✨ BONUS CONTENT: An Expanded Scene told from the Magical Cat's Perspective ✨🐾

Day 5 of 5: Enjoy a key moment from Moonlight, Magic, and Murder from Kheppy’s point of view—featuring quiet truths and a haunting late-night journey. 🐈💛

Hi, cozy reader friends!

Welcome to our fifth and final day of Moonlight, Magic, and Murder bonus content! 🐾✨

First and foremost, thank you so much for being part of this release week and for helping welcome Boo, Kheppy, and the Laguna Bay gang into the world once again. Whether you’ve been sharing posts, leaving reviews, recommending the series to friends, or simply spending time in Laguna Bay alongside these characters, your support means more than I can say. 💜

To wrap up this cozy celebration, I wanted to share something especially close to my heart: an expanded scene from Moonlight, Magic, and Murder told entirely through Kheppy’s eyes.

In this quiet late-night moment, Kheppy takes a midnight journey with Saphira—one that begins as a simple walk beneath the stars and slowly becomes something far more emotional, mysterious, and unexpected.

This scene gave me the chance to explore Kheppy’s voice and inner life a little more deeply, and I hope it feels like one final cozy visit to Laguna Bay before we close out the release week together. 🌙🐈‍⬛

Thank you again for all your kindness, enthusiasm, encouragement, and support during this launch. I’m so grateful you’re here.

Ready for the scene? Here we go…

Kheppy and Saphira’s Late-Night Crossing

(An expanded scene from Chapter 24 of Moonlight, Magic, and Murder, told from Kheppy’s point of view)
by DeAnna Drake

It was a difficult time to leave Boo and the others, but there was nothing more to be done for them tonight, and I could sense that my ghostly friend, Saphira, needed to get away. The tension in the house had drained her, so I suggested we take a walk—just the two of us—to clear our heads and get some fresh air.

Boo didn’t like the idea, which didn’t surprise me.

“Are you leaving too?” she asked as I led the phantom feline toward the back door.

Boo sounded so sad I nearly changed my mind. But she needed time with Lila and Delphine, and I didn’t know if there would be another opportunity to help Saphira. So, I murmured to my new friend to give me a moment and asked her to wait by the door. Then I returned to Boo.

“Saphira needs me now,” I said calmly. “And I have questions for her. I’m curious about her experience of the afterlife.”

Boo glanced at Saphira, then back at me.

“You know I would never refuse you anything,” she said.

“I know. That’s why I always return to you, and I always will.”

That seemed to ease her worry. “Just don’t wander too far,” she said, her motherly instincts slipping through.

I brushed against her ankles on my way back to Saphira, then turned toward the door.

Together, my ephemeral feline friend slipped into the night: I through the flap, and Saphira through the solid door, her form gliding through it like a whisper. No matter how many times I saw spirits do that, it never failed to surprise me.

To her, though, it seemed entirely unremarkable, so I kept my composure in check as we crossed the porch and made our way to the dirt lane.

What I told Boo was true: Saphira needed me, but I also welcomed the escape from the tension in the house.

Inside, everything had been troubled—voices, emotions, truths that didn’t quite add up. Out here in the cool night air, the world returned to something more familiar, more manageable. The earth beneath my paws. The steady rhythm of the breeze. The distant crash of the ocean waves.

I worried about Saphira as she hovered beside me, her form growing ever more indistinct, the edges shimmering like a disturbed reflection.

I said nothing, giving her space to gather her strength.

“You’re quite calm,” she said after we’d been moving for some time, her voice faint—fainter even than it had been inside the house.

That concerned me.

What I hadn’t told Boo—what I was only beginning to admit to myself—was that she was fading, as though the world could no longer quite hold her.

I did not yet know how to help her. But I had one idea, and I was determined to see it through—to do what I could for this child of Bastet, even if she was not one of the goddess’s immortal kind like me.

“I am always calm,” I replied, trying to mask my thoughts so she could not read my concern.

She made a soft sound that suggested she did not entirely believe me.

We continued along the lane—me padding along the gravel, her gliding over it—as the house disappeared behind us.

For a time, she kept pace with me.

Then she faltered.

It was subtle at first. A hesitation in her movement. A faint distortion along the line of her back, as though her shape could no longer quite remember how to hold itself together.

I slowed.

She did not seem to notice.

“I did not realize how… loud it was inside,” she said, her voice thinning at the edges. “Not in sound. In feeling.”

“Human emotions are rarely quiet,” I said.

“Yes,” she murmured. “They press in from all directions.”

The silvery outline around her trembled.

Gone.

Then—back again.

I kept walking. Panic serves little purpose.

To make it easier on her, I adjusted my pace. I veered off the main lane, taking a narrower canyon path—faster, if less certain. A shortcut, I hoped, that would get us there in time.

When I sensed her weakening further, I returned to our earlier conversation, hoping to distract her. “When human emotions overwhelm you, you must try not to take them all in,” I said, keeping my tone steady. “Not all at once.”

Her form flickered, and she seemed confused. “I do not try. It simply happens.”

Her voice faded on the last word.

For a moment, she disappeared entirely.

No shimmer. No outline. No presence at all.

The space where she had been felt suddenly, sharply empty.

I stopped.

“Saphira.”

No answer.

My heart raced. Was it already too late?

Then, just as suddenly, she reappeared a few steps ahead of me, her form fainter now.

“I am here,” she said, though the words came slowly, as though pulled from a great distance. “I am trying to stay.”

That, more than anything, tightened something deep within me.

Trying meant effort. And effort could only last so long.

“You are doing well,” I said, though I was no longer certain that was true. “Stay with me if you can.”

“I am,” she said, but even as she spoke, the edges of her dissolved again, breaking apart and reforming in uneven rhythms.

I had seen spirits linger.

I had seen them fade.

This—this was something in between.

Unstable. Uncertain.

Her connection to this world was weakening by the second.

I hastened our pace. Instinct telling me time was running out.

I could feel the place ahead—where the boundaries blurred.

“Saphira,” I said, more firmly now. “Stay close.”

“I am trying,” she repeated, though this time the words barely reached me.

Again, she vanished long enough that the absence tugged at me like a pulled thread before reappearing at my side, dimmer still.

Dwelling on it would not help her.

I simply kept moving.

Faster now.

Purpose had replaced calm.

If she could reach it—

If I could get her there—

The night opened slightly ahead, the path easing as the land gave way to something quieter still.

I felt it before I saw it.

A stillness that did not drift.

A silence that felt alive.

A place that remembered.

I pushed forward, every step measured, every instinct focused.

If there was any place that could hold her here, it would be this.

“Just a little farther,” I said, though I did not know if she could still hear me.

For a moment, there was nothing beside me.

Then—

A faint shimmer.

A fragile outline.

“I am here,” she whispered.

And this time, I did not slow.

Because if she slipped away again—

I was no longer certain she would find her way back.

The air changed before we crossed it.

Not a wind, not a sound—something subtler. A threshold felt more than seen.

I stepped forward.

For a single heartbeat, Saphira faltered beside me, her form disappearing to almost nothing.

Then we crossed.

And everything shifted.

Her form gathered—hesitant at first, then stronger—as though something unseen had reached out and steadied her. Her wavering edges smoothed, the silvery light of her form brightened until she stood beside me with a clarity I had not yet seen.

She drew in a breath—unnecessary, but instinctive—and let it out in a soft, startled sound.

“Oh,” she whispered.

Her voice was stronger now, and steady.

She looked down at herself, then lifted her gaze, turning in place as though seeing everything anew.

“I don’t…” She hesitated, searching for words. “I don’t understand what’s happening.”

“You do not need to,” I said.

Because I did not fully understand it either.

But I recognized it.

Long ago, the priestesses had spoken of such places—grounds marked by memory and reverence, where the boundary between worlds thinned. I had seen it before. Spirits could linger there, hold their shape more easily… find something, if that was their wish.

“I had hoped this would help,” I admitted.

She turned to me, her expression bright with wonder. “You knew this would happen?”

“I suspected.”

And I had hoped.

That was all.

She drifted a little higher, testing her form. There was no flicker now. No sudden absence. Only a quiet, luminous presence that seemed, at last, anchored.

“It feels…” She paused, then smiled—truly smiled. “It feels like I belong here.”

“Because you do,” I said.

The space around us stirred—not with movement, but with attention.

I felt them before I saw them.

Nearly invisible shapes among the stones. Soft glimmers beneath the trees. Presences that did not press forward, did not intrude—but watched.

Curious.

Welcoming.

Saphira noticed them a moment later.

“They’re here,” she whispered.

“Yes.”

“They’re not afraid.”

“They recognize you,” I said. “As one of their own.”

The spirits kept a respectful distance, their forms gentle and varied—small and large, swift and slow, each carrying the quiet imprint of a life once deeply loved.

One stepped—or drifted—slightly nearer. A small, bright presence that paused just at the edge of Saphira’s awareness, as though offering greeting without expectation.

Saphira’s glow warmed in response.

“They’re kind,” she said.

“They are at peace.”

She turned slowly, taking it all in, her earlier fragility gone, replaced by quiet assurance.

We stood there together for a time, surrounded by peaceful companionship—not just our own, but something larger. A gentle community that asked nothing, demanded nothing, and yet offered everything Saphira seemed to need.

I watched her as she settled into it, as the last traces of strain left her form.

She would be safe here.

More than safe.

She would be… embraced.

And that knowledge allowed something within me to ease.

“I must go,” I said at last.

She turned back to me, a flicker of uncertainty returning—not fear, but reluctance.

“You’re leaving?”

“Boo needs me,” I said simply.

That, more than anything, she understood.

“Yes,” she said. “She does.”

She hesitated, then added, “Will you come back?”

“I always return to those who matter to me,” I said. “You may consider yourself among them.”

Her glow warmed at that.

“I would like that.”

I inclined my head.

Around us, the other spirits remained—watching, waiting, welcoming.

She would not be alone.

As I turned and made my way back toward the boundary, I allowed myself one final glance over my shoulder.

Saphira stood among them now, no longer fading, no longer uncertain.

Belonging.

I had set out to learn from her—to understand something of the afterlife, to gather answers from a soul newly freed from mortality.

But as I crossed back into the night beyond, I realized I had learned something else entirely.

Not about what comes after—but what remains. That even between worlds, connection endures. And sometimes, the most important thing we can do is make sure another soul is not alone. 🐾💛

© 2026 DeAnna Drake. All rights reserved.

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Thank You!

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I’ll see you Wednesday for a regularly scheduled weekly newsletter!

Warmly (and with pawprints 🐾),

DeAnna

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What’s a Halloween shop owner doing in a quirky coastal town with skeletons in the closet? Solving murders with her talking feline friend!

The Laguna Bay Midlife Witch Cozy Mystery series is available at Amazon and in Kindle Unlimited at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FT92JS73

What’s a nice girl doing in a town full of cursed artifacts? Solving a murder with her talking feline friend!

Series available at Amazon and in Kindle Unlimited at https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D2M8RZNW.

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