Page 72 of Spring L.A.W.
The witches nodded and settled deeper into their seats. Some pulled out notebooks. Others just closed their eyes.
Rayna leaned into Payne’s side, and he shifted to make room for her, his arm falling easily around her shoulders.
“I still feel wired,” she murmured, just to him.
He smiled faintly. “I’ll stay up with you. We’ll burn it off.”
Rayna smirked, lips brushing his ear. “Careful what you offer. I’ve got enough adrenaline to launch a missile.”
“I’ve got enough stamina to ride it all the way.”
She laughed, soft and real. For the first time all day, the tension in her spine let go, and she settled into a comfortable slump.
Behind them, the witches chatted in low voices, and someone passed around a tin of cookies with a mysterious label that readNot for Mortals. Even though no one in the room was immortal, no one asked what that meant.
“Here he is,” Katie marched Eli into the war room.
“Eli, can you remember where you live yet?”
“Yes, it came to me a few minutes ago.”
“Oh, good,” Sahara said. “I was afraid I was going to have to hack into the FBI’s missing persons’ files.”
“Can you do that?” Eli asked, wide-eyed.
“Maaaybe?” Sahara winked.
“I’ve been thinking about what I’ll tell my parents about being missing for four days…”
“What?” a few of the witches asked.
“I’m gonna say I fell down a well.”
They chuckled. “No one is going to believe that,” Adam said.
“Okay, then, should I say I was pulled into a hazy space called the Between by a guy with no face, yanked out by a couple of witches driving a sports car, taken to some kind of traveling fantasy mansion, where they kept me alive by feeding me S’mores?”
After a beat, Rayna said. “A well it is!”
Outside, snow flurries made a last-minute Spring appearance, as if the earth needed a final cool cleansing.
“I think we’ve all earned a rest,” Joell said. “Take a day or two to relax at your various homes away from the mansion, and I’ll meet you in Tennessee before… Well, you know.”
“Before the red tide comes in?” Crystal asked.
“Before Shark Week?” Rayna added.
“Before Auntie Flow comes to visit? Before we have to ride the cotton pony? Before the Red River?” Lioness gleefully chirped.
Joell pinched the bridge of her nose. “Whatever… Tonight, we’re safe on Long Island. Tomorrow or the day after, the mansion will go back to Tennessee. I’ll meet you all there.”
Major Payne cleared his throat. “Meanwhile, I’ll take Eli home, and the man-pets will return to Rayna’s brownstone. She has a front door in need of repair.”
The End
(of part one.)
PART II
