by Chloe Adler
“Why have I never seen it before? I would have noticed this ring on your finger, Sadie. What’s going on?”
“Nothing.” I was prickly. Defensive. “I lost it shortly after we met, but it turned up again yesterday. It was sitting on my vanity.”
His eyes widened. He reached out toward the ring and then pulled back again, bringing his gaze to mine.
“It’s almost exactly the same as the one my mother wears,” he said.
“Can’t be.” I shook my head. “It’s one of a kind.”
“So is hers,” he responded as he reached for my hand, pulling it toward his face.
“Ryder, wait, don’t,” I called out as he gently brought the ring to his mouth and kissed it. It was a light kiss, like the kind of kiss you would place on the forehead of an infant.
The ring glowed, heat crawling up my finger.
“What the—?” I started to say, but the black and white tiles under our feet warped and shifted.
I was thrown off balance, falling as the movement continued up the walls. For a moment, the house turned liquid. Everything was wavering and shimmering as if we’d suddenly been plunged underwater, caught in an earthquake in the ocean’s depths.
“I’m falling!” My voice was elongated, like I was calling out from the bottom of a jar.
I fell slowly, time warping around me. Ryder caught me on the way down, my head in line with the sharp angle of the filthy toilet.
“Are you okay?” he asked. His voice came out the same way mine had, slow and elongated.
I’d never taken psychedelic drugs before but I imagined this is what it would look and feel like if I did.
“I think so.”
Then the shaking started again in earnest. The tremor was small at first. I hadn’t regained my balance yet but Ryder was holding me tightly, muscular arms wrapped snuggly around my torso. When the shaking increased, we plummeted to the floor. Ryder landed on his butt, pulling me protectively into his lap.
“What’s happening?” I shouted in his ear. There was a loud whooshing like that of a low-flying airplane overhead.
“No idea,” he shouted back.
We could barely hear each other. I wanted to scream a little bit because, for the first time in a very long while, I was actually afraid. Not scared for our lives, exactly. If it was an earthquake, I knew we’d be fine. Earthquakes happened often in California. Rarely were they dangerous, so we were all used to them. But this didn’t feel like a normal earthquake.
The shaking morphed into a bucking, like we were riding the world’s biggest rodeo horse. He had to throw his arms around my head to keep it from toppling toward the tub. My eyes widened and I screamed as we jutted forward, arms splaying out instinctively. Ryder, a complete gentleman even in times of strife, had somehow maneuvered himself underneath me, cushioning my fall.
Lying there together, as a unit, he ran a soothing hand up and down my back until the shaking stopped.
“It’s going to be okay, I’ve got you,” he whispered in my ear as the noise died down.
My head was buried in his chest, my eyes closed tightly. After it was over, we didn’t move for a minute or two before we both opened our eyes and stared at each other. I knew I had that scared-cat look on my face.
I never liked that look, it made me feel vulnerable. I don’t like feeling vulnerable.
“Wow, that was really scary,” Ryder said and I was glad he was the one to say so.
I nodded at him, unable to speak.
“Did you hurt anything?” he asked, concern lacing his voice.
I shook my head no. We were splayed on the tile floor like displaced fish flopping on dry land after a tsunami.
I got up slowly. The bathroom looked completely different from before the quake. I turned toward Ryder, my mouth unhinged in a most unladylike way. The dirt and grime from the floor, toilet and sink were gone. Everything sparkled like it had just been cleaned. The old, clunky, built-in corner tub was now a decadent, freestanding claw-foot tub complete with a high back and shiny silver knobs.
I used the side of the opulent tub to rise, finding myself in front of a lovely pink-tiled sink. Even the dingy toilet looked shiny and new. The only thing that remained the same were the black and white tiles on the floor, a shinier version of the little octagons.
Ryder was facing the doorknob, an elaborate brass number. He reached toward it, slowly, slower than I would have, and tentatively touched it, then pulled his hand back.
“What’s wrong?” I asked him.
“I don’t know what we’ll find on the other side of this.”
“Time to find out,” I said in a shaking voice that betrayed my true emotions. I was scared witless. I sucked in a deep breath and plunged my hand forward, but Ryder met me there and placed his on top of mine, resting on the changed knob.
“Together,” he said as we twisted it.
I gasped and fell back into Ryder. Reminiscent of Narnia, the only thing unchanged about the room was the size and shape of it. Everything else was different. It was as though someone from HGTV had cleaned and staged the area in the five minutes we’d been in the bathroom. The furniture was what really caught my eye. It was vintage nineteenth century and gorgeous, even to me, a modern girl.
The breath in Ryder’s throat hitched as he inspected our surroundings. The expression of surprise looked good on him. I felt a stirring in my nether regions before internally berating myself.
“Was it under some sort of spell or glamour?” he asked me.
I shook my head to clear the inappropriate thoughts and shrugged. “I may have been born to the most powerful witch on the planet but she has spent little time training me in the arts.”
“That doesn’t even make sense.” Ryder’s voice was raised, accusatory.
I waved my hand at the room, fluttering my wrist. “This doesn’t make sense.”
We both stepped out into the room together and I walked toward an exquisitely carved Victorian love seat. I wanted to make sure it was real and reached toward the pristine upholstery.
“Wait.” Ryder slapped my hand away.
“Why?”
“Let me do it, just in case . . . of anything.”
My knight. I nodded in agreement and watched as he reached toward it, just one finger outstretched.
He touched it quickly, but gently. Nothing happened. Not a waver.
“Well,” my smile so large it bared my teeth, “the earth didn’t open up and swallow us whole. That’s got to be a good sign.”
“I think it means that what we were seeing before was the glamour.”
“Oh, really? But why did it change, then?”
“I think it had something to do with your ring.”
“My ring?” I looked down at my finger, twisting the ring around so that the face of the large raindrop crystal lay against my palm. I closed my hand over it.
But Ryder clasped my hand in his, gently prying my fingers open. He spun the ring around again and stared at it. A sound caught in his throat as the crystal faced him. “Wow.”
“What?” I tried to pull my hand away.
He didn’t meet my eyes. “It’s basically the same exact ring as my mother’s, but with a different stone. Yours looks to be quartz. Hers is citrine.”
“But . . .”
“She told me it was a family ring. The power it had was the same as yours. Dispelling glamour.”
I stared at the band, intricately twisted branches made out of silver.
“It has other powers too,” he said and I was about to ask him what they were when he continued, “I don’t know what they are.”
My head cocked. If it was in his family and it was in my family, then . . . what did that mean exactly? That his family and my family were somehow related?
I suspected Ryder had a similar thought but instead of saying anything, he grasped me. Tightly. Wrapping his arms around me and nuzzling my neck. It worked. For that moment, I forgot everything.
“Whatever thi
s means, it doesn’t change things between us,” he whispered hotly into my ear. “They’re my adopted family, not my birth family. We are not related.”
Instead of responding, I clutched him back like a needy girlfriend. Already my attachment had reached disproportionate levels. The girl who does not get attached. The girl who stamps out proprietorial actions.
I needed him. I needed to know that I was important and that we were okay. This was not me at all. I warred with myself, curled against Ryder, falling prey to the din of Burgundy’s muffled scream.
Chapter Sixteen
I pulled away from him, moving towards the door. He was on my heels and we tripped over each other, trying to get out of the room and down the stairs. I barely had time to register the complete change in everything. The Victorian wallpaper, lush carpets and woven banisters.
When we reached the bottom, we ran from room to room. All furnished and decadent. The only things missing were Burgundy, Chrys and Jared. Repeatedly, I called their names. Nothing.
I breathed in the air like a dog scenting its master but could not find Burgundy’s cinnamon flavor lining the space. If anything, the area was empty and devoid of smell. Even the mustiness and rancid mold were gone, as though an antiseptic robot had removed all the microbes.
We searched frantically, opening doors and peering underneath furniture, but my friends and sister were completely gone.
The front door was still closed but we double checked outside. Just in case. Nothing. No one.
I turned to Ryder, panicking. “Where could they be?”
He shook his head. “Do you see the duffel bag with the supplies?”
“I don’t,” I said, looking around again, when a blur of movement caught my eye. I turned toward it quickly. There by the kitchen was Jared in his fox form.
His nose twitched as he ran toward me. I bent down and picked him up to kiss his cute little amber and white muzzle. Putting him back down, I asked, “Did you find a way into the cave from here?”
He barked once and ran toward the kitchen, and we followed. When he reached the pantry, its door ajar, he stopped and looked at us a moment before rustling out.
I ran over and pulled the door wider, revealing shelves stocked with old cans of food. Ryder pointed to a small space in the bottom right corner where Jared’s nose poked back through. It was barely big enough for him.
“Great,” Ryder said, “he can fit through tiny spaces that we can’t.”
“He wouldn’t go this way if we couldn’t follow,” I said. “Yes?” I looked down at Jared’s nose. His tongue lolled encouragingly.
Ryder swept cans off the shelf, tumbling them onto the floor; I followed suit. Soon the motions were frantic, almost comical as cans and jars rolled across the wooden floor. All that remained in the pantry were mostly bare shelves, no other way in. If it were even remotely possible, my heart would have fallen from my chest and hit the ground in a splat.
We were close, I could sense it. Frustration built, as though my loved ones were always just beyond my grasp, slipping from fingers closed too late on their hems. As if I could almost reach out and stroke Iphi’s soft ringlets. So many gone. Too many. Dad, Burgundy and both of my sisters. It’s funny how someone could drive you insane to the point of hating them, but when they were gone or in trouble, all of that pain was forgotten, replaced by fear and regret.
The loss was overwhelming. How could I live without my entire support group? I put my head in my hands. I will not let myself cry. Especially in front of Ryder.
His arms were around me in a second. He was petting my long hair and kissing the sides of my face and neck.
A sound emitted from the hole in the pantry, and we looked down. Jared yipped, gekkering like the fox he was, though I couldn’t tell if he wanted to fight or play. Rudimentary communication for a human, the only option for a fox. Usually, I spoke fluent Jared in all his forms, but this one was new to me. Was he telling us we were on the right track, doing what needed to be done?
Ryder stopped and looked at me questioningly.
“I think you need to keep doing what . . .” I trailed off.
He pushed me back against the open cupboard in understanding. His hand caressed me, over my back and then my breasts. It was difficult to focus on him, with my mind elsewhere. Luckily, my body and mind did not act like they knew one another. My hard nipples ached for him as his fingers pinched them lightly.
“Sadie,” he whispered in my ear as I shivered under the weight of his need. “Are you ready for my cock?” he growled in my ear.
“Always, but this feels weird . . .”
Jared gekkered again from his hole. Ryder’s eyes latched on mine and I nodded.
“Remove your panties,” he commanded.
Standing on one leg and then the other, I acquiesced.
“Lean back against the cupboards.”
I sucked my lower lip into my mouth in anticipation as I did what he asked.
Taking a step toward me, he lifted my skirt and touched my pussy. My breath turned to pants, matching the sound coming from Jared’s hidey-hole. Knowing he was watching us was oh so satisfying, and if shifters could change back within an hour of each shift, I had no doubt he’d have tried to join in.
“Spread your legs. Now.” His voice was gravelly, the tone deep and seductive over the demand.
I opened for him as he pulled a condom from his pocket and slid it on. Then I let him take me there in the kitchen, splayed against the inside of the cabinet.
He pushed in hard, no foreplay at the entrance. I buried my face in his shoulder to stifle my groans. How could anyone feel this good?
“That’s it, princess. Ride me. Pump me. Use me.”
Grinding into him, I gasped. His cock fit perfectly inside me, like it had been crafted just for my pussy. The mound of his pubic hair pushed through his boxers and hit me in just the right place. I rode him hard, my excitement mounting.
Ryder put his arms under my legs, lifting me up. My body held onto his rock-hard member as he bounced me up and down, impaling me against the cabinet shelves. The remaining few cans fell around us. My core was building toward release.
The orgasm exploded from the depths of my being, pushing upwards like hot, molten plasma.
“Oh yes, baby, come for me,” Ryder whispered in my ear. He pulled back to lock eyes as he erupted, rocking our lives.
There was an audible click as the cupboard behind me slid upwards. He clutched my ass and I wrapped my legs around his waist.
The moment to enjoy our orgasms was over quickly. With nothing to hold my back, I fell forward into his arms as he gently placed my legs on the ground.
His pants were still up around his hips. He tucked himself back inside, pulled down my skirt and spun me around, patting my butt.
Jared gekkered with glee, first peeking out of the darkness and then spinning around in a circle.
The passageway was small but we could squeeze through, barely. Good thing we weren’t claustrophobic. Jared ran ahead of us in the darkness, tittering softly.
“This can’t be the main way in,” Ryder said, his voice lilting at the end of his proclamation, making it both a question and a statement.
“No,” I agreed, thankful that Jared had found this alternate route.
Crouched together, Ryder grasped my hand, leaning forward to peer deeper in.
“It’s dark.”
“Stating the obvious, Ryder. Lovely.”
His hand reached up behind my head, where he gathered a tuft of my hair at the nape of my neck and pulled. Hard. “Ouch.”
“A snarky brat needs to be put in her place, how’s that for stating the obvious?” He removed his hand and cupped one of my butt cheeks gently before squeezing. “You can fix the darkness problem, can’t you, Sadie?”
“I can try.” Snapping my fingers, I focused on the concept of illumination. A spark, obviously coming from me, emitted a very faint glow.
“Not bright enough,” Ryder said. “
I can only see a foot or two, and barely.” He cupped my sex.
I writhed against his touch, pushing myself down. I was still bare underneath my dress and he pushed gently against my mound, adding and then releasing pressure.
I emitted a tiny mewl of pleasure and the passageway brightened. Ryder peered into it.
“Better,” he said and then inserted his thumb inside me pumping it in and out, alternating the pressure of his fingers against my clit.
The passageway lit up, revealing Ryder’s smile to my heavy-lidded eyes.
“Let’s go,” he said, pushing me from the inside to propel me forward.
“Do I have to be turned on for my magic to work?” I questioned, my voice as thick as my pussy was tender.
“Let’s find out,” Ryder said as he removed his finger and licked it.
The passageway remained lit.
Jared’s fox face appeared in front of me, emitting a low, quiet bark, telling us to get moving. Then he ran off.
“I’d rather go first in case there’s anything dangerous ahead, but . . .” Ryder didn’t have to finish his thought. I knew what he was hinting at and I crawled into the tunnel with my ass in the air. I pushed the hem of my dress up to present him with my bareness and he immediately crawled in behind me, cupping my ass with one hand and shuffling forward with his other.
After a few minutes, the light dimmed again and he placed his hand over my pussy, rubbing in slow, small circles. The light brightened.
“You’re like a light bulb that has to constantly be screwed,” he whispered.
I had to stifle a giggle. No time. And no extra noise.
The tunnel twisted and turned. We couldn’t see the end but we could see in front of ourselves to the next turn and we could hear Jared’s soft noises ahead. It took all my focus to keep crawling because Ryder was continuously finger fucking me, rubbing my tender folds. Making it even more difficult at every turn, when I stopped, he’d lap his tongue around my fiery core.
When I finally reached an area that opened up and I could stand my body protested. Stopping abruptly I wriggled my ass in the air, hoping Ryder would finish me off. Apparently, he had been crawling behind me with his head down because I felt his curls brush my bottom, sending waves of chills coursing up my spine.
