“Jo, you’re early, pumpkin.” Nanna smiled at me. Her golden retriever, Apple Betty, panted at me, her tail thumping listlessly on the porch floorboards. “Have some lemonade.”
I gulped two glasses, the cold juice hitting the back of my throat. It was already humid and gross out. Granddad hoarded Farmers’ Almanacs like they were gold. He’d gone through every issue and couldn’t find a hotter September or October on record.
“I don’t think it’s going to rain,” I said miserably.
She patted my cheek. “Don’t you worry on it. Rain comes when it wants to.” I’d tried telling my Environmental Science teacher that once, but he’d disagreed. I wanted to see him try and convince my grandmother otherwise. I had to grin at the image. She’d decimate him. “There’s my girl,” she said approvingly, not knowing what I was smiling at. “Go on and say hello to the old bastard.”
“I’m telling Granddad you’re calling him names again,” I teased.
She snorted. Old Bastard was the name of their goat. He was the oldest goat on the planet. He just refused to die. He was half-blind and he head-butted anything that moved, even if he did miss his target half the time. But he loved Granddad.
“Bring him a glass,” Nanna said, handing me another jelly jar of lemonade. I crossed the rut worn into the grass from countless daily walks to the barn. Old Bastard was the only animal they had left, except for Apple Betty, some chickens, and the barn cats.
I could hear Granddad cussing him. “Get outside, you lazy thing,” he said.
Old Bastard stayed where he was, chewing on one of the doors. The barn was dark, the air thick with dust and the smell of hay. I’d spent countless summer afternoons in the barn loft, eating Popsicles and reading novels about Anne Boleyn and Eleanor of Aquitaine. My parents were still trying to convince me to go to university and be a history teacher like Mom, but I just wanted to write historical novels, like Phillipa Gregory and Victoria Holt, and run the farm.
“Hi, Granddad.” I handed him the glass. At the sound of my voice, Old Bastard made a weird goat sound and charged me. I leaped out of the way, and he got distracted by one of the fences.
Granddad shook his head. “He never did take a shine to you.” He wiped his face with a bandana. “Loopy old thing.”
I kissed his leathery cheek. His eyes were squintier than usual, and he smelled like cigars. “You’ve been smoking,” I accused.
He shot a guilty glance at the porch of the house, as if Nanna could hear us. “Be a good girl and keep a secret.” He slipped me a dollar. He’d been bribing me since I was three years old.
I grinned. “Okay, but you know those are bad for you.”
He wagged a finger. “Smoking is bad for you. I’m an old man.” He wiped his face again. “Hard summer, pumpkin. Hard summer.”
I hugged him, feeling useless and sad for him. “I know, Granddad.”
“Main well up and quit on us yesterday,” he said. “Turned on the hose and nothing came out.”
I winced. Wells only ran dry when it was so hot that even the groundwater running under the fields dropped too low for the pump to grab. They had two other wells, but the main one watered the crops and the orchards. Granddad looked about a hundred years old. It was alarming.
He must have caught the worry radiating off me. “We’ll get through. We always do. Just have to call a water witch to find us a new well. Trouble is, she’s overbooked.” He flashed his usual toothy grin. “Go on, Jo-bug, before the Old Bastard makes a run at you again.”
Last time he’d caught me, I had a bruise on my butt and couldn’t sit comfortably for a week. I went around the other side of the farm fence, wisely keeping it between us. “You’re sure?”
“Your grandmother just snuck off to the orchard,” he tattled. “You know she’s not supposed to climb those ladders alone.”
I was crossing the lane toward the fruit orchards when Devin’s car rumbled up the driveway, chased by a huge cloud of dust. I blinked at him and Eloise when they climbed out.
“Dev, she got you up at this hour?” They were both decidedly not morning people. “Blackmail? Death threats?”
“I am an awesome friend.” Devin yawned.
“He really is,” Eloise agreed. She was wearing a gingham blouse, nipped in at the waist, and a huge white flower pinned behind her ear. “Plus, I bribed him with caffeine.” She handed me a paper cup of iced coffee. “I need your Internet.” Devin’s computer was in his room and his mom wouldn’t let girls up there, even if it was just Eloise or me. Actually, especially if it was us. “And backup.”
I raised both my eyebrows. “More batty old ladies?”
“Worse.”
“All right, give me a minute. I need to go lecture Nanna.” We headed toward the apple trees. Both Devin and Eloise worked here during the planting and harvest seasons when there were extra chores to be done. They knew their way around almost as well as I did. The plots of carrots and garlic looked like they might hold on, and there were onions and squash ready to pick.
We found Nanna at the top of a ladder with a basket. The apples were small but they weren’t buggy. They’d make decent sauce. This was the oldest part of the orchard. The gnarled trees extended gray branches out like an old-fashioned hoop skirt, trailing leaves and fruit.
“Nanna, Dev and El are here to help me pick apples, so get down from there.”
She eyed me sharply. “Tell your granddad I can pick apples without his interference.”
“He’s too busy smoking his cigars out behind the barn.”
She muttered to herself and climbed down off the ladder. She was still muttering as she stalked away. Devin shook his head. “You totally sold your granddad out.”
“Hell, yeah, I did. Cigars are right nasty.” I climbed over a fence, using the shortcut to the house. “Let’s go use the computer and then we can come back and fill up some baskets for them.” Eloise was even quieter than usual, chewing on her lower lip. She wasn’t wearing her customary red lipstick. Definitely a sign of impending doom.
“Did you tell Dev about the acorn thing?” I asked her.
“Yeah.” Devin was the one to answer. “What is it with you two?”
“Hey! How is this my fault, exactly?”
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “But it usually is.”
“I was busy ogling the hot guy, remember?”
“When aren’t you?”
“Practice, practice, practice,” I agreed.
The farmhouse was painted white with yellow shutters. The inside was cool and dark and smelled like lemons and rosemary. We went upstairs, where I had my own room. It was full of books and posters of Stonehenge and knights in silver armor kneeling before women in velvet dresses. There was a dart board on the back of the door, with a drawing of Henry the Eighth as the target. I was writing a book about him. Devin sprawled on the bed, and Eloise went straight to my desk and booted up my laptop.
“What are we googling?” I asked idly, putting on some music. The harmonized voices of the Medieval Baebes filled the room.
“I’m going to have to introduce you to music made in this millennia,” Devin grumbled.
I ignored him and read over Eloise’s shoulder. “Lucas Richelieu? Is that the cute guy from the ice cream parlor?”
Eloise nodded grimly.
Devin lifted his head. “This is a boy thing? You said it was important.”
“It is,” she replied quietly. “He showed up at my place last night. On the roof.”
Devin sat up abruptly. “What? Why didn’t you call me? Did you call the cops? What the hell?” Devin rarely got this worked up over anything.
“What did your mom say?” I asked.
“I didn’t tell her,” she admitted.
We both stared at her. Eloise told her mom everything. They were weird that way. “You didn’t tell her?”
“I think he was protecting me.”
“From what?” Devin demanded.
“Crows.”
&n
bsp; “Crows,” he repeated, baffled.
I tilted my head. “Yeah, that’s weird, El.”
“I know. But they were dive-bombing us. Lucas gave me this pendant, and then he jumped off the roof. And vanished.”
“He vanished.”
“Stop repeating everything I say,” she muttered, annoyed. She turned back to the computer screen. “There’s no Lucas Richelieu anywhere. Certainly not in Rowan, anyway.” She spun in the chair. “Something really strange is going on. Mom called Antonia and told her to come home because, and I quote, ‘It’s starting.’ And now she’s avoiding me.”
“So what do we do?” I asked, sitting on the edge of the bed. “Have you ever googled your aunt?”
She spun around without a word and started typing furiously. Devin and I got up to lean on the desk on either side of her. We scrolled through pages and pages of links.
“That one.” Devin stopped us, tapping the screen. “School yearbook picture.”
I whistled. “Did no one in the eighties own mirrors? I mean, seriously.”
“She dropped out when she was sixteen,” Eloise said. “And then it’s like she disappeared. Her cell phone’s unlisted, and she changes the number every year. She’s never had her own apartment. She just lives in her van and drives around.”
Devin looked at her out of the corner of his eye. “Did she gamble or something? Maybe she owed people money.”
“Maybe. But for over seventeen years?” Eloise rubbed her temples. “I’m getting a headache.” She turned away from the computer. “I’ll keep searching later.”
“Are you okay?” I asked. “You’re a little pale.”
“Yeah, it’s just the glare off the screen. And stress, I guess.”
“You know what solves all problems, including stress?” I asked, slinging my arm over her shoulder when she stood up. “Picking apples.”
She snorted.
“I think you’re confusing picking apples with chocolate.”
• • •
I went to the café the next morning with my laptop and tried to research water witches. I was convinced Granddad was starting to go senile. But after following a few links, I found another name for a water witch: a dowser. Which was really only half-helpful. I didn’t fancy calling up some crazy person with a bent wire hanger to walk the fields of the farm, trying to psychically commune with the groundwater. But I read so many testimonials about their accuracy that I phoned the local dowser anyway. Granddad was right; she was fully booked until the first frost, whenever that might be.
“You look organized,” a voice like warm chocolate said over my shoulder. “And rather fierce,” he added when I tossed the phone aside, frustrated.
I glanced up and immediately had to remind myself not to purr. It was the guy from the party, with the ripped jeans and the great butt. His smile was dark and positively wicked. “Hi.”
“Can I sit with you?” Eloise was right, there was something of the rock star about him. He was beautiful, with moody eyes and a sullen mouth.
“Sure.” What kind of an idiot would say no to that? It just figured that there wasn’t a single person I knew here to see this totally hot guy asking to sit with me.
He raised his eyebrows at my laptop. “School paper?”
“Helping out my grandparents, actually.”
“Are they looking for a water witch, then?”
“You know about this stuff?” I asked, surprised.
“Some.” He accepted a tall coffee from the waitress, then added three sugars. The music from the speakers behind us was slow and peppery. “What’s your name?”
“Jo.” I took a sip of my own drink, wondered if he was going to ask me for my phone number or if I should ask for his. Eloise got all flustered around cute guys and blushed and stammered. I didn’t have that problem. “You were at the party on Friday night, weren’t you?” I didn’t mention that I’d followed him into the woods.
He leaned back in his chair, his legs sprawled out. His boots nudged the bottom ruffle of my skirt. “Aye.”
Aye. Seriously? Could he be hotter?
Unless he had been looking for his girlfriend at the party.
Not hot.
“I was supposed to meet my cousin,” he elaborated. “But I couldn’t find her.”
Hot again.
“Does she go to school around here?”
“The high school across from the park.”
“Rowanwood High. That’s where I go.” He knew someone from my school. He officially wasn’t a stranger anymore, so Eloise’s voice nagging in my head to be careful could shut up now.
He drank from his cup, then motioned to my laptop with it. “Found yourself a witch, have you?”
I shook my head. “There’s only one dowser in this whole county and apparently she’s booked solid.”
“Not surprising.”
“Not with this heat spell,” I agreed. Which was making the café feel like a jungle. Even the windows were sweating. I hoped my face wasn’t shiny or my hair damp.
“I could help you with that,” he offered.
I tilted my head. “You could? How?”
His smile was a touch sardonic and more than a touch self-deprecating. It was difficult not to get distracted when a boy smiled like that. “That kind of thing runs in my family.”
“Really? What would you need? Those metal rods?” I’d seen them on one of the websites.
He snorted. “Hardly. A branch is all it takes. Apple or willow is best for water witching.”
“Apple branches won’t be a problem,” I told him. “My grandparents have an apple orchard on the outskirts of town. That’s where they need to dig a new well because even the rain barrels are empty.”
“I could try now if you’d like.”
It was a struggle not to pounce eagerly on the opportunity. He was gorgeous, he was sexy, and he was smiling at me. “That would be brilliant, thanks,” I said as casually as I could. By which I mean: not even remotely casual.
It felt warmer than usual in the café. And I was thinking all sorts of naughty things. Like whether or not it would be hot enough in the fields that he’d have to take his shirt off. I could just tell by the way the worn cotton clung to him that he had really nice arms. And shoulders. And abs. I shut my laptop and slipped it into my bag, hiding my red cheeks. “My car’s just out front.”
We walked outside. He was taller than I’d thought, and his eyes were even more mysterious in the bright sunlight. I stopped in front of Granddad’s old Buick. It was gray and hideous, and older than I was, but it was all mine. I opened the driver’s door and paused. He was still standing on the sidewalk, watching me. “What’s wrong?” If I had latte milk foam on my lip, I’d just die.
“You shouldn’t let strangers into your car.”
I grinned. “Now you sound like my best friends.”
“They’re right. I’ll meet you there.”
“Do you have a car?”
He inclined his head. “I’ll follow you. Which is your grandparents’ farm, in case we get separated?”
“It’s Jack Frost Farms, off County Road 7.”
“So your last name is Frost?” A faint frown puckered his brow, as if he’d thought it was something else.
“No, my mom’s maiden name was Frost. My last name is Blackwell,” I explained. “Here, give me your phone number,” I suggested, whipping my mobile out of my pocket so fast it nearly flew out of my hand. “And I’ll text you mine, so if you get lost I can give you directions.” Now I’d have his number. And he’d have mine. Well played, Jo, I congratulated myself cheekily. Poor Eloise, how could she not find this sort of thing fun?
“I’ll see you there, Jo Blackwell,” he said, after giving me his number.
I shivered at the sound of my name on his lips. Then I just nodded because I couldn’t think of anything else to say. I drove away, glancing in my rearview mirror to see if he was following me but I couldn’t tell which was his car. It only took about ten mi
nutes to reach the end of town and another five to get to the farm. I passed the Christmas tree lot and Granddad on his tractor a few acres back. The Christmas pine tree crop was part of the reason the farm was named after Jack Frost. Granddad never could resist a pun or any kind of wordplay. It drove Nanna batty.
I texted Eloise once I’d parked the car. ROCK STAR. AT THE FARM!!! I texted Devin the same thing, mostly because it bugged him when I did. I climbed out of the car and leaned against the door. Since it was Sunday, Nanna would be in the back kitchen, baking apple and pumpkin pies to sell at the farmers’ market. I made myself turn around to get my knapsack out of the back of the car so it wouldn’t look like I was staring at the road, waiting.
When I popped my head back out, he was there. I jumped, startled.
“Easy,” he said softly, taking my bag so it didn’t drop. He put it on the hood of the car and then rested his arm on the window beside me. He blocked out the sun, which shone so brightly behind him he was a black silhouette.
“I didn’t see you,” I said lamely.
“A friend was waiting for me. I had him drop me at the end of the lane.”
“Oh.”
He was really close. I could see the flecks of light gray in his black eyes. I didn’t even know irises could come in that color. My breath felt wispy in my chest.
He leaned closer still, his mouth hovering near mine. “Why don’t you show me to the dry well, Jo.”
I swallowed. “Okay.” He pulled back and I felt the ridiculous urge to grab his arms and keep him there. This heat better break soon. It was making me stupid. “This way. The main well’s back there behind the barn, but if you need an apple branch we’ll have to go to the orchards.”
We went down the gravel lane into the apple orchard, the humid heat like water between us. He didn’t seem affected, even though he was wearing jeans. I was in a long skirt and tank top, praying I wasn’t visibly sweating. My braid hung behind me, bumping my lower back as we walked. His hands were in his pockets. He tossed his hair out of his face.
I took him into the rows of the older trees, the hot air full of the sweet smell of rotting apples. Bees drifted lazily in between the trees. He dropped his gaze to the ground, searching.