by Eden Butler
“That’s a lot of people coming here to find something that maybe can’t be found.” I felt the vibration of my sister’s voice as she looked up at me. That frown, the stupid, scrunched up dip between her eyes—there was real fear and worry in her expression. “I’d hate to be you.”
“It does suck sometimes.”
“But you aren’t worried?”
The water was cold with the smallest flecks of ice floating around the bottle when I drank from it. I could deflect my response to my sister’s comment, but not for long. She knew me too well. She’d see right through me if I tried to deny I wasn’t generally concerned about how things could turn out during our search.
“You worry enough for the both of us.” I took another swallow when she only continued to glare at me, forgetting for a moment that Mai wouldn’t let me hide my fear for too long. “Besides, this is nothing compared to the search party last year in Ohio. Those mortals brought out the National Guard and four different sheriff departments from three counties. All of them going off of my direction.”
Mai made a little sound of surprise and touched my arm to pull my attention to her shocked face. “You told them you were psychic?”
“I told them I had a gut feeling. They didn’t much care how I knew, just that I did.” My sister relaxed with my explanation and leaned against the counter as I mirrored her stance. “Mortals see and believe what they want, you know that. It doesn’t matter if the truth is right there in front of their eyes. They’ll only see what their brain tells them makes sense.”
Mai nodded at the crowd outside that window. “These aren’t mortals, Jani.”
“Which is good. No need to lie to them.”
When I straightened and turned back to stare out of the window again, Mai joined me and we both watched the weres and covens tossing their packs and listening to Bane as he and his shifter friend Wyatt pointed toward the forest.
“Yes, but that means they’ll expect more from you.” She paused, taking the bottle of water from me. “I’m worried about this. I’m worried that whoever took the Elam is going to target you.”
“They won’t touch me.”
“How do you know?”
Mai didn’t fight me for the bottle when I took it. “Bane won’t let them.”
My twin’s smile was wide and hopeful, advertising the intent behind that look. She wanted me back in the Cove and I guess being around Bane gave her a little too much hope that might happen. I almost hated deflating that pretty bubble of anticipation. “Get over yourself, nosy witch. It’s not like that.”
“So you say.”
I stared at my twin, shaking my head when that wide grin didn’t falter in the least. “It’s like you forgot that we aren’t eighteen anymore.”
“I know what I see and I know what drove you away ten years ago.” She didn’t, not really, no one did, but Mai liked to think of herself as all-knowing when it came to love. More specifically, when it came to me and love. She’d been way off her game for a long damn time.
“He’s engaged, Mai, and not interested in anything with me. Besides, this is a job. The money will help with my debt and doing well will help Papa’s business save face.” She frowned, as though only just remembering that it was her husband who’d ruined things for our father. “Stop with the grimace. You’ll get wrinkles.”
“Ronan…”
“You were stupid in love with him.” She didn’t loosen the tight set of her mouth when I nudged her, seeming unwilling to let me tease her a little. I hated Mai letting that guilt get inside of her. “He was a charmer and good looking. We’ve all done stupid things when our libidos are firing on all cylinders.”
Finally, that frown eased and my sister shook her head. “What have you done because of your cylinders?”
“Stupid, stupid people, sis.”
“You aren’t the only one.” Two shifters approached the door, pulling our attention away from talk of wayward cylinders, and I smiled at the slow grin that came across Wyatt Rimmel’s mouth when he nodded to us both.
Ten years back, I’d met Wyatt one afternoon after I had ditched the last fifteen minutes of English Lit. He’d been waiting on Bane, a surprise visit, he’d claimed. “It’s his eighteenth birthday this weekend,” he’d told me as I nodded at the comfortable spot he’d taken up on the hood of my patchy, rusted, holes-in-the-bumper ‘68 Shelby.
“That right?” The shifter hadn’t moved, so I edged him off the hood and dumped my backpack onto the front seat. “This information should matter to me somehow?”
“You’re Jani,” Wyatt had said, laughing when my face went flushed and blotchy.
I slammed the car door, which rattled the front window and the shifter finally slid off my car. “How do you know?”
“Folks talk.” Eyes shifting to my tight grip on the door handle, Wyatt relaxed, seeming like he found my little bout of curiosity funny. “Especially smitten folk who try to play like no one touches them.”
“Who on earth…” But I hadn’t needed to ask the question. I knew, of course I did, but couldn’t seem to bring myself around to thinking that Bane wanted anything other than to trade long, knowing, unresolved looks with me. “What’d he say?”
With another laugh, Wyatt had leaned against my car. “Ah, beautiful, what kind of friend would I be if I let my boy’s secrets spill?”
“Honest,” I offered. “Helpful.” My smile couldn’t quite match his, but Wyatt seemed to have gotten a kick out of my exuberance.
“Shameless. I like it.” He moved in closer, too close for my liking and he knew, saw that he made me a little uncomfortable as I stepped back. He didn’t follow, but did offer a generous examination of my frame, my face, before the smile he wore turned genuine. “I see now. You’re something else.”
“You’ve heard different?”
“No. I haven’t heard anything but good. Maybe,” he’d said, sidling a little closer, “just maybe you should take initiative, jump before he can break away?”
My go-to defense was always to curl a bit inside myself and back then, Wyatt’s confession had stirred up a lot inside of me. Still, I thought that maybe he was messing with me, just to get under my skin. Teenage boys did that. Hell, my brother still does that.
When I didn't respond, Wyatt cut me some slack and stepped away, a decent enough distance that I felt relieved. “Listen, Jani, it’s only my gut instinct, but I know what I’ve been told and I know what I see in front of me. You like him, get him.”
“It’s not like that. He’s…taken.”
“Hell, beautiful, no one’s taken, not really. Especially not that one.” Wyatt nodded over my shoulder and I looked around, eyes blinking fast when I noticed Bane watching us closely as he came down the steps of the school. I kept my gaze on Bane and that curious, mildly irritated expression of his. But Wyatt moved closer, stepping to my side so he could whisper in my ear. “Sometimes, you gotta take what’s yours before anyone else can latch on to it.”
“He’s not mine.” I had my door open and my butt on the seat before Bane made it into the parking lot.
“No? Well, shit, maybe I should change my plans and keep you company this weekend, Miss Jani.”
Engine running and my hand on the wheel, I’d smiled up at Wyatt and laughed at the glint in his eyes and the way he hadn’t looked at my face. “You’re a hell of a lot of trouble, aren’t you?”
“Absolutely.”
“Then I’d probably be better off ignoring everything you just told me.”
Wyatt shrugged and glanced to his left as Bane walked closer. “It’ll probably keep me from a busted nose if you do.”
“Well, I’d hate to come between two secret-keeping friends.”
“You do that, Jani, and I’ll owe you one.”
“I’ll remember that.”
And I had, just then as Wyatt strolled into the kitchen followed by a younger, smaller version of himself. The Rimmell genes were excellent and Wyatt still had the same soft features tha
t were exaggerated by the smooth shape of his jaw and the whirl of green in his hazel eyes.
“You here so I can collect?”
Wyatt’s laugh was still loud, still carried around the room with very little effort. He remembered. “Never said a thing, did you?”
“Nope.”
“Then why’d I still end up with a bloody nose that weekend?”
He leaned against the counter, sizing me up, looking like he wanted to see the differences, the similarities from the kid he had met that one time years ago.
“Got me,” I said, folding my arms as Wyatt kept looking me over. Only this time, I didn’t mind the examination. This time I could stand the scrutiny a man often gives a woman. They could look all they wanted. At least until I shut them down. “I didn’t tell a soul.”
“How you been, Jani?” he finally asked, ignoring the shifter next to him when he cleared his throat.
“Good. Only back for this one job.” At my side, Mai shuffled her feet and I finally pulled my gaze from Wyatt’s handsome face. “This is my twin sister, Mai.” A nod and Wyatt shot her a smile.
“Twins? Wow. That seems a little unfair.” My sister and I both frowned at Wyatt’s friend when he laughed, his gaze volleying between us. “Two beautiful woman, twins at that, in one small town. Not fair at all.”
“Look at you with the flattery,” Mai said.
“I call ‘em like I see them, Miss.”
Wyatt slapped his friend on the shoulder. “This is my little cousin, Joe Arvel. He’s from our pack in Columbia.”
Pleasantries were exchanged, handshakes were given, and at Wyatt’s explanation, I noticed how similar the two shifters were to each other—same narrow eyes, same elongated noses and each had high cheekbones that made their eyes nearly vanish when they smiled. But where Wyatt was sandy-haired with a few waves touching the back of his neck, Joe had dark, thick hair cut short and tight.
“So this is the famous Janiver Benoit?” Joe asked, waving off his cousin when Wyatt elbowed him. My cocked eyebrow had Joe shrugging. “Sorry, but Bane said you were the best at tracking.”
I bet he did and just for a second, I wondered what else Bane had said to the two cousins.
“She is the best,” Mai said. “She doesn’t track, she finds.”
“Oh, Joe, there you are,” we heard as Lennon walked into the kitchen. He offered me a nod, then smiled easy, but still the professional. “Mr. Iles said that you and Wyatt...” Lennon nodded to the pair of them and then moved his gaze back toward me, straightening his spine when that gaze stopped on my sister.
There was a quick pull against the lines that we all seemed to feel. My skin went warm, tingled like I’d ran around a carpeted room in fuzzy socks, and Wyatt and Joe stepped back, away from Lennon as though he threw off a pheromone only the shifters could sense. At my side, Mai’s voice hummed, but she shook her head, blinking when Lennon cleared his throat. “Miss…that is, Mrs. Phillips. How…how are you feeling?”
“Fine, thank you, Lennon.” I’d never seen Mai so timid around a man. I’d certainly never seen her fidget the way she did then with her foot bouncing against the tile floor. She’d never had to be timid before. My sister was beautiful, with her hair a shade or two lighter than my chestnut brown and she had beautiful pale skin and green eyes that shone against her complexion. Men gravitated toward her without any encouragement on Mai’s part.
She never had to cajole or flirt. And she’d never done the awkward, anxious thing when a man she liked paid attention to her. So this, between my sister and Bane’s guard, was just plain weird. We all stood there a moment, watching, it seemed, for who would speak again, Lennon or Mai and when this ridiculous back and forth shyness would play itself out.
Finally, with Joe clearing his throat, Mai stopped staring at Lennon and the guard nodded at her. “I’ll just…I’m…” And with that she stepped away from the counter to fuss with the cabinet next to the fridge, out of sight of Lennon’s gaze.
“Pardon, Joe, Wyatt…Mr. Iles says your pack will head out first.”
“Nice to meet you, Janiver,” Joe said, shaking my hand again and I blinked, pulling my attention away from my sister’s odd behavior. Joe’s skin was rough with calluses on the inside of his palm and as he gripped my fingers, I felt a cool, relaxed sensation passing from his skin to mine. It made me wonder if Joe had a little more than shifting magic beneath that tall, wide frame.
Wyatt nodded, gave me a small wink before he left and I ignored that flirty smile as I took my hand back from Joe. “Please, call me Jani. Everyone does.”
“Or Miss Benoit,” Bane said, coming into the room. Wyatt slapped him on the back as they met at the doorway, but I waved Joe off, doing my best to remind myself that Bane was the client. If he didn’t want anyone being too friendly, that was his prerogative.
Still, I didn’t need him speaking for me. “Jani is fine. It was good to meet you as well.”
From my peripheral, I could make out Mai’s shifting gaze, how she watched Lennon as Joe left and the guard listened as Bane said something to him in private. This skittish, shy twin burgeoned close to sad. “Here.” My sister frowned when I handed her a glass bottle from the counter, whiskey with a bite, but she didn’t outright refuse it.
“I don’t…”
“Please. You’re a smitten kitten. Have a drink. You’ll be all on your own with Lennon tonight. You’re gonna need liquid courage.”
“Look who’s talking.” She handed me the bottle, glancing toward the two wizards as they chatted. Well, Bane chatted and Lennon nodded after every instruction his boss gave him. “Mr. Senior Year Fantasy will be right beside you for thousands of acres. You’ll be sleeping under the moonlight three feet from him.” I choked on the liquor and my twin laughed. “Uh, huh, now who’s the smitten kitten?” She laughed when I flipped her off and then kissed my cheek. “Be safe. Be smart,” she said, leaving me in the kitchen with that bottle and the Fantasy.
Another swig, this one going down with a burn.
“That’s not going to hinder your reach once we get out into the forest and you try to search for the Elam?”
“No,” I said, closing my eyes when Bane stood next to me. “It’ll heighten it.”
“So you say.”
I took another sip. “I do.” Then another before I nodded at the black runes that were tattooed around his forearms. I couldn’t make out their meaning, but knew there were many Celtic and some Druid markings that seemed vaguely familiar. A majority of the patterns looked Asian-influenced. They weren’t tattoos, really. They were marks of knowledge, lessons taken and given, used to hone his craft.
“Some of us didn’t need to train in Tibet with thousand-year-old mages to learn our craft.” Made a little bolder by the liquor, I stepped into Bane’s personal space and ran the tip of my fingernail over the runes wrapped around his forearm. “All these runes, all that pain and blood, I never once had to suffer so much for my craft.”
“Maybe,” Bane said, taking the bottle from me, “if you had, you wouldn’t need the liquor.”
“Maybe I like the liquor.” My tongue felt heavy in my mouth and I wasn’t sure why my voice had suddenly lowered or how I could feel the ley lines whispering against my mind.
But Bane wasn’t drinking and I doubted the lines could touch him. He was too versed in blocking raw magic. Still, he didn’t seem wholly unaffected and for whatever reason, he at least didn’t object at how closely I stood in front of him. “You strike me as the type of witch who likes things that are bad for her.”
The laughter came quickly, with a sudden reminder of the worst possible thing for me—the wizard standing inches away. Unbidden, a memory of that solitary day when I’d bitten the forbidden fruit and I forgot myself for just a moment filled my head. Maybe I was drunk on the liquor. Maybe the lines were speaking, taunting too loudly anytime Bane was near. Whatever it was, I didn’t restrict my words or the blatant way I flirted. “Oh, baby, you got zero idea.”
&
nbsp; Bane blinked. I blinked and just for a second I savored the silent room, the energy that built between us then. “Did you…did you just call me baby?”
It was if he’d unstoppered a drain and I twirled down into its belly. Mortification, humiliation, it had to be all over my face, easily read in my expression. But I was not a witch that would admit defeat, or mistakes made so quickly. I was a natural survivor. I’d say anything to weasel my way out of a tight spot. Or utter humiliation.
“No.” There was a touch of humor in my response—forced and clearly fabricated—but it didn’t stop me from making that sound or stepping back when Bane held my wrist.
“You did.” He pinned me in the corner of the counter with that wide body nearly engulfing me in shadow and heat. “Damn.” Bane came so close, mouth too near my neck as though he was just managing to control himself and not devour me right then and there. “Why do I like that?”
I knew why and just then, I hated that he didn’t. Because you claimed me! Ten years ago, I wanted to scream. Because I am yours, because you belong to me.
Some part of him had to know the truth, despite the block I had put on his memories. Somewhere, behind all that power, the knowledge, the lists of lines of duty and expectations, lay the hidden memory of that one blissful afternoon with me in that empty classroom. The day our nexuses melded. The day we claimed each other.
The way Bane looked at me, the deep focus of his gaze on my mouth, shifting across my fingers brought us closer and closer to the edge of something that could mean nothing but misery. For him, at least. And I couldn’t stop it. I didn’t want to stop it.
All around us seemed to settle; every sound, every scent, just like it had that day, just like it had the first time we kissed. The only sound I could clearly hear was the steady, rhythmic pulse of his heart and mine—two separate bodies moving toward each other, closer, nearer until Bane’s stubble grazed on my cheek and he held my head still, insistent between his fingers.
I had only to tilt my head back a little. Move my chin, wet my bottom lip and he’d take my mouth. It was all there on his face. Expressions that told a thousand stories, made a million promises and I wanted them all inside me with him, where he was meant to be.
