When new-in-town potion maker Sarah Cooper inadvertently sells an illegal love spell to the conniving Homecoming Queen, she has to act fast to undo her mistake. For Sarah to preserve her potions license and keep her dreams of becoming a full spell caster on track, she must recover that love charm. But to do so, she'll have to infiltrate the coolest crowd on the Harding High campus. Too bad there's no Popularity Potion to help. Suddenly, solving global warming seems easy...

~*~

“You mean, you?” Devlin asks, eyebrows rising. “Hang with the jock and jill crowd?”
The breath I’d held comes out in a huff. “What’s so shocking?”
He shakes his head, resumes the walk across the field. “Nothing. Nothing.”
“What? Tell me.” A couple of players pass us by on their way back to the gym and I wait for them to be out of earshot before I push harder. “You think I’m not...?”
Brows lifted, he squinches one eye, the left side of his mouth rising in doubt. He makes a vague motion that seems to indicate my wardrobe.
Naturally I look down at my clothing. Flip flops, faded jeans, green t-shirt. It’s not like I’m wearing sparkle nail polish and a Hello Kitty hoodie. “There’s nothing -”
“There’s nothing wrong with the way you look,” he says, softly, soothingly. “But it’s not...”
“What?”
“You won’t exactly blend right in.”
Ouch. One thing for me to think it; another for him to say it. Still. This is no time for me to be bummed by what Devlin Shaw thinks of me. I have a plan to launch.
“I can’t just walk in and sit down, no. Not unless I’m invited, included.” Even as I say it I wonder if he’s seen so much as one of the stupid teen movies that follow the ugly duckling to Prom Queen theme. The ones where the popular guy makes the outcast girl one of the cool crowd simply by association.
The silence between us grows and the only thing breaking the quiet between us is the slap of my flip-flops against my feet and the crunch of his cleats against the grass.
Finally he says, “So I’m the one who invites you, is that it?”
I nod, hope the look in my eye is more shrewd than relieved. “And I use the proximity to get to know Ryan, look for a clue on the best way to – what was it you said? Get his head back in the game?”
We come to a stop where the glorious green of the field gives way to dirt and clover followed by the rock-strewn path to the gym. When I face Devlin again, he’s running his thumb along the edge of his football helmet, slowly, contemplatively. Sweat pools at the small of my back. I’m convinced he’s not buying my story, convinced he’s going to change his mind about wanting a potion, convinced a hottie like Devlin is not going to want to be seen as possibly accepting the completely non-cool potion maker.
He nods as though listening to some internal voice. “Yeah. Okay.” With a tilt of his head, his eyes meet mine. “That might work. There’s Harvest Fair this Sunday over at Cassel Farms. Be a good start. I could pick you up?”
Relief swoops through me, threatening to make me weak in the knees. This is perfect. I get in close to Ryan, make an opportunity to get my hands on the talisman and –
“One thing though.” Devlin totally punctures my high. All at once the happy bubbles in my belly burst and make me nauseous.
“One thing?”
“Actually, two things. One, no making fun of my friends. No mocking them, and no curses.”
“Sure. No problem.”
“And two -” He rakes his gaze over me, head to toe “-if you want to fit in, you might think about wearing something a little more -”
“Slutty?” I snap.
His eyes slip closed and he inhales deeply as though the air is filled with patience. “Something a little less casual. Something that makes you look like you have a figure.”
I may not be a fashion plate – seriously, why dress to sit in a classroom all day – but I’m still enough of a girl to be insulted. “I have a figure. I have a nice figure,” I say.
Devlin’s eyes lock with mine, and his cheeks curve as he smirks. “Prove it.”