They’d met shifters from around the world and learned about their problems. In some countries, the hatred from humans was even worse than in the States. In some countries, it was barely there at all.
In the end, they’d decided to come home and get married with all their friends and family there. Millie moved into his house and they’d both gotten their jobs back.
When the preacher asked Brody if he would take Millie as his wife, his bear nearly burst from his body to claim her all over again. Instead he just said, “I do.”
When they were pronounced husband and wife, they kissed deeply. Everyone cheered as they walked toward the door. Out in the light, everyone threw birdseed when they made their way to the car for the reception.
Later, out on the dance floor, and after a few glasses of champagne, Brody spun Millie in a two-step to the lilting sound of country music. She’d become a good dancer, and they’d danced every chance they’d had since they’d declared their love for each other that night.
Finally, sweaty and a little drunk, they sat down to talk with their friends at the reception table. The first to come talk to him was his friend Chance Baker and Chance’s wife Summer. They’d been married about a year ago and had a baby son who looked just like Chance.
“We’re out of honey,” Chance said with his baby held against his chest.
“We’ve got plenty,” Millie teased. “How about a gallon?” She stood and took the baby bear out of his father’s arms, cooing at the little guy. Brody loved seeing her with a baby.
“The huckleberry patch is going in tomorrow. I hope you guys are ready for it,” Chance said.
“I absolutely adore huckleberries! I’m sure the bees will love it too,” Millie said.
The baby started to fuss and Summer took him back with a smile, her long dyed dreadlocks falling around her shoulders. “Your honey is the best I’ve ever tasted. It’s so fresh and natural.”
“I treat my bees right,” Brody said. He’d taught Natalie how to tend them while he was away, giving her something to care for after Chris’s death.
Summer and Chance went back out into the party to take care of the baby and Wyatt and Candice came up to the table, smiling and giddy.
“I never thought I’d see the day when you settled down, Brody.”
“Me more than Chance?” he asked.
“Chance looks big, but he’s really a softy. You, on the other hand, are a wild card.”
“Not anymore,” he said, squeezing Millie’s hand.
“I’ve bought you a year’s supply of steaks from my favorite rancher. I put my special seasoning on them so even an idiot can make a good steak.”
“Who are you calling an idiot?” Brody growled, with a good-natured grin.
“Not Millie.” Everyone laughed.
“Be nice, Wyatt,” Candice chided. “It’s his wedding day.”
“Brody knows I’m just messing with him. It’s good to have you back, buddy.”
Candice and Wyatt fell back into the crowd and Brody turned to his new wife. He took her hand and led her back out onto the dance floor. It was a slow song this time. He wrapped his arm around her waist and took her hand. Her eyes smiled up at him.
“I’m so happy,” she whispered in his ear.
“I’m happy too, babe.”
He pulled her to his body, and they the danced across the floor.
Unbearably Stranded
Mystic Harber
When curvy nature witch Vivian came home to Mystic Harbor, she started her life over without her crazy ex-husband. The problem is, her ex cast a binding spell on her when they first married and now wants force her to help him with is psychotic blood magic. Vivian would rather die than go back with him, so her only option is to summon a demon from hell to banish her ex for a hundred years. Too bad that kind of magic comes with a price.
In her quest to find the last ingredient to her summoning spell, Vivian meets Laurence, the broody grizzly bear fisherman. Laurence has no interest in helping a witch with her magic, but Vivian convinces him to take her out to a small island out at sea.
Caught in a magical storm, Vivian and Laurence are shipwrecked. Coming together to survive in spite of their differences, Laurence and Vivian heat up the cold nights while stranded on the island.
When they finally make it home, Vivian must still find a way to overcome her ex while retaining her integrity. Will Laurence offer his mate's bite to a witch? Or will their prejudices keep them apart and damn Vivian forever?
Chapter 1
Vivian threw a pinch of cypress bark into the brew and stood back. The concoction bubbled in a cast iron pot that hung over the open flame in her back yard. She sprinkled in dried thyme leaves, and smoke rose from the churning mixture.
The moon above glimmered, full and silver, casting its iridescent light down on Vivian’s voluptuous, naked body. She spoke the words of the old spells, calling on the gods of the underworld to come aid her.
She’d been warned, time and again, by her mother and sister that casting the summoning spell would only result in trouble, but she saw no other option.
The foreign words spilled from her throat like trickling honey off a spoon. They tasted thick and harsh on her tongue. Sharp words of the old witches spiked the spell with its needed intensity.
Calling a demon to do her bidding did not come easy. She’d collected almost all the ingredients, sure that these would do the trick.
Vivian pulled energy up from the earth, willing the creature to come forth and do her bidding. Nothing happened. Chill wind brushed over her bare skin, and a distant creature howled in the nearby woods.
She pulled the energy harder, willing the demon to rise. If she failed at this, all was lost. Harold’s claim on her was ironclad. She could not escape him as long as she lived, unless the demon came to take him to hell, where he belonged.
Shouting the words of the spell, she commanded the demon to rise. Nothing. Damn it. Vivian growled and closed her circle before grabbing her robe and stomping inside her house.
She grabbed the teakettle from the stove, filled it with water, and prepared a pot of herbal tea from a special mixture she’d created herself––lemon balm, passionflower, and lavender. She hoped it would help her calm down.
Her little house looked out over the churning sea and the lights of Mystic Harbor. Vivian wouldn’t give up her home, her business, or her life, just because her psycho warlock ex-husband believed he still had a claim on her.
The insane blood witch had cast a binding spell on her when they’d first been married. Intoxicated by his mystery and intense sexual domination, Vivian had agreed to allow him to cast the binding spell.
At the time, she’d wanted to be his. She’d been young and stupid. Harold was a narcissistic psychopath. During the first five years of their marriage, he controlled her every movement, isolated her from her coven of nature witches and her family, and ultimately started beating her.
It was a miracle that she’d gotten out and had been able to close the divorce at all. After she moved home to Mystic Harbor, she’d opened a small apothecary and skin care shop that catered to discerning locals and to the many tourists who came through town.
The kettle whistled as Vivian gazed out her kitchen window at the city lights below. She lifted the kettle from the stove and poured the boiling water over her delicately dried herbs. Aromatic fragrance rose on the steam, and she inhaled deeply.
After letting it steep, she poured herself a cup of the relaxing brew. She sat at her hand-hewn plank kitchen table and gathered her long silk robe around her.
Taking a sip, she realized her spell had not been complete. She’d missed the leaves of the black myrtle tree. It wasn’t just any myrtle tree, either; it was a type that only grew on an island off the coast of Oregon, far out to sea from Mystic Harbor.
She’d hoped she could cast the spell without it. Obviously, she was wrong. Now she had to find a boat and go out to the island where it grew. With all the expenses
from the business, she didn’t have the extra money to hire a private charter.
The irritation at the oversight of the black myrtle leaves bit her stomach even as the calming tea soothed her. She’d have to use what little money she had to make it happen. There went her cell phone for the month.
She valued her life far more than her cell phone. There was no way in hell she would allow Harold to drag her back to Chicago. The Chicago blood witches were all insane and into all kinds of unnatural, unsavory things.
As a nature witch from the Pacific Northwest, Vivian had a kinship with nature that she’d never been able to feel while in Chicago. Even aside from Harold’s abuse, she’d never been happy there.
She took another sip of tea and dialed her sister’s telephone number on her cell phone. Might as well get some use out of it while she could.
“Hello, Vivian. What are you calling me for on this full moon night?” her sister Marietta greeted her. Vivian could hear the sound of young children screaming and laughing in the background. She’d interrupted her sister’s family time and suddenly felt guilty.
“I need a favor,” Vivian said.
“Shoot.”
“You know Harold still has a binding spell on me, right?”
“How could I forget? It’s all you talk about. Mom told you she’d help you find a workaround. We can’t break it, but we might be able to keep him from claiming you.”
“No. That isn’t enough. I want the assurance that he’s never coming back for me. I want this taken care of.”
“What exactly do you intend to do?” her sister asked.
“The summoning spell. It will take care of Harold once and for all.”
“Mother forbade you from doing it, Vivian. Don’t even go there. It’s far too dangerous.”
“Marietta, I don’t have a choice. He told me he’s coming next week and intends to take me back with him. I’m not going back. I’ll die first.”
“And you just might if the summoning spell goes wrong.”
“It won’t. I promise you.”
Marietta sighed a long, drawn out sigh, then yelled at her kids to get off the kitchen counter. “What do you need?” she finally asked.
“I need to borrow a few hundred dollars to hire a boat to get out to Sea Cliff Island. It’s the only place south of Puget Sound where the right kind of myrtle tree grows.”
“Can’t you just order it online?” Marietta asked. There was a crash in the background, and Marietta growled out a short control spell.
“They don’t sell rare myrtle leaves online, Mari.”
“Come by tomorrow. I’ve got to go. I told you I’d cast a spell on you if you didn’t stop,” she barked. “Jesus. Young witches are worse than normal children.”
Chapter 2
Vivian rapped on her sister’s door, hearing the screech of children from within. The dog barked sharply, and Marietta came to the door looking bedraggled and tired. Deep bags hung under her eyes, and she still wore her pajamas.
“Come on in. Don’t mind the chaos.”
Vivian followed her sister into the big Victorian house set at the end of a quiet street in the oldest part of Mystic Harbor. She stepped over toys and shoes, smelling the scent of her sister’s baking wafting through the air. Blueberry muffins. Yummy.
Her nephew, four-year-old Sam, jumped on Vivian’s leg and clung to her as she tried to walk. Vivian looked down at him as Marietta picked up her eighteen month old from the hardwood floor in the living room. Her six-year-old daughter, Margo, twirled around the center of the room, a trail of pink feathers and butterflies circling her tiny hand.
“Margo’s coming into her powers,” Marietta grunted, situating the baby on her hip. “We’ve barely survived. Come to the kitchen. You look like you could use some food.”
Vivian looked down at her curvy figure and up at her sister. It wasn’t as if she was wasting away, but she was hungry. Those muffins smelled divine!
With the child still on her hip, Marietta poured Vivian a big cup of coffee, and the refrigerator opened on its own. Milk floated across the room and poured into the cup as Marietta spooned in sugar.
“This is how you like it, right?” she said as she handed Vivian the mug.
“Perfect.”
Vivian took a sip of her sister’s delicious coffee. Everything Marietta touched was delicious. The woman was a veritable virtuoso in the kitchen. Her husband, Alfred, was a lucky man. He taught organic gardening at the local community college, while Marietta home-schooled the children.
Sam still clung to Vivian’s leg and whined at her. “What is it, sweetheart?” she asked the freckled, red-headed child.
“Did you bring me a whistling potion?” he asked.
“I forgot, sweetie, I’m sorry. Next time.”
“Nooooooo…” the child howled.
“Samuel O’Malley, get up off the floor this instant, or you won’t be having dessert for a week.”
“But I want the whistling potion!”
“Get up and go help your sister with her illusion spells. Go on.”
The child grumbled as he got up from the floor, but he finally went off to the living room to mess with his sister’s butterflies.
Marietta put the baby in a high chair. A banana flew across the room, cutting itself, the pieces landing on the baby’s tray. She picked up a still-warm blueberry muffin from the cooling rack and put it on a plate for Vivian.
Vivian lifted the raw sugar-crusted muffin to her lips and took a big bite. Heavenly. She swore, if Marietta would let her, Vivian would never leave her sister’s kitchen.
“Now, tell me about this ridiculously dangerous summoning spell you want to do.” Marietta used her mom voice on Vivian, and Vivian cringed. Suddenly she felt like an immature child under her sister’s gaze. She gulped down another bit of muffin. Keeping her cell phone was worth her sister’s scrutiny, she decided.
“I’m summoning a demon to take Harold back to hell where he belongs. He’ll never bother me again.”
Marietta’s eyes grew wide, and her mouth dropped open. “You’re serious?”
“Deadly serious. He deserves what he gets.”
Marietta cleared her throat. “That isn’t for you to decide. There is a stiff price for actions like those you suggest. I don’t want any part of it.”
“I’m not going to murder him. He’s going to go to hell, alive. And stay there a long, long time. Maybe forever. The spell only lasts as long as I live, and that will probably only be a hundred years.”
“So you intend to banish your ex to hell for a hundred years, and you don’t expect to get any bad karma from that?”
Vivian sighed. Marietta was right. She would get bad karma from it. Six times six times the karma. But, Harold deserved to be banished. There weren’t any witch police she could call or a witch lawyer she could hire to take out a magical restraining order. She had to deal with it herself.
Harold’s binding spell was absolute. It couldn’t be broken. The only other solution was to get rid of Harold.
“Will you help me or not?”
Marietta scrunched up her face and frowned, looking at her baby. “I can’t,” she said, shrugging. “I really wish I could help you, but I can’t have that karma coming back on my family. Please understand. I’m advising you to find another way. Give Mom’s protection spell a chance.”
“The last one didn’t work, Mari. He’s coming. This is my last chance. I’m not going back to Chicago with him.”
Marietta grabbed her sister’s hand and looked her deep in the eyes. “I’m sorry this is happening to you, Viv. That man always seemed too good to be true. Rich, good-looking, but blood magic has a taint to it. We should have never let you marry him.”
Vivian looked down at her sister’s hand, holding her own. She wiped away a tear from her cheek and sniffled. “I was an idiot. Totally letting my hormones get the best of me. No one could have talked me out of it. Not even you and Mom. I should go. I’ve got to open the shop.
”
They stood and embraced. Tears slid down Vivian’s cheeks, ruining her makeup. She squeezed her sister, feeling the bond and kinship only sisters shared.
As Vivian let Marietta go, she realized how much she envied her sister. Marietta’s husband Alfred was a good man, an honest nature witch, and a farmer. He and Marietta tended two acres of organic farmland out behind the big Victorian and lived an idyllic life.
Vivian looked down at the floor, shame burning in her face. She’d let her youthful exuberance and naiveté ruin her life. What an idiot she’d been. However, she intended to take care of it, no matter the consequences. She wouldn’t let that bastard control her life for one more second.
Chapter 3
Vivian opened the front door of her store. The big windows looked out on the street headed directly toward the harbor and the sea. It was such a perfect location. She’d been so lucky in opening her business, you’d never believe she was cursed.
Flipping on the light, she inhaled the scent of lavender and honey. Her gaze ran across organized rows of white plastic jars and amber glass bottles. It made her heart sing to see her creations lined up on shelves ready to be purchased by her lovely customers. It was the best feeling in the world.
If there were any way she could get out from under the grip of Harold’s binding spell without resorting to summoning demons, she would do it. She hated the idea of doing that kind of magic. It was exactly the kind of thing to which a blood witch like Harold would stoop.
Few nature witches would ever summon a demon. And few ever had. She flipped the open sign in her window and walked behind the counter, ready for the day.
Customers began to filter through her shop throughout the day while she made soaps, lotions, and potions in the back room. It was such a beautiful life. All that was missing was the surety and comfort of true love.
She dropped fresh, fragrant rose petals into her distiller to make her rose essential oil, the colors and scents filling her with light.
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