by Rachel Shane
“Let me guess, you dumped her in a harsh way.”
He felt a prick in his chest. “I—” Cole sighed. “I didn’t technically break up with her. I just stopped calling her. And seeing her.”
Delilah winced.
Cole rushed in with the third option to distract her. “And my former roommate turned poker rival, Derek Hamel. We were best buds until a few weeks ago when I got an invite into the World Poker Championship and he didn’t. It had come down to him and me.”
“And Britta and Derek both know your new alarm code?” she asked.
Cole nodded. “But they don’t know magic.”
“We can’t be sure of that yet.” She shook her head at him. “Maybe next time you change your code, try not to tell anyone what it is.”
Cole shrugged. “I didn’t think anyone would try to kill me!”
A small smile played on Delilah’s lips. “You’re cocky, you know that?”
He let out a huff. “You think I’m an idiot.”
“Not an idiot so much as naive.”
In all his years, no one had ever called him naive. He was always the life of the party, entertaining guests with true facts about history and the world that impressed them as much as horrified them. He was the first of his friends in high school to lose his virginity and also the first to lose his innocence by dropping out when he won his first million swindling people in poker. Which he promptly lost the next month. Cole was a go-getter, not naive.
But weirdly, this lawyer, this witch, seemed to know more than he did about him and it infuriated him.
Delilah started to put the contract back in the folder when Cole stopped her. “Why is the folder so thick? What else is in here?”
“Usually it’s old wishes you made that came true. Like the ones on birthday candles or stars.”
Cole blinked at her, stunned. “Really?” Redness crested his cheeks as he thought back to his seventh birthday, when he wished for a talking rat. Thankfully that one hadn’t come true.
“Those are considered contracts against the laws of nature.” Delilah flipped through the files, pursing her lips as she extracted the one right below the curse. “What did you say your ex-girlfriend’s name was?”
“Britta Sinclair.”
Delilah’s eyes skimmed over a page. “And how did you two meet?”
A little wrinkle bridged between Cole’s brows. “The old-fashioned way. In a bar. No dating apps involved.” The whole world had stopped when Cole first spotted Britta sitting on a stool in a low-cut dress, her breasts spilling over the top, and winking at him as she plucked the cherry out of her cocktail and sucked on it. At that moment, Cole knew he had to have her, and have her he did. Every night for six months. For those six months, all he wanted to do was be near her, nestle his face in her neck, breathe in her heady scent. Until one day, Cole woke up and realized his feelings for her had…gone. He couldn’t remember why he even liked her in the first place. “Why are you asking me this?”
Delilah held out the second package of pages to him. “Because she put a love spell on you six months ago that only recently wore off.”
CHAPTER FOUR
DELILAH
Calls to Britta Sinclair went on unanswered and a pop over to her house proved no one was home. Too bad. Delilah was extra curious to meet the girl who not only stole Cole’s heart but also used magic to do it.
“Do you know where she might be?” Delilah tried to keep her voice light, like this was no big deal. But if Britta had created the curse, Delilah needed both Cole’s and Britta’s blood to break it.
Cole laced his fingers behind his head and paced. “She’s a consultant. Travels all the time to meet clients. She could be anywhere.”
His words echoed in her head like a gong, forcing Delilah into step, both of them pacing on the manicured front lawn of his ex-girlfriend’s house. She knew what she had to suggest but she wasn’t sure if Cole could handle it. “There’s a Plan B,” she whispered.
Cole paused, his chest heaving, his eyes locked on her.
“Whoever performed the spell needed to spread both sets of blood over the grave in order to bind you to it.” She tried to inject her words with cheerleader pep, like this was great news. “If I could evaporate the blood from the earth, I might be able to stop the curse without needing the culprit at all.”
Cole shook his head frantically at the suggestion, dark hair whipping into his eyes. “No. Absolutely not. I won’t be able to resist.”
Delilah gave him a slight smile, resting her hand on his shoulder. “I’ll protect you. I promise.” I hope.
Cole face crumpled. “You’re going to be busy creating a spell. You won’t be able to stop me. I won’t be able to stop me.” He let out an anguished sound and pulled out his phone.
“What are you doing?”
“Calling for reinforcements.”
“Do it on the way.” She headed to the car and much to her relief—and surprise—Cole followed like a dutiful puppy.
Delilah swerved into traffic, fitting her car between lanes. It took all her willpower to stay below the speed limit. Because there was one part of the curse contract she hadn’t told Cole about. He was running out of time. The curse was set to get stronger with each passing hour and soon it would be six p.m. and she’d have to get far, far away from him.
“Hey,” Cole said into the phone, his voice equal amounts of clipped and scared as hell. “Can you meet me there?” His eyelids twitched. “Please.” The word was a whisper, but it had as much power as the most powerful spells. It proved intent. Cole was scared as hell. And he thought whoever was on the other line might protect him.
He clicked the phone shut and rested his head against the backseat, eyes closed. His chest pumped raggedly. In his lap, his hand shook as if he was trying to hold it back from ripping open the door.
Her gut twisting, Delilah reinforced the locks with a brief incantation. “Who was that?”
“My sister.” He let out a sharp laugh. “That’s right, I called a babysitter. I’m a fucking grown man and I need someone to watch me.”
Delilah stifled a twinge in her chest, and she realized she ached to help him. “This is only temporary. We’ll fix it.” She rested her hand on his and squeezed. His fingers felt warm, and for the first time in a long time, she felt grounded next to him. Like his grasp was the only thing keeping her afloat.
He ripped his hand away and raked it through his hair. “Can’t you go any faster?”
Delilah’s hand stung from the cold air slapping against it without his touch. “Not unless you want to waste time getting pulled over.” But she also thought of another reason, one she kept to herself. The longer it took to get to the grave, the more time she could spend with him. He’d passed her first test when he refused to back down at her insistence of not helping him. And he passed her second test when he made her laugh.
And, okay, the glimpse of rock hard abs he showed her was already imprinted on her mind.
God, she was such a sucker for poker players. She loved a guy who knew how to take risks. She herself had taken a risk on more than one gambler in the last few years…and lost. But that didn’t mean she wouldn’t throw her chips in the next time a jackpot came around.
Cole breathed hard and jiggled the doorknob. He whipped his head to Delilah with the gravest of expressions. His voice came out serious. “Distract me.”
A sharp jolt of panic rocketed through her. The sage was wearing off. “How’d you get into poker?”
“After high school.” His words came out clipped, like he was forcing them past the breath he was desperately holding back. “Needed cash. I met some guys who played in the back room of clubs. I got good. Really good.” As he spoke each word, his shoulders relaxed. His eyes closed. It was working. “I started playing bigger tournaments…and winning them. Until recently when suddenly it was as if all my luck had run out.” He swallowed. “Now I owe millions.”
His words made her stomach squeeze. This p
oor guy. In poker, you have to come across as tough. You have to be stoic. And here he was showing all his cards.
“I never wanted to be a witch,” she said fast. Anything to grab his attention. Keep him focused on her and not the grave killing him from the inside. “I never even knew such a thing existed in real life. It’s not something inherited by genetics but by chance. Nature chooses you. Not many people have the discipline.” She was rambling, saying whatever came to her mind.
He let go of the door handle. “Why are you a divorce lawyer as a cover?”
“It’s not a cover. I do my fair share of non-magical law too—provided clients actually book appointments with me,” she teased. “And I went into divorce law because I like fixing things. And sometimes fixing things means getting people out of horrible situations.” Delilah gave him a grin. “Like yours.”
He laughed. “I think you’re the first person to ever refer to divorce proceedings as mending something rather than destroying it completely.”
“If I can get two people to agree to terms, then I’ve restored balance.”
He stared at her with such intensity that Delilah shivered under his appraisal. With effort, she forced her eyes away from his beautiful face and focus on the road. They were nearing the exit to the cemetery now and her shoulders braced in anticipation of the grave’s call under his breastbone growing stronger.
But he stayed focused on her. “If you consider breaking people up as a way to heal the world…what do you do for fun?”
Living in Vegas, the easy answer would be going out. A bar—but a local bar, not a touristy one. A coffee shop—downtown filled with start-up employees and hipsters. A casino—Cole’s second home. Any of those would have been acceptable, and she suspected Cole was waiting for her to say one of them. So he could place her in a world he understood. But that wasn’t her world. Delilah did go out, but not in the way he was thinking. Because the truth was…Cole wasn’t the only one cursed.
“I spend my nights the same way I spend my days. I go out looking for people in trouble and then I help them get out of it.”
He raised a brow. At the top of his hairline, a bead of sweat formed. “Why?”
“Because I have to. Just like the grave calls to you, this is my calling.”
On the third day of her Bindings and Entanglements class, Delilah’s professor presented them with a test that would encompass their entire grade. Another binding. This one tying them to the call of duty. Every night, an intense compulsion to help those in need swelled within their veins, carrying them into the streets. On the first night, Delilah tried to ignore the call. Her bones ached and her insides revolted, turning her violently ill until her legs forced her into the dark night. That night, she prevented a mugging by sinking her fist into the attacker’s gut despite not knowing how to throw a proper punch. The attacker fled and her nausea receded…until the next night.
The students thought their assignment was to break the curse by the end of the semester. But Delilah refused. The curse gave her a sense of purpose. A constant in her life after years of moving from town to town whenever her dad got a new job. She’d gone into law because she wanted to help people and here she had been given the gift to do so.
To Delilah, it wasn’t a curse. It was a new way of life.
Her other classmates broke the curse and promptly failed the assignment. Because the real assignment was to embrace it, not break it.
She was the only one who passed the class.
“It doesn’t bode well for me that you weren’t able to break your own curse, does it?” Sweat poured down Cole’s cheeks as they neared the grave. Red rocky mountains surrounded the area like a cage, sparse yucca trees looking out of place in their lone sentinel guard.
“I’m living with it by choice. If I wanted to break it, I could.”
He shook his head and laughed. “Man, I swindle people for a living and you swindle yourself out of a life.”
“That’s the thing about nature,” Delilah said. “It’s all about checks and balances.”
He tilted his head at her. “So this isn’t the thing you want my help with? Breaking your curse?”
Delilah smiled sadly. “Not even close.”
When they reached the gravesite and Delilah cut the engine, Cole rattled the car door to no avail. Delilah’s protection spell kept it locked shut. He flung his arm backward, raising it high in the air in preparation to strike the window. She fumbled in her purse and then slapped handcuffs around his wrist. In her line of business, it was best to keep a set or two at the ready. Cole jerked forward, trying to rip his cuffed arm out of her grasp. Before he could, Delilah snapped the adjoining cuff onto her own wrist.
Cole pried his fingers beneath his cuff and tried to slide it off. She’d seen men break their own hands just to fulfill a curse. “Get it off! I’m going to take you into the grave with me if you leave this thing on!”
Delilah squeezed his cuffed hand, lacing her fingers within his. “I won’t let that happen.”
But deep down she worried she wasn’t strong enough to stop this.
“Listen, I want you to take deep, concentrated breaths. Focus your mind on only your breath. Place one foot in front of the other slowly. Okay?”
He squeezed his mouth shut, face turning red from the effort of holding himself back. But he nodded. Delilah lifted the curse on the door and slid out of the driver’s side first. He climbed over the console slowly, taking great care with each maneuver, and then exited the car. His feet landed on dry baked earth, legs wobbling as he fought to stay rooted in place.
Torrid heat beat down on their shoulders, laced only with the brief and sporadic chill of a light breeze. Wind-worn rock formations blocked most of the wind. Up above, squawking birds covered the sound of Delilah’s racing heart. Cole tilted his face up to the sky and sucked in a massive breath.
And then he spun and raced toward the cemetery entrance, tugging her feet into a fast clip.
Delilah barked out a curse—an actual curse, not a swear—that halted him in place, freezing his body in mid-air. His muscles rippled as if he was still trying to outrun her from within the binding.
“Think of what you have to live for. Picture it in your mind.” Howling wind snatched her hair and whipped it around her face. The air carried the scent of dust.
“My nephews,” Cole said out of nowhere. “They look up to me. They don’t have a dad. I’m their only father-figure.”
Delilah’s heart ached at that news and she realized the worst thing of all. She wasn’t sure she could save him. “Good.” Her voice cracked. “Picture them. Think of how much they need you.”
He jutted his chin toward the wrought iron fence encasing the cemetery. “They’re over there.”
She whipped her head in the direction he’d pointed and spotted a woman herding three rowdy children as they raced across the graves like this was all a game to them. They weaved in and out of monochromatic headstones, ducking low behind each. The kids ranged in sizes with the littlest one stumbling and falling every few steps and the oldest one leaping over the stones to get away from his brothers.
“I’m in control now,” Cole whispered, hands balled into fists, feet spread apart in a fighting stance.
Delilah lifted the freeze spell off Cole and he marched at a determined pace toward his family, dragging Delilah with him. Cole’s sister rushed over to them and wrapped her arms around him, forcing Delilah to awkwardly stand at the edges of their affection. Cole’s sister’s mousy brown hair waved like a flag around her face and revealed her protruding ears. Her brown eyes studied Delilah as she stepped back. “Are you the one who’s going to save my brother?” The woman’s chest stilled.
Delilah forced the words through gritted teeth. “Yes.” She hoped they’d attribute her breaking voice to the dry heat. “I’m Delilah.”
Cole’s sister held out her hand and gave Delilah the weakest handshake she had ever felt. “Jewel Rafferty. Cole’s sister.” Jewel wrapped her arm
s around Cole again.
He finally pushed her off, his gaze fixated on the tombstones in the distance. Delilah held him back with a jerk of the handcuffs.
“It’s okay,” Jewel said in a soothing voice, her eyes locked on her brother. “You can let him go. I took precautions.”
Delilah’s shock at Jewel’s statement must have loosened her tug on Cole because he took off at a fast clip, jerking Delilah into a run after him. They trampled over the mottled yellow grass that sparsely popped out of the dirt packed ground, dodging marble headstones by millimeters. Delilah’s knee grazed the bottom of a palm tree. “Hey!” she shouted. “Slow down.”
But Cole ran faster, his head bent in determination like a sprinter reaching the final stretch of a marathon. Each revolution of his legs clearly reinforced his desire, and Delilah could practically feel how desperate he was to reach his end.
Cole jerked to an abrupt stop, dust spraying upward in a cloud at his feet. Delilah lurched and crashed into him. His arms encircled her tight as he let out a cry at the sight before them. Wooden planks covered the grave, cement securing them in place. Cole dropped to his knees, dragging Delilah down with him, and tried to pry up the planks with the fingers of his uncuffed hand. Splinters scraped his palms but he ignored the redness swelling his flesh.
Jewel’s children traipsed over the planks, holding their arms out for balance. The littlest one fell to a splat and started crying. Jewel rushed over to him and pulled him into his arms.
“Remove it!” Cole cried out. “No, wait.” He pulled out his phone and started furiously typing something. “God damn it. I need a construction company right this minute.”
Delilah bit her lip as she studied Jewel’s handiwork. It was a good idea to prevent Cole from crawling deep inside—but it ruined any chance Delilah had of evaporating the blood from the earth. And removing the cement via magic would lift the blood out as well. Magic didn’t discriminate by substance and wasn’t as easily controlled. A spell that would get rid of the cement would seek out anything foreign to the grave and destroy it. In Jewel’s attempt at helping Cole, she condemned this curse to be permanent.
