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He opened the door and walked into the shop. Gabi was there to keep anyone else from entering. She guarded the door, protecting the others from a few rodents.

The first hint that something was very wrong was the sound. There was a rustle in the walls, on the floor, from the back where there was a small office and a restroom. He turned on the light and the mice, not one or two but at least a hundred, swarmed. Some tried to hide in crevices and dark corners, but others ran straight for him. No wonder Gabi had panicked!

Silas held out his hand, and they all stopped. Even the sound, that rustling of an unnatural gathering of rodents, ceased. With a flick of his fingers he guided them away, herding them toward the back door. They went, scrambling over one another, obeying his silent command. Even those he could not see, those who’d hidden from him, listened and joined the exit. He unbolted and opened the back door and herded them out. They swarmed around his feet but didn’t touch him, didn’t run over his boots.

Once they were all outside he guided the mice along the backside of the downtown businesses, through tall weeds and past trash cans that would normally prove tempting. They scurried this way and that, sometimes scrambling over one another, but they obeyed. They stayed together and moved as he commanded. Behind and beyond the library, across Magnolia Street, to the vacant lot where Marnie’s house had once stood. From there it was easy enough to guide the rodents to the edge of the woods, where he silently instructed them to scatter. And they did.

Silas stood in what had once been Marnie Maxwell’s back yard, before a fire had destroyed the house and left a blight on the neighborhood. He watched the woods for a moment, no longer seeing the rodents but feeling them go, sensing their energy as the unnatural magic that had guided them into Gabi’s shop faded away.

Jenna no longer trusted him to get the job done, so she’d either cursed the shop herself or she’d had someone else do it. Not one of the Milhouses, but another witch. Someone who wanted isolation, as she did.

As he had, when he’d first learned of the plan.

Was he going to let one night in a woman’s bed change his mind?

He was such a sap, where women were concerned. The entire animal kingdom would answer his call. They obeyed his commands, they would come to his aid if ever he needed them, he knew what they needed and what they wanted, at all times.

Women, all humans, were a different story.

Silas retraced his steps, back to the beauty shop back door, which still stood open. He walked through the shop and out the front door. When he stepped back onto the sidewalk Gabi was there, waiting anxiously for his report.

“You need tools, right? How the hell did they get in? How do you get rid of that many mice? What am I going to do?”

He’d never heard her sound so frantic, so out of control, not even last night when she’d freaked out on him. Then again, he didn’t know her all that well. Maybe she was an overly dramatic woman, one for whom everything was a crisis. She hadn’t struck him that way, but he hadn’t been thinking clearly where she was concerned.

And he had to admit, that had been a shit-load of mice. No one but him would’ve been unaffected by the sight.

“The mice are gone,” he said.

She slipped past him, opened the door a couple of inches, and looked inside. “There were hundreds of them, maybe a thousand. Did you look upstairs? They can’t all be gone. They’re hiding, and as soon as I go back in…”

There were half a dozen people on the sidewalk. This was a small town filled with too damn many psychics, and they’d been out to dinner at the town’s only restaurant, so his relationship with Gabi, new as it was, wasn’t a secret. He stopped her rambling with a brief, public kiss that shocked her into silence.

“Trust me,” he said as he reluctantly released her. “They’re gone.” When she reached for the door again, he stopped her with a hand on her arm. “But the place needs a good cleaning before you get back to work.”

“Droppings,” she said with a touch of horror in her voice.

“Oh, yeah.” He looked to Jordan. “Would you call Trudy and ask her if she has time today to give the salon a good scrubbing?” Damian’s mother was a whiz at that kind of thing. A wave of her hand, a few properly spoken words, and in a matter of minutes the place would be as good as new.

“Sure,” Jordan said, heading back to her own business to make the call.

“I can clean it myself,” Gabi said. “I really should…”

“You should take the day off. Spend it with me.”

Gabi opened her mouth to argue with him, but she didn’t get far. “I have clients on the books. I need to call and reschedule.”

One of the women in the crowd waved a hand. “I had the ten o’clock appointment. Next week is fine. How about ten on Tuesday?”

Gabi nodded. “Yes, thank you. See you then.” She took a pen and a small notebook out of her purse and made a note.

Most people had that kind of information on a smart phone or maybe a tablet, but Gabi used paper and pen. As far as he knew, the only phone she had was the one in the shop. She wouldn’t want to use that one, since the last time she’d seen it the receiver had been swarming with mice.

“Come to my place, make your phone calls from there, and then we’ll take the rest of the day off.”

Again she hesitated, but then she said, “That might be nice.”

“Might be?” he asked, teasing.