Maybe this would fill in the blanks for me. Help me to understand what piece of Win’s puzzle I was missing. “Then shoot.”
“You asked why I hadn’t crossed over once, and here’s really why—I believe I can get back to your plane.”
No. No. That wasn’t possible. How could he even think that? How did I tell him it was impossible? “How do you plan to accomplish coming back from the dead, Win?”
“I know you think it’s improbable, maybe even impossible, but if you were once a reallive witch—spells and cauldrons and all—why couldn’t I be reincarnated? Who’s to say I can’t come back?”
He had a point, but still, I couldn’t encourage him. Even though I found I’d like very much for Win to actually be here, I just didn’t see how it was possible.
In all the spells I knew, in all the crazy hoodoo I could once conjure as a witch, I’d never witnessed an actual reincarnation. I also still had no answer for how Win was communicating with me if I no longer had my powers.
Yet, here we were…communicating as though he were on this plane.
“I can see your skepticism, and for now we can leave this in a box somewhere—all tied up. But regardless, I know in my gut there’s a way. I know. And when the time comes, I’d like your help.”
My chest went all tight and itchy at his conviction, but Win was right. For now it was better we left this topic in a box.
“Fair enough. We’ll leave it alone for the time being and focus on helping the other side, with me as MZ Jr.”
Belfry yawned when I scooped him from my purse and placed him on my shoulder. “Can I help, too?”
“Would we be the dynamic three-o any other way? We’re like Charlie’s Angels now,” I joked.
“I call Sabrina,” Win said. “She was the smart one.”
“I’ll take Farrah. I think I have the hair for it,” Belfry added, melting into peals of laughter.
“Well, if this very moment isn’t fortuitous. It must be fate,” Win commented, a thread of excitement in his voice.
I wrinkled my nose and cocked my head. “What’s fortuitous?”
“Shhh, Stevie! I can’t hear.” Win stopped talking for a moment and then he said, “Whoa, whoa, whoa. Slow down, mi amigo. I don’t speak Spanish. Turkish, Russian, Latvian, French, and Italian, yes. But my Spanish is rusty. What’s that you say about Stevie?” He paused again. “Well, hell. I’ll tell her. Of course I’ll tell her. Just give me a minute.”
I sat up straight now, totally alert. “Tell me what?”
“I think we have our first customer, MZ 2.0 and you’re never going to believe who it is. You’d better get your turban pressed.”
The urgency in Win’s voice made my heart kick up a notch. “Well, tell me already. I can’t stand the suspense!”
As Win muttered whom he was talking to in my ear, and my eyes went wide with shock, I nodded with purpose. “Tell her we’re on it!”
That thrill of hope I’d been experiencing these past couple of weeks returned in a rush of adrenaline. I was coming to terms with my new life as a non-witch, and I was still doing what I’d always loved to do.
Helping people—only now I was doing it with a little help from my friends.
It just didn’t get any better than that.
The End
I so hope you enjoyed Witch Slapped, and I hope you’ll return to Ebenezer Falls and find out whom our intrepid afterlife spy Win is communicating with, how he plans to get back to this plane, how in the fudge he’s communicating with Stevie and if our Mini-Spy, Stevie’s, always going to remain mortal in Book 2, Quit Your Witchin’—the Witchless in Seattle Mysteries!
Preview the next book
Quit Your Witchin'
Witchless In Seattle Mysteries, Book 2
Chapter 1 (unedited)
“Crispin Alistair Winterbottom!”
“Now what, Stevie? You’re always yelling. Have I told you you’re a yeller?”
I ignored his complaint, followed by an aggravated sigh. “You know exactly what. This will never work if you keep trying to land a date with our client’s deceased lover. Understood?” I whisper-yelled at my partner in spy.
“Bah,” he whisper-yelled back. “It’s not a date, Stevie. I was just asking if Kitty liked to dance. When’s a trip around Plane Light Fantastic ever hurt anyone, Miss Funstomper?”
I ran my hand over my temple before giving it a good squeeze to ease the tension. “That’s not the point. When we agreed to do this—reopen Madam Zoltar’s with me as her successor, you agreed to play by my rules when contacting the dead.”
“I am playing by your rules, Dark Overlord. You said nothing about asking a client’s deceased loved one if they had a hobby. Not a solitary word. Did she, Belfry?”
Belfry, my tiny cottonball bat familiar, stretched and yawned from the bed he’d made from one of the leaves of an elephant ear plant. “I hate to side with the Cumberbatch wannabe ghost, but that’s kinda is what you said, Boss.”