and empty takeout containers.
“Saul Henderson,” I purred, folding my arms with a pleased smirk. “Your time on this plane is up. You’re mine now.”
I moved closer, and something soft shifted under my Gucci loafer. I glanced down to find a thin line of yarrow and salt that created a ring around the recliner that had become Saul’s deathbed. My brow perked. The cloying scent of herbs waftedfrom a bowl that sat next to the chair, accompanied by a hunk of freshly forged iron and a black tourmaline crystal.
“Well, that’s a new one. Trying to ward against me, old man?” I mused when my eyes met his open, unseeing ones. “Your witchy bullshit won’t keep me from my collection.”
Powdered sugar still clung to the corners of his mouth. I looked around the room and spied a half-eaten box of apple cider donuts on the coffee table. I knew for a fact those weren’t just any donuts, but the most coveted baked goods in all of Maple Hollow. Captain Geriatric must’ve been waiting in line all morning for them.
I grabbed the box and tucked it under my arm. “Waste not.”
The dead often missed the sweets of the living, but there’d be none where he was going.
At least he’d died eating Eloise’s famous donuts. I was rather fond of her and her brother, Wyatt, the werewolf who owned Full Moon Bakery. He knew the right salt-to-sugar ratio when it came to my favorite apple tarte tatin, but ever since his younger sister had joined his ranks, the confectionaries had become even more sinfully decadent.
I drummed my red-polished nails across the pastry box as I looked at Saul’s wan face. “You don’t mind, do you? They’d pair nicely with the Colombian cold brew sitting in my fridge.” When Saul didn’t reply—because he’d been dead for hours—I let out a wistful sigh. “Well, I’d love to stay and chat, wrinkles, but you know, no rest for the wicked.”
Another long moment of silence. Not even a stirring in the ether.
His spirit must have been in shock to not protest my claim on it.
Nonetheless, I reached into the air between us, swirling my L’Occitane-lotioned hand as it pierced into the void and beyond, feeling for his soul, which should still be clinging to his body.
I searched and searched . . .and searched. . . and felt nothing.
My gut plummeted.
“What the . . .?”
I poked at the air with more force, grasping for what was rightfully mine. Focusing all of my magic, I let the tendrils of my essence stretch into the far reaches of oblivion, but in the end, I came back with nothing.
“Where the fuck is your soul?” My eyes widened in fury at the limp sack of stale blood and human flesh.
It was all coming together now. The crystal, the herbs, the iron . . . the odd expression on Saul’s mottled face. Someone had beat me to the jump. Someone had taken what wasmine.
There would be literal hell to pay for this theft.
Still holding the box of donuts, I leaned forward and pulled the collar of Saul’s shirt toward his shoulder.
“Shit!”
The sigil—my sigil—had been broken. My mind reeled. Someone had broken a powerful demon’s sigil. That kind of arcane horsepower was upper-management hell mojo. Who had the kind of magic to pull this off?
I swept a hand through the air, sensing, probing.
There were no threads of magic that I could detect, and the smell of the place was covered by the pall of incense.
The herbs burning in the bowl caught my eye again. Lavender, mugwort, and the smallest hint of wolfsbane. An odd blend, to say the least. Nothing any of the local witches would openly use with the number of werewolves they were rubbing elbows with these days.
