Light Me Up

SARA

I’d stayedtrue to my word with Theo and had Landry pick me up for work. Though it seemed pointless, the worry in his eyes got to me. It was clear whoever sent that package wanted to mess with me, but they could have done it in person, and they didn’t. I wasn’t even sure what they meant by it. As more days passed, I felt less scared and more angry that it happened in the first place.

In fact, I was all but sure it had nothing to do with Devil’s Rain and was probably just some crazy person who saw the Eryn Blake post. Maybe some sort of deranged person who didn’t like witches, or a fellow coffee-shop owner who was jealous of the attention we’d gotten.

It was a flimsy idea, but I couldn’t think of anything else that made sense. So I felt confident that I wasn’t in danger and this was all just some sort of sick joke. But I didn’t want to add on to Theo’s already-large list of burdens. So I’d follow his rules for now.

The lunch rush was over now, and only a handful of customers lingered at seats throughout the shop. Alex came to watch over me like a hawk, but for the past hour she’d been deep in work, having set up two laptops on a table in the back corner. I was cleaning the milk frother on the espresso machine when the bell over the door jingled.

“Oh hi there, Sara!”

I gritted my teeth before turning to face the town gossip.

“Hi Miss Cheryl. How are you doing today?”

“Oh, just fine. I’ve been cleaning out the garage all morning so I told Gus I needed to come into town for a treat.”

“Ah, well it sounds like you sure deserve one. What can I get you?”

Cheryl perused the glass case, her eyes lighting up with more excitement at each confection she saw.

“Oooh you have the lemon squares today. Now those are my absolute favorite, Sara. I really think you should make them more often, though that might actually be a bad thing for me.” She laughed a hearty guffaw and patted her belly.

“Well I’ll see what I can do.”

My voice was cheery and sounded fake to my ears, but she didn’t seem to notice. And truth be told, I couldn’t fault her for gossiping about Theo and me. I’d always liked Cheryl and was guilty of gossiping with her too from time to time.

“Anything to drink?”

“Well I think I could use something cold. I’ll take one of those mango iced teas.”

“Coming right up.” I looked over at Landry, who had already started ringing up the order at the register. It was nice to have a good right-hand here and I reminded myself to give her another raise soon.

I plated the lemon square, but when I went to get the iced tea, I realized we were out.

“Let me go make you a fresh batch real quick, Miss Cheryl. It won’t take more than a few minutes.”

“Oh that’s fine, honey. I see Alexandra back there and I’ve been meaning to talk to her about the wedding.”

“Sounds good.”

I strode through the swinging doors and gathered the supplies. Since it was a specialty tea, I only made small batches and kept all the ingredients back here to keep the front less cluttered. I made quick work of it, putting on the boiling water and preparing the pot with black tea leaves and my own specialty blend of dried mango and spices.

The shop phone rang out, and when I looked through the door window to the front, I saw Landry was still chatting with Cheryl. I went to the desk at the back of the kitchen and picked up the phone from there.

“Hello, The Witch’s Brew, how can I help you?”

At first all I heard was quiet breathing, and then a raspy voice spoke.

“I thought you were dead.”

My mind wasn’t sure I heard the caller correctly, but my body reacted like it sure did. My heart jumped in my chest and my stomach turned over.

“Wha— um, what? Excuse me?”

“You were supposed to be dead, Sara.”

My breaths were coming fast now, and the hand holding the phone trembled next to my ear.

“Who—” I whispered, but choked on the word. I shut my eyes tightly and shook away the fear, but it didn’t budge. I cleared my throat and tried again. “Who is this? Wh—what do you want?”

“I’m sad you’ve forgotten all about me. After all this time, I shouldn’t be surprised. You got a lucky break. You’re supposed to be dead. I guess I’ll just have to do it myself this time.”

Click.

I couldn’t swallow, couldn’t move except for my muscles that were shaking. All the fear came rushing back to me, a wave of it, crashing over my head and threatening to drown me.

But this time I had help. I thought of Theo’s smile. This time I had people on my side. I dropped the landline phone and grabbed my cell from my pocket, tapping Theo’s contact.

“Hey hippie, how’s it going?”

“Theo I—” I swallowed around the lump in my throat. “I need you.”

* * *

I sat in Theo’s office again, an intense feeling of deja vu washing over me. Landry had brought over a chamomile latte, so I was blessedly drinking that to calm my nerves.

Theo sat at his desk with a cup of black coffee and a face twisted with anger. He was on the phone with some of his deputies and trying to juggle the string of arsons with this mess of mine. Every minute or so, he’d drag his hand through his hair in frustration.

As soon as I’d called him, he’d come running over to the shop, finding me in the kitchen once again, dealing with the aftermath of some sick threat. Earlier I’d put the whole tongue package out of my mind. Dismissed it as some one-off nonsense that would just go away if I stopped thinking about it.

How naive that was. I let my guard down and was body slammed back into reality. I guess someone really was threatening me. And I had no idea who or why.

But knowing I had Theo was a relief. I was still nervous to lean on him—or anyone—too much, but I was trying. I took a last sip of the latte and dropped the cup into the trashcan next to his desk.

“No shit.” Theo’s eyes widened in surprise. “Alright, well thank you. I’ll be in touch soon. Bye.” Theo hung up the phone and stared at me.

“What?”

“Just talked to the medical examiner. The tongue that was sent to you was cut from the body premortem. They’re working on testing the DNA but that could take a while.”

I flinched.

“Premortem, so that person is still alive?”

Theo folded his arms on his chest and dipped his head.