Spells and Secrets
Woods Crossing Magical Mysteries Book 1Sarah Rae Drake
Hydra Productions Online LLC
Copyright © 2023 by Raven Heidrich
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Contents
1. Chapter One
2. Chapter Two
3. Chapter Three
4. Chapter Four
5. Chapter Five
6. Chapter Six
7. Chapter Seven
8. Chapter Eight
9. Chapter Nine
10. Chapter Ten
11. Chapter Eleven
12. Chapter Twelve
13. Chapter Thirteen
14. Chapter Fourteen
15. Chapter Fifteen
16. Chapter Sixteen
17. Chapter Seventeen
18. Chapter Eighteen
19. Chapter Nineteen
20. Chapter Twenty
21. Chapter Twenty-One
22. Chapter Twenty-Two
23. Chapter Twenty-Three
24. Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter One
“Good grief, this place is huge!”
I set down the box I’d been carrying and surveyed the large first floor of Grandma Celeste’s old brick townhouse. The rooms were decorated with chintzy old furniture, a mishmash of different decades. It was sweet, in an old-lady sort of way, but I wanted to decorate it with some more updated furniture, and possibly do different paint.
The curtains definitely had to go. They were the old white lace variety and had yellowed significantly with age. Making a mental note to put curtains on my shopping list, I hauled the box upstairs and set it down in one of the rooms; the blue-painted one at the end of the hall.
I couldn’t have been more excited to inherit a paid-off house and a business to boot, but my dad had freaked out when the executor for Grandma’s estate called.
We hadn’t even heard about a funeral service or anything, but that was no surprise since Dad hadn’t been in contact with Grandma for years.
“No, she absolutely will not sign the papers!” he’d hollered into the phone. “She’s too young to inherit anything!”
The lawyer had made it clear that the decision was mine to make, so here I stood in Grandma’s house.
Life in Titan Bay was okay, but there was just something about spreading my wings and coming back to my roots at the same time. I’d been born and lived the first four years of my life in Woods Crossing, but I didn’t remember it at all.
The town had an odd appeal to it, almost like an old friend who’d been waiting to see me for a long time and couldn’t wait to catch up.
The possibilities for the house and the shop were endless. If the shop took off, I might even have enough money to update fixtures and put some better countertops in the bathrooms and kitchen. It was my chance to finally make my mark in the world, and I couldn’t wait to take it.
Working steadily for the next hour, I was able to empty my car of all my earthly possessions and get them into the house. I didn’t own any furniture since I’d lived with Dad in Titan Bay, so the process didn’t take long.
Sitting at the kitchen counter, I wrote down a list of groceries and other necessities I planned to grab at the store. The only major shop in town was the Dollar General just down the road. There was also a small, family-owned grocery store, so between the two, I hoped I could get what I needed.
As I headed into town, I couldn’t completely avoid the twinge of sadness that wound its way through me. I remembered my last day in Titan Bay when Dad and I had a huge fight. He told me that his mother was crazy and had no right to offer her inheritance to me.
I’d told him to get over it and let me go. He insisted on treating me like a child even though I’d turned twenty-six the previous month.
When he told me he didn’t plan to visit, it hurt, but it also gave me the courage to break away from him once and for all.
Dad had always been so protective of me. A part of me understood his fear since my mom passed away in a car accident when I was four, but he didn’t even let me get my driver’s license until I turned nineteen, way too long after my friends at school.
