“Yeah.” Jerome looked sheepishly at his hands for a moment. “Most people have to infuse a potion one at a time.”

  “But most people aren’t you,” I said, and I would have bet money he was blushing.

  “Yeah,” he said, and his voice cracked with that single word. I tried not to smile. “I have found I can make potions in batches, and it helps tone down the magic just a little bit. Remember when I was struggling with the imagination potion?”

  “Yes.” I nodded. We’d had a fountain in our house for weeks, or maybe spring was a better term for it, no clue where the water came from or where it went, but occasionally it had overflowed and flooded the living area; it was impossible to forget. It had only disappeared when our house was torched with hellfire.

  “My teacher suggested I try making a batch of them for the exam portion when you told her the trouble we were having with it. When I made a batch, it worked properly, but it didn’t when I was making them individually,” Jerome said.

  “Ah,” that potion had also created a unicorn and the unicorn still existed, living in a barn behind the house with a horse that someone bought my nieces. Jerome had made the unicorn two-tone pink in honor of his mother, who had been battling breast cancer at the time. My nieces loved it and named it Pinkie Pie, after the My Little Pony. “So, if you don’t make potions in batches, they are too strong, is what you’re telling me,” I said after a moment. I was letting Jerome drive. I pretty much always let him drive, because he wanted to drive, and he needed the practice.

  “Yes,” Jerome said.

  “But again, that’s an exception, not a rule.” I nodded. “Got it. So, is your teacher strong enough to make batch potions?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Jerome answered. “Her specialized magic is mostly in potions, that’s why she took the post teaching them. But even if she was on the verge of being homeless, I don’t think she’d make a potion that allowed a mass summoning of demons.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “She gave me a lecture about not letting people know I could make super strong potions, or batches of them, because people would want to take advantage of me,” he said.

  “Ah, she was nice when I met her,” I said. “So, we should go check on her. She may not be doing it willingly.”

  “I don’t know where she lives.” Jerome gave me a skeptical look.

  “No, but I bet Principal Grace would give me the phone number.” I dug out my cell phone. I started the conversation with an apology when Principal Grace answered. I explained that I needed to talk to her potions teacher and gave her the vaguest description I could manage of why, and Principal Grace told me she’d text me the phone number and then expressed surprise that I had called her and not Penelope. Penelope was a witch, she was also Janet’s sister, and the potions teacher was a member of her coven. I called Penelope next. Penelope didn’t answer and I got a text back almost immediately telling me she was with the St. Louis County Sheriff’s Department, and she’d call me when she was done.

  “Do we go home?” Jerome asked.

  “I suppose,” I answered after a moment. It bothered me that Penelope was with the sheriff’s department. “No, let’s go see Magda Red,” I said, changing my mind.

  Magda wasn’t home, so we drove to the AESPCA. I texted her from the parking lot. Jerome and I had trouble gaining entrance into the AESPCA building because they had demonic possession detectors that went off whenever they were exposed to Stygian magic, and Jerome and I both carried lots of it. There was a back entrance that did not have possession detectors on it, but I didn’t feel like walking back there. After a few minutes, Magda came out to the car. I explained about trying to contact Jerome’s potions teacher and calling Penelope, showing Magda the text she sent in reply.

  “You think this means what?” Magda asked me.

  “I don’t know,” I answered as I got out of the SUV. “But it has to mean something.”

  “Maybe someone tried to steal her car,” Magda said.

  “Yeah, I just have this feeling,” I sighed. “It feels connected somehow. Do you trust Miguel Smith?”

  “Yes, I’ve known him for at least a hundred years and he’s a member of a powerful pack.”

  “So, he’s a shifter,” I replied.

  “Yes,” Magda replied. “Why?”

  “If I take this to him, is he going to treat me like I’m crazy?”

  “No, he’s a consummate professional. He may think you’re crazy, but you won’t know that unless someone tells you,” she said, giving a pointed look at Jerome.

  “Do you think I’m crazy?” I asked.

  “No, but I know you. You might be incredibly lazy, but you have great instincts. When you listen to them.”

  “Since it’s Saturday and he’s part of upper management, is he working?” I asked.

  “You say that like supervisory management positions never work weekends, but I worked most weekends when I had the job. He rarely works weekends unless it’s an emergency, because he has two little ones at home, and he doesn’t work during the full moon cycle.”

  “Since you said pack, I assume werewolf. Does he know Bill and Camilla?” I asked.

  “He is a werewolf and yes, Camilla is his Alpha and he’s married to Camilla’s niece.”

  “Well then, I will consider him trustworthy,” I said. Camilla and Bill had great instincts about people and if they trusted him to be in their pack, I could trust him as well.

  “My advice, wait and see what Penelope says when she calls you back. If it’s not related, and I mean strongly related, as in having evidence of relation to the break-in at your office, then suggest a link based on instinct to Miguel but don’t push it,” Magda said. A car pulled up next to where Jerome, Magda, and I stood.

  “Huh, you,” the man said as the window rolled down, and if I hadn’t had super hearing from being part angel, I wouldn’t have heard it. “I was going to come find you, I didn’t expect you to be here when I arrived,” Miguel Smith said. “Let me park.”

  “You’re coming in on a weekend, things must be bad,” Magda said to him as he parked in the space next to my SUV. She was frowning.

  “They might be.” Miguel cocked his head to the side. “I was called to the STLC Sheriff’s Department at one this morning to talk to a coven of hysterical witches and wizards. To my surprise, Soleil texted one of them during my interview with her.”

  “Penelope is many things, hysterical is not one of them,” I commented dryly. “She also didn’t tell me the AESPCA was there. Can you tell me what’s going on? Because I’ve had this feeling since I texted her that it is related to the break-in at my office.”

  “She can tell you herself, she’s on her way here,” Miguel said. “Your feeling isn’t wrong. But you lied to me and I’m not sure if it was intentional or not.”

  “I did?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

  “You said you had no summoning spells in your grimoire.” Miguel responded a touch coldly.

  “I don’t. I have some notes on summoning, but no actual spells. As I discover how a person has become possessed, I write it down in my grimoire, toward the back, so that I can build a better picture of the ways in which a person becomes possessed.” As I finished the sentence, a sheriff’s cruiser pulled into the parking lot and a deputy got out with a large black bag in his hand. I had seen one before, it was a shielding bag and meant he was carrying something magical in it. He brought it over to Miguel and Miguel took it out of the bag and showed it to me.

  “Okay,” I said, frowning at him.

  “This is yours and there are multiple summoning spells in it.”

  “That’s not mine,” I said. Miguel began to glare at me.

  “I know it’s yours, it has your name in it,” Miguel said sternly.

  “It’s not mine.” I repeated, and it wasn’t. My grimoire had been a Christmas gift from my nieces a few years ago and pink was their favorite color, therefore they had bought me a pink grimoire and then covered it in those fake plastic jewels and even spelled my name across the front and made a little sun in yellow gems. For the record, I hate the color yellow, but I used it because they had given it to me.

  “I’ve seen hers and that isn’t it,” Magda said. “Jerome has a matching one to Soleil’s and they were given to them by little girls.”

  “Maybe she has two,” Miguel suggested.

  “She has two and that isn’t one of them,” Magda said. “Plus, Jerome said there was a tracking spell on hers, remember, so if it’s hers, it can be verified.” Miguel responded by opening the book and showing the front page where my name was written, declaring ownership. Then he turned a few pages to the first spell. “That isn’t her handwriting, and she sucks at magical handwriting. I can’t explain the first page, but so far, all evidence points to that not being hers.” We stood at a stalemate for several seconds. Miguel not sure whether to believe us or not. The tension and silence were broken by Penelope popping into existence beside us.

  “I have been looking for you,” Penelope said to me. “I think someone’s trying to frame you.” she blurted out and we all stared at her.

  “What?” I asked, blinking. Penelope rarely used portal travel, although she had a license for it.

  “Last night, we had a coven meeting. Three men broke in and demanded we make a potion from a grimoire they had. I took the grimoire and one of my coven members started the potion. The book said it belonged to you. But I’ve seen your grimoire, and this wasn’t it. Melody ended up making a chameleon potion instead of the potion they wanted, which was a possession potion. While she was making it, we managed to take down one of the men. We ended up holding him while the others ran away. That’s why I was at the sheriff’s department. They left the grimoire behind when they ran away. Oh, shit,” she said, as it registered with her that Miguel Smith was standing there glaring at me.

  “You told me at the sheriff’s department it wasn’t hers,” Miguel said.

  “Apparently, you didn’t believe me,” Penelope said, gesturing at the grimoire Miguel was holding.

  “I did not.” Miguel agreed coolly. “You and she are friends.”

  “Yes, but that’s not her grimoire. It’s easy enough to clear up, my coven helped Jerome with the tracking spell that’s on her grimoires. If this is hers, it will have a tracking spell on it.”

  “I am of the opinion that it won’t. I think this is a secret, dark grimoire,” Miguel replied.

  “Yeah right—that book has potions and spells in it for things other than summoning demons, which proves right there it isn’t Soleil’s. Actually, the fact that there’s a potion recipe in it at all proves it’s not hers,” Penelope countered.

  “Angels can make potions, it’s like baking a cake,” he replied.

  “That is true of most angels. Soleil is not most angels, and for that matter, Soleil can’t bake a cake, not even one of those boxed ones where all you do is follow the directions,” Jerome said with a grin. “Soleil barely keeps one grimoire, let alone a secret one.” Jerome pulled a grimoire out of thin air. It was definitely mine from home. It was bright pink with fake, yellow jewels all over it. “Have this analyzed and you’ll understand what I mean.” He handed it to Miguel.

  “Why did you just give him my grimoire?” I asked the teen.

  “Because he needs to understand just how incompetent you are with magic,” Jerome said. “I had to bespell both your grimoires to copy work from one to the other and I had to put a spell on it to copy thoughts from your mind into it magically because you were writing hardly anything down, even the good stuff.”

  “I would have known about that,” I said, a bit defensively.

  “Logically, yes you should have realized I’d done it, but how often do you open your grimoire? Twice a year, maybe?” Jerome said. I frowned at him and tried to remember the last time I had opened either of my grimoires, and my frown increased, because he was correct, it had been probably seven months or so.

  “I think we all need to go inside and discuss this,” Miguel said.

  “Fine, I just need to call my neighbor and have her and her husband take Angel for a walk,” I said. Miguel frowned at me.

  “Her neighbor is your aunt by marriage and Angel is a hellhound,” Magda informed him. I dialed Camilla’s number, she answered on the third ring.

  “Hey, I’m being detained by the new head of investigations at the AESPCA. Someone created a grimoire and put my name in it, and it’s filled with dangerous stuff he suspects is mine. Jerome is with me, though. We’ll need you and Bill to ensure Angel doesn’t sleep all day, please,” I told her. She made a disgusted noise in her throat.

  “I’m guessing that you mean Miguel and that’s why you called me instead of your parents,” Camilla said after a moment.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “If he arrests you, I’ll come down and help get you out,” Camilla added. “But I believe once he gets to know you, he’ll realize you aren’t motivated enough to be a dark arts practitioner.” She gave a chuckle. I would have argued, but she wasn’t wrong. It took a lot of work to do bad things, and I wasn’t willing to expend that kind of energy. I’d spent years not realizing I was an archangel because I was too unmotivated to discover I was magically powerful. So, while I knew I should be offended by her comment, I wasn’t. Besides, being offended required effort, too.

  Miguel’s phone chimed and he looked at it. He frowned at me.

  “Inside, please,” Miguel said to me as he tucked his phone away. I was about to say something about the detectors, but Magda shook her head at me, and we all followed Miguel inside. Jerome and I made it three steps into the building when chaos erupted, and the possession detectors began screeching. Several people muttered swear words when they saw it was Jerome and me. A few turned and walked away. A few others stood glaring at Miguel and our group.

  Chapter Five

  “I warned you, Soleil possesses Stygian magic, as does Jerome,” Magda said, and Penelope tried to stifle a giggle.

  “More evidence the grimoire isn’t hers, because she doesn’t need a potion to summon a demon or cause possession,” Penelope said.

  “Hell, she doesn’t really need a spell to do it, either. If she just thinks too hard about it, demons are forced into our plane. It’s been a problem while teaching her to use her magic as of late. As I told you last night, if Soleil were summoning demons, everyone would know,” Magda told him with a frigid, disapproving tone.

  “And I told you, she would not use conventional methods if she was trying to hide it.” Miguel snapped back.

  “Yeah right, that would require her to put effort into discovering unconventional methods for summoning demons,” Magda replied in the same tone. “Everyone in the investigations department worked with her when they were dealing with the demon boxes two years ago, and when they were dealing with the genetically engineered cambion last year, and they all said the same thing. Soleil isn’t involved.”

  “Involved in what?” I asked, realizing there must be more going on than a break-in at my office and Penelope’s coven being taken hostage. No one answered me, and Miguel intensified his glare. “That stony silence would work better if Jerome hadn’t been spending time with my uncle. You may not want to tell me, but you told Jerome just now when you thought about it and tried to make your face passive or neutral and he’ll tell me later,” I said. Jerome gave a single head nod.

  “Shit,” Miguel muttered, and we began walking again. Someone had been kind enough to turn off the possession detectors and they’d stopped screeching, as had the audio instructions telling us we were supposed to be evacuating the building and how to do so in an orderly manner. He tried to separate me and Jerome and place each of us in interview rooms, but Magda reminded him Jerome might not look like it, but he was only sixteen and if I wasn’t with him, one of his grandparents would need to be called, and Miguel didn’t want to deal with my mom or Raphael while he interviewed Jerome. Miguel then tried to kick Magda and Penelope out of the interview, and both stayed put and flat out refused to leave. Penelope, like Magda, worked for the AESPCA, albeit neither of them in investigations. Annoyed, Miguel said he guessed he should consider himself lucky Camilla wasn’t also here causing a scene. I volunteered to call her again and get her to join us if he wanted, and he said something about preferring to herd cats.

  He questioned me for about two hours, most of it about the time I had caused a temporary possession of my sister’s ex-husband, who was currently sitting in prison. I’d put a time limit on that possession of 24 hours. After the time was up, the possession ended without the need of an exorcist. Actually, they’d tried exorcism before the time limit ended and couldn’t force the demon out. However, this specific line of questioning bothered me—what exactly was Miguel Smith getting at?

  “Look, as fun as this trip down memory lane is, what’s the point? I served my time, paid my fine, and did community service,” I interrupted.

  “During that robbery with the statue imbued with magic the insurance company has you investigating, the homeowners were home and were temporarily possessed,” Jerome replied. “But like what you did, there was a time limit on the possession, and they couldn’t exorcise the homeowners before it wore off.”

  “Oh, holy hell!” I squeaked. “That’s...” I blinked rapidly a few times.

  “We’ve been through all the records we have on demonic possession and there is only one instance of demonic possession having a time limit,” Miguel said.

  “Then there was the weird break-in at our office,” I said. “No wonder you suspect me, contrary to what everyone is telling you about me,” I said, and Miguel had a moment of something strange happening to his face. “However, if I had attempted a mass possession, it would have succeeded,” I added. “Mass possession would be super easy for me.”

  “Soleil, shut up,” Magda said smoothly.

  “Okay, let me reword it. It would not have been an attempt at a mass possession, it would have succeeded, and yes, it would have been easy. But I would have needed to eat an entire buffet afterwards,” I said. Magic was energy and to make energy in living things required an intake of calories. The bigger the magic, the more calories needed by the magic user.

 

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