Crime and Curses: RIP Magic Academy Paranormal Romance Series, #2

Crime and Curses

★

RIP Magic Academy

Paranormal and Supernatural Prison Series

★

Book 2

★

by

E. Hall

Crime and Curses

Copyright© 2020 E Hall

All Rights Reserved

––––––––

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any informational storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author/publisher except where permitted by law.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

*Note: a version of this book was previously published under a different pen name of mine. It has been revised and updated.

––––––––

Cover Design: Camila Marques from Open World Cover Designs

Website: http://www.ehallauthor.com

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ehallauthor

Contents

December

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

January

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

February

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Let’s Connect

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Also by E. Hall

December

★

Chapter 1

★

––––––––

JJ’s smile stuns me. However, when it slides over to Honey, cheering from a nearby seat in the rumpus stands, my heart sinks. Their eyes hold and lock. Her grin suggests a kind of cockiness that can only come from Riptivik’s queen bee.

I don’t know how to feel about JJ. It was my suggestion we pretend our kiss didn’t happen. Anyway, it was less of a kiss and more let’s prove that we can’t be friends or anything more.

Going from hating each other to friendship is a bridge best not crossed. How could we trust each other? I’d always doubt and wonder. Anyway, the only sure thing in my life right now is that he despises me. I can count on his cloudy, grim expression to ruin my day.

JJ, playing for the red team, the underdogs, scores. From across the aisle, Honey’s shouting gets louder and I sense her focus is on me.

Does she think we’re competing for JJ’s attention?

Do I have a tattoo on my forehead that says conflicted feelings over Riptivik’s resident moody, mysterious, and mean guy? I replay the scene from earlier today in my mind. We hate each other. End of story. But my heart tells a different tale.

I get to my feet.

Yassi tugs on my sleeve. The game is just getting good. Where are you going?

Washroom, I say and don’t bother smiling. It’s not a lie, I need to splash some cold water on my face. Since I missed classes earlier, she’ll probably think I’m under the weather.

As I squeeze past the others to the stone stairs, the crowd roars when the red team scores another point. JJ lifts his wand in triumph at the shot. I snag on the curl of his lips. Not quite a smile like before, but just the notion of his mouth brings back the recent memory of his against mine. There was craving there that I only recognize now as my stomach grumbles. Maybe I should get a giant, ever-twisting pretzel. No, that won’t satisfy the hunger. I sigh. Leave it to JJ to make me feel...unlike myself—the happy-go-lucky, cheerful, confetti-lover turned conflicted and confused wish witch.

One minute I’m walking down the stairs and the next I’m tumbling head over heels. My wand slips out of my pocket. I extend my hand, reaching for it at the same time I meet Honey’s eyes. I grapple for something to break my fall as my arms windmill. The look on her face isn’t of concern or apology. No, it’s glee. Pure evil. The crackling of magical energy surges like the ball during rumpus and explodes out of me.

Sharp waves of silver light blast across the stadium. There’s a roar. Not from the crowd but from a dragon. At least I think it’s the head of administration, Storch, who happens to be a dragon that I blasted with magic just now.

I scramble to my feet. It was an accident, I say to anyone who can hear me, but the crowd is screaming, clapping, and stomping because it seems that at the same time my magic erupted out of me, JJ used his own to blow up the concession stand, including the condiments containers. A diversion or was he celebrating his score? Ketchup, mustard, and relish covers everyone closest to the stand, including Storch.

I lost my appetite.

JJ’s eyes skate toward me as though he saw what happened. Disapproval streaks across his face. He’s called for a foul and the use of unnecessary force. As the referee reprimands him, I hurry to the washroom.

I’m shaking as I splash water on my face. I expect Honey to come in to gloat or the Office of Magical Management to fine me or send me to the Iron Tower, but I’m alone until the crowd cheers again.

The red team won.

I emerge into a flurry of people tossing confetti and cheering. I scan the field for the players. No JJ. He’s the kind of guy who’s gone before he’s even arrived. He slips in and out of situations, conversations, and the rumpus arena like a whisper.

Everyone chants his name, including Honey. After his big win for the red team on the field, instead of sticking around for the post-game celebration, he disappears. Probably off brooding somewhere.

Yassi, Audra, Winnie, a few other girls are all dressed in gold to support Bobby Gold. They meet me on the edge of the field, cheering as everyone casts more confetti into the air after the underdog red team’s big win.

Don’t get me wrong, there are some sore losers. In fact, only about half of the losing team sticks around. I keep my eyes out for Bobby Gold, but as the gold team captain, he’s probably off dealing with the spoilsports.

Even though everyone is truly rooting for the same team, the way recruiting goes for rumpus is you earn your way up.

I finally understand that part of the magical sport. Wish I could say the same about my magic. Actually, considering I’m allegedly a wish witch, I don’t say that. Not out loud at least.

This was JJ’s first time playing at Riptivik. Apparently, rumpus fans haven’t seen skills like his since Leominster Stevens back in the nineteen-twenties. At least that’s what I overhear and what Dewey confirms. I’ve had three different people explain rumpus to me in three different ways. I still don’t fully get it. Not like I do soccer.

Even if you’re not good enough to make the red or gold teams, learning the game is a requirement here at Riptivik Reform—they’ve already taken most of the fun away, I guess they reason that this keeps us active and out of trouble. It’s probably my worst class. Ask me the rules and I’m lost.

It comes as no surprise though. One day I was walking through life like everything was okay. It’s not. Now, I’m trying to adapt to a new normal. Or thinking about it another way, a world that is as far from normal as they come.

By Great Gregor’s Mighty Axe. Did you see JJ on the field? Dewey calls. The dude was an animal. I wonder whose place he’s going to take. He’s a clinch for the Gold Team longfielder but no way would Bobby Gold give up his spot.

Winnie shakes her head. Coach Niffenniddler has the final say. Plus, Bobby is a second-year and JJ is a first. So once Bobby graduates, the spot opens up.

At the word graduate, everyone looks at her with dismay.

Yassi snorts. "Unless you know something we don’t, we’ll all be awaiting release rather than having the professors see us on our merry way."

The positions aren’t fixed for the year. If the coach wants to move Bobby he can, Dewey says.

But he’ll still be captain, Winnie interjects. He was voted in by the team. She’s the resident Bobby Gold expert.

I can hardly keep track of it all as half the campus continues to cheer for the red team. They never win. Not until JJ came out of nowhere, a gray streak on the field, and scored point after point—probably flexing his skill for Honey Oakes, the resident popular, pretty girl. All the guys on the field were probably showing off for her.

Eventually, the violet shadows of dusk push everyone toward the dining hall. I keep watching for Bobby. It’s not like we have a thing, but he is irrefutably hot and seems interested in me. Also, I’m supposed to be spying on him.

However, he never shows up—probably strategizing for the next game. Neither does JJ. Likely he’s flirting with Honey somewhere. She’s also conspicuously absent. Typically, she makes herself the center of attention even when it isn’t her win to celebrate.

While I eat my slop, I can’t decide if I’m surprised about the way JJ smiled at Honey, if it’s just part of his typical mysterious behavior, or something else. Usually, after gold wins, the team and fans revel and recount the plays and scores for the next hour while eating dinner, pie, and lingering for a bit longer.

Unfortunately, I’ll see JJ later to continue our seminal seminar mind-wall training. Even though the butterscotch pudding pie is delicious, I’m not hungry for another bite. I push it away when the bells ring, signaling it’s time to return to the dorms.

Everyone grumbles as groups of students wait to leave with our Constabulary Coven chaperones.

Why do we still have to do this? a vamp complains.

So you don’t get sucked up by a demon, duh, a weregirl retorts.

I have a thing or two to say about sucking, the vamp says, getting in the weregirl’s face before adding, blood.

Yeah, well, if you want to keep your teeth you better shut up or— She pounds her fist into the mitt formed by her other hand.

Audra leans in and says, I heard the CC only managed to capture two of the six demons before they dispersed.

I heard it was three of nine, Dewey says.

Someone told me they’re multiplying, a cyclops guy says.

They can’t multiply, interjects Quince, easily the nerdiest kid at Riptivik.

Yassi and I know better than to be caught between him and any sort of technicality so we rush off to join the next group to leave. I also happen to know that I killed one of the demons and JJ vanquished the other. Then again, if Quince is wrong and the cyclops was right, who knows how many there are total.

Everyone holds hands as we cross the campus to Penny House. The stars twinkle against the dark night sky. It doesn’t seem like we’re in danger at all. At least not until I get inside and find JJ waiting in the entry.

He’s the last person I want to see even though the little leap in my chest tells me otherwise.

Chapter 2

★

––––––––

JJ must be waiting for Honey. The memory and disappointment of thinking he’d smiled at me and then spotted her rushes to mind and I push it away. Although, earlier, we did discuss how we’re better off hating each other, so maybe he’s moved on to prettier pastures.

It’s not that I think I’m ugly. Quite the contrary. Just ordinary. Naturally tan skin, brown hair, green eyes. The only guy who’s ever looked at me twice was the boy next door, Riley. He was friend-zoned the second he challenged me to a spitting contest in sixth grade.

Yassi passes me a look of commiseration at the sight of JJ’s sour expression and then waves as she rushes upstairs. Come find me later.

No doubt I’ll want to rant about how much I can’t stand him.

You don’t look like someone who just won the rumpus game of the season, I say to JJ sharper than I mean. Who cares if he smiles at Honey. All the guys do. It shouldn’t matter.

What do I look like? His gaze pins me in place.

His hair, longer now than when we first met, sticks out at sharp angles from beneath his top hat. The gray eyes that fixate me hold history, meaning, secrets. And his lips... I look away.

Several things come to mind: miserable, sad, maybe even lonely. You look like JJ Thorne, I say instead.

He snorts. No, I don’t.

He always says the most cryptic things. I’ve pretty much given up on trying to get answers out of him. Okay, mystery man. Let’s get this over with.

He follows me up to my dorm room where we have special permission to study, but before I open the door, I have a flash of inspiration. I vowed to learn more about my wish witchery and seeing as I’ve exhausted the small study downstairs, the library is my next option. Seeing as I rarely have time during the day with my packed schedule, perhaps JJ will escort me across campus since curfew hasn’t yet lifted. Aside from the members of the Coven Constabulary and the chancellor, he’s the only person I know of on campus who can do that and ward off demons. It seems even they have no interest in him.

However, an idea pops into my mind.

I stop before turning the doorknob and say, I just remembered that my roommate is using the room tonight. A pixie study group. Do you think we could go to the library? My voice is an octave or two higher than usual. I’m a terrible liar but am careful to conceal the truth under thoughts of how delicious the pie was at dinner lest JJ goes poking around in my head, which is why I need these lessons in the first place—my mind is like an open window as opposed to a brick wall.

JJ looks me over and then shrugs. Sure. But we’ll use the back door. He waves his hand vaguely in the air. I don’t feel like dealing with crazed rumpus fans.

Wow. That was easy. Is that why you weren’t at dinner? I ask, calling out his absence.

His eyes snag on me. You noticed?

I walked into that one. Of course, I did. JJ Thorne is the only person I love to hate. I also noticed the way he looked at the queen of mean just before I went tumbling.

As if reading my thoughts, though I know he’s not at least not right now, he says, You took a shot at Storch, huh?

What are you talking about?

You can thank me for covering for you. He holds out his hand for me to take—a protective measure when traveling across campus after dark.

Reluctantly, I fit my palm against his and take this conversation away from curious ears. JJ, I did not try to use magic on the head of administration, I hiss.

His shoulders lift and lower. Felt that way to me.

Should I bother asking what you mean? I huff.

I can feel your magic, Maija. He speaks the words slowly as if bearing a secret. I fouled against the other team to cover it up. Could’ve scored another point, he adds as an afterthought.

I should say thank you. I don’t.

We reach the library and I follow him to the third floor and to the back, past stacks of old, leather-bound books.

Figured we’d go somewhere quiet, he says.

It’s a library, I counter at a whisper.

The libravens—librarian raven shifters—watching over the books take their job very seriously.

JJ settles into one of a pair of high-backed leather chairs. A table with a reading light sits in the middle. He’s at ease for once, as if he sits here often. You first, he says.

Such a gentleman tonight, I retort in a sarcastic tone.

He sighs as though he’s tired—he did just single-handedly win a rumpus game.

I close my eyes and center myself. I find the threads of energy between us. I catch