“So with the engineering and construction types moving to town, that’s even more people,” Will mused. “People who will need the housing and food and all the stuff we mentioned, plus medical care, a firehouse, a real courthouse facility. All of the things you need when people get into the mishaps involved in being people. We may have to build a hospital.”

“Mystic Bayou can’t stay the same,” Dani said gently, kissing Zed’s cheek. “That was never an option.”

“But we can keep the changes from being destructive,” Zed muttered. “Keep the local businesses from getting run out of town. Keep the cost of living from getting so high the families who have always lived here can’t afford it anymore.”

“We’re here to help any way we can,” Alex promised.

“We’re gonna have to add another stoplight, huh?” Zed asked.

“That will make three!” Bael crowed, raising his hands in triumph.

Leonard pulled his truck down the gravel drive to the maison de fous, a strange mishmashed house on the water that Will and Sonja were renting from the town. Called the House of Fools by the locals, it consisted of several faded blue-gray stories, topped by a copper cupola, green with age.

As Leonard carried his offering of flowers and a bottle of wine down the drive, he could see mason jar lanterns strung over a dock that extended from under the “ground floor” to the water. Guests were sprawled in a ring of comfortable looking, mismatched chairs, watching the twilight bloom. Witch bottles glowed to life in the trees, giving the small gathering a festive air. Bael had Jillian seated in a heavily cushioned Adirondack chair, rubbing her feet. Dani was perched in Zed’s lap, chatting with Jillian while sipping a can of ginger ale. Will was burning something on the grill and couldn’t have looked happier, while Cordelia Canton gave him pointers on proper grilling techniques.

Charlotte was standing at the end of the dock, talking to Will’s brother, Jon, while they drank beer. A sudden and sharp pang of jealousy speared right through Leonard’s chest, and it shamed him. Charlotte seemed like the kind of lady that deserved someone like Jon, a selkie like his brother, who was a decent enough person to have earned Sonja’s good opinion–which wasn’t easy. Also, Jon didn’t have a curse hanging over his head. Maybe fate could have been a little kinder by not pairing Charlotte with someone so broodily and sensitively handsome–right in front of Leonard’s face. But he’d gotten used to this sort of kick in the teeth from fate.