The witch didn’t have a clue what was about to happen to her because she didn’t do anything to keep Paisley from touching her. The woman pulled again, and there was no question in his mind that she intended to use her magic against Paisley. Paisley’s hand touched the center of the witch’s chest, and faster than the other times, she brought away her hand.
The witch gasped and her magic broke off. She staggered back. Urban, being clueless about what had just happened, caught the witch’s arm. Paisley opened her hand and Iskander stepped in, giving the magic that flowed from her fingers a way to get home. It was her natural resistance, he realized, that kept the magic she’d taken from the witch from boomeranging into her, the way you’d expect with a talisman, for example. The woman had her hands clasped over her chest, gasping the way the other witch had done. If Urban hadn’t caught her, she probably would have fallen.
“You bitch,” Freddie said, low and ugly. She pushed away from Urban and lunged at Paisley.
Iskander stepped in to take the brunt of her attack. At the same time, he pushed Paisley back. He didn’t hold back on the magic he pulled through him. He’d fry the witch here and now if he had to. He grabbed the witch’s arm and released enough magic into her to scramble her brains for a bit. Her forward motion stopped abruptly. “Whoa,” he said with a laugh. He looked at Urban. “My friend, I think your girlfriend has had too much to drink. Maybe you should get her a cab and send her home.”
He let up on the witch just enough for Urban to take over. She was unsteady on her feet but aware enough to know she couldn’t do anything here that vanilla humans wouldn’t be able to explain away. All the same, Iskander kept himself between the witch and Paisley.
Her lips drew back from her teeth. “What did you do to me, you bitch?”
Ashlin drew herself up. “Iskander is right, Urban. You need to send the lady home.”
She pointed at Iskander. “I’ll kill you. Right after I kill her.”
Iskander met her gaze and leaned in close enough to say, “If you have a complaint about me, take it up with Nikodemus. You know where to find him.” He moved away. “Paisley, you ready to go?”
CHAPTER 28
The next day
Harsh called early the following morning, while he and Paisley were still in bed, because, yes, he was still more than interested in having sex with her, and he liked lying beside her while she slept. The phone woke her up, but he kept his arm around her while he answered.
“Hey, Harsh. What’s up?”
Harsh said, “Meeting tonight. Seven o’clock. Bring Paisley.”
“Bring the usual?”
“Yes.”
The meetings were potluck, which meant Harsh cooked something fabulous and just about everyone else brought takeout. Iskander was in charge of desserts. He looked over at Paisley and grinned. She looked so adorably rumpled when she woke up. “Will do.” He dropped his phone on the floor, rolled over to face Paisley, and told her about the meeting. “Can you bake some stuff? Something killer good.”
“Sure. What would you like?”
“A cake. A really awesome cake like those ones you make for me. Chocolate with that bitching frosting you do. Brownies. Gotta have brownies.”
“How about some tarts, too? Cookies?”
“Perfect.”
“For how many?”
“Fifteen or twenty.”
She pushed herself onto her elbow and brushed her hair out of her face. “Are they all bottomless pits like you?”
He laughed. “Yeah. Pretty much.”
“What time is it now?”
“Little after six.”
She snuggled back into the covers. “Good thing it’s Sunday.”
He turned onto his stomach and draped his body partly over hers. “You put in more hours than anyone else at the bakery. You should take some time off once in a while.”
“I’m the owner. That’s the way it works.”
“Tell me how I can help you get more time.” He was still racking his brains about what kind of things he could do for her that would show he cared. “If you need money, I have it.”
Paisley frowned. “I’m not going to take money from you.”
“Hire an accountant to do the books and payroll for you. Get a couple more bakers. Nikodemus has attorneys and accountants on staff. He’ll hook you up with good advice. ”
“I can’t afford advice that good.”
“If he doesn’t comp you, I’ll call in some favors and set it up at a price you can afford.” He slid his arms under the sheets and pulled her close.
“I’ll think about it.”
“That’s all I ask.” He kissed her ear and then her cheek and worked his way lower. “What else can I do for you?” he said. He moved his hand between them and waggled his eyebrows at her. “Am I getting close?”
“You wicked creature, you.”
“What’s your favorite color? Do you like jewelry? Did you used to collect anything? What if we got a dog? Do you like dogs?”
She touched his face, sliding her fingers along his tats, and it felt good. Really, really good. “My favorite color these days is blue.”
“What’s your favorite flower?” But he never got an answer. She was too busy making him forget his own name.
At six o’clock that evening, her ponytail made a streak of dark red over the crisp white of her shoulder, mysterious with strands of mahogany and gold. He wanted to undo her hair and bury his fingers in it. The cake she’d made at his request was boxed and taped down so he couldn’t peek at what she’d done. Three more boxes sat on the kitchen counter. His house smelled like a bakery, and it was awesome.
He took his time looking at her, thinking about peeling off her clothes and his and stretching himself out on top of that killer body of hers. She wore a black and white polka-dot dress and a pair of flat slipper-type shoes. She had a tiny purse under one arm and a jacket draped over the other. The dress was short. Or maybe it was just her legs were long. Plenty tight enough, though it looked to be made of a springy fabric.
“You look fantastic.”
“Thanks.” They loaded her boxes into the truck. The cake went on her lap and the rest of the items he put on the floor between her feet where they covered up the hole in the floorboard. Her dress hiked up another couple of inches.
He started the car and the engine about drowned out his words. “Ready?”
“Ready.”
Fifteen minutes later, he parked the Chevy in Harsh’s garage, next to Nikodemus’s Reventón. Now, there was a car. He wondered if Nikodemus would consider trading. He got out and came around to help Paisley with the desserts. She reached for the boxes on the floor, and he tried not to look down her dress while she was doing that. The neckline didn’t gape the way he’d been hoping.
She handed him the other boxes. Iskander balanced them on one palm while he helped her slide from the Chevy with the cake box firmly in her arms. Long, long pretty legs. Iskander thought of them with great fondness. With great lust.
She looked at the sleek black car and pointed. “That’s a twenty-first-century car. Harsh must have some serious money.”
“Probably, but that isn’t Harsh’s car.” Should he buy her one? If he had the money, would that be overkill? What about insurance and maintenance? He’d have to cover that for her. Which he could get away with if let her think they would share the car. “It probably means Xia and Alexandrine are here. Xia is having some kind of affair with Nikodemus’s car.”
“Nikodemus.” She shuddered, and he moved closer to her. “I can feel him. And others like you. Magekind, too.”
“Carson, Alexandrine, Maddy. Emily. Leonidas. Maybe some of Maddy’s wilders.”
“And Harsh. I thought he was one of you.”
“He is. Mostly.” Well, wasn’t that interesting? She was picking up on that about Harsh. He shifted the boxes he was carrying. “Just so there’s no surprises, Rasmus Kessler is Alexandrine’s father.” Paisley’s eyes widened.
“They don’t get along. He tried to kill her once. More than once.”
“This is like walking into a minefield.”
He kissed the top of her head. “No worries. I’ve got your back, cupcake.”
Ashlin Lau was right. He needed to do something to prove to Paisley that he cared. He just didn’t know what that was.
CHAPTER 29
Paisley took a good look around on the way inside. This wasn’t a house. Harsh Marit lived in a mansion. An honest to goodness mansion. She happened to know the Gettys lived just a few houses down. She’d catered the desserts for a party there a couple of years ago when she was saving every penny she could in order to open up the bakery. Never once had she imagined she’d be a guest in any of these mansions.
If you had the ability to do magic that controlled other people and could do Lord knows what else, it must be easy to amass the kind of money that bought a house like this and a car like the one in the garage. Conversation got louder the farther inside the house they got, and her chest vibrated more. There were demons in there. Of course. Pretty soon the air smelled of curry and something cooked in garlic and butter.
Iskander led her into a living room full of people, and there was a dip in the sound level of the room. A sort of communal intake of breath. There was music playing, but it wasn’t loud enough to cover the quiet. Most of them weren’t people at all. Demons. They were demons. A few, very few, were magekind. There were no screamers here, thank God.
Maybe twenty people were here, mostly men but a few women. She’d met Carson before, but the other women were strangers. She stopped beside Iskander, holding the cake box with her purse squashed under one arm. They were going to have to walk the gauntlet all the way across the room to the table with food and drinks on it.
“Iskander!” someone said.
Iskander lifted a hand in greeting, not far because his arms were full, and headed for the table of food. She followed. The minute Iskander put down his boxes, a very tall and very big man clapped him on the back.
“Hey, Xia,” Iskander said.
While she tried not to stare too hard, Iskander and Xia did that male hand clasp, back slap thing. They stepped apart when they were done. Iskander opened the top box, then looked around the room and said loudly, “Dessert’s here!”
Xia rubbed his hands together. The ornately carved hilt of some kind of weapon was clipped to the side of his jeans. “Did you get those little brownies from the grocery again? I love those.”
Paisley put down the cake box and shoved her purse into her coat pocket. She found a clean plate and, from the box of supplies she’d brought along, took out a bottle of chocolate syrup and piped a decorative swirl on the plate. She arranged her brownies and added a dusting of powdered sugar, also from the supplies she’d brought. She set out the first plate, then did another with the cookies and tarts from the other boxes Iskander had carried in.
Iskander took one of the brownies and handed it to Xia. “My friend,” he said, “I have acquired the secret weapon of desserts.”
“What’s this?” From the corner of her eye, she saw Xia staring at the brownie he held with a deeply suspicious expression. She gave up arranging food to watch. She was always nervous when someone new was trying her food. There was, she knew, no accounting for taste, and some people flat out had none. He examined the brownie before asking in a worried voice, “Did you make this?”
“No,” Iskander said. He rolled his eyes. “I did not.”
“It’s not my favorite kind.”
Iskander glared at him. “This is better. Way better.”
Her heart pinched a little at how fiercely Iskander responded.
The big man looked over his shoulder and called out, “Alexandrine, baby, if I die, it was for a good cause. I love you.”
Alexandrine. Rasmus Kessler’s daughter. And the woman was involved with a demon. She tried to figure out which woman she was. A tall blonde who didn’t look anything like Rasmus except for the color of her hair seemed the most likely candidate.
“Try it,” Iskander said. “And prepare for heaven.”
Xia took a tentative bite. Good grief. He was almost as gorgeous as Iskander. She enjoyed watching the expression on his face go from worry to amazement to sheer bliss.
“Where did you buy these?” he asked Iskander.
Iskander jerked his thumb in Paisley’s direction and grinned. “My secret weapon made them.”
Xia’s head whipped around, and Paisley was speared by a pair of eyes too blue to be real. Nobody had eyes like that in real life. Neon blue. Not human. Her chest thrummed. He took a step toward her. She would have backed up if she wasn’t already against the table. Xia was really big, and though she knew Iskander would never let anyone hurt her, Xia didn’t look friendly. He jabbed a finger at her. “You made these brownies?”
“Yes, sir, I did.” Her accent turned as thick as her chocolate syrup. She wiped her hands on a paper napkin and held it out. “Paisley Nichols. Pleased to meet you.”
“You’re Paisley Nichols?” His eyes went wide, and he did a quick check of Iskander. “The human woman Nikodemus was telling us about?”
She nodded. “I assume so, yes.”
“You freed kin who were lost to us.”
“That’s her,” Iskander said.
Xia ate another bite of brownie. “And you made these?”
“Yes, sir, I did.”
While she watched in amazement, Xia went down on both knees and then bowed his head, the fingers of one hand pressed to his forehead. That got them some attention. The noise level in the room went down several more notches. Xia looked up and said, “For food like that, I’d swear fealty to you if I weren’t already sworn.”
“Good grief, get up.” She shot a glance at Iskander, but he was no help. He was grinning like he’d made the brownies himself. “They’re only brownies.”
He stood, smiling like a kid. “What else did you bring?”
A petite woman with glossy black hair and a hooked nose that made her more beautiful rather than less, sidled in between Iskander and Xia to reach for a brownie. She wasn’t the least bit afraid of Xia, and for a moment she wondered if this was Alexandrine. The woman slid a shoulder across Iskander’s chest as she got between the table and Xia. She was magekind. “Hello, Iskander.”
“Hey, Maddy.” Iskander didn’t do anything to avoid or end the contact. Plainly they were good friends. Then again, Iskander was friends with everyone. And a flirt.
“Cookies,” Paisley said in answer to Xia’s earlier question. She tried to ignore Iskander and Maddy and couldn’t. “There’s cake, too.” She handed Xia one of the chocolate chocolate-chip cookies. “I brought strawberry custard tarts, too.”
He looked at her from over the top of the cookie. “You made these, too?”
“Yes, sir.”
He bit into the cookie. By now, there were several people crowding around the table.
Maddy fixed her attention on Paisley. She had a tart in one hand and the other on Iskander’s chest. Her dark eyes went wide when she took a bite. “These are heavenly.”
“Thank you very much.” Paisley turned around and unboxed the cake, sliding the disassembled cardboard container from underneath. She had an awkward moment while she looked for a place to put the cardboard. She slipped it under the table. She was jealous of Maddy, which was stupid.
Oh, Jesus. She wanted to be the one who touched him like that. In front of everyone. She bowed her head. Somewhere along the way, her feelings for Iskander had gotten complicated. Or maybe it wasn’t complicated at all. She pressed her hands to the table to stop them from trembling. Her first time meeting Iskander’s friends and she was turning into a jealous bitch.
Meanwhile, Xia stepped up to examine the cake she’d made. White chocolate buttercream with white chocolate dots and sugared violets. Inside was chocolate and vanilla checkerboard, though the others didn’t know that yet. Xia looked at her and back at the cake. “I fucking worship
you.”
“Paisley,” someone said.
She looked and saw Harsh coming toward them. He wore a suit tonight, and for once she could believe he was a physician just from looking at him. “Dr. Marit.”
Maddy gave her a strange look. She still had her hand on Iskander’s chest.
“Don’t you clean up nice?” Paisley reached up and touched Harsh’s tie. He preened for her until she had to laugh. If Iskander could flirt with Maddy, then she could flirt with Harsh. Right?
“Thank you.” He surveyed the cake. “That is too pretty to eat.”
“No, it’s not,” Iskander said. He pushed his way closer, away from Maddy, who, Paisley was aware, was now regarding her with a curious expression. “Totally not. That’s killer frosting right there—she made it specially for me—and I’m not passing it up because you’re a pussy.” He threw out a hand and grabbed a fistful of Xia’s shirt. “Give me your knife.”
“Fuck off. You’re not cutting cake with my knife.”
Iskander glared at him. Maddy had yet to stop staring at her, and that meant Paisley had to concentrate on not staring back just as rudely. A shiver took her, raising goose bumps up and down her arms. Something in Paisley’s chest flexed, and Maddy’s eyes widened. The woman mouthed the word ouch.
“That shit’s not going to work with her,” Iskander said with a glance at Maddy. “She’s a resistant.”
“So I’ve learned.”
“You want cake, Xia?” Iskander asked. “Or are you a pussy, too, and just want to look at it?”
Paisley didn’t care for Maddy. At all. She was still standing too close to Iskander, for one thing. Xia unsnapped the weapon from the scabbard at his hip and handed Iskander a knife that didn’t look like any knife Paisley had ever seen.
“Put that thing away,” Harsh said. He made a brusque motion with one hand. “It’s not safe in here and you know it.” It wasn’t clear to Paisley what Harsh meant by that besides what was obvious about a knife that wasn’t made for cutting cake. Harsh said, “I’ll get a knife from the kitchen.” He glared at Iskander and Xia. “No one do anything stupid.”
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