Magic Touch

by Leia Stone

  The ring.

  The proposal.

  I’d forgotten all about it, and seeing the box brought a smile to my lips.

  Brock wanted to marry me.

  Sitting down on the bed, I couldn’t wait any longer. I peeled open the box, and right away emotion tightened in my throat. The ring was made of a thin band of white gold, with a giant amethyst set in the middle of it. A row of small diamonds encircled the stone.

  Purple. My magic, my eyes. Brock had gotten me a ring that matched me! It was so incredibly thoughtful and unique and totally my style. The amethyst was super shiny and huge, at least four carats. I didn’t want to know how much he’d spent on it. I simply loved it and I had to try it on. Pulling it from the box, I slipped it onto my ring finger and grinned. It was a perfect fit. Collapsing onto the bed, I stared up at my hand in awe.

  Mrs. Evie Adams. Mrs. Evie Black-Adams. Hmm.

  I was grinning like a fool, but sleep was pulling at the edges of my mind. I didn’t want to take the ring off, so I didn’t. I fell asleep with that huge fucker on my finger.

  I was totally marrying Brock Adams. I just hadn’t told him yet.

  10 Bite me

  “Evie…” Brock’s smooth, deep voice dove into my consciousness, stirring me from a deep sleep. “Evie,” he repeated, shaking me gently.

  “Hmm…?” I mumbled.

  Remembering all the shit that had gone down recently, my eyes popped open wide at the fact that Molly, who was like a little sister to me, was possessed by a fucking fog demon. Sure, maybe it was only a little part of the fog demon, but it was still more than enough. Images of her snarling and growling at us flashed through my mind, and I pushed myself up to a sitting position, rubbing at my face.

  “How long was I asleep?” I asked Brock, before realizing he wasn’t looking at me anymore. Well, not exactly. He was staring at my hand with full-on intensity.

  A quick glance told me that I’d fallen asleep with the ring on my finger. Shit. This wasn’t how I wanted him to find out I was accepting his proposal. I’d wanted to declare it romantically—and not in the middle of this shitstorm with Molly.

  When I looked back up, he was waiting for me, his amber eyes alight. “Does this mean what I think it means?” he asked.

  I hesitated. “I don’t want to do this when things are so messed up with Molly. First, tell me, do you have news?”

  He nodded, his gaze once more flickering toward my engagement ring, a slight smirk pulling at his lips. “The council’s vote was unanimous. I have their permission to turn Molly. They took a while to come to an agreement though.” He grimaced, but with the dark stubble on his face, it only made him look dangerous and sexy. “You slept for more than three hours.”

  “How’s Molly?” I insisted.

  Brock scowled deeply, and even before he answered I knew I wouldn’t like what he had to say.

  “There’s no way to sugarcoat it. She’s not doing well. She’s grown even more hostile than she was before, and now she’s also refusing water and food. She looks like she’s strung out.”

  I scooted toward the edge of the bed, slipped back into my pants, and bent over to pull on my boots. “We need to turn her right away, then. We can’t wait.”

  “Can’t it wait long enough for you to give me an answer? Are you going to marry me, Evie?”

  Still seated on the bed, with my second boot half on, I turned to look at him. The stress of the demon fog and all the other terrifying shit that had emerged from the gate to the underworld was evident in the tension that rode his shoulders, the way his eyes crinkled in the corners with exhaustion. Brock was responsible for an entire pack, and he seemed to worry about me and the baby constantly. He didn’t need to also worry about this.

  I finished pulling on my boot and scooted closer to him on the bed, reaching for him, my ring glimmering across our joined hands. Staring into his eyes, I recognized all the hope he held for a beautiful future together, the love he had for me. Without a doubt, this was the man I wanted to share the rest of my life with.

  Smiling, I leaned forward. “Yes, Brock Adams, I will marry you”—he broke into a grin that erased all the evidence of strain from his face—“but, I’m going to put the ring, which I totally love by the way, back in its box.”

  His forehead scrunched into lines of confusion. “I don’t understand.”

  “You proposed to me while we were in the middle of dodging the Akuma and figuring out how to prevent what amounts to a demon apocalypse on earth. And you only did it when my dad freaked out about us living in sin. There’s no fucking way I’m going to officially accept your proposal when my apprentice is fighting off demonic possession. We need good juju around this marriage.”

  I shook my long hair, the pitch black strands sliding across my bare upper arms. “No, we’re going to do this right, once all this shit is over and the gate is sealed, taking with it all our nightmarish problems. Then you can wine and dine me, get down on one knee and look at me adoringly while you do your thing.”

  He chuckled. “I’ll do whatever you want as long as you marry me.”

  “Absolutely whatever I want?” I asked, winking at him.

  “Anything.” His voice grew husky and his eyes hooded.

  I let out the groan of all motherfucking groans. “Why can’t we just have some time to be alone?”

  “I’ve been asking myself that same thing basically since I met you.”

  “Before or after you parked a bulldozer in front of Gran’s house and threatened to tear it down?”

  “Yeah, definitely after that.” He laughed, offering me his hand. “Come on, let’s go get this over with.”

  Standing, I slid the ring from my finger, admiring it while I replaced it in its box, then took his hand.

  “You’re going to be stuck with me for the rest of our lives, Brock Adams,” I told my alpha.

  His eyes twinkled as he pulled me close, pressing a quick kiss to my waiting lips. “Lucky me,” he said. “Now let’s go make your apprentice a werewolf.”

  Well, that’s not something you hear every day, I thought as I followed him from our bedroom and through the house. Then again, nothing about our lives had been ordinary since the moment we met. It probably never would be, though I’d settle for demon free.

  I thought I’d imagined the worst when Brock told me Molly’s condition had deteriorated, but nothing had prepared me for the malice that seemed to drip from her every pore. The moment Brock and I stepped through the threshold to Gran’s cabin, Molly began to snarl and hiss like a wild animal.

  She sat more or less on Gran’s droopy, well-worn couch as she thrashed. Her ankles were bound with black silk bondage ties. I absolutely was not going to ask Haru or Reo how they’d come into possession of them to tie her up. The brothers and Molly had been living together in the cabin since I moved in with Brock, which meant they’d had plenty of opportunity to, uh, connect.

  Haru and Reo knelt on the couch to either side of Molly, each of them gripping one of her arms tightly to keep her from hurting herself or anyone else. I could tell from the pained expressions on their faces that they were trying very hard not to harm her, but she wasn’t making it easy.

  As Brock and I approached, Molly lunged forward, half coming off the couch as she did, and Haru stumbled off the furniture while he and Reo tugged to hold her back.

  “Don’t bother trying to get close to her,” Johnny said. “The person you knew isn’t in control anymore, not at all.”

  I flicked an annoyed look at my cousin. The way he said it made it seem like we weren’t getting Molly back, and we totally fucking were.

  I looked to Cass, Tianna, Willemena, my dad, and Cho instead. Cass stepped forward, rubbing worriedly at his little potbelly. “We’ve got to hurry, Ev. The longer she’s like this, the harder it will be for her to fight for control once she becomes a wolf.”

  Tianna nodded at her little impish lover. “He’s right. If she stays this way much longer, she might st
art to forget who she really is, even once she’s a wolf. We need to do this before any more damage can be done.”

  Brock released my hand and stalked forward. “Now that I have the council’s approval, I don’t need to wait anymore.” He pulled up the hem of the form-fitting black t-shirt he wore, and when he yanked it over his head, Cho’s eyes went wide. Willemena and Tianna trained their eyes on him too, as if determined not to miss the show.

  “Uh, Brock?” I said.

  He looked up as he unsnapped his jeans. “Yeah?”

  “Maybe you could undress in my old bedroom.”

  He scanned the witches, who were staring at him, as if noticing them for the first time, then moved into my old room, not bothering to close the door behind him.

  Werewolves. They were so used to being naked around each other that they didn’t give it much thought. It was the way their lives were. And it would soon be Molly’s life.

  I chewed my lip. I knew she wanted to be a supernatural and all, but would she be ready for coming out of this as a full-blown werewolf? And she would come out of this—because there was no way in hell I was even going to entertain the possibility that she might not survive the shift. She had to.

  Cass, always so attuned to me, spoke into my thoughts: ‘Don’t worry, girl. Molly’s strong. She’ll pull through.’

  I nodded roughly. ‘But will she be able to fight off this demon? Will she be the same carefree, supe-loving Molly we know?’

  ‘Of course she will.’ But a hint of doubt crept across our telepathic link, making me shiver with dread before shaking it off.

  Cass drew up to my side, offering his silent support. I could always count on my bestie to have my back, even when all I needed was some encouragement.

  Brock padded out of my old room in wolf form just as Ray let himself into the cabin. When Brock met his second’s gaze, I knew he’d been communicating with him through their pack link. He probably wanted Ray here just in case anything should go wrong.

  No matter how many times I saw Brock’s wolf, I couldn’t help but admire it. The large gray wolf was all lean, muscled strength and fierce determination. Brock’s yellow eyes moved from Ray to me, and I nodded.

  It was time.

  As if the fog demon within Molly understood what was about to happen, and what the end result of Brock’s wolf bite would be, Molly thrashed and pulled against Haru and Reo’s hold with such renewed ferocity that Ray and Johnny ran to help them contain her. Even my dad looked worried, rolling his wheelchair a little closer to my side. Willemena and Cho looked on with somber expressions, while Tianna crossed her arms over her chest and narrowed her eyes at the scene.

  With Molly’s arms pinned fully against the couch, she kicked her bound legs like a psychopathic mermaid. She bucked and sneered, gnashing and grinding her teeth so ferociously that I worried she might crack a tooth before this was all over.

  But just as I was about to ask Cass and Tianna if they wanted to hold down her legs, Brock lunged for her. He was faster than I realized; he clamped sharp jaws around her bare leg, slicing into her calf without warning.

  She roared in outrage, but Brock held on.

  A fierce power whipped through our pack bond as his unseen alpha magic wrapped around Molly. His power was a tangible force sweeping like a gust of wind across the room. Tianna and Cho bristled, as if they too could feel the magic, then Molly flung her legs up in a brutal snap that dislodged Brock’s jaw and sent him flying across the open living space. His wolf form crashed into a couple of dining room chairs, which toppled over like dominoes. Brock grunted, but twisted so that he somehow managed to land on four paws.

  ‘Are you okay?’ I asked him urgently through our pack link.

  ‘Fine,’ he grumbled. ‘It’s done. Now we just have to wait for the werewolf magic to spread into her and see if her body accepts it.’ Then he trotted off toward my old room again, and when he emerged, he was all hot man again.

  If her body accepts it. He said if.

  Brock ran a hand through his dark hair while we all took in Molly. Her resistance to the men holding her was decreasing, the fight appearing to ooze out of her like air out of a deflating balloon. When she finally sank against the couch in complete exhaustion, Johnny and Ray stepped away, and eventually even Haru and Reo released their hold on her, though they monitored her with narrowed eyes.

  “How long will the transition take?” Tianna asked Brock.

  “It depends on the person. It can take anywhere from a few minutes to a few hours. Since I’m an alpha and my magic is stronger, it will probably take less time. But I’m not sure what kind of effect the demon fog will have on things. That’s new territory for me.”

  While everyone turned to stare at Molly again, whose purple-hair draped over the back of the couch, I studied Brock. His back was tense, his eyes sad.

  ‘Are you all right?’ I asked him privately, and he met my gaze across the room.

  ‘Yeah, it’s just that being a werewolf can be a risky life. And she won’t get a choice on which pack she’s a part of either. Since I’m turning her, she’ll automatically become part of my pack.’

  ‘She trusts you,’ I said. ‘I’m sure she’ll be glad not only to be a wolf, but to have you as her alpha.’ Croft wouldn’t be too glad, but the vamp lawyer hadn’t been coming around much anymore now that Molly had become part of our crew. Molly’s days as his blood mistress were officially over, and I was damn glad. Ever since I’d known this girl, she’d wanted to be immersed in the supernatural world. She’d have no problem with the choice we’d made for her.

  ‘I hope you’re right,’ Brock said. ‘I hope she makes it through.’

  I didn’t put words to how important it was for me that she make it through. I wouldn’t lose Molly. No fucking way. I was not letting a damn fog demon take her from me. She would survive the turn. She had to. I’d accept nothing else.

  Molly was unmoving, the contrast to her earlier behavior disturbing after she had fought for so many hours. She closed her eyes as if about to take a nap.

  “Maybe we could have some tea while we watch her,” Willemena suggested, already moving over to the dining table and righting the chairs Brock’s wolf had crashed into.

  Cass’ head jerked up to meet mine and he grinned. I smiled back, my heart not quite in it, even though I could tell he was trying to cheer me up. “Tea is for pussies,” he said, and Willemena whipped her head up.

  She stared at Cass for several beats, before throwing her head back and laughing. Her long, gray hair was loose today, and it swept gracefully along her back as she laughed. Finally, she wiped at her eyes, and smiled sadly. “I miss Belinda.”

  I nodded. “I miss Gran too.”

  “I’m not sure this is the time to laugh and reminisce,” Johnny said, narrowing his eyes at Willemena.

  The old witch, who’d had Gran’s trust, shrugged with disinterest, taking a seat with a sigh. “Son, someday you’ll learn that you have to take life as it comes. You have to laugh when you can and roll with the punches. If you don’t, this life will fucking break you.”

  Then Willemena tilted her head against the chair back and closed her eyes.

  “I’ll go put on a pot of coffee,” Cass said, but stopped halfway to the kitchen when Molly sat straight up on the couch and screamed.

  11 This bitch has nine lives

  Molly’s cry cut straight through my heart and had every single person in the cabin running toward her … and then stopping short when we realized there was nothing we could do to help her.

  Her body contorted in every direction all at once, bones and cartilage crunching. Her face scrunched in pain, and a second scream ripped from her throat.

  “Oh my God. What can we do?” I asked, panic rushing my words together.

  Brock was already shaking his head sadly. “There’s nothing we can do. She has to do this on her own—every wolf does. I’m surprised she started shifting this quickly, but now that she is, we’ll find out soon eno
ugh if she’s going to survive my wolf bite.”

  My pulse thudded loudly through my head, willing her to fight this with everything she had and pull through.

  I lost track of how long I watched my purple-haired friend fight the way the wolf worked to shape her body into something it’d never been before. Sabine came and went, taking Molly’s vitals and marking things on a clipboard. Somewhere along the line, Haru had untied Molly’s ankles, and Cass had placed his stubby hand in mine, and we’d commiserated together. I didn’t expect Johnny to stay this long, but he was still here. As was my father. We were all just looking on and waiting, hoping for the best. There was nothing else we could do.

  After some time, I became almost numb to Molly’s cries of pain. I had to push them away so they wouldn’t make me crazy. Was this how it’d been when I’d first shifted into my fox? No wonder Cass had been so freaked out afterward.

  Haru and Reo winced with each one of Molly’s screams, until finally, after what seemed like an eternity, her cries lessened, and she simply whimpered. And when the whimpering ceased, a gorgeous white wolf with a black right front leg stood next to the couch, panting with exhaustion, ribcage heaving.

  I’d half expected her fur to be purple.

  Despite her physical exhaustion at the pain she’d had to endure, a steely strength blazed from her sky blue eyes.

  ‘Our girl did it,’ I whispered in awe to Cass through our connection. ‘She fought and she made it.’

  ‘That she did.’ I sensed Cass’ proud grin even without turning to look at him. ‘Our apprentice kicks some serious ass.’

  ‘You can say that again,’ I said, then turned to find Brock grinning, his smile lighting up his whole face.

  “Molly did it,” he said aloud, and Tianna whooped so loudly that I startled before laughing to ease some of this ridiculous fucking tension.