by Lisa Ladew
The king only stared for a few moments, then nodded sharply. “It will be done.”
***
Several hours later, the roosters crowed proudly outside as Dahlia and Crew made their way back to their room, hand in hand. Crew had touched the mind of every person the king had put in front of him and gave the king a ‘yay’, ‘nay’, or ‘could be swayed by money or promises of power’. The castle staff was suddenly much lighter, but the king could trust them all.
As soon as they were inside, Dahlia pulled him into a hug. “Thank you for doing that.”
Crew shrugged, his amber eyes intense with heat. “It was only right.”
“I’ve had some time to think, Crew, and I’m ready to find our way home.”
His gaze bored into her. “You’re certain?”
She nodded. “I’ve been thinking about this all wrong, thinking if we could stay here, maybe we could somehow skip out on all that demon and prophecy stuff, maybe avoid the danger totally.” She dropped her eyes. “I was hiding from it, and that’s never a good idea. Especially when every world is dangerous.”
Crew took her chin in his hand and brought her eyes up to meet his. “Delaying isn’t hiding, Dahlia, you just needed a little vacation. A little time to clear your head. Are you positive that you’re ready to go back now?”
She bit her lip and nodded.
“Good,” he rasped, his voice suddenly thick and heavy as his lips dropped to hers, kissing her deeply and with such passion that her core heated instantly. She felt something inside of him unfurl and let go, and only later realized it had been his tight control of himself. “Because I can’t wait one more second to do this.”
He kissed her again, then lifted her and carried her to the bed, breaking the kiss to put her down and turn her around. She fell onto the bed and pressed her face into the blankets as he lifted her skirts and threw them over her head. He retreated for a moment, and then she felt his thick cock at her entrance. He was inside her in only one thrust and she cried out at the intruding pleasure of it.
He wrestled with her skirts until he could see her again, and she tried not to tense, knowing what was coming. He pulled her hair into a ponytail and tugged it toward the bed, baring her shoulder.
A vicious, growling snarl came from him and Dahlia had one second to be scared before his teeth sank into her unblemished skin.
“Oh!” Dahlia cried as an orgasm that hadn’t been close a moment before forced its way through her, wringing every ounce of pleasure out of her that her body had to give. Crew pumped into her twice more, sending more furls of sensation through her, then he stiffened and groaned, and she felt his hot seed shoot inside her, even it bringing pleasure.
The stiff sound of cloth ripping reached her ears, but she couldn’t worry about it as more pleasure took her higher, then feathers wrapped around her, lifting both her and her mate from the bed into the air. She cried out again, mystified, but feeling completely safe. Crew wrapped his arms around her from behind as they first raised, then lowered back to the bed, and the feathers disappeared.
“What in the hell was that?” Dahlia panted.
“That was some badass lovin’.” Crew said, pulling slowly out of her, then looking around for something to clean up with. “You’re welcome.”
She laughed. “No, you’re welcome.” When she turned to see him, her blood was running down his chin. The sight didn’t gross her out at all, like she’d been afraid it might. It made her wonder if he could do it again. She’d come too quickly, next time she wanted to savor it more, if that was possible.
“No, I mean the feathers.” She touched the bite where her neck met her shoulder. It seemed to be healing already.
He climbed onto the bed with her, face clean, and smoothed her hair back.
“That was your daily reminder that you’re half-angel, just in case you do something silly, like forget.”
Chapter 34
Heather ran to catch up to Ella, leaving Graeme behind to talk with Trevor as they all walked through the driveway to the van that would take them to the police station along with their daily guard. She grinned as snow melted underneath her feet the way it did Graeme’s. She could only put out about half as much heat as he did and only if she concentrated super hard, but it was enough to bring a smile to her face.
Ella smiled at her. “No word?”
“Nothing. I’m starting to get antsy. The pendants seem like they’re dead.” Heather stuck her hand in her pocket and pulled out Dahlia’s pendant. Graeme had Ella’s. “Graeme says they aren’t, but I can’t help but worry.”
Ella dropped her voice. “Trevor’s worried, too. And Wade is sick out of his mind. Lorna said he hasn’t slept for days.”
Heather pouted and shoved the pendant back in her pocket. “If only they would just tell us Crew and Dahlia are ok. Then we could wait a little─”
A bright light filled the sky and Heather and Ella raised their hands to cover their faces. Their guard came streaming out of the temporary shelter that had been built in front of the house for heat and electricity for them. Heather could hear their rough exclamations, but she couldn’t see them because her retinas were scorched.
A thick longing for her bond-partner twisted through her and she dropped her hands to her belly for just a second, then turned to look for Graeme as the light faded.
Ella grabbed her. “Do you feel it?”
Heather didn’t want to admit anything. “What?”
“Like you have to jump Graeme or die trying?”
Heather nodded slowly as Trevor and Graeme came running up to them. Ella grabbed her shoulders. “That’s what I felt when you and Graeme had your bonding ceremony.” She looked up into the sky. “He’s claimed her. I know it.”
The light began to disappear from the sky, more slowly in some places, until only a glowing arch was left.
Mac spoke up from behind them. “It’s like a rainbow of sex. A funky sexbow.”
Heather glared at him, still irritated with him from the other night. Bruin, the big bearen Mac seemed attached to at the hip, elbowed Mac and grinned. “Makes me feel tingly in my girly parts.”
Mac snorted. “You have girly parts? That explains a lot.”
Bruin’s smile didn’t fade. “Fuck you, Scooby-Doo.”
Trevor turned to hide his smile, pulling Ella with him and whispering into her ear. Ella giggled and hid her face in her hands.
Graeme grasped Heather’s arm and she smiled, imagining what he was going to say. “Check the pendant.”
Ok, that wasn’t as sexy as she thought it would be.
“Hurry, before the light fades completely,” he said, his eyes searching the sky. Heather pulled it from her pocket and held it up. “Graeme, its eyes are glowing.”
He grabbed her arm in a tight grip. “Let’s go.”
***
Dahlia watched Crew relax and unwind before her eyes as he told her about the wings and what they had looked like. She hadn’t even realized how much tension he’d still carried until he began to let it go. Frequent sex helped him a lot, but now that she was good and claimed, he looked like he’d turned back the clock. Half of his worry lines were gone, smoothed out.
She looked around at the room she now wondered if they’d ever leave. “We’re still here. I guess it wasn’t that easy.”
He touched her face, her hair, her shoulder. “We’ll find another way. Don’t worry.”
“The king said there’s a portal to another world somewhere to the north, but it’s ten feet off a cliff-face. You have to run and leap for it.”
Crew grinned. “That’s my doll, always looking for the most danger she can find. When we get home, I’ll have to take you to a twelve-step program. Or just accept that you have the spirit of a wolfen.”
She laughed and punched him lightly on the arm. Heather’s pendant chimed in her pocket. She looked at Crew questioningly and dug through the folds of her skirt to fish it out.
The noise was much louder wh
en it escaped the fabric of her skirt. “Crew, look,” she said, turning it so he could see the glowing eyes of the wolf.
A noise sounded in the hall. A scuffling, bumping sound and then a woman’s giggle. “I bet they’re in there,” the female voice said.
A male’s Scottish brogue cut through the door. “We should give them a few minutes.”
The giggle sounded again and Crew jumped off the bed, shooting Dahlia a shocked look. He pulled on his pants and crossed the room as Dahlia scrambled to right her skirts and pull the torn dress back into place.
Crew ripped the door open. Dahlia saw only a male’s broad back pressing a female against the wall, but she noticed at once that their clothes were modern.
“Graeme!” Crew shouted.
The male whirled about, and his face broke into a smile. “We found you.”
Heather peeked around Graeme and, when her gaze landed on Dahlia, she shrieked and ran into the room, catching Dahlia around the shoulders and hugging her, squeezing the very breath out of her.
“Hi,” Dahlia finally managed when Heather let her go and stepped back. The only people in her lives who had ever greeted her like that had been her mother and Crew. And now her sister. And to think, she’d almost entertained the thought of not going back. She held up Heather’s pendant. “This is yours.”
Heather’s mouth fell open. She looked around the castle. “Is this the world where I left it with the little boy?”
Dahlia nodded. “Time moves faster here. That was twenty years ago in this world.”
“Twenty years!” Heather took her pendant and gazed at it. “Caius, the boy? Is he─?”
“He’s the king now. Your pendant helped him do a lot of good stuff for the world.”
Heather turned to look at Graeme. “Did you hear that?”
He nodded gravely. “Aye.”
Heather dug something out of her pocket and handed it over. “Here’s yours.”
Dahlia felt her heart seize in her chest and her throat wouldn’t work. Her pendant. She touched it gently, remembering the last time she’d seen it. Her mom─the thought hurt so much and she turned away from it, cradling the pendant in her hand, trying to keep herself together. A strange buzzing filled her head as she waited for Heather to tell her about her mom.
But Heather’s eyes were still crawling over the castle. “King, huh, I’d love to see him.”
Graeme shook his head. “I dinnae ken if that is a good idea. Ask Dahlia what she feels.”
Heather waved her hand. “It’s cool. You’re right. Maybe I can just leave him something. Something to say I was thinking about him.” She dug in her pockets, pulling out only some keys, her phone, and an orange whistle of some sort. She tossed it on the bed. “That’s perfect. It’s a survival whistle with a compass and a signal mirror. I got it for your mom, but I can get her another one. She’s a super sweet lady, but she sucks at directions. She got lost this morning in the meadow behind the house─” She broke off and frowned at Dahlia. “Dahlia, what’s wrong?”
Crew rushed to her and Dahlia went limp on the bed as blackness rushed up to meet her, willing herself not to faint, not to lose it completely.
But she did.
Chapter 35
Dahlia came to slowly, blinking her eyes as Crew held her by the shoulders and blotted water onto her face. She stared at him gratefully. “I’m ok. I can sit up.”
He helped her up and Dahlia grabbed Heather’s hand. “My mom. Tell me.”
Heather spilled the story in only a few minutes and Dahlia’s world collapsed just a little more. Confirmation. Somehow, she’d always suspected she’d been responsible for making her mother disappear. The worst fear she’d buried in her life had just come true.
She tried to speak. “Is she?─Does she?─Is she mad at me?”
Heather’s brows furrowed. “Mad at you? Has your mom ever been mad at anyone?”
Dahlia cocked her head, hearing something that she wasn’t sure if it was in her mind or somewhere outside the castle’s walls. A yowling, like an animal… then she knew.
She turned to Crew. “Angel, he’s calling me.”
He nodded. “I hear it, too.”
“Time to go, kiddies. Got all your stuff?” Graeme said.
“Oh, I just want to change into my─”
But before Dahlia could finish the sentence, they were being pulled across time and space. She reached for Crew in the split second she had before her bare feet touched the snowy ground. He caught her hand, landing on the ground next to her, looking around at the Illinois winter from the middle of someone’s driveway. He smiled down at her. “Well, that was easy.” She tried to smile back, but her heart still pounded.
Heather and Graeme appeared next to them, their entrance into the world just as simple as Dahlia and Crew’s had been. Heather grabbed Graeme’s hand. “My pendant was way better than Ella’s or Dahlia’s.”
He grabbed her hand and kissed it. “Of course it was, leannan.”
A male voice sounded behind them. “Crew, what the fuck is that on your face?”
Crew stood up straight and wiped a hand across his face, turning to greet several men Dahlia did not recognize. She could guess about one of them, though. The guy in the camo cap had to be Beckett, Crew’s best friend in this world.
“Never mind, it was a smile. Never seen you wear one before,” Beckett said.
Crew flipped him off, then caught him in a bear hug and clapped him on the back, then shook the hands of the other men, leaving stunned expressions on their faces. “Get used to it, Beck, you’re gonna be seeing it from now on.”
He turned to Dahlia and picked her up in one smooth motion, then pressed a kiss to her lips as the guys in the driveway whistled and cat-called. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to get my female out of the cold.”
Dahlia still couldn’t speak. She looked around, wondering exactly where they were. One more guy caught her eye. “Mac,” she cried, forgetting herself for just a second, forgetting what world they were in. She owed him so much thanks. She turned to Crew first. “Does Mackenzie like you in this world, too?”
Mac’s eyes narrowed and he came close. “Where did you hear that name?”
Too late, Dahlia realized her mistake. “Your… your sister,” she said in a small voice.
Mac’s face tightened and he faced Crew. “My sister is alive in that world you go to?”
Crew nodded and his expression tightened. For the first time, Dahlia saw him as his friends knew him.
Mac didn’t say anything for a few moments as everyone seemed to hold their breath. Finally, he spoke, and his voice was softer. “Is she an adult?”
Crew nodded again.
“What─what is she like?”
Crew opened his mouth, then closed it again, then opened it again, like he wasn’t sure what to say, but Dahlia knew exactly how to describe Mackenzie.
She caught Mac’s eye. “She’s fierce.”
Mac clenched his lips together and his eyes glistened. He nodded to Dahlia once. “Thank you,” he whispered.
Then he turned and walked away, not towards any buildings or cars, but just away. When he crossed the street, he walked straight into the forest, plowing furrows in the snow with his boots.
Everyone in the driveway watched him go.
***
Dahlia clung tight to Crew as he carried her into the house. “That was sweet,” he said to her, his small smile that was meant just for her back on his face.
He put her down just inside the doorway and she looked around. The house was beautiful.
A woman’s voice called from the top of a stairway to her left. “Ella, is that you? I have to show you this snow angel I made. You can see it best from up here!”
Dahlia clutched at her throat. “Mom?” she whispered. Crew steadied her from the back. Someone pounded down the stairs and Dahlia looked up, her legs threatening to give way under her.
Her mother came down the stairs, a smile on her face, look
ing impossibly beautiful and sweet and just like Dahlia remembered her. Dahlia barked out a rough cry and covered her face with her hands.
Deborah stopped. “Dahlia,” she said softly, then her feet pounded down the rest of the stairs so fast Dahlia was afraid she would fall.
“Dahlia, baby, I’ve missed you so much.” Her mom gathered her into a hug bigger than the one Heather had given her. Tears streamed down Dahlia’s face, but still she couldn’t look at her mom.
“Baby, look at me. Sweetie, how have you been, oh, I love you so much, baby.”
Dahlia couldn’t get her voice to work. Her tears were thick and heavy and strangling her. Her mom rubbed her hair and rocked her back and forth and finally Dahlia found the courage to speak. “Mom, I’m so sorry.”
“For what, baby? You didn’t do anything.”
Dahlia lost it again. Her mom didn’t even know. She gathered her courage and all the strength she had and said, “I sent you away all those years ago. It had to be me. When I touched the pendant, that made you disappear. It’s my fault. All my fault.”
She let the tears fall freely behind her hands and waited for her mother to realize it was true. Deborah peeled her hands away from her face and looked her in the eye, her expression kind. “Oh, my baby girl. It’s not your fault. It was never your fault.” She stopped talking for a second, then seemed to gather courage and start again. “When I told you that I thought your father wanted me to show you the pendant, it wasn’t exactly true. When he left it with me, he told me not to give it to you till you were old enough to understand what it meant, and he left it up to me to decide when that was. It was my fault, Dahlia. All my fault. Never yours, sweet girl.” She pulled Dahlia close. “It’s been an adventure, and if I could do it all over again and never leave you, I would, but then you wouldn’t have a half-brother.”
Dahlia hiccuped and tried to stop her flow of tears. “A what?”
Her mom held her at arm’s length, and she dropped her hands and met her mom’s eyes. “We’ve got a lot to talk about, baby girl. I hope you can forgive me for leaving you.”
