5. Chapter Five

Chapter Five

Callum

Hex flicked his tail at me across the glass top of the display case, annoyed that I wasn't giving him the attention he felt he deserved. Not looking up from the computer screen, I absently reached over to give his soft black fur a pet.

Scanning the appointments, I saw Mrs. Hawthorne was scheduled at five to have her cards read. I liked the older lady; it was always a hoot to read her cards. She usually came in once a week and was always eager to tell me if anything the cards had predicted had come true.

Reading cards came easy to me, and my readings were surprisingly spot on most of the time. We did a fair amount of business with card readings, especially this time of year. October saw Salem filled to the brim with tourists, eager to take any of the numerous ghost walking tours, visit the site of the famous witch trials, and stay in rumored haunted hotels. Even though we were a bit off the main drag, thanks to our online presence, people still managed to find us.

Thunder rumbled outside, and I glanced up just as the pattering of rain against the windowpane started. The wind whistled sharply, and I shivered. Unease skittered across my skin. Something was brewing in the wind. The skies outside had darkened with the oncoming storm, casting gloomy shadows over the store's floor.

Sighing, I flipped on the light next to the computer. We tended to keep the shop lights muted, casting shadows in the corners. It added to the ambiance we were going for, but it was hell on my faulty eyes, especially when the clouds blocked out the sun.

I'd kill some time between walk-ins and card readings by filling some of our online orders. Our online sales were always good, and when Daphne had started making candles–some spelled and some not–they had become a hit. There was always someone who wanted a good luck charm or a love potion.

If I had time after filling orders and preparing them to ship out, I would do a quick inventory of the floor items. Along with kitschy, witch themed souvenir items, we sold sage, candles, and crystals. We did do some potions, but those were kept in the back, and were only for a few select clientele. I left those things to Gran, Mom, and Daph. No one wanted me trying my hand at any potions. Not with the way my magic tended to…have a mind of its own. Who knew what any potion I made might end up doing.

I knew where my strengths lay and I played to them.

Thunder boomed so loud it felt like the old house shook on its foundation. Hex, none too pleased with the noise, jumped from the counter. With a swish of his fluffy black tail, he disappeared through the opening of the curtain that covered the doorway behind the counter. It separated the main part of the house and our living space from the shop floor.

An hour later, I was printing shipping labels when the shop door opened with a gust of wind so forceful it whipped away from the person who had tugged on it. The bell above it tinkled loudly. Wind, rain, and small bits of debris and leaves flew in, followed by a man who was valiantly trying to pull the glass door closed behind him and block out the ominous weather.

He was tall, with broad shoulders covered by a black hoodie, and tight jeans that hugged his delectable ass to perfection. My mouth watered at the sight of that peach, and heat flushed through my body. I usually didn't have such a visceral reaction to a man's ass, but this one was grade A prime. His hair, darkened by the rain, was flattened against his skull, and hard to determine its actual color.

His aura drew my eyes in, the blues and violets swirling around his tall frame, like undulating flames wrapping around him. Mixed in with the cool colors there was a splash of warmth, red, and a bit of orange.

Auras could tell you a lot about a person, if you knew how to read them. I had always been able to see auras, for as long as I could remember. They were just a part of a person when I looked at them, like their eye color or hair. It wasn't until I was maybe ten, that I realized and understood that not everyone saw colors surrounding people the way I did. In my family, I was the only one who could see a person's auras.

The blues told me he was a seeker, with a strong imagination, but he could also be critical and a tad snobbish. Violet indicated he had true greatness in him, while also having the ability to be cunning and selfish. The red and orange told me he had strength and a love of life, but that he could be self-indulgent.

What had my brows furrowing and me pushing my glasses up was the tiniest swirl of brownish black weaving its way through the otherwise lovely colors of his aura. Brown usually meant low energy, but black could mean one of two things: depression or death.

There was something familiar about his aura, like I had seen it before, I just couldn't place from where.

The man finally got the door wrestled into submission and firmly closed, dimming the sound of the wind and rain raging outside. He turned, running a hand through his wet hair, brushing it back from his forehead .

And I forgot how to breathe.

My stomach dipped and swirled, and I grabbed onto the counter, my entire body playing haywire with itself.

Michael fucking Endicott, the…third? Fourth? It didn't matter. His family–at least on his mother's side–dated back as far as mine did in Salem, which was a long fucking time.

My high school crush.

At least for the two years before he had graduated. I'd been a sophomore when he and Daphne had been seniors, though they hadn't run in the same circle of friends. Michael was a complete jock. The it guy. The one everyone wanted to be, or at least be around.

Every single time I had passed him in the hallways my body had reacted much the way it was doing now.

He hadn't even known I'd existed then, but oh how I had daydreamed about our eyes meeting, that smile of his lighting up his face, and he would see me. Of course, we would be together happily-ever-after, the perfect couple.

I snorted out loud at my own ridiculous fantasies and hoped he hadn't heard me over the storm outside.

He'd been so fucking beautiful it had hurt to look at him. Sandy brown hair, sparkling blue eyes, a dick-hardening smile. He had been sheer perfection in my adolescent eyes. Good looking and great at every single thing he did. Football? Star quarterback. Basketball? He could land a three pointer every time. Track? That mile didn't even make him winded.

Unlike what happened to my lungs anytime my green eyes landed on him, when I couldn't remember how to properly breathe. Or speak. Or think. Which had been often, because I seemed to always have an uncanny ability to pick Michael out in any crowded hallway, between passing periods. His aura had always drawn my eyes immediately to him.

Michael Endicott had fueled many of my teenage hormone driven dreams–and even a few grown up ones, to be honest.

He had left Salem after graduation, off to Boston and law school. He'd been a prosecuting attorney in the city for the last few years, his smiling face showing up across the front page of the papers more than once. It was the only reason I subscribed to the online editions. I could honestly care less what was happening in Boston, but every once in a while, I would log in and there would be Michael's face staring back at me, blue eyes shining. Announcing another victory, another win, another criminal he had put behind bars.

Pushing my glasses up my nose, I straightened to my full height, which at six-foot-one was only about an inch or two shorter than Michael.

His wide, slightly frantic eyes darted around the shop. Like he wasn't sure how the fuck he had landed in this strange place, filled with all kinds of witchy type things, before he visibly shook himself.

His lips moved silently, and I wondered if he was giving himself a pep talk of some kind, while I waited with bated breath to see what he was going to do next.

And why on earth he was standing in The Witch's Brew.