Easy Magic (Boudreaux #5)

“I’m starving. I’ve been waiting all day for this, so I didn’t eat much.”


“A woman after my own heart,” Gabby says with a wink. “The guys are always hungry.”

“Guilty,” Rhys says and kisses his wife’s cheek. “And you’re an excellent cook.”

“Thanks, babe.”

The dining room table is already set, and Gabby begins bringing hot dishes in from the kitchen.

“How long have you lived here, Rhys?” I ask and ignore my growling stomach.

“For a couple of years now,” he replies. “I’m Kate’s cousin.”

“Really? I didn’t know that.”

He nods happily. “She suggested I come down here to the inn for some R&R, and it turns out it was the best thing I ever did in my life.”

“So you enjoy it, then?”

“I do. It’s different from where Kate and I grew up in Denver, but it has it’s own charm. There’s plenty to do, and Gabby’s family is here. It made sense to relocate.”

“How do your parents feel about that?”

Larissa, the spirit I spoke to during the séance, has walked into the room and is standing in a corner, watching me. She’s not speaking.

“My parents both passed away when I was very little. Kate’s parents raised me.”

“I’m so sorry to hear that,” I reply, keeping Larissa in my peripheral vision. “I also lost my parents when I was a baby. My grandmother raised me.”

“Interesting,” Rhys replies. “Well, Kate’s folks live in Ireland now, so it’s just Kate and me here in the states.”

“And you have each other here, with a wonderfully big extended family.”

Rhys and Gabby both smile widely. “That’s a beautiful way to put it,” Gabby says.

“I need to talk to you, Mallory,” Larissa says, but I try to ignore her. Tonight is about Beau and his sister, spending time with them. I don’t want to have to deal with this tonight.

Not today, Larissa.

She shakes her head adamantly. “It’s important.”

I take a bite of a Brussels sprout.

“Mal?” Beau says, frowning down at me.

“Yes?”

“I just asked how the Brussels sprouts are.”

“Oh, they’re good.” I can’t taste them. Larissa is agitated, and won’t go away.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, just as my phone rings. Lena’s calling, probably to talk about dinner with Miss Sophia. I send her to voice mail and do my best to smile at Beau.

“Nothing. I love Brussels sprouts.”

“What do you see?” he asks, setting down his fork.

And then he’s gone, along with Rhys and Gabby, and the food on the table. Only Larissa is here with me.

“What’s happening?”

“I don’t know,” she says. “It just feels different now.”

I frown and turn my head, listening. Despite coming in here with my walls up and door shut, I’m seeing and hearing more than I ever have before. I can hear a man’s voice, calling from behind the house.

“Do you hear that?”

“Oh, yes,” Larissa says. “He’s been calling out for as long as I’ve been here. That’s normal.”

“Do you know who it is?”

“No.” She shakes her head and looks around the room, as if she’s expecting someone to walk in. “Sometimes I think it sounds like my Douglas, but it can’t be him.”

“Why can’t it be him?”

“Because if it was him, I’d be able to see him, wouldn’t I?”

I blink rapidly, not sure how to answer. I don’t know.

But I want to help her. And if it’s Douglas outside, I want to help him, too.

“I’ll go see.”

“Be careful,” she says. “It’s different today.”

“Can you leave the house?”

“I can only go out to the back steps, but I can’t go further.”

I nod and stand, heading out the back of the house toward the loud voice of a man, yelling. I can’t make out what he’s saying.

I walk through the back door, and Larissa is still with me. She stays on the steps, wringing her hands at her waist as I walk down the path lined with oak trees toward what I assume is the old slave quarters.

“Hello?” I call out. There are several spirits here. Two children are playing hopscotch on the sidewalk. An older woman is rocking in a chair on the porch of one of the small slave quarter buildings. Her dark skin is wrinkled, her hair white and standing up on end.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she says. She’s not mean, or angry. She’s trying to warn me.

“Who is yelling out?” I ask, opening my mind wider so I can search out. Miss Sophia told me to keep myself closed up, but I want to help Larissa. I know I can help her.

“That young man has been yelling out in torment for a century,” she says, her face turning sad. “Poor boy.”

“Where is he?”

She frowns. “Why, he’s right there. You can’t see him?”

I turn in a circle, looking around me. The voice is getting louder, more frantic.

And then, there he is.

“Are you Douglas?”

He’s out of breath, panting as if he’s just run a hundred miles.

“Yes’m.” He nods. “I can’t find Larissa. She’s lost.”

“I know where she is,” I reply, excited that there is finally something good that I can do with my gift. “I can take you to her.”

“You can?” His eyes fill with tears. “I’ve been looking everywhere.”

“She’s in the house.”

His face falls. “I can’t go in there.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve tried to look in the house, but I can’t go up the back steps.”

Oh, God.

This is heartbreaking. Why would this happen?

But before I can try to help further, absolute darkness falls around us. I can’t see my hand five inches from my face.

“What is happening?”

The red glow is back. The same one from the cemetery.

“I have to help you,” I say to Douglas, who is looking in the direction of the house, his face a mixture of pain and longing.

“It’s her,” he whispers. I follow his gaze, and sure enough, Larissa is walking carefully toward us. She’s scared and hopeful, and then I’m suddenly standing in front of my grandmother.

“Oh my God.”

“Hello, my love,” she says.

“You’re here. Why are you here?”

“Because you need me.” Her eyes are sad, belying the smile on her beautiful face. “He’s here to hurt you, darlin’.”

“Who?”

“He was here before,” Larissa adds, her voice trembling. “When I saw you before, with the other women.”

“The séance,” I say, and she nods.

“I’ve never seen anyone else in the house before then.”

“She can’t see the living?” I ask Grandmamma, who shakes her head slowly.

This is so fucking weird.

“Watch your language,” Grandmamma says sharply.

“Did you find Douglas?” Larissa asks.

“I did,” I reply. “He’s right here.”

“Oh.” Her eyes fill with tears. “I can’t see him. Why can’t I see him?”

“Why can’t she see him?” I ask Grandmamma.

“Because she’s being punished for throwing herself off of that cliff. They’re both being punished.”

“Well, that’s horrible.”

The red glow intensifies. “He’s coming.”

“Who?”