Paranormally Yours: A Boxed Set

by Alisha Basso

  Francie leaped to her feet and skated out behind me on her platform tennies, quickly catching up. “Outta sight. Grannie always said make new friends. But keep the old, ’cuz one is silver and the other is—”

  “Gold?”

  “Oh, did you know Grannie too?” She grinned at me, and I wondered if she could possibly be real.

  I looked closer. Her teeth were smiling, but her eyes weren’t. So she wasn’t totally for real, which frankly, was something of a relief.

  Then I remembered the weird echo on the ethereal and wondered what her deal was. But people fake it for all sorts of reasons. Maybe she was trying to make a good impression. Maybe she was just scared. I’d give her the benefit of the doubt and try to help her if we got past tonight.

  But for now my top priority was the Mayan Doom, which meant finding someone else for her to annoy…I mean to occupy her.

  Since Wenkermann had sent most everybody home, Research and Development was a holiday ghost town strewn with wreath tumbleweeds and shiny tinsel cobwebs. My only hope of finding a warm body was to head for the cafeteria. People could usually be found there grabbing their caffeine and carbs day or night.

  My flats made no noise going from the carpeted concrete of the office area to the tiled concrete of the cafeteria. So I didn’t disturb the trim figure with long honey-colored hair absorbed in the bank of vending machines. Francie clomped in behind me and the figure turned.

  Planning Witch Handover, backlit by the bright coffee vending, was stirring a cup. She appeared in her mid-twenties, until you met her sharp gray eyes. That steady, intelligent gaze said she was a mature wizard.

  “Jones. I’ve been trying all evening to find you.” Handover set her coffee on a nearby table and picked up a tablet computer. “It’s a disaster.”

  My heart sped up. Had she stumbled onto the Doom too? Could this be the help I was looking for? Relief cascaded through me. Handover was forceful and dogged, or in résumé-speak, highly motivated and tenacious. She’d be an invaluable (and non-Venus) ally. “You heard?”

  “I just found out. For shame.” She shook a finger at me. “How could you not sign up for the Secret Santa?”

  Focused on worldwide peril, my brain did a bit of a duh-huh? “What Secret Santa?”

  “The Center’s gift exchange. I’m sure you know I run it every year. Why didn’t you sign up?”

  “Well…the signup list went around in September. I wasn’t sure I’d be” —alive—“here then. But I’m glad to catch you. There’s another problem. You know today is December 21, right?”

  “Of course I know. The Secret Santa is Monday.” She waved the tablet. “That’s only three days from now and—”

  “Wizard Handover, I hate to interrupt, but the twenty-first is also the predicted doomsday. And it’s real.”

  She nodded impatiently. “A real disaster, that’s what I’m saying. Do you have any idea how many people have picked now to vacation? Here.” She thrust the tablet and stylus into my hands. “Sign.”

  I dutifully penned my name on her tablet. What could I say? She was two levels above me on the organizational chart.

  “Ooh, sign me up too.” Francie ka-clicked her pen to a stylus point, grabbed the tablet and scribbled her name.

  Handover asked, “Do you work here?”

  “I sure do. I’m Adept Francie Mica Frankie. Wizard Jones is my Master.”

  I bit back a groan. “I’m your supervisor or mentor, Francie, not your—”

  “Nice to meet you, Adept Frankie. See you both Monday.” Handover nodded and left.

  “What next, Master Mentor?” Francie chirped.

  Good question. I stumped out of the now-empty cafeteria.

  And ran into Dennis Long, coming…I mean trotting around the corner. He brightened the instant he saw me. “Wizard Jones, there you are! I’ve thought of another reason for us to work Venus magic…” His eyes flickered to Francie, who was tucking her pen in her cleavage, back to me…then flipped back to her so fast they left skid marks. His mouth fell open and his lips reddened distinctly. “Hello.” His voice dropped in pitch to lounge-lizard. “Nice to see you again.”

  She stuck the end of one braid in her mouth and sucked on it. He reacted in the obvious fashion. And there I was, caught between a Francie Mica and a hard place. Someone at the karmic level was snickering.

  A prime opportunity for escape, though. Avoiding conflict was not quite brave but very practical. “Dennis, you’ve met Francie? I was going to introduce her around. Maybe you could do that for me instead?”

  His eyes brightened until I needed sunscreen. “My pleasure.”

  She was equally enthralled, floating from my side to twine an arm around his. “I’d like that.” She batted eyelashes at him.

  Aw, that was cute. Puppy wizards in love.

  “Wait. Wizard Jones.” Francie’s eyes widened, shifting to me. “Venus magic. You’re not related to the great combat wizards Jones and Jones, are you?”

  “Well—”

  “Because I’d love to learn about Venus magic.” She turned to Dennis. “You could help.”

  This was turning out better than I’d planned. Not only was he taking her off my hands, any positive magic they generated would help in fighting the silver needle.

  I clapped them on the shoulders. “Great! You two work together.” Then I snuck…I mean I started walking away.

  “That’s brilliant,” Dennis said. “It would be even better than just Wizard Jones and me.”

  Francie wrapped arms around him. “We could both learn from Master Jones.”

  Not master. But I was almost around the corner and home free, so I kept my mouth firmly shut.

  “Three-way Venus.” Francie bubbled. “Three times the love magic fun!”

  That stopped me. I turned very, very slowly. “What?”

  “You, me and Wizard Jones?” Dennis was panting. “A magical ménage? A Three-way of Love?”

  “Nuh…nuh…” I picked up my jaw from the floor. “No!”

  “No?” Francie frowned at me with a chipmunk-like wrinkle of nose. “What do you want, then? A four-way of love magic? A five-way of love magic?” She put a creepy spin on “love”, pronouncing it luuuuv.

  “That’s not what I meant!” Why was everyone—Dennis, Francie, Rafe—suddenly fixated on Venus magic?

  And why Venus magic with me? Was it something in the water? Or the very fact I didn’t want to, like Murphy’s karma?

  I said, “Look, I just don’t do that sort of thing.”

  “Oh, that’s right,” Dennis said. “She doesn’t, you know. She wouldn’t do it with me, and if she wouldn’t with me, obviously she doesn’t ‘do that sort of thing’.”

  “Yes, I… Wait. What?”

  “That explains a lot.” Francie nodded. “She doesn’t like love-making.”

  “Or sex,” Dennis said.

  “I like sex.” I wondered when exactly I’d lost my mind. “I like sex plenty.”

  “Then why won’t you do love magic?” Francie smiled expectantly.

  “Because Venus isn’t ‘love’ magic. It’s just sex.” At their twin blank looks I blew an exasperated breath. “Please understand. I know you admire my parents, but there’s a huge downside to Venus. Sex triggers oxytocin and endorphins and other feel-good hormones that trick people into thinking they’re in love when they’re not. It tricked my parents into marrying. But in reality, they had nothing in common, don’t you see?”

  They stared at me like I was speaking Mayan—with a bad New Jersey accent. Francie said, “What does that have to do with three-way Venus magic, Master?”

  Arrgh. “Not. Master.” I pulled my phone from my pocket and checked the time. Ten o’clock.

  Damn it, I’d wasted half an hour, a critical half hour if the panic curve hadn’t changed, putting us beyond the Plan B team of wizards. “Dennis, introduce Francie around to whoever is here. I’ve got work to do.”

  Chapter Five

  Strangely, t
hat encounter clarified things for me. Francie and Dennis, discussing things so blithely, made me realize that Venus magic was really just sex. Surely I could handle a bout of just sex?

  Okay, damn the oxytocin, full speed ahead. I strode for the elevator.

  They tried to follow, but I channeled Chief Wenkermann and glared, adding a smile that glinted like a saw. They backed off.

  I’ve always wanted to make a difference with my life. As a kid, I wanted to be a fearless combat mage—see the world, save it—but I hadn’t even saved my parents from the car accident. I still had nightmares of being trapped in the back seat, feeling their pain, dark and hard, as their blood seeped out and their hearts started to race just before the end. All that pain, awful pain, like a fist balled in my chest, my head spinning, unable to breathe… I’d tried to heal them with magic, but I was eighteen years old and untrained. I’d reached them through trance, but before undergraduate school I didn’t have any of the advanced visualization techniques. Maybe if I’d had my golden needle or bucket of magic…but not then. Not when I was eighteen.

  I’d felt them die.

  I shook myself. Point was, I wasn’t a combat wizard, but I could pump out mega-positive energy via Venus magic. I rode the elevator to five, strode firmly to the meditation room, and, before I could over-think it, knocked on the door.

  Rafe opened it and leaned casually against the jamb.

  I’d forgotten that a) he was quite that big, b) he was quite that on fire with magic, and c) his naked chest begged quite that loudly for me to open my mouth and suck.

  I stuffed my tongue back where it belonged. “May I come in?”

  “Of course.” He stepped aside but between the size of the doorway (small) and him (enormous), it was barely enough room for me to squeak by. Certainly it wasn’t the mile or more I needed not to feel his heat or smell his arcane, masculine scent.

  I scooted past him to the other side of the room. There I turned and cleared my throat. Cleared it again. Then I opened my mouth to give the go ahead for just-sex-and-damn-the-hormones.

  He shut the door and took one step toward me. He filled my vision and the room, which suddenly was smaller, hotter, and smelled better than any place I’d ever been.

  Desire sheared through me. I trembled with the intensity of it, throbbed with it. Gasped on it.

  My mouth hung open, words unsaid, as my breath rasped in and out. “Just sex” seemed a little naïve right then. There was no “just” anything where this male was concerned.

  I managed, “This enemy…I don’t suppose you can just zap him?”

  “Unfortunately, no.” Rafe crossed his arms, bunching muscles I didn’t think most guys even had. “I can’t ‘zap’ him, as you say, because locating on the physical plane is problematic.”

  “So you said, no GPS. And the ethereal?”

  His eyes swirled. “Jinn magic in the human sphere can have catastrophic consequences.”

  Those eyes sent a jolt through me. “Because jinn power is A-bomb level compared to human?” I’d studied jinn theory, but facts were a little thin on the ground.

  “Size is the major issue. We live on a scale you can only imagine. Humans, to us, are very small.”

  “Like what, poodles? Mice?”

  He shook his head, his braid dancing on his muscled chest, licking it as I’d like to…yeah. He said, “Even smaller. On the mental plane you see humanity as, what? A cloth?”

  “A tapestry.”

  “How big? Room sized? Planet sized?”

  “Well…I don’t know. I only see portions at a time. Maybe a football field?”

  “To me, the entirety of humanity fits here.” He pointed at his open palm.

  The warmth drained from my body. “I see.”

  “Like a hill of ants in my hand.” A tiny holographic hill of articulated bodies appeared in his palm. “I might try to flick away a single ant. But…”

  Forefinger and thumb together, he released his forefinger like a trigger. It plowed into the pile, throwing hundreds of small writhing bits into the air. The explosion of ant bodies fell like a shower. I could almost hear their tiny screams.

  He searched my eyes, perhaps saw the dawning horror there. “Amaia, I’m sorry. Jinn don’t see individual humans, we see humanity. The pile, not the ants. Our magic is too broad-gauged to be useful.”

  “Right.” I understood now what Wenkermann meant when he said jinn were “dangerous”. I cleared my throat. “Okay. No direct jinni-type intervention by you. Is there any other way you can help?”

  “If you were healthy, I might be able to feed you a small bit of my power. But with you sick…well. As weak as your body is, even a trickle of jinn-size power would rip you into shreds.” He shook his head again. “You know what we must do to generate energy.”

  Right. Venus magic with a hot, half-naked jinni.

  Part of me was glad. Guardian angel Rafe was my friend, my ally. I’d always been able to count on him. Loneliness figured in, too. Since leaving my friends on the other coast I’d been hungry for connection. Venus would connect us like nothing else.

  Couple that with the fact that he was gorgeous, the man of my dreams? Yeah. Bucket list.

  He cocked one black brow at me.

  How loud had I thought that? I hid my face in my hands—like that could mute my panic.

  Because no matter how gorgeous he was or how much I wanted this, part of me was still afraid. My parents had proven sex alone could bond. Take the fact that I was already half in love with Rafe, magnify it by a couple jinni-induced orgasms—kiss my heart goodbye.

  In my dark hand-cave I had another thought, only slightly less horrible. Jinni-orgasms were supposedly the kind that grabbed you and slammed you face first into the pavement. Would sex with Rafe make me lose my ability to concentrate? Without full-witch clarity I might lose my grip on my magic.

  No. Sex was just sex.

  I uncovered my face. Rafe’s carved expression was more severe than usual. “Amaia. It’s ten p.m. We have just two hours. If the Venus magic is to be effective we must begin now.” He took a step toward me. Stopped, eyes again softening. “But it’s your choice. I won’t do this if you don’t agree.”

  Just sex. I huffed out air so explosively it was like expelling my heart. I nodded.

  He took another step, and another, until he towered over me. “Say it out loud, Amaia. Make it clear for both of us.”

  Do I have to? Can’t you pluck it from my head? Cowardly, not practical, but I was tired and scared and committing myself to do the thing I swore I never would.

  “The words,” he said softly. “Tell me mentally, but say the words.”

  I…I want to give it a try, at least. I reached deep inside myself for courage and found only practicality. I’d never do this unless I did it now. So, do it now. I’ll have sex with you.

  Ah. And I with you.

  He palmed my head and, with a deep sigh of pleasure, kissed me.

  Oh stars, his tongue, his lips, his heat. His taste, dark, male, full of magic. By the time he lifted his mouth, I was dizzy with longing, my heart pounding. Still fearful, but I’d committed to try. “Will…will this take long, do you think?”

  He considered me, his black eyes glittering with lust-filled sparks. “The balance is skewed toward fear and destruction. It may take several of your human orgasms to compensate.”

  “Sevuh…” I cleared my throat. “How many is several?”

  “I will know better after the first. Perhaps…six?”

  I choked. Half a dozen jinni-powered orgasms in two hours? Would I even live?

  Oh yes. Quite pleasurably. The dark voice was a mental purr.

  Stop that, I gasped. “I changed my mind. I can’t do this.”

  The glitter disappeared, replaced by an almost human look of compassion. Don’t you trust me?

  I blinked. “What?”

  “Amaia, we have known each other for years. In all that time I’ve never hurt you. Don’t you trust me not
to hurt you now?”

  Rafe had always been there for me. The truth cut through my panic. “Well, sure I trust you, but—”

  “Then let me help you with this.” He hugged me close, caressing my hair. It’s just sex. Not scary at all. His petting hand stroked down my head and along my spine, rubbing gently between my shoulder blades. His other hand rested warm on the base of my spine.

  He drew my tension out with his clever stroking fingers. I melted against him. He kissed the top of my head, gently, almost lovingly. I nestled into his arms with a sigh.

  His fingers began to stroke a different rhythm, heavier, more insistent. His hand, resting on my tail bone, was hot, radiating fever into my hips, my bones. My pelvis felt heavy, my sex swollen. I moved restlessly under his hands, brushing my shirt front against his naked torso. It rasped like sandpaper. My nipples tingled.

  His arms tightened around me, pressing me closer to his rock-hard muscles. Thigh to thigh, his hips to my belly, and wonders, his flame-licked chest right under my mouth. I kissed him there, and it was like lipping hot silk.

  “Ah, Amaia, yes.” He pressed his hands to the back of my hips and rolled his pelvis into me. The ridge there was heavy and swollen and insistent.

  An answering heat flared deep inside me and burst in my sex. I thought it was an orgasm. I raised my head in wonder.

  His mouth crashed down and he kissed me, hard.

  His tongue filled me, his heat an oven. I opened wider in welcome, delighting in his hot potent taste, his masculine power. It overwhelmed me, almost drugging me with pleasure—so good when I’d had nothing but pain for so long.

  As he kissed me, I sensed him shaving off an infinitesimal layer of his life force, a glimmer of an atom of a shard, and load it into his jewel wheel where a very sizable erection was building. I had just enough presence of mind to wonder what he was doing—when he ground his hips into mine.

  A cannon ball of magic shot into me, penetrating the barrier of clothes and flesh. Passion energy jagged through me, raising my nipples and every hair on my body. The magic scalded my blood and seared my nerves, sexual pleasure screaming along every path. I was crackling with lust, charged to the full, overcharged—