Magical Weddings (75 page)

“Back off, grabby hands,” I say. “It was my mom’s and I don’t think you need to see it.”

Her playful expression falls flat. She even looks somewhat chastened. This is quite astounding for Tori. Not much in this world makes her humble.

Tori steps back and plants a hip against the counter. “So why did you bring it downstairs then?” she asks, crossing her arms over her chest.

“I was going to ask your mom and Aunt Jet to clear a few things up for me.”

“Things like what?” she asks with a skeptical tilt of her head and a cocked brow.

The look on her face brings a heavy sigh from the pit of my tired soul. She’s going to insert herself in this situation whether I want her to or not.

“Is that you, Aspen?”

Aunt Ivy bustles into the kitchen from the back pantry wearing her gardening gloves and apron while holding an armload of fresh herbs.

“You’re finally up, I see. How about an herb omelet or a carrot cake muffin? Everything is fresh and your stomach will thank you.” She practically sings this last part as she places the frilly and fragrant herbs down next to the sink.

“No thanks,” I mutter. “Rook brought breakfast.”

“Aunt Jet said you broke it off with him,” Tori says, accusingly.

“I did,” I moan, and drop my forehead back down to the counter. I can’t take either of their attitudes right now. Not the perky morning sparkle from my aunt, or the judgmental inquisition from Tori.
Where is Aunt Jet?

“So did he beg you to take him back?” Tori asks. “I saw his truck pull in this morning.”

I can hear Aunt Ivy running the water and washing up, but I know she’s listening to every word.

“Worse,” I say.

“He proposed!”

“Goddess, no. That happened yesterday.” I lift my head an inch from the countertop and let it drop back down. Then I repeat the process. “He asked to be friends.”
Thump.
Banging my head is actually sort of helping.

“Oh, my god. He didn’t,” Tori says.

“Oh, Sweet-pea. That would be so perfect,” Aunt Ivy coos from her side of the kitchen.

I hear her shut off the tap and then the sound of her voice carrying over as she crosses the room.

“You could have a long term relationship like I did with Grant. You’re strong enough to do this. I know how much you care for him.”

“He swears that his visions always come true, but his visions are of us getting married and living in his beautiful house. I’m so confused. He wouldn’t lie to me, but how is he having visions of our future when I know he’ll die young if he marries me?”

“Move on. There are literally millions of men to choose from in this world. Don’t waste another minute on this guy.”

“Hush up,” Aunt Ivy warns.

I close my eyes and wish I had taken the outside stairs to the barn instead of seeking familiar family comforts.

“When you find that perfect someone, you’ll quit thinking love is to be used and thrown away,” my aunt says to Tori.

“Not me,” Tori says. “I’m never going down that road. Look how much misery you put yourselves through. I’m having as much fun as I can and if it ever starts to feel serious with a guy, I’m running away. Love hurts, and it’s
really
painful in this family.”

Now it’s Aunt Ivy’s turn to sigh. If there is one thing my aunt could change about her daughter, it’s this. She can’t take how Tori is such an overwhelming player of men. I don’t blame my cousin for her behavior. Her lifestyle choice isn’t one I would pick, but I can also understand it to some degree. I think it’s because Tori knew her father and saw what her parents went through in order to live with our curse and it gave her a different perspective on life. My father died before I was born. My cousin and I see love and relationships from totally opposite perspectives.

As of last night, I now know that my parents married each other secretly. They did it in a way that my mother hoped would be exempt from the curse. Obviously, Mom’s hopes had been metaphorically flung off a cliff and drowned in oblivion. My own feelings are currently hanging on a similar edge and are half a step from falling off the same cliff.

“Honey, I know when you come running home with no forewarning. It’s to escape from your latest love interest, and to eat a home cooked meal. So who is he?” Aunt Ivy says to Tori.

“We’re not talking about me, Mom. I’m a hopeless case, and you know it. But Aspen brought down her mom’s journal and has something to share with you.”

I feel a poke on the side of my head and turn my face to give Tori my best evil eye.

“What?” she asks innocently. “That is why you’re down here and not outside with your other boyfriend.”

“Perry is not my boyfriend.”

“I know he’s not. Snowdrop is.”

I push myself up and glare at Tori, contemplating whether or not I could get the duct tape out of the drawer and across her mouth before she can release a counter spell.

“Uh-huh,” she says, wagging a finger in my face. “I know that look. Whatever you’re thinking isn’t going to happen.”

The sprayer nozzle from the kitchen sink rises like a viper ready to attack. Then the water starts running.

I flick my intention at the junk drawer where there is usually a roll of tape. The drawer flies open.

“Stop that, you two. You’re not twelve anymore.”

I roll my eyes and close the drawer. She’s right, and besides, no one ever wins when Tori and I start disagreeing. I’m usually left feeling truly uncomfortable while Tori laughs at whatever mischief she’s unleashed on me.

“What did you learn from your mom last night?” Aunt Ivy says, leaning forward and placing both elbows on the opposite side of the counter from me.

“Not very much,” I lie, and then change my answer. “Actually, a lot about her and my dad.”

“I know she tried to put him off. She didn’t want to hurt him. Eventually they decided it was worse to be apart and would rather have a short life together than none at all.” Tears collect in tiny pools beneath my aunt’s gray-blue eyes.

I glance over at the back door instead of starting to cry with her. Swallowing the massive lump in my throat takes some effort, but I manage, and turn back to look at her and Tori.

“Is there another book?” I ask her, my voice tinged with hope.

She shakes her head and frets at the journal lying on the counter in front of me.

“The writing just ends, like there should be more or something. She’s talking all about my dad and how they wanted to build their own house. Then, nothing.”

The three of us stare at the journal like we’re waiting for it to start speaking. It doesn’t. It lies there like the inanimate object it is.

“The last page is all water stained and I wondered if maybe she dropped it in the rain or the bathtub and it got ruined so she started another journal.”

“I’ve looked, sweetie. I couldn’t find anything. I suspected…” Aunt Ivy cuts herself off and turns back to her herbs.

“What?” I ask.

“Yeah, what?” Tori says. “You can’t throw that into the room and then not finish what you were going to say.” Tori places a hand on her hip and we both stare at her mother’s back.

“Just tell me, so I can decide how much effort I should put into this, or move on. My mom’s not coming back, and as far as I know, there’s nothing in this book that will help me get over Rook. In fact, this is written testimony on why I need to make a clean break now.”

Aunt Ivy is very still and unusually quiet for a long time as she composes herself. Then she reaches for the herb rack and rips off a section of comfrey leaf.

“You’ve already dumped him, so just let him go on his merry way to South America, or wherever he’s headed,” Tori says.

I look at her and contemplate her logical, no-nonsense suggestion.

“It’s a lot harder for me than it is for you, Tor. I actually really lov—”

“Don’t say it out loud. You need to be telling yourself that Rook isn’t the best lay you have ever had and to start looking for a new boy-toy right away. You know that’s the best way to get over a guy. Find someone hotter than Rook and then make him treat you like a goddess.”

“You are wrong in every way,” I say, but I can’t help the small disturbing smile playing with the corners of my mouth.

“Ow!” Aunt Ivy says, and then rushes across the kitchen.

“What are you doing!” Tori says, half concerned and half perturbed by her mom’s interruption.

“Open the book,” she says, and there are tears streaming down her face. She’s also bleeding. A trickle of blood runs over her fingers.

I rise from the stool and come around the counter to do whatever I can to help.

“The book, the book!” she says, and nods at the green cover.

I switch directions and flip open the journal.

“To the last page,” she orders.

The back cover crackles open. The water damage has made the back of the journal crispy and fragile.

Aunt Ivy lets her blood drip on the yellow stained page. The three of us stand around the end of the counter and watch the blood disappear into the paper. And we keep staring. The blood soaks in and disappears, but then nothing happens.

With matching frowns, we contemplate in silence what we just witnessed.

That is, until we hear, “What in the Goddess’s name are you idiots doing? Then again, maybe I don’t want to know.”

We turn in unison as Aunt Jet walks in from the entry hall.

I look back down at my mom’s book as Tori grabs the comfrey leaf and wraps it around Aunt Ivy’s cut finger. I glance up long enough to see the life of the comfrey plant being drained for the mending of the wound. I also see the blade that Aunt Ivy used to slice her finger lying on the cutting board by the garden herbs.

“Unnecessary roughness,” I tell Aunt Jet as I will the book under my hand to give up its secrets.

“I was starting to tell Aspen that I always suspected that Aurora had a spell on the journal. When I originally found it, I tried salt water, blessed water, spring water, and rose water. The back of the book has clearly been wet. We just proved that it takes sacrifices, but blood doesn’t work on it either.”

Aunt Jet’s look of having to suffer the intolerable is equally divided between the journal and her sister. “Aurora didn’t want us to know what she put in the book and we should respect that.”

“I thought Aspen might figure it out. The idea just came to me to try my own blood. It’s much thicker than water. I didn’t do it before because the page wasn’t stained that color, but you know, sometimes the life force will bring out the magic faster than anything else. With the three of us concentrating on it, I was hopeful I could finally see what she wrote. She was trying to end the curse forever the day she drowned, and I think that journal will tell us a lot more about it.”

“You need to give it a rest, Ives. Aspen has enough to deal with right now.”

“If there are hidden messages in this book, I want to know,” I say.

“Me too,” Tori says, raising the level of excitement in the room. “There’s nothing better than a new family secret being let loose on the world.”

Jet flashes a disapproving look at Tori. “Aurora deserves more from us. If she wanted to keep it secret, then we should leave it at that.”

“We don’t know what she wanted,” Aunt Ivy says. “We obviously can’t ask her. I think it doesn’t hurt to try and find out what she was doing. We’ve both tried over the years to come up with a solution to our family problem. If Aurora would have only come to us…”

Aunt Ivy lets her sentiment trail off. It hangs in the air like a somber fog. We all know that regret. If my mom would have gone to her sisters for help, maybe she would have lived. No one saw what happened that night when my mother lost her life, but we have all come to the same conclusion. She was trying to break our wedding curse and she failed.

“She didn’t come to us and that’s the end of this discussion.”

Our lips seal simultaneously. I glance at the members of my family and feel the choking pain of rising tears once again. Mom and her sisters were as close as any family could be. No one liked to think about the hole that Aurora’s early death tore in us.

“I have to check on my animals,” I say, snatching the journal off the counter and heading out the door.

Houdini, my cat, is the first to greet me as I enter the barn. She says good morning with a chirping meow and a swish of the tail. When she sees me watching her, she flops down onto the barn floor and wiggles on her back until her silky tuxedo paint job is neatly covered with fine brown dust.

What is it with my pets taking dirt baths?
“Morning to you too, Houdini. Are you doing your job of protecting the barn, or are you on a break?” I ask.

She gets her paws under her and sashays over to me looking pleased with herself. I move farther into the barn before she takes the opportunity to wipe all of her dust onto my pants.

Snowdrop and Perry are nowhere to be seen. I check their stalls and see that the floors are clean, their water buckets are full, and the feed bins are empty. True to his word, Rook did as he had said and now my horses are out in the paddock. I don’t call them back in. The sky overhead is threatening rain and they may as well enjoy the morning before the weather turns.

With Houdini weaving around the barn like my drunken shadow, I make my way over to the tack room and my so-called office. I check my desk and clipboard. My two appointments, a horsemanship lesson with a nine-year-old girl and the laminitis case, had both cancelled. With an empty schedule glaring at me, I become aware of the feather-soft tingle on the back of my neck. I place the clipboard down and rub my gooseflesh covered skin, willing the supernatural whisper to go away.

Unexpected free time never leads to anything good. I’ve learned this lesson before. Staying busy keeps the trouble at bay. I drop my hand to the journal stuffed into the front pocket of my sweatshirt and say a quick protection spell. The universe doesn’t need to be conspiring against me today. If by chance, the cancellations were only because I needed to mourn the loss of the best relationship I’ve ever had, then the universe definitely got it wrong. I would much rather stay busy than have time to dwell over my losses.