Free Soothsayer: Magic Is All Around Us (Soothsayer Series Book 1) by Allison Sipe Page B

happened. I vaguely remembered making it to my bed that night and Harriet, my next door neighbor and adopted grandmother, waking me up the next morning. She made me the most awful-tasting tea and applied a balm to my wounds, including the scars on my torso. At the time I didn’t have the energy to ask her what she was doing in my house or how she knew that I was hurt. I convinced myself she must have seen me come in on Saturday night. I was in and out of sleep the rest of the day and each time I woke up Harriet gave me more tea.
    “Oh, Violet,” Becky’s voice chimed, bringing me back to reality. I blinked a moment, remembering I was in my office and not still living through that terrible night. “Man do I have a story for you.” She walked up to my desk and sat on the corner.
    “What’s up?” I asked, not looking at her and trying to keep my hair across my face so she wouldn’t see the cuts and bruises.
    “So, you know that guy I met at the wedding?”
    “Yeah what about him?” I started rifling through my desk drawers as another reason not to look up at her.
    “Well, I ended up hanging out with him the rest of the weekend.”
    “Hung out?” I spared a glance at Becky to furrow my brow at her. She wasn’t the type of girl to just ‘hang out’ with a guy.
    “Yes,” she shot back, her irritation apparently blinding her to my appearance. I returned my glance to the drawers. “Just because we hung out in bed all weekend doesn’t mean we didn’t spend quality time together.” She giggled.
    “Uh huh, and are you going to see him again then?” I asked, standing up and walking over to Jessie’s desk, pretending to look for something.
    “I don’t know. I mean he’s nice and all and we had a good time but I don’t think I can see it going anywhere. Violet, are you listening to me?” Becky asked with a hint of irritation in her voice.
    “Of course I’m listening. So you don’t think it’ll go anywhere.”
    “What’s with you? What’s so important that you can’t take five minutes to look at me and have a conversation?” She hopped off my desk and made her way to where I stood. I kept my head down and started opening Jessie’s file drawers.
    “Violet seriously, what’s going on?” Becky demanded. She grabbed my arm and spun me around. Her expression transformed to a look of pure shock.
    “Before you freak out, it’s nothing, I’m fine,” I said, trying to pull away from her, but my body was too tired and sore to put up much of a fight.
    “What happened to you? Who did this?” Becky asked, gently pushing my hair behind my ear so she could get a better look at the damage.
    “It happened at the Maxwells, after you left.” I sighed, defeated. I was hoping I could bypass seeing Becky until I looked a little better; I didn’t want to lie to her.
    “Did that Robert guy do this to you? I saw the way he was looking at you all night, I swear if he-”
    “Would you calm down, of course he didn’t do this to me. Stop jumping to conclusions, I was just mugged,” I interrupted, stopping her train of thought before it ran off the rails. Once she got going it was hard to stop her.
    “Just mugged?” Becky yelled.
    “Yeah, come here, sit down.” I motioned her toward the chairs at the front of the studio. “It was the end of the night and I walked out to my car to put my gear away. When I went to open the trunk someone came up behind me and attacked me.”
    “Oh my god,” Becky gasped.
    “I yelled for help and Robert and his sister were able to run the guy off before he could do anything more than this.” I pointed to the cuts and bruises on my face.
    “What do you think he was after?”
    “Not sure.” I suppressed a shudder as I thought about what my attacker did want: me.
    “Have you gone to the police?”
    “No, there’s nothing to say to the police.”
    “Nothing to say,” Becky yelled, standing up.
    “I didn’t get a look at the guy and he didn’t take anything. What