Cursed in Love (Nora Moss Book 1)

by Zoe Ashwood

  “What’s wrong?” I ask—then notice that he’s weirdly tall compared to the Land Rover.

  No, that’s not it. His head and shoulders clear the roof for another reason altogether.

  “The car got buried overnight,” he announces, his words clipped, and, for the first time, showing a hint of a foreign accent.

  Levi stumbles from the tent, pulling on his boot. “What?”

  He stops and blinks. The car’s tires are completely submerged in the sand, and there’s a large sand drift piled up against the side of the tent that I hadn’t even noticed.

  Raphaël utters a stream of Arabic curses, then yanks open the driver’s side door, dislodging some sand that trickles down in a small, dusty avalanche. He gets behind the wheel and puts the key in the ignition without turning it all the way.

  None of the lights turn on, either in the car’s cabin or on the dashboard.

  “I don’t want to ignite it,” he says. “If the sand gets inside the engine, we’re done.”

  He hops out and stalks around to the trunk, where he unearths a pair of shovels. Levi jumps in to help, and they clear the sand from around the engine hood. Raphaël opens it, and together, they peer inside while I make myself useful by shining a flashlight on the engine.

  Even I can tell that the engine is a lost cause. Sand fills the cavities between the various parts I can’t name, and the battery has a layer of fine, powdery dust lying on top.

  “This had to be deliberate,” Levi mutters. “There’s no way this much sand would have ended up inside otherwise.”

  I study the ruined engine. “Well, at least they went after the car, not us. If this is their level of precision at such a distance, they could have easily buried us in sand overnight.”

  Levi stares at me, then studies the tent. He grabs the flashlight from my hand and shines it at the sand drift that surrounds it. “I’m not sure about that. Look.”

  The sand forms an almost perfect circle around the tent. I must have stumbled over it earlier, as it’s disturbed in front of the entrance, but otherwise the pile is large enough that it might have covered the tent completely.

  “Your spell saved us,” Levi says. “What did you do, Nora?”

  I gape at him in disbelief—what is he accusing me of?—then remember the part where I added a layer of protection against physical blows. Oh. “It was just a protection spell.”

  He tosses the flashlight to Raphaël, then takes my shoulders, shaking me slightly, as though unable to help himself. His lips are pressed together in fury, and I’ve never seen him this angry before.

  “You could have killed yourself!” he grinds out, his voice rough. “How much energy did you use up, huh? What if the storm had lasted longer, and every dust particle you repelled expended just a tiny bit of your power?”

  “I wanted you to be safe,” I cry, glaring up at him. “And good thing I did that, too! Look at this. Those witches are mad, and I can’t have you hurt, I can’t!”

  My voice catches in my throat, and I clamp my mouth shut before I blurt something I’ll regret later.

  “Godsdamnit, Nora,” Levi growls, “I don’t want to be protected at the expense of your safety! Remove the spells. Now.”

  I lift my chin. “No.”

  “Remove them, or I’ll break through the magic myself,” he threatens.

  A golden glowing orb appears on the palm of his hand, the spell he uses for blasting through enchantments when he can’t be bothered to undo them slowly and with much less energy.

  In answer, I pull on my magic, renewed now by my rest and the moon’s glow, and send a fresh wave of power into the spells covering the three of us.

  “I’d like to see you try,” I force out through gritted teeth.

  With his fixed stare and livid expression, Levi shakes with fury. I brace myself to withstand his magical attack. We’ve never tested our powers against each other like this. We’ve worked together a lot, so I know how strong he is, how meticulous and persistent when it comes to undoing other witches’ work. But I’m strong, too. I can hold my own, and if he tries to take this away from me, he’s in for a rude surprise.

  Levi bites out a vile curse, turns away as though he can’t stand the look of me, and stalks off into the predawn twilight.

  I remain rooted to the spot, breathing heavily, my power pulsing through my veins with no outlet. When I’m certain he won’t make good on his threat, I droop to the ground and put my palms flat on the cool sand. The magic trickles out of me, sinking back into the earth, completely harmless.

  Pressing my lips together, I lift my gaze to find Raphaël still standing by the car, the flashlight now extinguished. I straighten up, and he sighs, then comes to stand next to me.

  “He cares about you a lot,” he says quietly. “More than you probably realize.”

  I swallow past the tightness in my throat. “I know. I care about him, too. That’s why I won’t…” I wave a hand around to indicate the spells I put on the three of us.

  His lips pull to the side in a grimace. “Does the spell really sap your magic if we’re attacked?”

  I lift one shoulder in a shrug, trying to appear cool and collected. “I couldn’t form it so it would leech on your strength. And it needs to get energy from somewhere. This was the only way.”

  He’s silent for a moment. “I wish you told us that before you put the spells on us,” he says finally.

  I give him a sad smile. “If I had, you wouldn’t have agreed to it.”

  “Nora,” he groans, but he doesn’t push the issue.

  And I get it. They both want to wrap me up in cotton wool and protect me, but in this—in magic—I’m strong. I might be the strongest one of us. And if they’re risking their lives to help me win this godsdamned competition, I’ll do whatever I can to make sure they survive and share in the profits.

  “We have to get going,” I murmur, leaning heavily on the car. “I’m guessing we’re walking the rest of the way there.”

  Raphaël pulls his phone out and types something on it. “This car isn’t going anywhere. I’m messaging Aya the coordinates so she can send someone to retrieve it.”

  I gulp at the thought of what that will take. A team of people for sure, a mechanic, a tow truck…

  “How much is this costing you?” I ask. “You’ll have to tell me. I’ve budgeted for unplanned disasters, so all you need to do is give me the sum, and I’ll—”

  He stops me with a hand to my arm. “It’s fine. I’m invested now. I’m going to help you reach that valley and get your token.”

  And then?

  I want to ask him about his plans for the future, but I can’t. He doesn’t owe me anything beyond what he’s already done, and he’s gone above and beyond with helping us. We would have managed without him, sure, but who knows how that would have turned out.

  The thought has me cracking my knuckles in frustration. Already, I’m allowing myself to depend on Raphaël, and that’s just not smart. His words earlier this morning were beautiful, but he has made me no promises. Nothing beyond a bargain—his help for an undetermined spell.

  I need to talk to him about that. Aya’s reaction at the coffee shop was strange enough that worry niggles at me. What could be so horrible to push the capable, collected woman to tears?

  But before I can start that conversation with Raphaël, Levi returns to our small camp and disappears into the tent. I have to fix things with him—his reaction tells me he’s really hurt by my decisions, and I can’t have that. We’ve gone through a lot, and this isn’t the first argument we’ve had over the years, but it feels different now that we’ve also started…whatever our current relationship is. A painful ball of tension has settled in my stomach, and it won’t disappear until we make things right.

  I follow him inside the tent and find him angrily stuffing his sleeping bag back into its sleeve. He doesn’t look over when I enter, but his shoulders tense, and he stops for a second before resuming his work.

  I
kneel behind him, clenching my hands in my lap to keep from reaching for him. “I’m sorry,” I begin.

  He stills, his head hung low. “For what?”

  “Not for putting the spell on you,” I reply with honesty. “But I’m sorry I created it this way without telling you, and I’m sorry you think it was a mistake.”

  He sits back and finally, finally faces me. “Nora,” he says, “I’m not—”

  A gust of wind lifts the tent flaps, and we both turn toward the entrance, but they settle back down.

  “I’m not mad at you,” Levi resumes the conversation.

  I raise my eyebrows in disbelief. “I find that hard to believe.”

  He snorts, then scrubs his palm over his short hair. “Yeah, well, I’m not mad only at you. I hate that you thought you had to—I don’t know—sacrifice yourself? Both Raphaël and I are strong enough to defend ourselves. And we’re here to protect you. Not the other way around.”

  I tug at my sleeves and try to find the right words. “I know. I’m really grateful for that. But I can’t let anything happen to you, Levi. I couldn’t take it. And I pulled Raphaël into this, so I feel like he’s my responsibility, too.”

  A low growl sounds from the outside.

  I sigh, then speak up. “Can you hear everything we’re saying?”

  “Yes,” comes Raphaël’s reply. “It’s a tent. Not a vault. And vampires have enhanced hearing.”

  “Of course they do,” Levi mutters.

  “I heard that, too,” Raphaël quips.

  “Come in, then,” I call, “it’s weird talking to you when I can’t see you.”

  Raphaël’s dark head appears at the entrance, and we shuffle around to make room for him.

  Silence descends on us as we stare at each other. I can’t help but remember what we did here last night, and I quickly stamp down on that thought before Raphaël can sniff out my excitement with his superior senses or something.

  “Look,” I say, “can we just move on from this? I promise I won’t do anything like this again without telling you.”

  “But you won’t release the spell?” Levi asks.

  I shake my head. “Sorry.”

  He lets out a groan of frustration but finally claps his hands together. “Fine. But if I see an attack sapping too much of your strength, I’ll crack your spell immediately.”

  Reluctantly, I agree to that. We can only hope it won’t come to that, but we’d be fools to go in without a good plan.

  “Now what?” Raphaël asks.

  I roll back my shoulders and peer through the tent opening toward the lightening sky.

  “Now, we walk.”

  Twenty-Three

  Nora

  The Egyptian desert is no joke.

  We’re only seven miles from our destination, and we start walking before dawn, but in two hours, I’m a sweaty, exhausted mess. We left behind all unnecessary gear, and Raphaël has arranged for a different extraction point with Aya, to the east of the valley, nearer the Nile River, instead of to the west, in the direction of Khadra. It will take us longer to drive from there back to Cairo, but the trek through the desert will be much easier this way.

  Despite our misgivings, we also left behind the tent and only took the essentials.

  “They won’t risk sending another sandstorm to us so soon,” Levi argued. “Even humans would get suspicious if that happened.”

  “They weren’t too concerned about humans seeing magic when they attacked us in the middle of the bazaar,” I argued. I also wasn’t sure there was just one team attacking us, but in the end, taking more water on the hike won over taking the tent.

  My backpack is laden with Levi’s necessary gear as well as mine because he’s lugging along the big containers of water we took from the truck. It’s enough to last both of us for two days—which is kind of scary now that we’re walking through the desert under the baking sun. But if this mission isn’t done in two days, it’ll be a failure anyway and we’ll need to call in serious help.

  If anyone will be brave—or reckless—enough to come pick us up in the cursed valley we’re about to enter.

  “Good thing we picked Iceland as our next destination.” Levi wipes sweat off his forehead with the sleeve of his t-shirt and peers down at me from under his hat. “I don’t think all this sand is really my thing.”

  “Pfft,” Raphaël snorts. “I wouldn’t trade the heat for that damp cold if you paid me.”

  I choose not to comment that Levi only picked Iceland as a mistake, and leave them to their bickering. It’s interesting to watch them get to know each other, especially now that Raphaël’s big secret is out of the way and his personality—the one I fell in love with—shines through.

  His dry wit is a perfect match for Levi’s more direct, cynical humor, and I think that, given some time, they’d be great friends. Which makes me wonder if this…arrangement we seem to have started could be more permanent.

  With a sigh, I hike the backpack higher on my shoulders and follow the men up a rocky slope, ignoring the blister that has formed on my left heel because I’m sweating so much in my hiking shoes.

  Only one eighth of a mile to go, according to Levi’s fancy GPS gadget.

  We reach the top of the ridge, and a valley opens up in front of us. Just beneath us, its mouth is open wide while the gap between the hills grows narrower toward the south. We’ll have to descend this incline, then walk on the bottom of the valley, because the slopes in the upper part are too steep for us to safely climb down without proper equipment.

  “We’ll be sitting ducks,” Levi mutters, voicing my worry.

  I squint, trying to discern what lies ahead of us. “I can’t see the end of the valley, can you?”

  Raphaël shakes his head. “Not from here.”

  I turn to study him—he’s been quieter as the morning wears on—to see if he’s showing any signs of strain. I’m still unsure of what sunlight does to him, exactly.

  At that moment, a glint catches my attention. It’s only visible for half a second, and when I twirl in that direction, it’s gone.

  “What is it?” Raphaël asks immediately.

  “We have to get down from here,” I tell them. “I think I saw something move on that peak over there.”

  The low rise is too far for me to see well, especially with the air now shimmering from the heat, but that was a reflection for sure. No telling whether it was a pair of binoculars, sunglasses, or something more sinister, like a rifle scope. But if someone is watching us, we can’t afford to stay up here.

  We half run, half skid down the slope, dislodging rocks and dust. If we’ve been seen, this isn’t a time for stealth but for speed. Fine sand clings to my sweaty skin, creating a crusty layer that’s probably great for sun protection but itches like crazy.

  Levi grabs my hand and tugs me along, supporting me so I don’t stumble over the larger rocks in our path. Our sweaty palms stick together, and when I glance up at him, he grins, excitement shining in his eyes.

  He’s loving this.

  I can’t help but smile back, and it’s like we’re back on one of our previous missions, before everything became too complicated and serious.

  “This is it, Moss!”

  He whoops, then picks up more speed, following Raphaël who’s several paces ahead of us. I rush after him—it’s either that or risk losing my footing altogether.

  “You’re insane,” I call, laughing.

  We land on the valley floor, in the shelter of a rocky outcropping, and I gulp in big lungfuls of breath, my hands on my knees. Then I look up at Levi, and he’s so beautiful, my stomach flips over at the sight of him. Without thinking, I step forward and wrap my arms around his neck, going on my tiptoes to kiss him. His warm hands find my hips, and he tugs me to him, his fingertips digging into my skin. He returns the kiss with passion, igniting blazing fires in my belly, my chest, my heart.

  When I break away, his grip on me tightens for a second before he seems to come to h
imself and releases me. Raphaël stands several paces away from us, studying his phone, deliberately turning his back to us. His shoulders are tight with tension, his posture stiff.

  I hate that he feels excluded when I kiss Levi. Slowly, I walk to his side and touch his arm. Raphaël pockets the phone but doesn’t lift his head. There’s nothing I can say to him right now that won’t sound forced, so I put my palm to his cheek, smoothing my thumb over his sharp features. He draws in an inhale through his nose, and for a second, my brain freaks out that I’m probably a sweaty, smelly mess. Then he groans, leans into my palm, and cups his hand over it. He kisses the inside of my wrist, then lowers his head to touch his lips to mine.

  Our kiss is gentle and exploring, different from the rushed, stolen kisses we shared before. I haven’t kissed him like this since we were together, and my heart aches at the memory, at how he’d cherished me then. His fingers dig into my hair, and his exhale is ragged over my lips, as though holding back is costing him great effort.

  When I pull back, I stare at him with wide eyes. What he showed me through this kiss… Gods, I can’t even wrap my head around it.

  He returns my gaze for a moment longer, then hangs his head with a self-deprecating smile. “Forgive me for sulking,” he says, “and thank you for this.”

  He turns away from me before I can react and faces the valley. I want to grab his hand and make him look at me, make him explain why on earth he’s thanking me for the kiss, but Levi steps up next to me. Our eyes meet, and he shakes his head almost imperceptibly.

  Fine. This isn’t the right moment to push Raphaël, and if Levi has sensed something I haven’t, I’ll just have to trust him that he knows better.

  “The nameless valley,” Levi says, joining Raphaël at his side.

  I march forward and stop in front of them. “Okay. Since Aya freaked me out really well, we’re going to do this properly,” I begin. “Levi and I will comb the path ahead for any hidden magical traps, and you, Raphaël, will be our watchman. If anything moves or you see something you don’t like, we need to know—even if we’re completely immersed in magic.”