by Michele Hauf
He sensed the fear in her tone and felt a trace of it shiver down the back of his neck, as well. There was no promise that their future would go smoothly. And he’d never forgive himself if they did have a child and Bea was unable to hold it.
Kneeling before Bea, he clasped her hands and kissed the palms. Pressing his face into her palms, he closed his eyes and prayed that this night would go well. He’d worry about the rest of their life as it came to them. One day at a time.
“Whatever the future holds,” he said, “I’ll be there holding you and we’ll face it together.”
Her mouth spread into a smile and she bowed to hug him, her hair spilling over his face and neck.
The doorbell rang, and, after kissing his wife, Kir then winked. “You ready?”
“Bring it.”
* * *
The Jones brothers were dark, focused and—okay—still a little sexy, Bea decided as she watched them prepare the living room for the grand spell they had detailed to her and Kir. A salt circle was standard and, apparently, so was whiskey. Both men imbibed while setting up the spell area. A lot. As did Kir.
Should she be getting drunk? It might lessen her anxiety. But someone had to remain calm and sober should the spell actually work and Sirque was rescued.
They weren’t really drunk. And TJ did offer Bea a quaff from his bottle, but she politely refused.
“Now.” CJ, the tattooed twin, stood before the salt circle, whiskey bottle dangling near his thigh. Both men were shoeless and oozed a dark sensuality. “TJ and I have determined that neither of us, unfortunately, can make the journey into Faery.”
“Much as I’d kill to venture into that realm,” TJ added, “we’d have to perform such a complex set of wards to even begin to make the journey that it would take too long.”
“I’ll go,” Kir offered. He stepped up beside Bea and put an arm across her back. “Just tell me what I need to do.”
TJ, who had taken to lighting black, white and red candles around the perimeter of the salt circle, shook his head. “Has to be a blood relative.”
Bea realized that CJ was looking directly at her, and she felt the connection of his jade gaze like a bullet piercing her heart. But, of course, it made sense. And she was willing to go back to Faery to find her mother, but...
She looked up into her husband’s eyes. “What if I don’t make it back?”
“She can’t go,” Kir stated.
“She has to,” CJ said. “And don’t worry. We’ll send your doppelgänger, Bea. You’ll remain firmly ensconced in this realm at all times. Trust me.” He winked. “It’s a magic trick.”
She did not feel the levity; nor was she inspired with confidence. Kir rubbed his palm up and down her arm. But she stepped out of his grasp and moved toward the circle. “I’ll do it.” She took her husband’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “I can do this.”
“I know you can. But I’m not sure it’s safe. Can I go with her?” he asked CJ.
TJ stood beside CJ now, shoving the lighter into a front pants pocket. Both gave Kir that don’t-question-just-do look.
“No,” Kir said. “I won’t let her go alone. I’m sorry for dragging you guys all the way over here—”
Bea tugged on Kir’s arm. “We can’t let her remain there. She was so weak. Malrick tortured her. She’ll never find a way out on her own. You promised her, Kir.”
“Right. I promised her. That means I should be the one to go after her and risk the danger involved.”
“Blood only,” CJ reiterated. “If she doesn’t go in, we won’t be able to hold the connection on this side.”
Bea stepped before Kir and grasped both his hands, pleading with him in a silent gaze. Letting him know she wouldn’t stop until she knew Sirque was out of danger.
“The witches say I’ll be safe,” she entreated softly. “And it won’t even be me who goes to Faery.” Which, she didn’t really understand. Her doppelgänger? This could get interesting. “Let me do this, Kir. For as much as you needed to walk away from your pack for me, understand now I have the same desire to walk toward and rescue my mother.”
He nodded. His kiss was long and lingering, and though the twins stood watching, Bea surrendered to the soft warmth of her husband’s mouth and the sure heat of his embrace.
“You won’t drop her hand during the whole procedure,” CJ said to Kir. “I noticed you two are bonded. That’ll provide the lock that holds Bea to this realm.”
“We need to do this now,” TJ interrupted. “The moon is at its zenith, and it could take her days, weeks, to find the demon.”
“Weeks?” Kir asked.
TJ shrugged. “Faery time is different from mortal time. What may seem like moments on our side could be a lot longer over there.”
“We’ve talked enough. It’s time for action.” Bea gripped Kir’s hand and the bond mark glowed. “Just don’t let me go and I’ll be fine.”
She sucked in a breath. Saying the words and believing them were two different things. But she did have faith that her husband would never let her go.
Kir nodded, conceding silently. “What do you need us to do?”
“Bea, step in the circle,” CJ instructed. “We’ve already explained the doppelgänger will arrive in Faery and you’ll search for your mother. You’ll feel Kir’s hand in yours, but you won’t see him. No matter what you do, Bea, don’t drop his hand. You, too,” he said to Kir.
“Never.” He squeezed Bea’s hand as she stepped over the line of salt.
TJ added, “We’ll be able to home in on Sirque through Bea’s blood, so we should be able to place you quite close to her.”
“Ichor,” Bea said. “I don’t have blood in my veins, but ichor.”
“Right. And perhaps a bit of demon blood, eh?” CJ suggested.
Bea nodded. She could never be disgusted by her demon half again after meeting the brave, proud Sirque and witnessing the tremendous sacrifice she had made to help Kir find her. That was one amazing demon chick.
“Then let’s get this party started,” TJ announced, and, with a swallow of whiskey, he then spewed it out toward the lighter he’d reignited. A spray of flame lit the room, and the brothers began to chant and walk the circle in dancing steps.
Bea smiled at Kir, then swallowed and closed her eyes. She didn’t want to look at him anymore. She’d seen him smiling back at her. That is how she wanted to remember him if she never saw him again.
* * *
The moment Bea’s doppelgänger entered Faery, Kir felt it. Her grip loosened in his, and he had to clasp her hand with both of his so as not to lose his hold on her. The bond mark glowed as if a beacon. She was close to him, yet so far away.
CJ had warned him not to step across the salt line or to break it with his boots. But now, only two minutes into the spell, he strained to hold on to Bea, so much so that he leaned backward to counterweight his body so it didn’t slip forward. Her pull was tremendous, but he suspected it was more Faery trying to pull her in completely rather than her petite strength.
The Jones brothers had ceased chanting and now hummed in a resonant tone that reminded him of holy voices echoing out from a monastery. The twosome embodied strange, wicked magic.
The candles flickered at his feet, the flames dancing back and forth as if wind brisked through the room; all windows and the patio door were closed.
He shouldn’t have allowed Bea to do this. He couldn’t bear to lose her again. And he doubted Malrick would be so amiable as to allow his daughter to return for a second time without facing dire consequences.
His palm was slick with sweat. Kir dropped one hand to wipe it along his pants leg, then slapped it back onto Bea’s wrist while he wiped the other hand.
“Hold her hand!” CJ warned.
He quickly resumed the clasp and the bond marks glowed brighter than he’d ever seen. It was as if their skin opened to let out the inner light from their very souls. He wasn’t sure what he would do were Bea not in his life. He didn’t
need children. He only wanted his wife, safe in his arms.
“Ah, hell.”
Kir jerked a look to CJ. “What? What’s wrong?”
TJ leaned forward, across the circle, inspecting Bea’s face. Kir couldn’t see it because she leaned away from him, straining forward as if she wanted to run free from him. Her body was here in this realm, but her consciousness was in Faery.
“What is it?” he yelled, bracing himself to maintain the stronger pull from his wife.
“There’s ichor dripping from her eyes,” TJ said calmly.
“She’s bleeding.” Kir shook his head. “We’ve got to stop this now!”
“It’s not much,” TJ verified. “But I’ve never seen this when we’ve done the spell before.”
Heaving the air in and out of his lungs, Kir struggled with Bea, who suddenly seemed to come back and struggle with him. The candle flames grew, stretching higher than the men’s knees. Sulfur filled the air.
And then, Kir’s body tumbled backward. He hadn’t let go of her hand. He couldn’t have...
“Bea!” he cried as his shoulder hit the floor and he rolled to the side.
Yet he rolled over on top of his wife’s body, and knowing she was there beneath him created a rush of relief through his body. He collapsed on top of her, hugging her, burying his face in her hair with no intention of letting her go.
“It worked,” he heard one of the twins say.
“She’s badly injured,” the other said. “Won’t survive.”
Kir held tightly to Bea, breathing in her sweetness, her Faery sparkle and trusting heart. Even as he processed what the witches were saying, it was difficult to move away from his wife. She could have been lost to him.
“I’ll never lose you,” he said against her cheek, then kissed her closed eyelid, which was slippery with her ichor tears. “I love you.”
“Me, too,” she whispered softly from within the tangle of her hair. “Go help my mother. Please?”
With another squeezing hug, he finally pulled himself away from Bea and turned on bent legs to lean over the salt circle alongside the brothers. The demoness lay in a pool of black blood. One horn had been severed at the temple. Scratches marked her face and neck, and at her chest a wide wound pulsed up thick black blood.
“Can you heal her?” he asked the brothers.
“Not a demon,” TJ said. “We work dark magic, not malefic magic. I’m not sure a warlock would be capable of such.”
“Is she going to survive?”
Kir turned to Bea, who sat up now and had asked the question in a little-girl voice. A little girl who had only just found her mother and needed that promise of a familial connection.
“Truth?” TJ said from over Kir’s shoulder. “She’s in a bad way. I have no idea.”
Bea scrambled over to Kir’s side and he took her hand when she leaned over Sirque’s body. She whimpered and touched her mother’s face.
Sirque stirred. The witches stepped aside, leaving them to this terrible moment. A moment Kir sensed would not end well.
“Bea,” Sirque whispered. Blood drooled from her mouth. “You...saved me?”
“Oh, Mother.” She lay upon Sirque’s damaged body and nuzzled up to her. “I wish we had been made differently so we could have shared this hug long ago. I love you.”
A smile curled Sirque’s mouth and she nodded, accepting her daughter’s love. “Love,” she whispered. “So exquisite.”
“You need to heal, Mother. How can we help you?”
“Daemonia,” she said on a sigh.
“It’s probably her best chance for healing,” CJ said from where he stood outside the circle. “We do know how to expel demons out of this realm. Rather easily, in fact.”
“Then you should do it,” Bea said. She kissed her mother’s cheek and squeezed her hand. “Come back when you are well.”
Sirque closed her eyes and the witch twins took over, restoring the salt circle and then chanting in the Latin that neither Bea nor Kir understood.
Kir slid his hand along Bea’s and bent over to kiss her cheek. “She will come back someday.”
“I know. It was good I got to see her now, though.” She tensed as suddenly the brothers’ magic lit the room with a blue glow and the demon in the center of the circle was gone. “Until we meet again, Mother.”
Chapter 30
Some months later...
Snow coated the yard, yet the sun was high and Bea hadn’t bothered to put on a coat. She wandered into the backyard shed on tiptoes, licking her fingers of chocolate. Kir brought her pain au chocolat every morning for breakfast, left it bedside with a glass of orange juice, then slipped out to work in his shop until she rose.
Leather had been stretched over an intricate wooden frame. The frame had been fashioned by a furniture craftsman Kir had met a month earlier. And the leather, now covered with gorgeous handiwork, gleamed with Bea’s faery dust.
Kir sat on the floor before the object. Glancing over his shoulder, he turned and set a hammer down beside him on the cardboard that served as a rug beneath his work space. “You’re not naked.”
“It is twenty degrees outside.” She teased at the short hem of the sheer pink nightie with the dragonflies embroidered around the skirt. “You don’t like it?”
“Come here, Short Stick.”
She straddled his hips and settled onto his lap.
“Oof,” he said.
“Oh, come on. I haven’t gained that much weight. Have I?” She grabbed a thigh and wished it was a little thinner. And she wouldn’t reach around to gauge how much she’d gained on her ass. That way lay Crazytown.
“You are gorgeous.” He spread his palm over her blossoming belly. “Abundant with life.” He stroked his fingers over her skin and then down to tease between her thighs.
“And for some reason horny as heck lately. Must be the demon in me jonesing for your touch. Are you busy with the project or do you want to take this sparkly bit for a ride?”
“Let’s rock the little guy up and down.”
Bea smoothed a palm over her stomach. “What makes you think it’s a boy?”
“I just know.”
“Yeah? Well, you know it could be a werewolf.”
Bea stood so Kir could unzip his jeans and shuffle them down. “Yep.”
“Or it could be faery. Could be werewolf faery. Or even werewolf demon.”
“I know that.”
“What if it’s demon faery werewolf?”
He shrugged. “I don’t care what it is. Only that our baby is healthy and happy. Will that work for you?”
“It will. So long as I can hold him in my arms, all will be well. I love you, Kir.”
“I love you, Bea.”
And their lovemaking gently rocked the cradle behind them and stirred a glittering cloud of faery dust about them.
* * *
Three months later Bea gave birth in the spring on the day the first anemone bloomed. The faery midwife handed her the squirming infant, swaddled in soft wrapping, and left the happy couple alone in the bedroom of their home.
Kir kissed Bea on the forehead, and, happy tears spilling from his eyes, he bowed to kiss his son on the pert little nose that was a match to his mother’s nose. “He’s perfect.”
“Everything is perfect,” Bea said on a tired sigh.
She closed her eyes and concentrated on the warmth of her son’s head against her chest. Skin against skin. So tender. So luxurious. Did she sense the need to draw him tighter to her and feed upon his vita?
No. And she never would.
She hadn’t seen her mother since the Jones brothers had sent her back to Daemonia, though Sirque had sent a liaison with word that she was doing well and would come to visit when she could.
When Kir tried to take the baby from her, Bea gladly relented and fell into a blissful peace as she watched father and son standing in the sunlight beaming through the window.
Finally, family was hers.
* * *
* *
I hope you enjoyed Kir and Bea’s story! Most of the paranormal romances I write for Nocturne are set in my Beautiful Creatures world. They don’t have to be read in any specific order, but if you like a secondary character, they may have their own story for you to check out. Here are the stories you can find at your favorite online retailer for some characters in this book:
TJ’s story is THIS GLAMOROUS EVIL
CJ’s story is THIS WICKED MAGIC
Blyss’s story is MOONLIGHT & DIAMONDS
Edamite’s story is BEWITCHED
Keep reading for an excerpt from THE IMMORTAL’S REDEMPTION by Kelli Ireland.
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The Immortal’s Redemption
by Kelli Ireland
Prologue
Scotland, 1718
A damp cold seeped into Dylan’s bones. He and another young assassin had spent the night in the hillside cave again, waiting. It was the worst part of his job. He’d rather be active, engaged, whether in subterfuge or killing, because activity meant progress. Waiting meant...waiting. Nothing happened. The sun and moon chased horizons more slowly. And one could only prepare so much before the actions became habitual. And habit would get you killed.
Dylan flipped his kilt higher over his shoulders, his gaze locked on the sun’s first softening of the eastern night sky. The Scottish laird of Clan McKay had made it a personal goal to see the Druids run out of his lands. He’d acted against the peaceful settlements with violence. It was about time the fat bastard met violence in return. He’d have to pass through this valley in order to reach the next Druidic keep. With a fair amount of certainty, Dylan was sure the man would never make it that far. It was, after all, his charge to ensure the laird didn’t make it through this valley.
