“Damn,” Jasper said.
We all knew the pain of a beautiful, poisonous clawfoot tub.
“You want us to move that out for you?” Jasper asked. “Into the yard, at least, so it’s not in your way?”
“Uhh…no. I got it.”
“You got it? You know levitation spells, Princess?” Jake looked at Jasper and they went back out the door.
“Just so you know, my ancestors weren’t princesses, they were baronesses!” I said.
They returned with a dolly.
“Baroness,” Jake said, bowing to me before they went up the stairs.
I decided not to fight it, even though they were being nicer to me than I deserved, and I knew this was a bad idea. The first rule of magic is that all magic comes with a price, a trade of some kind. Having the Sullivan brothers just hang out and do a bunch of hard work for me? Well, that was magic too. And there had to be a price later.
They grunted and barked “Stop!” and “Wait wait wait” at each other as they dragged the heavy thing down the staircase, and then they dragged in their fresh materials to fix the floor above me, so I had to leave the kitchen alone for a while.
I liked to start with the easiest room and move on from there. Since I had already taken stock of the whole project, I went to the bedroom and got to work on the floors, moving out the old twin bed frame and one ratty armchair, then fixing up and filling in a few spots where nails were pulling up or gaps appeared between boards. I really enjoyed this stuff. It was like meditation, hours slipping by before I knew it. And while my rich family would have been horrified to see their daughter fussing with dirty old floors, one thing I could say about Jake and Jasper is that they got it. I could hear snippets of their conversation and they were loving every minute of the restoration.
Then I came to a crack in the floorboards that had been underneath the bed. The board seemed a little loose. I tried to pull it up. Painful heat shot through my nerves from fingers all the way up to my shoulders. I whipped my hands back too late.
But this was a good feeling to have in an old house. Once you shook it off.
“Ah-haaa…secret hiding place,” I whispered. I took out my wand and delicately tapped the edge of the board, sensing a protection spell. “Éclairer…” I should probably quit with the boarding school magical French, but it was habit by now. Really old school witches used Latin, and super modern—or low-class—witches used whatever language they actually spoke. But the daughters of wizarding royalty always used French. The pattern of the spell glowed, and I could see that it was a tricky knot.
“Ooh…we’ve got something good here. Bevan! Come take a look.”
Bevan appeared, perched on a curtain rod, and immediately swept down, studying the spell from his smaller vantage point. It looked like a glowing web around the floorboard.
“This one will take hours to unravel,” he said.
“Well, I have to do it. There could be something dangerous in there.”
“Better wait until the canines have packed up and gone home. I didn’t know when I invited them that they would stick around. I thought you’d want to get rid of them as soon as you felt better.”
“Yeah, but…they’re fixing that whole room. I can’t say no. It’s dangerous in there. And I am paying them. They must have some free time they thought they’d be using when they bought this place.”
“Either that, or they think you’re going to find treasure here and they want in on it… They bid you up much higher than this place is worth. Curious, isn’t it?”
“You did bring them here,” I snapped at him.
“Because you were hurt! Now you need to tell them to go away!”
“It’s only polite to let them finish.”
“That’s what she said,” he said drolly.
“Go away!” I hissed, blushing as I heard Jake and Jasper’s work boots creaking toward me.
“Hey, we’ve got your floor all set,” Jasper said. “New tongue and groove boards, reinforced the joists… We’ll leave the ceiling repair in the kitchen to you since I don’t know what you plan to do in there.”
“That’s fine,” I said. “That’s great. I didn’t expect it to go that fast.”
“The good news is that it wasn’t termites,” he continued. “It looks like it was a magic blast that just blew the floor out.”
“Uhhh…I guess that’s good news.”
“So we’re heading out,” Jake said, tossing a hammer from one hand to the other and slipping it in his tool belt. “You good here, Duchess?”
“Baroness,” I reminded him. “Yes. Totally. I got it from here. Really appreciate your help. How much do I owe you?”
“Nothing,” Jasper said, like he just wanted to move on. “We weren’t doing anything today.”
“And we’re still not,” Jake said. “So if Jasper isn’t going to accept the fee, then maybe I will.”
“What—a date!?”
“Yeah,” he said, looking at me like he knew he was hot when he swung a hammer around, and he wondered if I was going to make something of it.
“Are you fucking serious?” Jasper said.
“I gave you a fair shot,” Jake said. “But let’s be real here. We didn’t help her because she’s ugly.”
“We helped her because she was hurt.” Jasper grimaced.
“I don’t mean that part. I mean the day we just spent sweating over flooring! And I haven’t been on a date in a while. I know you’re bound and determined not to fall for either of us, Hel, but I’m willing to try my luck.”
I was gaping at them both stupidly. There was a reason I left society to work on old houses. I could make a snappy comeback, sure. I had grown up in a household of squabbling siblings. But I
