Total pages in book: 51
Estimated words: 49441 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 247(@200wpm)___ 198(@250wpm)___ 165(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 49441 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 247(@200wpm)___ 198(@250wpm)___ 165(@300wpm)
“Have I told you how impressive you are?” I asked.
“Not in the past hour or so. Go ahead, praise me,” she invited, smiling at the camera.
“How about I praise you when you finish the job. That necklace is heavily guarded.”
“You mean this?” she asked, reaching behind her to lift up the gleaming, twelve-million-dollar necklace, waving it carelessly at me. “Child’s play,” she declared.
Then she disappeared again, only re-appearing when she stepped back out front of the building.
Where the owner of said necklace and his entire security team were waiting for her.
I moved out of the surveillance van to step next to her, my hand going to her lower back as she handed the necklace over to the shocked and horrified owner.
He’d insisted when he’d hired us that there was no way Roxanne could get the necklace, that he had it on the best authority that it was protected both by human and magical measures.
Roxy proved him wrong in under fifteen minutes.
It was a new record, actually.
“I… it turns out I will be needing your input after all,” the man said, slipping his necklace into a suitcase that was handcuffed to one of his security guard’s wrists.
“How’s Monday work for you?” Roxanne asked.
“Eight?”
“If you mean eight at night, sure,” Roxanne shot back, smiling. “But if you mean in the morning, then absolutely not. I don’t get up until eleven,” she declared, still wearing some of her sloth proudly.
“I will have my secretary call you,” the man said, giving us both a nod, then rushing back into his building to secure his very expensive necklace once more.
“Not too shabby,” Roxanne declared as we walked back to the van, checking her watch. “We still have time to pick up pizza and get home in time for the season premiere of The Scandalous Lives of Witchy Wives.”
Some things never changed.
And I was eternally grateful for that.
Not only because she got me addicted to that ridiculous show, but because I appreciated how there were still parts of the Roxanne I met nearly a year ago in this newer version of her.
She’d known almost immediately after coming out of the maze that her vending machine spells simply weren’t going to be worth her time anymore.
She’d tapped into a much more powerful magic inside of her, and she’d been interested to find how she most liked to use it.
After several failed attempts at things like classes, private consultations, and even helping a famous actress land her dream job over her rival, she came to the conclusion that she really only harnessed her powers at their full potential when it felt like there was a lot at stake.
Like our very lives in the labyrinth.
That led to some searching to figure out a career path for her that would be both exciting and challenging.
It came to us, amazingly, through one of her silly reality TV show programs as we’d been lazing in bed naked, eating popcorn out of a massive plastic bowl.
The people on the show were talking about the uptick in heists involving witches and their magic thwarting the human security systems. And how they really wished there was some sort of consultant to work with to secure their own valuables from magical theft.
And so… a business was born.
With a little overhead provided by me, and a few weeks of hard work to prove herself, she had a business going.
She was focused and motivated and at her full power.
It was amazing to watch.
Then just as amazing to go home with her, climb into bed, and rot away eating delicious junk food and watching endless television.
“Do you want to grab some drinks and ice cream at the bodega before we grab the pizza?” I asked as I opened the van door for her.
She reached out, grabbing both sides of my suit jacket—some habits died hard—turning me, pushing me back against the van, and planting a long, deep kiss on my lips.
“This is why I love you,” she said, beaming at me. “You get me.”
I did.
What’s more, she got me too.
For my last birthday—my first actual, human one in over three hundred years—she’d given me several journals that must have taken weeks to track down.
I still liked books about lore, witches, demons, vampires, everything supernatural.
I was actually working on a database that would have all of these old tomes scanned and available for other eyes.
Because, some day, the books, like all of us, would be gone. I wanted proof of their existence and their wisdom available to future generations.
As for my cure, it was currently sitting on my desk as a paperweight. Roxy had spelled it so it couldn’t open without the spell that she kept hidden somewhere even I didn’t know about.
I’d thought about the curse and the cure for a long time after we got back from the labyrinth. The conclusion I came to was that… being a human being wasn’t a curse that needed curing.