Water Witch Read Online Free PDF Page B

dump my bottle, avoiding her, hoping she wouldn’t ask me any difficult questions.
    “Vincenzo…what did you think about when he jumped off the rock?”
    Questions like that. I closed my eyes and sighed. “I…” I thought about his gorgeous back muscles, how long his legs were. I wondered if I’d made him sad. I wished he’d stayed to talk to me. “I was angry he left without answering my questions.” I risked a glance at her, and knew by her tight smile she’d read the truth I had omitted.
    “What?” My mother watched us both, sensing an unspoken dialogue.
    Noni ignored her. “Are you afraid of him?”
    “Terrified.” That I might be attracted to a monster. That I might never get to hear his voice, or touch his skin.
    Noni crossed her arms over her chest. I wasn’t fooling her. “You should try to have a dream vision tonight.” She smiled, daring me to argue.
    I narrowed my eyes at her.
    Dream visions were horrible. Mainly because I’d never learned to control them, relying on my spelled chain to keep them in check. Both my mother and grandmother knew I disliked them, but they didn’t realize how unskilled I was in that area. I swallowed hard and nodded. I had to get better, and the only way was practice. “Okay.”
    I glanced at my grandfather’s journal. “Can I borrow that?”
    “Of course.” Noni handed it to me, her eyes still curious.
    My mom stopped me from going to my room. “Will anyone tell me what is going on here?”
    “Nothing, Mom. Noni’s just reminding me to take my skills more seriously. And I will, I promise.”
    That appeased her, and though I knew she’d ask Noni for more details later, and was pretty sure Noni would reveal her suspicions, she kissed my cheek and smiled. I spent some time unpacking the car, moving back into my old bedroom. Then I sat on my bed reading Nunu’s journal. At first, every entry was interesting to me, and I lost myself in nostalgia. I teared up when I read the proud way he declared I’d someday be my own boss, and make my living helping people. I laughed at an entry about the coven elections, where he joked that Noni would either have to bite her tongue or use it to apologize.
    Then I started scanning for my name, or for any mention of Fae or Faerie or Portal . I found nothing.
    “Vinny?” My mom knocked lightly on my door, then poked her head in. “You want to eat? I made string beans with tomato sauce.”
    “Sure, sounds good.”
    She smiled and walked away. I closed the book, leaving it on my bed, and followed her. The sky had turned pink, and the setting sun streaming in through the windows made the old floorboards glow a deep amber. There was nowhere in the world as safe and comfortable to me as this place, where I could practically feel my family magic around me. I’d missed this house.
     
    “Say when.” My mom scooped polenta onto my plate, and I held my hand up after three big spoonfuls. She used the back of the spoon to make a well in the middle of the mound, and I chuckled. 
    “I’m glad I’m home.”
    Noni laid her gnarled hand over mine and squeezed.
    I filled the depression in my polenta with garlicky, tomato-sauced string beans, and dug in, enjoying the comforting flavors of my childhood. We ate, and shared a couple bottles of wine, while I got caught up on coven gossip. After we’d cleared our dishes, Mom took a plate of cut fruit from the fridge and we all ate from it, stabbing pineapple and melon with our forks.
    “There’s a bonfire tonight, I think, at the Sullivan’s.” The comment sounded too casual, and I cocked an eyebrow at her.
    A coven bonfire that didn’t happen after an Esbat ritual was pretty much just a party, and mainly functioned as a place for the younger, unattached witches to find partners for no-strings sex. “Mom, are you trying to suggest I should go looking for a hook-up?” I laughed. Three hours ago, I would have welcomed the information and gone to the party eagerly. But not now.