Chapter
One: The Assignment
Ghostly
haunts
and
ghostly taunts
A
familiar face
for
Samuel Chase awaits
After several moments of silence
following the pronouncement, Amira Walker glanced up from her notebook and
stared at the man across the desk. The cream-colored parchment in the
director’s hand exploded into a confetti mist with a muffled poof. From the
colorful mini-explosion and the horrid attempt at rhymes, the personality of
the assigner reminded her of her youngest sister, Ris. Vibrant, explosive,
unpredictable.
The pink, blue, purple,
and yellow remnants landed on the desk, and Sparsh raked the paper puddle into
a black wastebasket. He wore a stern expression, a black, tailored three-piece suit,
and a tie with bright yellow pineapples over a rainbow background. The first
time she’d seen Sparsh, she’d jokingly called him the agency’s Bosley. But no
iteration of the man from the Charlie’s
Angels television series or movies was a powerful warlock that distributed
secret paranormal assignments. The intimidation factor was high.
He’d read the rhyme
twice in his deep, monotone voice.
Calex Dimas, Lex for
short, her senior partner and kind of
boyfriend, leaned back in the chair beside her,
his easy demeanor belying the keen wit and sharp intuition she’d seen in action
firsthand when she’d met him three weeks ago. “I didn’t think we’d be hearing
Samuel Chase’s name again so soon. Can’t the Council come up with a few more
lines of instruction so we can have a better understanding of what’s
happening?”
The rhyme came from
seers inside the Council on Crimes Against Humans. They then employed the LSP
to handle the assignments.
Sparsh ignored the
question and clicked away on his desktop computer. The printer behind him
churned to life and spit out sheets of paper.
Amira clicked the top
of her pen in and out three times. Poofs and rhymes and magic, oh my. Just another day at Lost Souls ParaAgency.
She was a long way from her tea shop in her hometown of Burberry, South
Carolina. Well, not too far actually, since the LSP office was located just
west of Savannah, Georgia and therefore only a couple of hours drive south.
With her free hand, she
smoothed the top of her skirt. A tickle of anxiety trickled down her spine when
she thought how little she knew about the agency or the Council that employed
them. Since entering LSP’s headquarters a half hour ago, she’d seen less than
five people milling about in the stark, undecorated hallways on the surface
level. The main thing she knew for certain was that they kept the paranormal
community a secret from regular humans as well as protected humans from bad
paranormals. She agreed with their overall mission, even if she didn’t agree
with all of their enforcement tactics. The three-page strongly worded letter
she and her middle sister Ally had penned to the LSP outlined all of their
grievances and suggested ways of improvement.
When she’d asked Lex
about training, she’d received a manual through overnight delivery. Apparently,
the assignment she’d interfered with in her hometown the month prior had been
the only on-the-job training they intended to provide. Being on her home turf
and surrounded by her witch family had been a major bonus for that incident.
With shaky confidence, she wondered if she could handle what came next.
She suppressed her
doubts and reminded herself that the part-time job with the LSP would help keep
her sisters safe and off the Council’s radar. That took priority above all
else.
Her gaze wandered
around the room and settled on Lex’s profile. The Council and LSP had sent Lex
to her town to find a bad witch. After a good amount of confusion and a wrongful
accusation, they’d worked together as a team to find the culprit creating
magical chaos. She’d also fallen for him. Hard. Unfortunately, they’d had their
first and last real date the night
they’d solved the Burberry case after he’d asked her to join the agency. Since
then, their late night conversations during his visits had centered on personal
security and which alarm system would best fit her lifestyle. She appreciated
his almost constant concern, but had hoped for a tad more in the romance
department.
That alone was a good
enough reason not to put a label on their relationship this early on. But add
in her three spell-casting, meddling great-aunts who wanted nothing more than
for her to marry him and have his babies as soon as possible to guarantee the
future of the family magic, and she wondered if she and Lex really fell into
the “meant to be” category. Amira saved those depressing thoughts for a late
night tub of ice cream.
She cleared her throat
to redirect her thinking and focus on what she could control—being an
invaluable part of the agency team. “If the assignment is so vague, why does it
have to poof Mission: Impossible
style?”
“The ‘poof’ connects
the magic to the amulet, and once Lex places it around his neck, the Council
will automatically be notified that the assignment has been accepted,” Sparsh
answered, his tone matter-of-fact. He collected the printed documents and
slipped them into a manila folder. “As to the vagueness—that’s not my
department.”
Amira’s tingle of
anxiety returned at the mention of the Council. Sparsh and Lex’s grandfather
were convinced a coup within the Council simmered below the surface, and the
troublemakers had grand designs on becoming less human-friendly.
Sparsh stood and handed
an opened black jewelry box to Lex. The amulet adorned with a golden stone in
the center would give them a magical “power up” on their assignment. The amulet
could be used as a tracking device and had other magical properties that could
come in handy in a pinch.
This one was different
from the one Lex used during the assignment where they’d met. That necklace had
produced a zing between Lex and herself every time they’d touched. Fun, yet
distracting.
Not that she’d be an
advocate for magic.
Amira reached for the
sparrow dangling from a silver chain around her neck, her mom’s talisman a
constant reminder of the unpredictability and all too often tragic consequences
of spell-casting. Even though she’d agreed to improve her magic by training
with her great-aunts once a week, she still preferred to stick to her wits and
newfound ability to doggedly uncover the truth before resorting to spells to
solve problems. And since she and Lex had recently discovered that the Council
wanted the Walker sisters for their magical abilities for unknown reasons, she
planned to only use magic when absolutely necessary.
“So if the magic
connects with the amulet,” she asked, “then that means this is a real haunting,
right? Like how Lex knew that there was a bad witch in Burberry?”
Sparsh raised one of
the caterpillar-ish eyebrows camped out on his forehead and sat back down. “Determining
if the ghost is real or fake will be part of your investigation. Do you have
your manual with you? On page two hundred sixty-one, you’ll find the protocol
for spectral hauntings.”
One of the many issues
in her and Ally’s letter to the agency—vagueness of assignments.
“There’s a manual for
this job?” Lex chuckled, drawing an eye roll from Sparsh.
“Your former assistant
must have read it for you,” the other man
answered, his tone dripping with sarcasm.
Sparsh
has some sass hidden under his starched collar.
Amira stared at her two
lines of notes again. She drew a frowny face with vampire fangs near Samuel’s
name. In Burberry, the scripted television ghost-hunter had tried to blackmail
her and her sisters into becoming a “real lives of witches” reality show. “How
does this work since we’ve met Samuel Chase? Will the mind-erasure hold for the
duration of the assignment?”
“For that reason alone,
it’s too risky of a case.” Lex interjected before Sparsh could open his mouth.
“Even if the LSP erased his memories and that of his crew, they might have
missed someone, and being recognized could blow our cover. An errant cameraman
they forgot could expose us.”
She slanted her eyes toward
Lex, but not to take in the crisp lines of his beige button up shirt that added
an unhealthy dose of sex appeal. His objections irked her. They were partners,
and she should have a say in whether they accepted a case. “I’m more curious to
know why Samuel would have a legitimate ghost problem. I heard he retired from
ghost hunting after the Burberry fiasco. The stress gave him a gray hair or
something.”
For the first time
since she’d been shown into Sparsh’s office, Lex angled his body toward her and
gave her his full attention. “Attempted murder might do that to some people.”
She waved her pen with
a flick of her wrist. “I think our witch was just trying to teach him a
lesson.”
His lips formed a
half-smile. “Which was?”
She mimicked his smile,
wishing she’d put on another coat of lip gloss in the lobby as his gaze
traveled to her mouth. “Don’t tick off a witch.”
His smile fell and he
lowered his lids over his brown eyes. Due to family drama of his own, Lex would
never be a big fan of witches in general.
Sparsh set a file
folder down on his desk and pushed it toward Lex. “Mr. Chase has indeed retired
and opened a bed and breakfast north of Atlanta. Ironically, it’s now haunted, but the occupants have kept it low-key. This wouldn’t
have come on our radar if the Council hadn’t sent the assignment.”
Lex cut his gaze toward
Sparsh. “Which is odd for a television personality who makes a living off of
fake ghost encounters. Something isn’t right about this case.”
“This has become a high
priority job.” Sparsh said. “Our tellers foresee an incident as soon as this
weekend. There’s no time for a complex set up, and your history with the ghost
hunter puts you ahead of the game. Celebrities like him get more attention than
the average ghost chaser, so this needs to be
debunked and silenced ASAP.”
Lex pushed the file
back toward Sparsh. “Send another team. I don’t want to end up in a tabloid
magazine. We’ll wait for something else.”
Sparsh pushed the file
back with one finger. “Your grandfather says it has to be you.”
The atmosphere in the
room shifted as Lex leaned forward, losing all of his relaxed posture at the
mention of his grandfather. “Why am I not surprised? I still don’t think this
is a good first assignment for Amira.”
“Are you saying I can’t
handle a ghost?” She’d done a pretty good job of handling Samuel just a few
weeks ago.
He tossed his hands
wide. “Don’t put words in my mouth.”
She bit the inside of
her cheek. Goddesses alive, were they having their first argument as an almost couple? She ended it quickly by
reaching forward and grabbing the amulet. She tugged the leather throng over
her head. “There. Assignment accepted.”
She patted it twice,
and then removed it and put it in the black box.
Lex’s mouth gaped open.
Sparsh tapped his
fingers on the desk, the corners of his eyes crinkling as if he wanted to
smile. “Moving on. Amira, your insurance benefits paperwork needs to be filled
out in human resources. Tippie will show you down to sublevel four.” He cleared
his throat with a few ahems and shifted in his chair. “And… You both need to
fill out the Consensual Romance in the Workplace Agreement.”
Lex grunted out a
strangled noise.
She blinked several
times as her cheeks warmed. A pre-typed form would definitely put a label on
their relationship.
Sparsh glanced between
them and settled his gaze on the top of his desk. He picked up a few files and
placed them back in the same position. “I don’t do relationship counseling. I
only hand out the assignments. Can LSP count on you two as a team?”
Amira held her features still, not giving in to
the disappointment of Lex choking instead of gallantly professing his affection
for her in front of Sparsh. “Absolutely.”
