Lily tucked the blankets firmly around the deputy’s body as Nolan nailed canvas tarps over the windows to block out the light. When she finished, she studied at the mummy figure on her bed. “I hope this works.”

“It will.” Mara stood in the doorway. “I give you my word.”

“Your word isn’t—” Nolan began.

“Nolan.” Lily held up her hand. “Stop. Unless you want me to start judging you for going all monster on the full moon, you can’t judge Mara for going all possessed when the ghosts used her.”

He sighed. “I apologize.”

“Come on.” Lily reached for Mara, who shrugged back out of the way.

“Where?”

“To pick out a bedroom for you. This one is obviously taken for the time being.” Lily glanced to the room Nolan had been staying in. She knew she should kick him out but couldn’t bring herself to do it. She gestured to the empty one. “That one is free. Or there are two upstairs. Polly and Dante stay on the third floor.”

“Why would you do this after all I’ve done?” Mara clearly had a hard time trusting anyone. Lily couldn’t blame her. “How do you know I won’t... you know... again?”

“Because I’m going to make sure we do everything we can to stop that from happening again. What you went through as a child…” Lily felt tears come to her eyes. “That should never have happened. I wish more than anything I had known about you. I would have found a way to come here and get you away from her. Everything our mother told you…” Lily shook her head in denial and swiped the moisture as it trailed down her cheeks. “Mom was sick. I don’t know if something happened to her, and that led her to do drugs. Or if the drugs caused her to be mentally unwell. Or if she was sick to begin with. I do know that, the way this town acts around anyone with our last name, if people saw the signs, they didn’t think to help her.”

She took a deep breath. This was hard to talk about.

“Or it was me.” Mara hugged her arms to her chest. “You don’t know that it wasn’t because of me.”

“Actually, I do. You’re twenty. She showed signs before she was pregnant with you. So you see, her illness wasn’t because you were evil and sucked the life out of her. You, Mara, are one of us whether you want to be or not. Welcome to the I Had Marigold Crawford Goode as a Mother club. Once you’re in, you can never get out.”

Lily smiled, trying to make a joke.

“Funny,” Mara answered wryly.

“So I’m guessing Mara is short for Amaryllis, but why Edison? Are you married?”

Mara chuckled. “Far from it. Not really a lot of options when the only people you talk to are ghosts. I borrowed it from a childhood friend, Luther Edison III. He used to work in the mines. He’s been kind of like a strange father figure to me. You might know him by his nickname, Stan.”

“Stan?” Lily couldn’t hide her surprise.

“Yeah, well, he grows on you. He was always the nicest to me. All he ever wanted me to do was help him look for his shoe. We never found it though.” She glanced toward Lily’s bedroom, where the sounds of Nolan hammering canvas came from within. “You know that man in there is madly in love with you, right? I saw it the day we met. Whatever you’re fighting about, you should forgive him. He would walk through fire for you.”

Lily glanced back. She didn’t dare show how much those words gave her joy. “Do you think?”

Mara chuckled. “I’ll take the room down here. I’m not sure I can handle being next to Polly.” She started to walk to the room, only to stop. “Are you sure she’s a relative?”

“Yep. You’re related to her.” Lily nodded. “She’s a Crawford. She was mom’s twelfth cousin’s sister’s daughter once removed and then unremoved’s mother’s aunt’s granddaughter.”

Mara frowned. “What’s unremoved mean?”

“No clue.” Lily laughed before saying seriously, “I’m glad you’re here, Mara. We’ll figure it all out. I promise. You’re safe.”

“Pickle, darling,” Polly called.

Mara’s eyes widened, and she quickly shut the bedroom door to hide.

“Pickle, we need to talk. You’re giving Crawford witches a bad name. We have to get started with your reeducation immediately. I will not let you out of my sight until…” Polly paused at the top of the stairs. “Oh, Lily, before I forget. I’m pretty sure that feral black cat hanging around is your familiar. You should work on taming it. It peed on Winks.”

“I’ll try.” Lily really had no great motivation to stop the cat from peeing on the gnomes. Maybe her familiar sensed how annoying she found the little statues. What a good little kitty cat. Lily pointed toward the closed door. “She’s in there.”

Polly went to the door. “Pickle, I’m coming in.”

If she wasn’t mistaken, it sounded like a dresser was being slid in front of the door as a blockade.

Polly knocked. “Open the door, pickle.”

“Polly, I need you to make sure her vessel door thing stays closed,” Lily instructed. “We’re counting on you.”

Polly nodded. “As easy as canning a cucumber. I’m on it.”

Lily felt more than saw Nolan behind her. She didn’t say anything as she walked into his bedroom and waited by the window. Dante was lying in the yard surrounded by gnomes, who were also tipped over onto their backs. She could see her brother talking though no other person was around. She really hoped that the knocker’s aura-contamination-whatever didn’t last too long, so she could have her snarky brother back.

Hearing Nolan come in, she moved to sit on the bed. Their eyes met, and she knew in that moment everything she needed to. It was the same way she knew Mara just needed a little time, family love, a couple of binding potions... and maybe some therapy. In all honesty, it was better to keep her newly found sister where she could see her. It’s not like Lily could send her back out to the mining camp to get turned into a ghost hotel again.

“Tell me,” she said to Nolan now they were alone. “Tell me and I’ll believe you.”

“The council asked me to write up the citations before you came. They also asked me to help nudge you out of town. I said yes.” Nolan’s eyes turned toward the floor. “It was before you arrived. I thought Goodes coming to Lucky Valley was a bad thing. I—”

“Pickle, I will break down this door,” Polly warned.

Nolan again tried to speak and was cut off. “I—”

“Open up and take your medicine like a good girl,” Polly ordered.

“One second.” Lily lifted her hand and gently tried to close Nolan’s door using magic. The wood slammed hard, and the frame cracked. She jumped in surprise. “Oops.”

“A little less next time, dear,” Polly yelled, “but good effort.”

“I can fix that,” Nolan said.

“You were saying.” Lily gestured that he should continue.

I thought it was my duty to do what the council asked of me. But then I met you, and in that first moment, everything changed. I wanted you to stay. I wanted—”

“You wanted what?” She stood, needing him to finish what he was saying.

“I wanted you, Lily. From the first moment I saw you laugh in the lawyer’s office at one of your brother’s jokes. The sound filled me, and I honestly thought you were casting a spell.”

“I didn’t have my powers then.” She took a step toward him.

“I know that now.” His eyes again lifted, the soulful dark gaze drawing her in as it always did.

“And I now know that it was Mara trying to scare us, not you. I know you don’t like her, but she’s my sister. She needs her family. She needs to be around someone who understands what it was like to have a mother like we had.”

“It’s not that I don’t like her. I just sensed her intentions weren’t completely honorable when we met her.” Nolan closed some of the distance between them. “Call it my werewolf sixth sense.”

“As annoying as it is, I also kind of like you trying to protect me.” She closed the distance between them. “I always want there to be complete honesty between us, so I have a confession.”

“What?” He looked worried.

“I wasn’t sad to see wolf-Nolan tear up that teal couch. It was ugly.” Lily pressed her lips together and tried not to laugh.

“I’d planned on giving you a citation for too many garden gnomes,” he answered. “I’m pretty sure you can’t have a gnomery in city limits without a special permit.”

“You can try but Polly will only invite more out of defiance.” Lily felt joy erupting through her very being. She knew in that instant she had finally found a home. “When you move in here permanently, that couch is not coming with you.”

“What do you mean, when I move in?” He lifted a hand to touch her cheek.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot to tell you an important part of my plan.” She batted her lashes at him.

“What part is that?” He glanced at her mouth, leaning ever so slightly forward.

“The part where I say I love you, and I want you to move in here with me and my crazy family, and we get Jesse to come help open a bed and breakfast named after chubby statues.” Lily lifted up on her toes so her lips brushed his.

“I didn’t hear anything past ‘I love you,’” he whispered. “I love you, too, Lily.”

Their lips met, and she felt her powers swirling around them, encasing them with love and protection. Nolan lifted her off the floor and carried her toward the bed. As he gently laid her down, she knew that this was everything she could ever want. Forever.