“Oh, hell no, give me a minute.” She went into the kitchen. “Louie, an emergency has come up and you’ve gotta run this bitch until Ash gets back.”
“Are you kidding me, Deidra? Who’s going to cook?”
“I see Sasha back there, let her do it.” Louie’s girlfriend was sitting on the food prep counter and waved at them. She shrugged.
“Yeah, I’ll cook. We can handle it, Deidra, go get your fix.”
“It’s an actual emergency this time. Chloe’s missing.”
They didn’t believe her, just waved her off even with Brent standing beside her, nodding at everything she told them. It didn’t matter she was going with him.
“Let’s go.” He grabbed her and she jerked away from him.
“Dude, I took at least a Xanax and a half, I can’t move that fast.”
He ran and started the truck, pulling up to pick her up when she made it to the edge of the parking lot. She climbed in painfully slow and he headed to his grandmother’s place. She had to be able to reverse whatever the wizard had done to make her forget.
Deidra managed to fall asleep on the way, and he was careful not to drive too fast. He’d only done minor damage to his truck when he wrecked it, but he wasn’t in the mood to do it again. He couldn’t believe she was asleep, but he had never taken Xanax. They pulled up in front of Madame Visionary and he shook her probably a little more violently than necessary.
“Get up, we’re here.”
“What in the world are you doing here, Brent? Who is this?” His grandmother gestured to Deidra, who’d sleepily walked into the house passing by her and sat on the couch, looking stoned out of her m
ind. Regina had her full fortune-teller outfit on, and he was shocked at the difference.
Her hair was up under a scarf and that weird crown sat on her head. She had long gold earrings that touched her shoulders, and a dress that covered her whole body like a tent. There was a fake piercing in her nose and her makeup was bright blue and went all the way up to her eyebrows.
“Grandmother, you look weird.”
“I just finished with a client, honey. Now what is the meaning of this? Why does this girl look like you picked her up on the side of the road?”
“Okay, this is Deidra and she was there the morning Layla died. She can’t remember, but she saw something. I think her memory has been wiped of just that incident. Chloe’s missing, Grandmother. I think Ash has her and he’s going to kill her. If she knows something that can help us find her, then I need to know it.”
“Okay, I’ll try, but it might be hard to bring her memory back not knowing what type of spell he used. Inevitably it will be dark magic, which is harder to crack, but I’m always up for a challenge. Let’s see what we can do.”
“Thanks.”
He watched as Regina moved around Deidra, who seemed oblivious that someone was even looking at her. It was amazing she was able to function. She was staring into her eyes, and he hoped she was attempting to figure out what spell had been done.
“Okay, I need some theme music.” She went over to the stereo and turned on a Fleetwood Mac song. Once it was going, she was dancing around Deidra. It was the strangest thing he’d seen. Well, at least for that day. She danced by her a few times and then she touched her. With her hand on her arm and her eyes closed, she continued to dance and he realized it had gotten even weirder.
Suddenly her eyes flew open. “I’ve got it,” she said. “Turn the music off, would you.”
He rushed over to the stereo and turned the music off, noticing Deidra still didn’t look like she knew or cared what was going on.
“Dark and harmful magic inside this girl’s mind, reverse your evil ways and help her rewind.” She touched Deidra’s head and they watched as she passed out on the couch.
“When she wakes up, she should remember,” Regina said happily and they both waited.
Deidra didn’t wake up right away and Brent figured it had something to do with the Xanax. After twenty minutes had passed, his grandmother said, “Oh dear, do you think I killed her?”
She sat up a minute after that and looked more awake than he’d ever seen her. “What the hell happened to me?”
“You were unblocked, so to speak. It should be in your mind now, the memory you couldn’t remember,” Regina told her and watched her face as it went back to the sleepy slack look Deidra had perfected.
“I do remember. I went to the back of the house and saw Ash taking guns inside the house.”
“What?” Brent said. That didn’t sound right.