Switch of Fate 1

by Lisa Ladew

  Her laughter was musical, showering him like raindrops. “I like that one, too.” His heart kicked up a notch. Cora’s smile slipped a bit.

  He pulled back from her, busying himself across the room. Way too cozy. He needed to distract them both, or else find a way to wrap his fingers around fate’s neck. “I’m hungry, Cora. I could make-”

  But Cora was glowing. Her normal aura, the one he’d barely noticed, was bright and twisting with green. She’d crouched down to see the bottom shelf of books. Her body was tight, rigid. She raised one hand to grasp something, but only hovered her fingers above it, her voice reverent. “What is that?”

  Ah, shit. Jameson knew what it was. Carick’s words from the meeting with the shifters came back to him.

  There may be those among you who have something precious, an object you’ve held sacred for much of your life, but you’ve never known why. It could be a stone, a weapon, a piece of wood that you never knew what to craft from it. You’ve carried it with you for years, not understanding the compulsion. This is one of your most important purposes. Shifters can intuit what the switches need, even the weapon that will be the most true for a switch to whom they are covenbound. They are compelled by the instinct to gather or create the item, to hold it, save it for decades if that’s what it takes, until they meet the switch to whom it belongs. Then they hand it over.

  Carick’s voice in his head again. If Jameson had a choice at that moment, he would put the Steward right back in his deep cave.

  She is not for you. It has never been so.

  He spoke quietly, cursing fate, cursing Carick, cursing all the bullshit that was between him and Cora. He’d made her a resonant even though she could never be his? “A knife I made from a railroad spike a long time ago.”

  Her reply was hushed and breathless, putting Jameson in mind of intimate secrets. “May I hold it?”

  An unholy ache moved through him and Jameson wrestled it down, settled his breath. “Of course.”

  She was talking about a knife he’d made. Or dagger, as he sometimes thought of it. It was smaller than a hunting knife, but wicked dangerous looking. Her hand neared the head of the dark spike, where he’d heated and twisted the shaft to form a grip, then beaten and pounded the rest until it became a blade. He’d apprenticed with a blacksmith for free, just to learn how to do it. The compulsion he’d felt back then became clear to him for the first time. Shit. It couldn’t be her resonant. But if it was…

  Jameson knew the moment her skin made contact with the dagger, because the green aura around her body lit up brighter still, alive and crackling with energy in shades of shamrock and seafoam. “Do you see it?” he whispered, pointing weakly to her.

  Cora dropped the dagger, frowning. The aura faded.

  Jameson crept toward her, crouched next to her. “Do it again.”

  She obeyed, slender fingers slipping around the hilt of the blade and gripping tight. Her breath came faster.

  God, I have to know… “How does it feel, Cora?”

  A ghost of a smile crossed her lips, and in it, he saw more than just her. He saw wisdom of the ages. When she spoke, her voice was deeper than normal and intensely sure. “Powerful. Natural. Right.” She turned glittering eyes on him, her green glow sparkling around her. “Prowl sex doesn’t bother me anymore,” she whispered. “I see what it’s for, what it does. It stretches behind me like a scroll, the evolution of the Prowl.” She said the last two words like they represented something holy.

  Blood surged through Jameson’s body. He could see her seeing it, and it floored him.

  She frowned down at the knife in her hands and dropped it deliberately, almost throwing it. It clanked on the floor. Her glow lessened and her face looked like just her again.

  She picked it back up, like she couldn’t help it, but it wasn’t the same. She still whispered, like the moment was holy. “What is it made of?”

  Holy. He agreed it was and whispered back as best as he could. “Steel: Iron. Some copper, a few other metals.” She stared at it as if he had said gold, diamonds, metals we dug up from the surface of Mars.

  He had to test her! A real live switch. And he was the Keeper. They would learn together. He grabbed two things from the top of the cold wood stove and brought it to her. “Touch these.”

  He had his cast iron skillet and a steel-lined copper pot. Cora reluctantly put down the knife, then took the skillet.

  No more whispering. She giggled. “It tickles.”

  Jameson couldn’t help but grin along with her. Fresh. Sweet. Feminine. He loved her company. “That one has more carbon. Now try this.”

  He traded her for the copper pot, and immediately her mouth pursed in a little ‘o’. “This one’s stronger, like holding a vib-, uh, massager.”

  Cora blushed and looked down, handing the pot back to Jameson without lifting her eyes from the floor. Which was good, because he was pretty sure his cock had visibly twitched when he imagined the trouble sweet but sarcastic little Coralie could get up to with a vibrator.

  She pulled him back to reality. “Neither of them feels like the knife.”

  Jameson waved her off as he replaced the cookware. “It’s obvious metals switch you on. We just have to find the right mix.”

  She snickered. Jameson loved how she caught every word-nerd joke that spilled out of his mouth. But why would he have her resonant? Carick had said it had never happened before, the Keeper becoming covenbound. Did he dare hope? But how would that even work?

  Coralie sat on the floor, her legs folded, her sundress covering her knees, holding his knife in her hands. It was an unwanted reminder of his most downtrodden days and she was turning it back in forth with her delicate fingers, gazing at it like it was the Hope diamond. She was completely enchanted and it lit him up like a Christmas tree, healed him somehow.

  Jameson had always thought the Instinct had saved him because it had judged his duty as the Keeper as more important than his family. For a century it had infuriated him, enraged him, the idea that his family was disposable to the Instinct. But what if he hadn’t been saved just to be the Keeper? What if those days on the railroad hadn’t been about running at all? What if he hadn’t shirked his duty by leaving, but rather… fulfilled it? A stretch. One he didn’t know if he had a right to make.

  “It’s yours.” The words stuttered out without Jameson knowing they were coming. Of course it was hers. Everything he had was hers. He groaned at the thought, then spoke quickly when she shot him a freaked-out look. “If you want it, I mean.”

  Coralie’s smile lit up the whole cabin. His whole fucking life. She spoke almost primly. “Thank you, Jameson.”

  His name in her mouth made his dick spring up hard as a rock, begging for its turn. Jameson angled away from Cora so she wouldn’t see.

  He needed a moment, and so did his body.

  Chapter 28

  Cora woke in one ungainly leap, peering around heavily at her surroundings, trying to figure out where she was and what had happened. A soft couch with a fuzzy blanket over her and a poetry book folded on her chest. Jameson’s cabin. The knife! That heavy used-to-be-a-spike that had felt so good in her hand had made it all real, every bit of it, then woven into her dream to show her other truths. She had sisters coming to Five Hills, or who were already here, and soon she would know them. Not biological sisters, although they were all related. But sisters in a very real sense, all the same. Killers, every last one of them, like her. Vampire killers.

  Hooo-boy. Cora dropped her head back to the couch pillow and tuned-in to herself, trying to get ahold of how she felt about this new determination. Surprisingly ok. Excited, even? One good thing, getting fired suddenly felt like no big deal, when a few hours ago it had meant the world. But now? She was a witch. No, a switch. And she had vampires to kill. Grading papers and planning lectures probably would have gotten in the way of all the murder.

  Was it really murder if it was vampires? Cora’d gotten the impression from Carick and Jam
eson that everything she’d ever studied about vampires was going to turn out to be wrong. But no big. She loved to learn new shit, and she was gonna get an A+ in vampire-murdering. Become the star student of her undead-assassination academy. Whatevs. She’d skipped training yesterday why?

  She sat up and reached for the knife laying next to her on a coffee table. But what was beside it? A rich grosgrain leather object had been placed there while she slept.

  A sheath for her knife, on a slim, small, black belt with a brass buckle. Another, smaller belt attached at the tip of the sheath. Cora stood slowly and grabbed the rig, stepping into it. She couldn’t get it up over her hips, so she undid it and slipped it up to her waist, securing it there quickly. She turned and tried to examine herself. No. That wasn’t where it belonged. She moved the belt buckle out three notches, then a fourth, and let it fall to the top of her hips. The sheath hung from her right side, the belt slanting across her middle sexily, the smaller belt buckling perfectly around her thigh to hold her weapon in place. The knife was small, so the sheath was small. Dainty, but deadly. She loved everything about both.

  She burst with excitement and looked around for a mirror… or a man, something that would tell her how she looked. The smell of dinner reached her, but Jameson wasn’t in the kitchen. She skidded to a stop there when she realized the neat-as-a-pin kitchen didn’t have a microwave. She’d be screwed there by herself. Would have to eat cold cereal and peanut butter and m&m sandwiches. But she bet that explained where Jameson was.

  She headed out the back door and found him in a tiny makeshift seating area. Stumps from felled trees served as chairs around the fire pit, and Cora could see dinner in progress. A skinned, cleaned rabbit stretched on a spit above the fire, a covered Dutch oven rested to one side of the coals. Jameson had his back to her and was ironing a pair of pants with an oven mitt and an old-fashioned iron he’d warmed in the fire, as a few stars began to twinkle in the dusking sky.

  Adorable. Sexy as shit. She wanted to eat him up. “Are you for real?” she said, catching his attention.

  Jameson turned to face her. When he saw the knife in its sheath at her hip, his eyes bugged out of his head and his tongue might have lolled. Just for a second. So that answered that. The knife looked good on her. It felt good on her.

  When he spoke, Jameson’s voice was husky, rough, and his words were completely disingenuous from what she could tell he was thinking. “Looks like you had a good nap.” She almost laughed, but instead she made plans to take advantage of what was going through his brain.

  She nodded and stalked toward him, her body lighting up with desire. “Now I’m hungry. What’s on the menu?”

  He lowered his head and stared at her through hooded eyes. He was so hers. She hoped the rest of him was as big as what she saw of him in clothes. Not too big. But good big. Fill-you-up-right big.

  “Roasted wild hare and sorrel,” he said, deliciously, catching her mood and responding in kind.

  She reached him, and he was ready for her. He leaned down to her, grasped her around the waist, above the belt and sheath, pulling her close. Finally, there was no resistance to her and to what was between them. He wasn’t going to deny them anymore.

  Their lips met, her eyes open, his too, eye contact so strong she felt it in her throat, in her nipples, at her very core.

  A green flash filled her vision, obscuring him for only a second, and then her eyes slipped closed. He was hers. Forever. She could feel it deep inside.

  The kiss deepened and she lost herself to it. He pulled her close, then lifted her off her feet, tucking his arms under her ass so their faces were right in line with each other. He didn’t even need to widen his stance to hold her up. She was lost to him and everything masculine, strong, sweet and thoughtful about him.

  That he was gonna keep her from killing humans she wasn’t supposed to kill by handcuffing her with pleasure, fucking her senseless, distracting her in every way imaginable with what was hopefully a very pretty penis? Only a bonus.

  ***

  Jameson bent to her, unable to stop himself for duty, country, friends, not even Carick. If he had to give up being Keeper to have her, he would. She was fresh and lovely, so pliant in his arms, her taste sweet like sugar. She owned him.

  Pine and bitter herbs replaced Cora’s scent for a moment and he stiffened then separated from her, going on alert, scanning the woods around them.

  Vampire.

  Cora only looked confused for a moment, then rage crossed her face. She bent her knees and took a wide stance, settling her center of gravity where it would be harder for someone to take from her. She delicately removed her resonant from its sheath, palming it, holding it out in front of her, other hand up to block any blows that came from the side, looking like a trained assassin. A magical trained assassin, by the flaring green glow that only he could see.

  Jameson’s couldn’t stop from staring at her, even as he continued to scent, trying to determine by smell alone where exactly the vampire was. How was it he’d gone one-hundred-and-some years without seeing a vampire in Five Hills, and now one was stalking his cabin? Because shit was moving. He had a switch with him. And vampires were arrogant motherfuckers who needed one less heart in their chests. He growled. They were going to try to touch his switch? Over his dead body. Which would never happen, not when Cora needed him.

  Cora moved toward a trail. Jameson ran in front of her, tucking her behind him with one hand, clearing her dagger. “Stay behind me,” he ordered. He would keep her safe. He moved down the trail, his hearing focused on her while scent and sight searched for vampire.

  “Fuck that,” Cora muttered behind him, getting a running start down the trail in his direction. Was she going to run into him? He would flatten her without meaning to. She would bounce off like a quarter off an army bunk. Instead she leapt at him, her hands hitting his shoulders and propelling her up and over. He tried to stop and spot her, but she was already spinning off. Cora landed on the rough trail ahead of Jameson on hands and feet, rolled her forward momentum into a somersault, and within one breath was up and running away, dagger pulled back out of her sheath. Her glow lit up the path and the trees four feet out from her on all sides.

  Jameson stopped and stared, jaw hanging down. He couldn’t help it. She’d… vaulted him.

  And fuck she was fast. She rounded a bend and he could only see her glow. Then not even that. Fuck! He shifted, clothes ripping off of him, and roared a warning into the forest as the white wolf. Touch my woman and have your limbs torn from your body!

  He bounded forward, catching up to her easily. The trail through the evergreens wasn’t wide enough for her and him both, but she heard him coming and skidded to a stop, turning to face him.

  She stared for only a moment, and he could see the realization click into place behind her eyes. She nodded sharply. Acceptance. “I’m losing him,” she hissed, moving to the side of the trail to let him pass. “Find him. Lead me to the bloodsucker.”

  ***

  Cora reached out a trembling hand to touch the massive white wolf as it passed her, snuffling and growling and snapping at the air on both sides of the path. He roared again, rather like a bear, or a Tyrannosaurus Rex, like no noise she ever would have thought a wolf could make.

  She knew the wolf was him, he was the wolf. Could see his soul shining out clearly through the deadly stare and snarl. Shifter. She got it now. True. Right. Predestined. The feeling that everything was as it should be filled Cora, powered her purpose. She followed the white wolf, anticipation and magic thrumming through her, funneling to her dagger. The magic was a tingle, rather like electricity, but not painful. She didn’t know what she could do with it, but possibilities stretched out before her, warming her, stirring her curiosity.

  The wolf faltered, slowed, then finally stopped. Cora stopped also, looking around. Had they lost the vampire? She felt around inside her. The anger and rage were leaking away, more every second, and she knew the vampire was moving
away from her. She swept her knife hand in the direction the connection between her and the vampire seemed to come from. “Find him! That’s your job, right? I know you can smell him still, you’ve got his trail. I can see it in your face.”

  The wolf only stared, his back as tall as her shoulders, ears perked behind him, away from her. He was as big as a bear, but looked nothing like one.

  He shook his head, almost human-like. He wasn’t saying he couldn’t follow the vampire. He was saying he wouldn’t.

  Her connection with the vampire weakened again, then broke. Why? Why would Jameson let the vampire get away from them?

  When she realized why, she turned, heat blasting from the top of her head, rage boiling in her chest. She’d never been so angry in her entire life.

  He wasn’t protecting her, he was coddling her, chaperoning her.

  He didn’t think she could do it.

  She turned on her heel and ran back the way they had come. Not to his cabin. Only away from him.

  ***

  Jameson had grabbed his clothes and run after her, but Cora was faster than the human him and made it through his house and down his driveway before she even slowed to a walk, resonant back in its sheath at her hip. She hit the quiet mountain road and turned left, heading down the grade. It was twenty miles back to town and she might just walk it, as livid as she was.

  He followed, pulling on his clothes as he went, but with no boots on his feet. Nowhere near the punishment he deserved. He called to her from behind. “Cora, please, let me drive you home.”

  “I’m fine,” she spat at him, slowing to a walk and pulling her phone out of her pocket. She had service. Nice. She stabbed the Uber app with her thumb, entering her location. The app pinged at her, distressed. A green button asked if she really wanted to order this car to the middle of nowhere? Fuck yeah, she wanted someone to haul their ass all the way up to her and drive her home. “Charge my fucking credit card, bitch,” she snarled, stabbing at the phone again.