Seasons of Love (Witches of Warren County) Read online

  The worst thing about being alone were the thoughts that intruded and wouldn’t leave her alone. She remembered her parents screaming as their car was hit. She’d been only three, but the accident had left an indelible mark on her memory. She’d been in her car seat but remembered the car skidding sideways and the crunch of metal as it rolled. She remembered crying for her mom. Her dad. Her brothers. But all that met her little girl ears were the sounds of the ambulance and the hush of a stunned crowd.

  Rain filled the little brook, so she rose to her feet despite the accompanying nausea. She made her way slowly up the embankment she’d been pushed down. A coyote called in the distance and fear — real and palpable — enveloped her.

  If she could just get back to the parking lot, she was sure she’d be able to flag down a car or use someone’s phone to call for help. But when she got to the top of the embankment, the whole area was empty. Tears began to join the rain streaking down her face.

  “Okay, stop it,” she muttered to herself. “You’ve watched enough TV. What’s the first thing the survival shows tell you to find? Shelter. So, get to sheltering, girl.”

  She climbed beneath a large fir tree and shivered. Her clothes and hair were soaked and the wind sapped the warmth right from her body. She squeezed the water out of her hair and shrugged out of her soaking wet flannel shirt.

  She hung the shirt over the windy side of the tree which helped. Ignoring the scratch and burn against her skin, she burrowed into pine needles for warmth and protection. She sniffled, feeling insignificant and petrified. Her foot hit something and she pushed the excess pine needles away to reveal a small stuffed bunny long ago abandoned by its owner.

  “Hey, Mr. Bun-bun,” she said, greeting the chocolate-brown bunny. “How about we look after each other, okay?”

  She clenched Mr. Bun-bun to her chest, broke down, and sobbed in earnest. The coyote cried again and Amber shivered as she slipped out of consciousness.

  Voices shouted near her, but they seemed so distant. It was simply too much effort to raise her eyelids and figure out what was going on. The sounds of rain were distant now and finally, she was blessedly warm. If only the shouting would stop.

  Jared bellowed out her name and it penetrated the fog enough for her to open her eyes. Pain wracked her body and she longed to slip back into the black oblivion.

  “Jare?” she called, her voice hoarse. She shivered in her damp clothes and her hands were weak as she crawled out from under the protective low-hanging branches of the fir tree. She clenched Mr. Bun-bun tightly, as though he were a talisman for the ages.

  Flashlights went in all directions as the search party spread out. Random shouts when up. “I see blood.”

  “Follow the blood trail.”

  “I can’t believe those girls left here there, thinking she was dead!”

  Police and rescue teams were on the scenes, their party lights illuminating the night sky. “Jared,” she tried again, only to find her voice was little more than a weak, froggy croak.

  “Hey, Nemo.” Nate ran towards her and she cried out when his warm hand cradled her cheeks.

  “Nate,” she said, weakly. Her teeth chattered and her hands and legs felt clumsy to move. “I’m so cold.”

  “You had us all worried, you know that?” He shrugged out of his jacket and slipped it over her shoulders before standing up. “Colletti! Found her!”

  Jared and Jeremy raced towards their sister but were pulled back by the paramedics. With quick, effective tugs, they cut off her wet clothing. Nate turned his head, not wanting to intrude on her privacy. The rescue workers got her wrapped in a blanket and on a stretcher.

  “What hospital?”

  “The closest,” Jared said. “We’ll be right behind you.”

  Nate reached down and picked up the little stuffed rabbit Amber had been holding and got into his own car. He knew he’d be in the way at the hospital, but maybe he could clean up the stuffed animal and give it to her when she woke up.

  He grabbed her torn clothes, found her flannel hanging on branch, and packed everything up to go home.

  Amber

  The slow, steady beat of hospital machines woke her up. She felt grimy. Like her skin was two sizes too small. The lights were dim but she could make out the solid, linebacker size bulk of one of her brothers.

  “Jared?” she whispered.

  “No, it’s me, Jeremy. Do you want me to go get Jare?”

  She heard the pain in her brother’s voice. Pain she had caused and ached to heal. The wings of guilt fluttered against her conscience.

  “I hurt everywhere, Germ,” she said as weak tears fell from her cheeks. She sniffled. “Can you lay beside me for a minute? And hold me?”

  “Of course, sweetie,” Jeremy said. He lowered the side rail and held her. His heat and love penetrated the thin cotton blankets and her soul-deep shivering finally quieted.

  “I was so lonely and abandoned out there in the woods. And all I thought about was you two. About how I promise I’ll behave and be a good kid. I won’t cause any more trouble.”

  “Shh,” Jeremy said. “You’re no trouble”

  I’m sorry,” she said. Tears continued to fall in a gentle pattern down her cheeks and she was powerless to stop them. She snuggled against the soft cotton of her brother’s sweater and let them fall.

  “You’ve done nothing to be sorry for.”

  “Not now. Before.”

  Jeremy lay there quietly and for a minute she didn’t think he was going to answer her. He sighed heavily. “You were a baby. The accident wasn’t your fault, Amber.”

  “We both know it was.”

  “No, I don’t know any such thing. You have nothing to be guilty about.” He paused and stroked her hair. “Did you think I blamed you?”

  “I was a brat. I wanted something and fussing over it. I distracted her.” Amber’s shoulders shook with her misery. “She was yelling at me,” Amber said, sobbing. “I’m the reason Mommy and Daddy are dead.”

  “Shh,” Jeremy crooned. “No baby,” he said, brushing her hair away from her face. “We never blamed you. We were just thankful you were okay.”

  “I know, okay?” Her voice caught. “I know you blamed me. Because I lived and they didn’t.” The words were barely coherent but Jeremy understood. “It’s why you hate me.”

  “I don’t hate you,” Jeremy said. “I’m afraid, Amber. We had to see you in foster care. Had to go through a million hoops to get you back after we were all separated. I’m afraid we’re going to screw up. Going to lose you again. It would kill us. Don’t you get it? You’re all we have left.”

  Amber was quiet in his arms, but Jeremy continued, just in case. “I never thought you were to blame. Not once. You are not responsible. A drunk driver hit their car and killed them.” Jeremy gasped with the pain. Of remembering. Of feeling things he had pushed down for the last dozen years. “Jare and I were only kids ourselves and we fought like hell to have us all placed together. We were all victims of indifferent adults who wouldn’t listen. As soon as we turned eighteen, we started learning what we had to do to get you to live with us again. I’m sorry it took so long but there was so much we had to do. So much we had to learn.

  Amber sobbed until she drifted off back to sleep. Jeremy looked up to see his brother standing in the doorway, tears streaming down his cheeks.

  “She’s all we have left,” Jared said, his voice a hushed whisper as he approached the bed. “I was so afraid we’d lost her, too.”

  Jeremy brushed a gentle kiss across his sister’s forehead and pushed the side rail back in place. Each brother took a side and held her hand, guarding her from all threats.

  “We won’t lose her, too,” Jeremy vowed.

  <<<>>>

  Nate

  She looked pale under the blankets, he thought.

  She turned in her sleep and he smiled when her brown eyes opened. “Hey, Amber. Good to have you back.”

  “No more Nemo?”

&nb
sp; He shrugged. “I didn’t think you liked it.”

  She blushed and looked down at her hands. “Maybe I don’t mind it so much anymore.” She smiled up at him through her bangs. “I’ve never had a pet name before.”

  Nate picked up her hand and traced the lines of her veins. “I really thought your brothers were going to kill me when they started looking for you.” He smiled up at her. “You could have told me they were twins.”

  She giggled. “Yeah, they can be a little intimidating.” She tightened her hand on his. “I don’t always think about them being twins. They’re just Jare and Germ to me.”

  Nate snorted. “Somehow, I can’t see myself being that cozy with two caged tigers.”

  Her giggle was weak, but there. “They aren’t that bad.”

  “Hah! That’s what you think. I thought I was a goner when they came to the diner looking for me.”

  “How did you find me? Did Brandi and Tracy tell?”

  Nate sighed. “It’s kind of a long story.”

  “I appear to have nothing but time,” she said with a lift of one eyebrow. “You may as well tell me.”

  “Harper’s Mill isn’t like other towns.”

  “Like Tabby’s eyes that always flash blue?”

  “Yeah, like that,” Nate agreed.

  “So, what else?”

  “I have a gift,” Nate said slowly. Carefully. “One that everyone in my family has.” He paused to look into her eyes. “I have psychometry.”

  Amber frowned and pushed a button so she could sit up. “What does that mean?”

  “I can object read. I can hold something and if I concentrate on it, I can read that items’ memory.”

  “That’s,” Amber began. Paused. “Weird.”

  “You’ve never seen anything weird happening in the Mill?”

  “Well, there’s that thing you do with fabric.”

  “What thing?”

  “Seriously, the fabric totally just parts for you.”

  Nate laughed. “Oh, yeah. That.” He sighed and looked out the window as he decided on what to say. “About two hundred years ago, my ancestors came to the New World. These seven sisters made their way down from Canada until they settled here in the Kittatinny Valley.”

  “Were they witches?”

  “That’s what they tell me.”

  “Does that make you a witch?”

  “I guess, but I really just consider myself a real person. I just have a special gift. Brandi’s parents gave me her phone and I could see and feel everything they felt and saw.”

  “Oh. That’s a lot to think about.”

  Nate’s heart shuddered. “Yeah, I know it is.” His dream of dating Amber was slipping through his psychometric fingers and there didn’t seem to be anything he could do. It was a lot, expecting a girl to still want to date you when she found out you could essentially spy on her by touching anything she owned. He’d learned to control it, mostly. But still. Hope springs eternal. “Anyway, I was just hoping we could. You know. Maybe go out? Even though I have all these super powers and shit.”

  She lay quietly and for a moment, Nate thought she might have fallen asleep. She tightened her grasp on his hand. “They’re sending me home tomorrow.”

  “I heard.”

  “They want me to take it easy, but Jare agreed to let Miss Chen send January’s prom project home. Maybe you can bring it with you tomorrow after school?”

  Nate nodded. “Okay. And maybe when you’re done with hers, you could start on that one for yourself.”

  “I’m not a senior and I haven’t been invited.”

  “That’s true,” Nate said. “But I’m a junior and I can’t imagine anyone else I’d want to go with.”

  “Except you haven’t asked me yet,” she teased.

  Nate’s grey eyes lit with pleasure. “Not yet. But I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said. “Maybe I’ll ask you when you’re not hooked up to monitors and I can get a kiss.”

  She leaned forward and touched his cheek. “Promise?”

  “I promise,” he said.

  The end.

  He Loves Me He Loves Me Not

  Harper’s Mill, NJ

  Seventeen-year-old Holly Moore grumbled to herself as she tromped through the underbrush leading up to the local hang out, the trestles. The sun was just setting, giving the abandoned bridge an otherworldly, zombie apocalypse feel. The distorted ravaged sounds of 90s grunge echoed in the air. The angst-filled lyrics joined the flow of anger coming off of her in waves.

  Harper’s Mill was a small railroad town nestled in the Kittatinny Valley section of the Great Appalachian Valley. It was settled in the early 19th century by a coven of seven witches who created a town protected by a magical charm. The descendants of each sister formed the core of the town’s local residents and were often referred to as the Old Families.

  The seventh sister had married John Ignatius Harper, himself the seventh son of a seventh son and their luck and wealth blossomed. Eventually, the little village was named after him.

  “Oof,” she said as she bumped into her cousin, Danny Light. “Get out of my way,” she said, pushing him with all of her might. Danny, all 6’3” of him, laughed at her futile efforts. Stupid jocks. What good were they, anyway?

  “Anyone lose a sprig of Holly?” Danny called to the group of kids surrounding him.

  Holly stewed. Oh, if only she had a nickel for every holly joke she’d ever heard she’d. Well. She’d have a crap ton of nickels, that’s for sure.

  “I’m looking for Gray,” Holly said, her golden-brown eyes flashing with annoyance.

  “Oh, look at you, acting all superior. Who do you think you are, Holls? It doesn’t matter what your last name is, you’re a Light just like I am.”

  Holly tilted her chin. She had heard that refrain her entire life from one cousin, aunt, or grandparent after another. Put down the books. Pay attention to the real life. Or the worst. Oh, Holly is just book smart, as though to take away from any of her other qualities.

  “Just get me Gray,” she demanded, pushing up her glasses by the bridge.

  “Yo, Gray,” Danny said, calling behind him. “You’ve got a visitor.”

  Gray James stood up and walked towards her. He at least had the sense to look ashamed of himself. “I can explain, Holls,” he said. Holly was glad she was immune to tall, lanky cowboy types with slow grins and dimples. Because if she was tempted for even a moment, he could break her heart.

  “Don’t you Holls me. We had a deal,” Holly said. The late April wind tore at her brown hair and the air smelled of an upcoming rainstorm. Why were they even hanging out at the Trestles when she knew all of them had warm beds to go home to?

  Holly took the crumpled up test paper in her hand and slammed it against Gray’s chest, inordinately pleased when he grunted. “I tutor you and get you through your senior year and your dad sponsors me for a summer internship in Munich. I’ve been getting it done, Gray James. But you blew me off all week and now this?”

  “How did you get my test score?”

  “Your dad called me. Pissed that I wasn’t living up to my end of the deal. I need this paycheck, Gray. Did I stutter in any way, shape, or form?”

  “Your deal to tutor me was with my dad,” Gray said. “I’m not worried about college, so my grades are none of your business.”

  She pointed at the test paper that had drifted helplessly to the ground. The wind picked it up and it fluttered down to the deceptively calm Delaware River. “A D-minus in German. We have been conjugating verbs for two weeks. How did you get a D on the test?”

  “I didn’t know the answers,” he said slowly, stretching out the syllables as though she wasn’t quite bright enough to figure out why he’d done poorly on a test.

  If steam could have shot out of her ears, it would have. “Did you not know the answers? Or not care?”

  “No one cares about German,” Gray said, crossing his arms over his chest.

  “You must have or you wouldn
’t have signed up for it.”

  “I did that for my dad. But I have no interest in working for his pharmaceutical company.”

  Holly tapped her foot, thinking. She needed this job. Her step-dad had agreed to let her foster rescue horses on his farm, but she needed to help pay for their care. But how could she do it if Gray fought her every step of the way?

  “I need this job,” she said. “So, what can I do to sweeten the pot for you? What do you want? What can I do for you?”

  Gray opened his arms, encompassing the trestle that spanned the Delaware River. “I have everything I need, Holly. Good friends, a few laughs, and an ice cold beer.”

  “There must be something more,” she said, narrowing her eyes as thoughts and ideas occurred and were discarded in rapid succession. “What do you plan on doing after high school?”

  “Not go to some diploma mill, signing my future over to spending every day in an office and breathing recycled air conditioned air.”

  Holly pursed her lips, going over everything she knew about Gray James. There must be something. Only child and his dad was a vice president at Stark Pharmaceutical in Princeton. The James family had money but weren’t exactly on the Harper level of wealth. There must be something he wanted. Wait!

  “Do you like horses?”

  His eyes took on a closed suspicious look. “Yeah, I guess. Why?”

  “Would you like to go trail riding one Saturday? I can get a lesson set up with Mr. Zielinski.”

  Gray was on the tipping edge. She could see, smell, and taste victory.

  “Come out to the farm tomorrow and we’ll have a session,” she said. “My mom is a great cook.” She could tell by the look on his face he was interested.

  “Your dad is Farraday?” he asked.

  “Todd Farraday is my step-father,” she corrected. Her eyes lit up. “Come up to the house tomorrow around one. I’ll take you on a tour of the barn.”

  “Deal,” he said. He held his hand out and they shook on it. He tilted his head towards the bonfire glowing behind him. “Come sit for a bit. Have a beer.”

  She opened her mouth to argue but closed it. She had just gotten everything she wanted out of their deal. The least she could do was hang out for a bit. “Sounds good,” she said. She took his hand, eyes lifted in a subtle challenge.