The Yellow-Bellied Scaredy Cat Read online

“Nice meeting you, Charming Calhoun.” He brought my hand to his lips and kissed it. “I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other again, soon.”

  I smiled and walked off, keeping my gaze straight as I left the carnival behind. I couldn’t shake the feeling that Samson was watching me. I also couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something off about his carnival. Over the years I had learned to listen to my gut, so I did.

  That was why I didn’t tell Samson that I had, indeed, seen his soul mate. I had seen her in a flash, a brilliant flash of light.

  I debated whether or not I should tell her. She would probably laugh it off and say there was no way she would ever be with a carnival owner.

  But what if she didn’t? What if she went with him? And what if Samson wanted something darker than how he presented himself?

  Just thinking that made me feel like a thousand roaches were crawling over my skin. I shook off the feeling as I headed back to the house.

  No, I wouldn’t tell Kimberly Peterson that Samson Magnum was her soul mate. At least I wouldn’t do it unless she asked me to.

  Charming

  “So, who wants to go to the carnival tonight?” Rose asked, her pink hair coiffed practically to the ceiling. She batted her lashes at me as if to add to the effect.

  “Oh, well,” I said uneasily, unsure how to get out of this predicament.

  Rose gently picked Pig up off the floor and tucked her under one arm. “Don’t tell me you’re not going, Charming. It will be so much fun. We can win large stuffed animals, ride the rides, Pig and I can enter the Tunnel of Love—we’ll do so many wonderful things. Oh, don’t you just adore the carnival?”

  I grimaced. “I’m not really sure—”

  “Don’t be ridiculous; of course you’re going, Charming,” Mama said as she sailed into the living room wearing her favorite dress, a pink gauzy thing that was more appropriate for a wedding than a night out, but what did I know?

  “Why do I have to go?” I argued.

  Mama shot me a fierce glance. “Because you are a Calhoun. As a pillar in this town, of course you have to go.”

  “I already went this morning, to match the owner.”

  Mama pulled on her gloves. “And did you?”

  “No,” I said eagerly, too eagerly. Mama eyed me skeptically. “I mean, I tried but I couldn’t pull up his soul mate. There must be some carny thing where you don’t get one, maybe. I don’t know. It’s weird.”

  I was talking too much.

  “You’re talking way too much, Charming,” Rose said. “We completely understand. You don’t have to drone on about the carnival owner.” She sniffed. “Besides, he’s never met me.”

  Meaning that Rose and her geriatric self would put some sort of sway on a man half her age.

  Well, I suppose never say never.

  “So it’s decided then.” Mama draped her jacket over her shoulders. “We’re going to the carnival as a family. We should, anyway. The carnival people, they’re magical, correct?”

  “How did you know?” I asked.

  She scoffed. “I can smell magic in the air, Charming. You get to be my age and every little change—from a throbbing knee to the hairs on the back of your head rising—signifies some sort of magical shift.”

  Ugh, I did not want throbbing knees. “Do I have to get to your age?”

  She glared at me in answer.

  “Just kidding,” I squeaked. Mama handed my coat to me, and I shrugged it on. “All right, let’s go.”

  We started outside when Broom hopped into view, jumping up and down excitedly.

  “Would you like to come to the carnival?” Mama asked.

  Broom did a half dip that I took to be yes.

  Mama grabbed the broom by the handle. “Then come on, but stay near us and under no circumstances are you allowed to fly off or do anything that looks magical. Do you understand?”

  Broom trembled in answer.

  “I will take that to be a yes, you understand. Now let’s get going.”

  We looked like a strange group—Mama, Rose with her pink hair and Pig in her arms, Broom and me. It must have been obvious to anyone with eyes that we were witches.

  But I quickly shelved that thought as we approached. The carnival lights glowed bright, and I was certain you could see the shining for miles. If nothing else, the lights would at least attract people to the carnival.

  We were halfway there when my phone rang. I pulled it from my purse and saw Thorne’s name on the screen.

  I skipped hello and went straight for the jugular. “Let me guess, you’re calling to tell me that you’ve spoken to your father about Blake Calhoun and he’s going to the vampire senate, or whatever it is you have.”

  “Council,” Thorne corrected. “And yes, I have called my father.”

  My breath hitched in my throat. “Really? You called him?”

  He sighed. Thorne was frustrated with me, no doubt, but I was frustrated with him as well. He was supposed to have gotten his father involved with Blake Calhoun weeks ago, but he’d been dodging it.

  “Yes,” he said, fatigue filling his voice. “I called and said what we’d discovered, that Blake is hunting a powerful object.”

  “And?”

  “He’ll be on the lookout for it.”

  My hopes fell. I’d thought this was our opportunity to join forces with Leopold, to tell the council what we knew. My voice tightened. “What does that mean—he’ll be on the lookout?”

  “It means complications have arisen regarding the council.”

  “What compilations?”

  “Listen, where are you?” Thorne said gruffly. “I don’t want to go into all of this on the phone.”

  Mama had just bought our tickets and we were stepping under the glowing archway. “I’m at the carnival.”

  “Reliving your childhood?” Thorne said sarcastically.

  “At least I’m young enough to remember mine.”

  “Amusing,” he said. “If I didn’t know better, I would say we were mortal enemies instead of what we are.”

  I followed Mama and Rose aimlessly toward the bucket game, where you toss a ball in a bucket and hope it doesn’t spring out. Awesome. We were already about to start losing money, and we’d only just arrived.

  “I’ll go first.” Rose plumped her hair. “I have a good luck charm.”

  From the ground, Pig snorted. Rose would have been better off rubbing Pig for luck than she would touching her hair.

  “Where are you?” I asked Thorne.

  “I’m at the jail. I’ll be there in just a minute.”

  I glanced around. “But you don’t know where I am. I’m at the—”

  “Told you I’d see you in a second.”

  Thorne’s voice came from behind me. I yelped. My phone slipped. I scrambled to catch it, but my fingers couldn’t grab hold.

  Thorne’s arm shot out, palm up. The phone landed with a light thump in his hand. “Here you go.”

  “Thank you.” I tipped my head up and smiled. The corners of his eyes crinkled like fans, making him look more handsome, as if that was possible. “But I don’t know why you have to scare me like that.”

  “I wasn’t trying to.” He shrugged. “I said I’d be here in a second.”

  “I didn’t know you meant it literally.”

  “Oh phooey!” Rose slugged the air. “I was this close to winning. So close.”

  Mama steered her away from the basket booth. “It will be fine, Rose. There are other games to play, and possibly others that aren’t rigged to lose,” she mumbled so that the booth worker wouldn’t hear.

  Thorne smiled at Mama and Rose. “Glinda, Rose, good to see you.”

  “Thorne,” Mama cooed, “are you here to steal Charming away from us?”

  “I certainly hope not,” Rose said. “He wouldn’t get very far if he stole her, would he?”

  “Not with witches in her family, he wouldn’t,” Mama replied.

  From its place wrapped in Mama’s hand,
Broom bounced up and down in agreement.

  “Don’t worry, ladies, I have no intention of stealing Charming away. Maybe while we’re at the carnival, but no farther than that.”

  “Maybe I’ll see you two in the Tunnel of Love,” Rose said gayly.

  Thorne quirked a brow. “Oh? Do you have a new beau?”

  Rose winked playfully. “No, dear, but you never know how the night’s going to turn out, do you?”

  A confused look flitted over Thorne’s face. Before Rose scarred him with tales of her prowess with men, I interrupted. “Rose, why don’t you let us take Pig around the carnival; that way your hands are free if they need to be holding on to someone?”

  “What a great idea, Charming.” She handed the leash to me. “I’ll see you back at the house.”

  Mama stepped forward and whispered, “Charming, be careful.”

  “Why?”

  Her forehead wrinkled with worry. “There’s a feeling that I can’t quite put my finger on, but there is something a bit strange about this carnival—other than the fact that it’s run by witches, that is.”

  So maybe my creepy feeling about Samson Magnum wasn’t an anomaly, because Mama obviously felt something, too.

  Thorne wrapped a hand around my waist. “I’ll take good care of her. There’s no need to worry. Glinda, Rose, it was good to see you.”

  They waved and we walked off, dodging the oncoming crowd. “It’s busy here tonight,” I murmured.

  “People love carnivals,” Thorne said in my ear. His breath tickled my flesh, and I shivered, in a good way. “There’s a mystical quality about them, don’t you think?”

  “You were just teasing me about being here.”

  He shrugged. “Just because I was making fun of you doesn’t mean that I don’t like them.”

  “You’re so frustrating,” I said.

  He shrugged. “That’s why you like me so much.”

  Unfortunately, that was true.

  My gaze darted over a tent advertising that inside awaited a half-man/half-fish individual. I shuddered at the thought of such a creature.

  “Is it a merman?” I asked Thorne.

  He hiked a shoulder to his ear. “Hard to say. It’s either that or an illusion.”

  “Hmm,” was all I could think to reply.

  “But I had wanted to talk to you about my father,” he said.

  “Leopold.”

  “Yes, and what’s going on with the council.”

  The line of tents suddenly ended and to my right lay an open ring. “Step right up,” barked Samson Magnum, “and meet the strong man. No man in the world can match him when it comes to sheer strength. Step right up and watch what he can do.”

  I pressed my lips toward Thorne’s ear. “I bet you could match him.”

  Thorne’s gaze slid to one corner. His lips curled in amusement. “But that wouldn’t be a fair fight, would it?”

  “I don’t know, it might be.”

  “Step right up,” Samson barked. “See the strong man. Witness for yourselves his tremendous abilities.”

  Giorgio was the picture of exactly what I thought a strong man should be. He was tall and balding with a mustache that curled toward his nose. His outfit did not disappoint, either. He wore an animal print leotard that looked to have been painted on him as opposed to slipped over his body.

  Giorgio crossed to a set of dumbbells. “Each of these weights,” he explained, “are fifty pounds. There are four on each side for a total of four hundred pounds.”

  A few people in the crowd whistled low at the impressive amount. The strong man chalked his hands, stepped toward the bar holding the weights and picked it off the stand.

  He grunted and exhaled, straining.

  Samson pointed to him. “Clap for him, help him lift the weights.”

  People clapped and shouted. Giorgio just about had the bar over his head when a loud crash occurred in the background. The next thing I knew, Arnold appeared from nowhere, running toward the crowd. He eyed the spectators and, seeming to be afraid of them, howled and raced backward, straight into Giorgio.

  The two men collided. Arnold threw up his hands and screamed while the strong man teetered backward, the bar full of dumbbells sailing up and over his head.

  Before I could turn to Thorne, he was gone, steadying the dumbbells over Giorgio’s head so that he wouldn’t topple back.

  When he was satisfied that the strong man wouldn’t fall over, Thorne patted him on the back and returned to his spot beside me.

  “Thank you to the helper from the audience,” Samson said, eyeing Thorne with a glint of interest that bothered me.

  I shrugged it off and watched as Giorgio finished up his show of great feats of strength. When it was over, Samson wove his way to us.

  “Ms. Calhoun,” he said, his smile revealing a mouthful of teeth, “I’m so glad you decided to return tonight, and to bring a friend.”

  “This is Thorne Blackwood; he’s the police chief around here,” I explained.

  Samson smiled like a Cheshire cat. “Oh, a man with a shield. I can assure you, Officer, everything we do in this carnival is above the law.”

  “I wasn’t questioning it,” Thorne said.

  Samson’s gaze raked over Thorne. “You’re not a witch, are you? You’re something else…something older.”

  Thorne’s silvery eyes flashed with distrust before dying to a simmer. “I am older.”

  “And very strong,” Samson mused. “You would make a good strong man in a carnival.”

  Thorne laughed. “I don’t think the carnival is my game.”

  Samson smirked. “You never know what your game is until you’ve found it. You never know.”

  Thorne placed a hand on the small of my back. “I do know, but thank you for telling me that I have a future with a carnival.”

  “Anytime,” Samson said as we walked away.

  When we were out of earshot, Thorne growled low. “Something about that man gives me the creeps.”

  “Me too, that’s why I didn’t tell Kimberly Peterson that he’s her soul mate.”

  Thorne stopped. “You’re kidding.”

  I shook my head. “I wish I were, but no, I saw her, clear as day, when I touched his hand. They’re soul mates.”

  Thorne stopped at a booth lined with water guns. He handed the attendant a few bills and aimed the gun at a row of moving ducks. “Are you going to tell her?” Thorne asked.

  “I don’t know. I have a feeling I’m protecting her more if I let her live in ignorance about the whole thing.”

  Thorn aimed and squeezed the trigger. Several ducks fell over as he fired water on them. “Ignorance has never been a help to anybody.”

  “It may be in her case,” I mused.

  Thorne finished the game. He won a small stuffed bear, which he handed to me. I let Pig get a whiff of the animal, as the little swine snorted when she saw it.

  “Thank you,” I said to Thorne.

  He wrapped an arm over my shoulder, and we walked off. “It’s not a true carnival experience until you’ve won a stuffed bear.”

  I laughed. “Agreed.”

  Thorne stiffened.

  “What is it?”

  He nodded into the crowd. “All your hopes about keeping that information from Kimberly may not be enough.”

  A cold tingle swept down my spine. “What do you mean?”

  “Look.”

  My gaze followed his and stopped when it landed on Kimberly, smiling and laughing with Samson Magnum. “Oh no,” I whispered.

  “Oh no is right,” Thorne said. “Looks like even you can’t stop true love.”

  Samson

  Samson could not excuse Arnold’s mistake. This was not some simple accident, one that could easily have been rectified. No, this was a blunder, caused by the kid and his stupid fear of everything.

  Samson found Arnold later, after all the guests had left. The kid was organizing the knives the blade thrower hefted onto his target.

/>   Samson considered the boy as he polished each knife before gently placing it in a leather sheath. The carnival owner pondered exactly what Arnold’s punishment should be. It wasn’t simply that Arnold had almost caused the strong man to be hurt, it was also that Arnold had embarrassed the owner in the middle of a show. What if the bar and dumbbells had fallen out of Giorgio’s hands? What if he had fallen and been hurt by one of the dumbbells?

  The carnival would look second-rate, and everyone in town would think it wasn’t worth the price of admission.

  But something good had come out of the mishap—Samson had seen him. Thorne Blackwood was a vampire, that was for sure. Samson had only ever glimpsed one vampire in his life before. They were elusive creatures, normally keeping with their own kind.

  But this one was out in the open. How peculiar, Samson thought as he rubbed his chin, to see a vampire so openly displayed. And his strength! That Thorne was quite clearly stronger than even the magic Giorgio used to amp his muscles. Samson wondered exactly how strong Thorne was—how much could he lift?

  He wondered something else, too—how much would people pay to see a real live vampire? A lot, he figured, probably twice as much coin as they dropped now.

  There could be complications, though. What if the government discovered what he had in his carnival? But then he pushed away the thought and realized that the government had no interest in pursuing Samson. As far as they were concerned, Samson’s entire carnival was comprised of nothing more than sideshow attractions—none of it real, all of it fake.

  Which meant they would not be concerned with a vampire, not at all.

  For as gleeful as the thought made him, Samson sobered when his gaze darted back to Arnold and he remembered how much Arnold had annoyed him.

  “Arnold,” Samson shouted.

  Arnold flinched and dropped one of the blades. It landed point down on the wooden table, adding to the hundreds of nicks that were already in place. One had to watch where you rested a hand on the thing; otherwise, you might need a pair of needle-nosed pliers to remove a shard of wood from your hand.

  Samson flared his nostrils and stalked toward Arnold.

  The kid cowered.

  That was what Samson wanted. The kid needed to remember who was in charge and how he was supposed to act at the carnival. Fear had no place in this business.