Bewitched on Bourbon Street (3 page)

Instead of leaving, both of my friends stared at me, their emotions conflicted. Their unease crawled over my skin, making me itch. They were worried, probably not happy about leaving me after learning about the curse. I backed up, putting distance between us. “It’s fine. Bea and I can deal with whatever we find out, and then I have to get home. Kane will be waiting.”

We had a date set for seven. Between his demon-hunting commitments and the shadow walking I’d been doing for Chessandra, we’d spent very little time together lately. Even Christmas Eve had been interrupted by the Brotherhood. Kane had been called to deal with a demon who’d been playing Santa down in Jackson Square. Talk about a nightmare before Christmas.

“All right. If you’re sure,” Kat said, her expression skeptical.

“I’m sure.”

They both gave me a hug and made me promise to call after Bea and I were done with the testing.

I waved as they reluctantly left. Bea crossed the room to let Rosalee know we were going, and I sat at the table by myself, watching the dwindling blessing party. All the remaining guests were alternating between staring at me and pretending I didn’t exist, trepidation streaming off them in waves. Sighing, I picked up Pyper’s abandoned daiquiri and took a long swig. If everyone in the room was going to treat me like a leper, then I was going to need copious amounts of alcohol.

After I’d finished Pyper’s drink, my vision turned fuzzy and I no longer cared what anyone thought. I was the one cursed, not them. And it wasn’t like black magic was contagious.

The room was spinning by the time Bea came for me. “Jade?” she asked. “Ready?”

“Absolutely,” I slurred and got to my feet, stumbling sideways. Giggling, I clutched her arm. “I probably shouldn’t drive.”

“That’s obvious,” she said dryly. “Come on. Let’s get you out of here.”

Bea wrapped her arm around my waist and guided me out of the lavish house. The late-afternoon sun blinded me, and I stumbled once more, crashing into the railing. At least I hadn’t flailed down the porch steps.

“Oh, boy. I think maybe you need a restorative.”

“Why? I feel great.” I tilted my head up, enjoying the warmth of the day.

“You won’t when that booze wears off. If the left side of your body isn’t bruised, it’ll be a miracle.”

I waved an impatient hand. “I’m perfect. For once, all this witchy B.S. isn’t bothering me one bit.”

“How could it? You can’t feel a thing.” She tightened her grip on my arm and carefully tugged me to her silver Prius. “Get in.”

I slid into the passenger’s seat and glanced around. “Where’s Pyper? I came with her.”

Bea started the car and shook her head. “She left already, remember?”

I blinked, hard. “Um, yeah, I guess.” But I didn’t. The day’s colors were blurring together, and I wasn’t even sure where we were anymore. “I might be a little drunk.”

“You don’t say.” Bea patted my leg. “Don’t worry about a thing, Jade. I’ll have you fixed up in no time.”

I sat back and closed my eyes, only to have my world spin out of control. Renewed nausea made bile rise up to the back of my throat. My eyes popped open, and I grappled with the door, looking for the window button.

“Oh, goddess above,” Bea mumbled.

My fingers finally found purchase, and the window lowered. Cool air rushed in, settling me.

“If you get sick, you’re cleaning it up,” Bea said, her voice harsh.

“Don’t worry,” I forced out between gulps. “I won’t.”

“I’ve heard that before.”

I turned to squint at her but couldn’t focus. “We’ll be to your house in a sec anyway.”

“No. We won’t. I’m taking us to my shop. That’s where my potions are.”

“Oh, crap.” My world tilted as she took a sharp turn, and I had to grip the door frame to keep from slumping over.

She chuckled. “Keep it together, Jade. We’ll be there in a few.”

I concentrated on breathing. In. Out. In. Out. Time got away from me, and I thought I might have blacked out for a moment, because all of a sudden we were parked in front of her shop, the Herbal Connection.

My door swung open, startling me. I glanced up into Bea’s exasperated face.

She held out her hand. “Let’s go, party girl.”

I clacked my tongue on the roof of my mouth and let her pull me from the car. “I’m not feeling so great.”

“No kidding.” She deftly unlocked the front door of her witch supply store.

The scent of fresh rain and sea-salted air washed over me. It was Lailah’s spell on the shop that put all patrons at ease by triggering their favorite scents. My stomach settled just a touch, the spell working its magic.

“Take a seat.” Bea deposited me on the stool behind the counter. “I’ll be right back.”

I did as I was told, trying my best to keep my eyes from crossing. The air conditioning blew down, and gooseflesh popped out over my arms. Suddenly everything came into focus, the wooziness vanished, and my alcohol haze fled.

Bea stood in front of me, holding an empty glass vial, a self-satisfied smile claiming her lips.

“What was that?”

“Elemental magic. It’s something I’m experimenting with. Looks like it worked.”

I raised one eyebrow. “Healing air?”

She nodded and held up the small vial. “I prepped a ginger bath, spelled the steam, and then trapped it in here. All I had to do was ask it to encircle you, and there we have it.”

“So air and water?”

“Actually, air, water, earth, and fire. Each was present. The ginger for earth, and the fire to heat it.”

I slumped back on the stool, my energy completely gone, and stifled a yawn. “That makes sense. So simple.”

Bea smoothed her elegant sheath dress. She looked so conservative standing there in her New Age shop. Had she ever looked the part? Not since I’d come to town a year and a half ago. She was always dressed in classic styles as if she was ready for tea at any given moment. The one exception was when she was digging in her garden. Then she wore overalls and cotton button-down shirts.

“I’d love to experiment with the elementals with you.” I grimaced and waved a hand at myself. “I mean, once we get past my current personal crisis.”

She patted my hand patiently. “I’ll get you my notes. Now, let’s go into the lab, where we can get down to business.”

I followed her through the tight rows of merchandise and into the back room that she’d turned into a research lab. There were two stainless steel workstations, both orderly, with hardly a thing out of place. Shelves of potions and herbs lined one wall, while leather-bound books lined another.

Bea snapped her fingers, her magic lighting the candles nestled in the wall sconces. The warm light glowed in the small room. She walked to the middle of the lab. “Stand right here while I get the potion ready.”

Nervous apprehension ate away at my stomach. My energy and ability to shield myself from outside forces had disappeared. Faint traces of excitement seeped in through the walls, no doubt from the tourists walking the streets of the Quarter. At least Bea was once again able to mask her own emotions from me. Because even though I no longer felt her concern, her short, jerky motions told another story. She was worried.

“Okay, I’ve got it.” Bea had a mortar and pestle in one hand and a bag of herbs and a potion in the other. “It’s not going to taste very good, but it’ll do the job.”

I gritted my teeth. And just when I was feeling better, too. No potion in the history of the Craft had ever tasted decent.

Bea eyed the potion and gave me an unconvincing smile. “It probably won’t be that bad.”

“Probably? You’re joking, right?”

“Okay. It’s going to taste awful, but it won’t hurt you. And by the end of it, we’ll have an image of whoever spelled you with black magic.”

A wave of exhaustion hit me, and I settled on a stool, ready for the day to just end. “Let’s get this over with.”

Bea nodded and went to work. In no time, she handed me the pea-green potion. I took the cup and stared down at the sludge that was roughly the same thickness as clam chowder—complete with herb chunks.

“This looks disgusting,” I said, my nose crinkled.

She raised her eyebrows. “Do you want to know who cursed you?”

“Yes.”

She waved to the cup. “Here’s your shot.”

“Crapballs,” I muttered and then chugged. The bitter sludge hit the back of my throat, and I forced it down, struggling to not gag. Good gods. Bea had lied. It was more than bad. It was horrible. I clutched my stomach and glared at her, grimacing.

“Give it a moment,” Bea said softly.

I would’ve sent back a snarky remark if I hadn’t been afraid I’d yak right there in her lab. Instead, I closed my eyes and mentally counted to ten. Slowly the nausea faded, and all I was left with was the rank aftertaste of dandelion and garlic. “Can I rinse my mouth out?”

Bea shook her head and handed me a thick white pillar candle, the flame already flickering. “Not yet. Suck in a deep breath and blow this candle out. The smoke will tell us what we need to know.”

At least that part was easy. I held the candle with both hands, filled my lungs with air, and then blew. The candle winked out, leaving only the blue-tinted smoke. As I continued to blow, the smoke thickened, rolled, and stretched in and out into unidentifiable shapes.

Bea and I both held perfectly still, waiting.

The smoke turned and twisted, then materialized into something that might resemble a human form, but before any features could be identified, it folded in on itself again, hovered, and then shot across the room and back again. It pinged off the walls, crisscrossing the room.

Bea frowned and pursed her lips.

“It didn’t work,” I said.

She shook her head and raised her hands toward the smoke, her lips moving in a silent chant. I was dying to ask her what she was doing, but I didn’t want to interrupt. If she was in the middle of a spell, any sort of distraction could cause an issue.

The smoke started to slowly drift toward her, but then it stopped, balled up, and shot away from us both, straight to Lailah’s workstation. Tendrils spilled off the ball and wrapped around a medium-sized vial full of red liquid.

“Bea? Is that a fertility potion?” I asked, watching as the smoke solidified back into the putrid green potion I’d swallowed and covered the bottle, forming a small pool on the counter. “Disgusting.”

She grimaced and glanced away, hitting a button on her phone. “Yes. It was.”

“But why—”

“Lailah? I need to see you right now,” she said into the phone. Gesturing to me, she headed for the door that led into the shop. “No. It’s an emergency…okay. See you in ten.”

Bea closed the lab door behind us, while I headed straight for the bathroom.

I could not go one more second with the vile taste in my mouth. I took my time rinsing with water and then again with the mouthwash I found in the cabinet. Once I felt like I wasn’t going to gag, I rejoined Bea in the shop. “All right. Lay it on me. What happened back in the lab?”

A muscle pulsed in her temple. The cold, hard expression on her face was almost terrifying. If I didn’t know her so well, I’d be convinced she was ready to spell me into next week.

“Bea?”

Her jaw tensed and her voice rasped as she ground out, “That was a bottle of fertility potion. The spell indicates that’s what was used to curse you.”

Shock turned my limbs to ice. I stood there, totally confused and at a loss for words.

Bea waited, her face set in stone.

I shook my head, logic winning out over fear. “That’s impossible. I haven’t even taken any. The bottle you left me is tucked away in a drawer in the bathroom until we decide what we want to do.”

A few months ago, after Bea had made the suggestion that Kane and I might want to start thinking about a family, she’d discreetly left a bottle of it on my nightstand. Instead of finding her meddling invasive, I’d thought it sweet. She knew firsthand how being a powerful witch could take over one’s life. I’d decided it was her way of letting me know I had options.

Bea’s brow furrowed. “I didn’t leave you a potion. Did you get some from the store?”

“No. I found it on my nightstand a few days after we talked about it. I assumed it was from you.”

She shook her head. “I didn’t put that there, Jade. Someone else did that.”

“Who?”

We both glanced at the fertility potions lined up on a nearby rack. Then we looked at each other.

“My spell didn’t identify any of the other bottles in the lab,” Bea said. “Only that one…on Lailah’s workstation.”

Chapter 3

“What?” I said stupidly, my brain refusing to register what she’d just said.

“Lailah—” Bea started.

I held my hand up. “Like I said, I haven’t taken any of that potion. Besides, Lailah would never curse me. Just like she didn’t curse you…dammit.” The light bulb clicked on as I remembered the time Lailah had been unwittingly forced to poison Bea. “You think she’s been compelled to harm me? Or possessed? No.” I shook my head. “That’s ridiculous. I know her too well now. I’d have been able to tell.”

Bea raised one skeptical eyebrow. “Really, Jade? You think that’s how this works?”

All the righteous indignation left me and I slumped. “No. It’s just not probable that she’d be targeted again. I mean, why would she be possessed?”

“To get close to you, of course,” Bea said.

“Of course.” My voice was flat. If that was the case, I was going to get Lailah a freaking magical bodyguard. It was one thing for some asshat to come after me, but to use my friends to do it was beyond low.

The door burst open, and Lailah rushed in, her breath coming in short bursts. Her long blond hair had been piled into a haphazard bun, and she’d changed into olive-green cargo pants and a white T-shirt. She stopped inches from me. “What happened?”

I stepped back, putting space between us.

She frowned and turned to Bea for an explanation.

“Come with me.” She slipped her hand through the crook in Lailah’s arm and guided her toward the lab. I moved to follow, but Bea paused and put her other hand up. “Wait here. We’ll be right back.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but the image of the potion flashed in my mind, and I closed it. “Fine.”