House Of Ivy And Sorrow Part 11

He flips it over, and as he reads his mouth gapes. "Jo . . ."

"I know." I stare at my hand, my whole soul feeling sick and tired. "It's like whoever is doing this is . . . having fun. I have to protect everyone in this picture before it's too late. Nana has the rest of town covered, but my friends need even more."

"What do we do?" Kat puts her chin in her hands and glowers. "I wish I could help. What's the point of being here if I can't help?"

"Kat . . ." I wish I could give her an answer. "Do you know Billy's address, by chance? Winn mentioned they were studying there tonight, but he's way outside town."

She shakes her head. "Ugh, I'm so useless."

"Don't say that. I'd hate to be doing this on my own right now." I pull out my phone with my good hand and call Winn. As it rings, my heart pounds faster and faster. Please, please pick up. It can't be too late.

"Hey," he says, and I can hear the gorgeous smile that goes with it. "Are you feeling better? Say you're feeling better."

Despite all my concerns, I grin like a fool. So relieved. "I'm feeling better."

"Good, I'll come get you, then."

"Are you sure? You're at Billy's, right?"

"Very sure. And I was just about to leave for his house, so perfect timing."

I laugh. "Awesome. I kind of need to beg Billy to read my paper-he did such a good job with Kat's, and I am way behind on my stuff now."

"See you in twenty?"

"Perfect. Thanks, Winn." I shut the phone, a plan already clicking into place. "Kat, you're about to be very useful, more useful than you probably want to be."

Her brow furrows. "What's that supposed to mean?"

I give her my best cackle.

NINETEEN.

"It's simple," I say to Kat as I paint the potion onto her palm. There's no way we could pull off giving Winn and Billy some kind of charm necklace, so I figure the best bet is to put the protection spell right into them. It won't be permanent, but it should ward off most bad magic and reduce the effects of anything truly horrible for at least a day. "All you have to do is touch him on the skin, and the spell will transfer. He won't even notice. Just don't touch anything before, or it'll get the spell instead."

Kat gnaws on her lip as I cover her fingers with the clear liquid. She doesn't daintily bite-no, she chews to the point you wonder if she'll start bleeding. "I don't know, Jo. I'm not a flirter; I can't touch him."

"Yes, you can!" I laugh. Kat never gives herself enough credit. She may be shy, but she is beautiful in her own right. Punk beautiful, with her heavy bangs and porcelain skin. "You totally had a vibe going with him the other day at lunch, and he's all thin and hipster. You'd look good together."

She stares at her hands. "I don't want to date Billy."

"I'm not asking you to date him-I'm only saying you could if you wanted. One touch on the arm does not a relationship make."

She sighs. "I guess this is what I get for wanting to be helpful."

"That's the spirit." Winn honks his horn, and I jump. "Better go."

I certainly don't mind scooting in right next to Winn when we get in his truck. As he wraps an arm around me, I press my hand into his forearm. The spell transfers, and I feel a little more at ease. Then I notice the ends of his hair are wet. Oh, for the love, he just showered. "You didn't have to get all cleaned up to study."

He laughs. "Actually, I did. I was out in the fields testing soil and compost. You and Kat would have opted to sit in the truck bed if I came straight from that."

I tilt my head to look up at him. "You test the soil?"

"Any good farmer does. If the pH levels are bad, it can damage the crop. Or sometimes there will be too much of a particular chemical, so you need to plant a crop that'll balance the levels out. We rotate our fields all the time."

"Huh."

"Huh?" He pokes me. "Having grown up around a bunch of farmers, I thought you'd know this stuff!"

"h.e.l.lo?" Kat says. "Jo and I live in town, and Gwen pretends she doesn't live on a farm. I've never even touched a tractor, nor do I plan to."

"Exactly," I say. "I have Nana's bug legacy to uphold, Gwen dreams of being a stylist, and Kat has her poetry."

"Poetry?" Winn leans forward to look at her. "You write poetry?"

She folds her arms. "I plead the fifth."

He glances at me, and I hold up my hands. "Hey, that's all I know. Kat doesn't show her poems to anyone."

We turn down Billy's dirt driveway, bouncing at each deep hole left from the winter snows. His house has its charms. The porch stretches all the way around, big and roomy. It's a nice shade of blue, with navy shutters. As we get out, I text Gwen in hopes that I can get her here so I can keep her safe.

We're @ Billy's if you wanna come. We want you to.

Sry for what happened.

Winn rings the doorbell. "Texting Gwen?"

"Yeah. I think she's mad at me, though." Sure enough, her text says it all: No thx. Too tired to play 3rd wheel tonight.

I show her answer to Kat.

"Ouch," she says.

"I know, right?" I sigh. Gwen won't let this one slide, and I have no idea how to make it up to her. I need to before our hunters hurt her.

Winn rings the doorbell again, which is when I realize we've been on the porch longer than the average wait for someone to answer the door. My heart speeds up, the thought of Billy hurt or dead suddenly at the forefront of my mind.

"Did you tell him we were coming?" I ask.

"Yeah, I called him." Winn knocks a few times. "Sometimes he can be a little s.p.a.cey, though."

"Really?"

Winn smiles like he's remembering something funny. "Guy's in his own world half the time, but it's always entertaining."

Honestly, I don't know much about Billy, except that he's Winn's friend and his parents are some of the few people around who don't grow corn. They have apple orchards. Every mother and grandmother in the area waits anxiously to buy them for fall pies. Well, minus Nana. She's a horrible baker, which is strange considering she mixes precise, nefarious potions all the time.

"Maybe you should call him again?" Kat asks.

Winn frowns. "His car is right there. He has to be here."

We all knock at once until my knuckles hurt.

Just when I think I'll have to bust the door down and save another person from death, Billy answers. His hair is the usual perfect mess, but he's breathing hard, and his face glistens with sweat. "Sorry, couldn't hear you over the music."

Kat and I exchange a relieved glance. What was he doing? Dancing? I try not to laugh, though the thought of Billy dancing is pretty funny. He's seems so laid-back.

Then, like a pro, Kat shoves Billy. "We were starting to think you were dead! Did you forget we were coming?"

The spell wraps around his arm as it drains from her hand in swirling plumes of blue mist. He's safe. At least safer. He shivers, but other than that I'm sure he has no idea what happened. He stares at Kat, surprised. "Sorry?"

"Whatever." She stalks past him and we follow.

"Got that out of the way quick," I whisper. "And after all that complaining."

She smiles. "I figured it was kind of like ripping off a fingernail."

I laugh, but it's cut short when Winn's arms come around my waist from behind. Is it wrong that I like how he grabs me without asking? It gives me permission to do the same. He plants his head on my shoulder, and I can't move even if I wanted to. "What're you two whispering about?"

"It's a secret."

"Hence the whispering," Kat says.

"Anyway . . ." I pull my paper from my messenger bag and hand it to Billy. "Thanks for the help. Here we were all talking about not skipping school this week, and I missed Friday and Monday."

"Not a problem. It shouldn't be too hard to get you caught up." Billy plops down on a maroon couch in the living room, already frowning at my writing, which probably sucks. I'm not great at school in general. Maybe because I've always known what I'll be doing the rest of my life, and you don't study it in college. It's more important for me to memorize spells and potions than long math equations.

"Good." Kat kneels by the coffee table and opens her giant binder. "Because if she had to study during lunch tomorrow I couldn't prove to her that we don't have a stalker."

"What?" Winn says as he pulls me into the love seat.

I try not to smile. And she thinks she's useless. "I swear, Kat, the day we went out to lunch there was someone with a camera across the street. No one else was by us, so what were they photographing?"

"A car? The road? A penny left in the street?" She pauses, and then goes for her special notebook. The poetry one. I suppose that was . . . inspiring.

"Hmm, a penny or Gwen sunbathing?" I ask.

"I didn't see anyone," Billy says. "Did you, Winn?"

He purses his lips.

Billy's eyes go wide. "Seriously? You saw someone?"

I knew it, but waiting for Winn to admit it is torture. I want so badly for him to give us some kind of clue.

"He wasn't exactly hiding. If you looked over you would have seen him staring at Jo." Winn tenses, and so do I. He wasn't just holding me close that day; it was like some gut reaction to protect me.

"Why didn't you say anything?" Billy asks.

"He . . . I don't know. The dude was creepy. He looked right at me, and it felt like he'd have no problem stabbing me in the heart if he felt like it."

The hair on my neck raises. Winn doesn't know it, but I'm pretty sure he was silenced with magic. That guy put a fear spell on him, told Winn he was dead if he pointed him out.

"What did he look like?" Kat's voice trembles.

"That's the thing." Winn holds me tighter. "He looked totally normal-short, dark hair, tall, young-"

"Young?" I say, disturbed by the idea.

"Yeah," Winn says. "But then for one second he didn't seem right, like he was a real creep underneath."

There's silence, as if we can feel the sincerity in his words and what they might mean. Normal humans may not be able to see magic, but sometimes they can feel it-like the niggling sense that something is off, though you don't know what.

This young guy had to be the one who took the cursed picture, but if that's true, then he's also not my mother's murderer. And that means there's more than one of these evil men after us. It could be a whole crew, for all I know.

Billy sucks in a breath. "Maybe we should skip school tomorrow."

I couldn't agree more.

TWENTY.

It takes every ounce of willpower I have to leave Winn tonight, but there is so much magic to prepare if I want to protect my friends, and "Nana expecting me home for dinner" is the easiest excuse I have. He hugs me after Kat gets out of the car. "Why do you always have to go?"

That frown of his is so not fair. He looks like a puppy locked up in the pound, begging me to take him home. "Seriously, Winn, it's in our best interest to keep Nana happy. What if I got grounded?"

He sighs. "That would suck."

"It would." I lean into him, soaking in the sensation before I have to get back to more witch stuff. "But we're still going on a real date, right?"

He hugs me tighter. "Right. And this time there will be no stalkers-turned-fathers or sicknesses to get in the way. You're mine for a whole night."

My face warms. "Well, not a whole night. That would definitely get me grounded, even if we spent the whole time playing Trivial Pursuit with your parents."