“I wanted her to be a man so she wouldn’t have been mutilated,” Rayner said. “I don’t want it here.” Still, he twitched the reins of his horse and started to take the narrow path down.
As they got closer, Thom said, “Well, she’s pretty for a boy, ain’t she? Coulda been worse.”
“Did I ask your opinion, cowboy?” Rayner asked coolly. “I thought you frowned on that out here.”
Thom shrugged. “Not a lot of women out here. Even the nearest whorehouse was a long way away. Sure, I prefer a pretty girl, but from what I hear, it ain’t so bad, if that’s all you got to work with.” Since being turned into a vampire, Thom seemed to have lost all pretense of proper behavior, but Rayner wasn’t sure he had much to begin with.
Up until that moment, Rayner might have shared blood with Silvus and Jie, but he very rarely shared sex itself and only in a teasing way before he took her off alone. If Lisbeth was a man this time…
For the first time in his life, Rayner had a face a slightly different dynamic with his beloved, and he wasn’t sure what to do or how to convince Lisbeth that she/he still belonged to them.
…but within the first few weeks, Thom had found it. He was no stiff Englishman like Silvus or a philosophical sort like Jie. The American cowboy was a kinky bastard who knew all sorts of interesting ways to tie a knot and didn’t mind sharing, and in his own crude parlance, could charm the hide off an armadillo. Where Rayner might have been nervous seducing a young man in seclusion, he realized it was much easier when his girl-turned-boy, whom he nicknamed Bertie, was already on his knees for Thom.
How much had he missed out on, by not being willing to share?
I shut my eyes as the memory rippled through me. A familiar feeling by now. Charlotte often provoked those memories.
“Charlotte…” She felt so good. So warm. As flush with life as a garden. Her cheeks almost looked feverish, her nipples peaked. I needed more hands so I could twist and tug them but in this pose I needed to support her legs.
“Mm…” Her fingers dug deep into the muscles behind my shoulder blades. “Yes…yes!”
I guess I didn’t need to worry that I was being too rough with her.
Alec started to back off, to retreat to the other side of the room.
“Alec,” I said. “It’s—you—you can stay close.”
“You sure? I don’t want to weird you out. I need to jack off.”
“Yeah. Just don’t jizz on me.”
“Shh,” Charlotte said, covering my mouth. “I am so close. Be romantic. No more talk of jacking and jizzing.”
“We’ll talk how we want and you’ll come anyway,” Alec said in a husky tone.
“Oh, that is so true,” she whimpered.
This was all turning me on more than I expected, too. When Alec got commanding with her, I got to reap the benefits by going deeper into her with every stroke while she shuddered and clutched at me.
Becoming a vampire had put all my senses in overdrive—sight, smell, hearing. I could hardly stand the rich, sexy scent of her, her panting mixed with little moans, her thighs hugging my waist. I was sensitive to her getting more and more amped up. Her heat, her core clenching around my shaft as I made my girl happy.
I felt up her lovely, soft legs as I held her close. I could feel myself losing it. I just hoped I didn’t bite her this time.
She threw back her head and let out what was almost laughter, but edged with what could have also been a cry for mercy.
The one good thing about being a vampire was that I could release inside her, and it made me feel primal satisfaction even if I would never have kids now. I wanted to fill her so full of me. My teeth sharpened.
I wanted to drain her dry, too.
A vein pulsed in her neck as she went limp in my arms.
Alec’s hands wrapped around my hair. “No,” he said, gentle but firm.
I had to drop her onto the bed so I wouldn’t hurt her and withdraw from her with some force, turning to the other side of the room.
“You almost bit her,” Alec said.
“I need to drink,” I said, grabbing my pants, trying to calm myself down.
“It’s okay, Montague,” she said dreamily. “You didn’t hurt me.”
“You don’t look surprised, Char,” Alec said. “How far did you go last time, Monty? You said you bit her but did you…drink?”
Now I snatched up my shirt. My teeth were still so sharp it affected my speech a little. “She was fine.”
“You really could have killed her.”
I wished I was one hundred percent sure that was wrong.
“No,” Charlotte said, lifting a hand to him. “No. He wouldn’t do that. I know it. But I also attacked him and stopped him. It was sort of hot, actually, but I won’t let him do it anymore.”
“Well…maybe with some supervision…” Alec put a hand over her as she lay on the bed.
She looked up at him. “I think we all know what it’s like to struggle to control yourself…”
“Mm…” Alec stroked his cock.
Charlotte rolled onto her back. She was almost under him now. His hand was pressed into the bed behind her. She watched him with wonderment. I probably shouldn’t be watching them anymore, but I did.
I could feel how things had changed for us tonight. It was almost exactly a year ago that Alec and I agreed to share her, but it wasn’t always easy to figure out how to do that. I knew Rayner didn’t jump right into it either.
It was good, I realized now. I felt safer going forward because Alec had stopped me from hurting her.
And then, I got to feel her so close to me, but I also got to watch her with him. She was quiet. She almost seemed scared, but her eyes told the truth. There was nothing Alec could do to her that she wasn’t willing to try. She adored my best friend, but was I jealous?
Alec was too different from me for that.
It feels pretty damn right, actually.
He came on the smooth plane of her stomach and she stayed firmly put beneath him, barely moving an inch, trying not to touch him.
When he was done, I put my silver ring on her finger. Alec rummaged in a drawer and found a protection charm ring of his own. They were a pretty common gift for witch and warlocks to get, and the rings that fit on our pinkies went on her thumbs.
“We’ll get better ones next time,” I said.
“I like it,” she said. “I still feel naughty, but like, not in a stupid way.”
That was such a Charlotte thing to say.
I took her hand and kissed her fingers. “Always naughty. Never stupid.”
“Now I’m going to take a shower,” she said.
“Goodnight.”
Alec looked at me as I walked to the door. An understanding passed between us. That actually worked, I thought, as I shut the door. Damn. I’m already ready for more.
I walked down the creaking, narrow stairs that led to their attic bedroom back to the third floor of Lancelot House where I shared my room with Harris. I had just started taking off my dress shirt for the second time when he banged the door open.
“Well, you look like you’ve been having fun,” he growled.
“Hey, don’t blame me for whatever your problems are. Where’s Daisy?”
“Gone. Hopefully not dead. Or undead.” He added, “We broke up.”
“Undead?”
“She threatened to become a vampire just to escape becoming the diviner,” Harris said.
“Holy shit.” My stomach twisted at the thought of Daisy joining up with that crew. I wouldn’t wish this on anyone. Hopefully they would refuse to turn her. “You didn’t go after her?”
“No. I did something even more drastic. I called her grandmother.”
“Oh…” The Chicago witches and the Florida warlocks didn’t cross paths often, but everyone knew of Ermengarde Pendleton. She was one of the most famous witches in the world. She didn’t mess around. I didn’t even need to know Daisy’s grandmother to know that getting in tro
uble with her might make you wish you were teamed up with demons instead.
Harris frowned. “It might have been a bad idea, but—I didn’t realize how desperate Daisy was to get out of her position. I thought she wanted the power. But in her mind, she’d rather get that power somewhere else.”
“You don’t think she just said it in the heat of an argument?”
“No,” Harris said. “No. I don’t. Her grandmother was notifying the council. Fuck. It’s going to be bad for her. But I couldn’t let her become a vampire. It only takes one night to seal your fate forever.”
Harris had probably just sealed away Daisy’s freedom. To keep her from becoming a vampire.
When I thought about it that way, I felt more pissed off than I expected. Was it that bad? Maybe she should be allowed to become a vampire if she wanted to. Not that I had wanted to. But it wasn’t that bad. Did I just not want to face the reality of how much immortality was going to fuck me up with time?
“They’ll send her to the Haven,” I said. “Until she’s subdued into compliance, and when you next see her she’ll probably be the diviner.”
“At least she’ll be safe and live a normal fucking life!” Harris climbed into bed without even taking his clothes off and turned off his light, which was the only light in the room at the moment. “Goodnight, Monty.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
Charlotte
“Hey, kiddo. So good to see you.” Dad gave me a huge hug and I gripped him a little tighter than I should.
He felt farther away from me every time I saw him.
At least after this year’s winter ball, I got to have a normal holiday break and come home.
“So…no boys this year, huh?”
“Just me,” Firian said, taking his hand from his hoodie pocket to shake Dad’s.
“Well, you’re like her brother or something. I meant those…school boys.” Dad laughed like he knew Firian well.
And I laughed like, too loudly.
“Nah, we left the ab slabs home,” Firian said, making me even more embarrassed than before. “We’re looking forward to a quiet holiday this year. Gaming, cookies, movie night.”
“I’m really glad,” Dad said. “I’ve missed you guys.”
Twenty-four hours later, it had become dangerously clear to me that when you have a dad who is a single parent and very involved with your life, you can’t hide important stuff from him. Like…my chemistry with Firian. I mean…I really really tried not to act girlfriendy. But it just slipped out. Like when we were making cookies in the kitchen together, even my giggle was damning.
“Can I talk to you for a sec before your Grandma gets here?” Dad said, after he asked Firian to go hang up the rest of the Christmas lights because he’d ‘hurt his shoulder’. Supposedly. But Dad was the type who would just hang up the lights anyway and make his shoulder worse.
In other words, uh-oh.
“Sure thing,” I said, with false brightness.
I had no clue what to say to him. None. This was right up there with your dad finding out you’d built a secret BDSM room in the basement when he comes over to fix your hot water heater.
“You and Firian seem…uh…you know. Close,” he said.
“Yeah.”
“Your mom said witches and familiars are always close. But I rarely saw hers.”
“Yeah…we’re…unique.”
“Are you still dating Montague?”
“Yeah. Yeah. I am.”
Great, maybe he would just ask some questions and I could keep saying ‘yeah’.
“Witches and familiars don’t—hook up, right? Firian is like your brother.”
“Yeeeah, um…”
Just lie to him! my brain screamed. How hard is it!?
My dad was everything to me. He taught me to read. He taught me to ride a bike. He taught me how to deal with bullies. When I got my first period he took me out for sundaes even though his attempt to say some ‘girl power’ things to me was deeply uncomfortable for both of us. He came home from a long, hard day of handyman work and still managed to make dinner and help me with homework. He tried really, really hard to make up for my mom being gone and he was awesome.
Lying to him was the hardest thing in the world. Because I knew when I lied to him, it pushed him farther away from me.
Was there a point of no return?
I broke into a sweat. “Dad…I need to tell you something. I—I don’t know how you’ll react. I know you might be upset.”
“Charlotte…shit. You look faint. Whatever it is, I will only be upset if you’re in danger or someone’s abusing you or something.”
I swallowed. “I think I’m in love with Firian. And I might be in danger because of that.”
“Because of the witch council or…?”
I nodded. I couldn’t meet his eyes. “But—I’m also dating Montague. And I…I might love him too. In the magical world, it’s—uh—it’s not unheard of.”
I still wasn’t looking at him but he did get speechless for a second. “Do they both know?”
“Yes.”
“So the magical world is…polygamous? I mean, I knew your other grandmother is, of course, involved with those…wolves.”
I covered my face. “Don’t say that.”
“Your generation didn’t invent freaky shit, you know. Neither did witches. When your mom and I got together, I was a roadie for a couple of bands, and I saw everything. The drummer in Angry Shirt—”
“Yeah, but I’m not ‘the drummer in Angry Shirt’.”
“Thank god for that.” He put a hand on my shoulder. “I mean, it is a lot for your poor dad to process, but on the other hand, I kinda knew. And if you’re not lying to either of them, and if they’re both treating you well…all that I care about is that you’re happy and safe.”
“Really?”
“I mean…it’s not—all I care about. Would I rather you dated one single, nice skinny kid with acne from your high school? Sure. I can dream. But you seem happier at Merlin College than you were in high school.”
“I am.” I threw my arms around him. “Dad…you’re the best.”
“I’m just relieved it’s only Firian and Montague. I thought you were going to tell me you were involved with that tattooed guy with the Robert Plant pants who looks like he could seduce the stripes off a zebra.”
I almost choked on my own saliva. “Um…it’s complicated.”
He looked at me. “Shit.”
“Alec can’t touch me,” I said. “There’s a spell on him.”
From the hallway where we were talking, we both heard the front door creak open, the sound of bags being dumped on the counter, and then my grandma sang out, “Joy to the world, the lord has come! And so has Graaandma! Where is everyone?”
Dad looked at me.
We were not ready for this.
“If he can’t touch you, let’s table that for a while,” Dad said.
I gave him a fist bump. “Yeah.”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Charlotte
“Welcome back. Hope you had a good yule,” Stuart said.
I definitely had, while Montague had a super Catholic Christmas in warm St. Augustine and I knew what Alec was up to because when we logged onto Fortune’s Favor at night, damned if our ninja girl wasn’t already running around and suspiciously leveled up. Harris, on the other hand, looked like if a growling sound was turned into a man. And I was a little worried I hadn’t heard from Daisy at all.
“I’m glad you all got those wands done before winter grows too cold,” Stuart said. “I know it’s hard to whittle a wand when your hands are numb in these old Victorian buildings…”
True enough. Merlin College had a lot of cozy fireplaces but the rooms were super drafty as soon as you stepped out of their radius.
“We’re going to focus on the realms,” Stuart said. “There are four you probably know about. The ‘human’ world, or, the Fixed Plane. This is your own world and you belong to it. Unlike
most other magical beings, all of you can use magic in the Fixed Plane, although there are still rules against using it around ordinary humans. Then we have the spirit world. When you die, you will go there and all we know of it comes from ghosts and spirits. Therefore, it is an incomplete picture and attempts to truly understand it have always failed. It is possible we just are not evolved enough to comprehend what is there.”
A lot of the guys scoffed or seemed checked out as Stuart was talking, like the last thing they wanted to hear was that there was something they would never know, or worse, that they weren’t awesome enough to know it.
“A little humility in the face of the universe is a good thing,” Stuart said. “Then we have Etherium and Sinistral. These realms are the focus of most of your magic. They are where power comes from. What separates you from a normal human is that you have the ability to connect to Etherium. Your familiar is your connection.”
Montague said, with a scowl, like he hated to bring it up. “That isn’t quite true,” he said. “If we lose our familiar, we don’t lose our magic.”
“All right. Yes. That is true. But you had one once. That’s all that matters to establish the initial connection.”
“Where do familiars come from?” I asked. “I mean, from Etherium, I know, but why do we have them?”
“Who can explain the theory to Charlotte?” Stuart asked.
“We know all this already,” Henry said. “Professor Jablonsky, I just have to say, I don’t think my parents are paying a lot of money to send me here just so I can tell Charlotte what a familiar is.”
Oh, yay. The Lockes left, and now I had a new nemesis I guess. Henry from Savannah seemed like he was auditioning for the role now.
“Henry,” Stuart said, in a voice so calm it almost turned chilling. “If you are finding this all too boring, I guess you’re free to leave. This is college. We don’t have any truant officers we’ll be sending after you, you know.”
“I’m just pointing out that this seems like stuff we already know.”
Stuart walked up to Henry’s desk. “We’ll be talking about this all week. I’m going to assign you a new class, Mr. Lapierre. You’re heading to conjuring. Is that better?”
A Witch Among Warlocks: The Complete Series Box Set Page 45
