The Witches of Snyder Farms (The Wicked Garden Series) Read Free Page A

you. I tried for years. It was impossible . It was like the Eli Green I knew had never existed. I would like to know what, exactly, you hid from me. I’d like to know who you really are.”
    Eli couldn’t decide if he wanted to laugh or cry. She had been thinking of him. She had even been looking for him. He put down his fork and sipped at his coffee. “You’re right. I’m nearly impossible to trace. That’s on purpose, of course. I had my reasons—well, my parents had their reasons. But I don’t think any of that much matters anymore.”
    Eli took one more sip of coffee. Ame and Gretchel watched him, silently waiting. “First of all, my last name is not Green. My birth certificate reads Elliot Stewart.”
    Gretchel’s nostril’s flared, and Eli prepared himself for the worst.
    “My name is just too confusing to explain,” he added quickly.
    “Try me,” Gretchel said, and Eli swore he saw her cheeks flame red before his eyes.
    “Well, I have two last names.”
    Ame and Gretchel just stared. “You’re not exactly clarifying matters, Mr. Stewart . Or, should I say, Mr…?” She raised an eyebrow as she let her question trail off.
    “Let’s start with your middle name, shall we?” Ame asked brightly.
    Eli shot her a look. “It’s Dominic. My grandmother told me that it was my grandfather’s name. At least she thinks it was.”
    “She thinks it was,” Gretchel asked incredulously.
    “The circumstances under which they met were… unconventional. She wasn’t able to have a child before she got pregnant with my father. In fact, her husband had left her because of that. My father never met him. I certainly never met him. My grandmother wouldn’t say much about him, except that he was a ‘poetic vagabond’ and a gift from the gods.”              
    “I’d like to hear more about this grandmother of yours,” Ame said.
    “Well, she was a professor at SIU—”
    “ Excuse me ?” Gretchel’s face was flaming again. “She taught at Southern Illinois University ? The same Southern Illinois University where you and I met?”
    “She wasn’t in Carbondale when we were, Gretchel. But she did own the house on Pringle Street, and now it belongs to my father, who I believe you spoke to when you called about the room,” Eli’s tone was soothing and contrite. Gretchel glared at him. He knew he had a lot of half-truths to answer for if he and Gretchel were going to have any kind of future together. “My grandmother died a few years before we met. Please, just let me finish.”
    Gretchel folded her arms and leaned back in her chair. Ame watched the interplay between her mother and Eli, transfixed. She had never seen her mother interact with her father this way—as true equals.
    Eli continued. “Honestly, I wish that you had been able to meet her, Gretchel—you too, Ame. She was an extraordinary woman. There was a lot that she didn’t know about my grandfather, but she did know that, in that one weekend they spent together, he had taught her more about love and divinity than she had ever experienced. She said she felt like she had seen Hermes manifested, and that he had entrusted her with Pan’s seed. She always told me that this was where my father and I got our hair and eyes.”
    Eli took a moment to refill his mug. “I can tell you that my father loves the idea that he’s a descendent of Pan.”
    Gretchel put her forefinger to her lip, and her eyes squinted remembering. “Pan’s garden. The statue…”
    “Exactly,” Eli was relieved to see Gretchel’s glance softened. “And my grandmother’s name was Penny—short for Penelope.”
    “So…?” Ame asked.
    “Well, Penelope was the name of the nymph who gave birth to Pan after a roll with Hermes.”
    Ame looked to Gretchel. Her mother shrugged. Turning to Eli, she asked, “Do you think your grandmother maybe romanticized her brief encounter with a handsome stranger? Maybe just a bit?”
    Eli scraped the last bits of sausage