Roses and Revenants: A Dark Paranormal Reverse Harem Romance (The House of Mirrors Book 1)

by Cate Corvin

  Who knew if I would ever see Ashville again? I had no real love for it, but it had been my shelter while I ran from the past. The people didn’t embrace me, but I’d had no need of their affection. It had been a good shelter, a place to lie low and recover from the storm.

  I leaned on the brick wall, picking at a loose thread on my leather jacket. “Ready to see old lover-girl again?”

  I smirked at Eric, who rolled his eyes. Melinda had once had far too much witch-wine and propositioned Eric at a party. He had turned her down, helping her save face, but I had been only fifteen and ablaze with jealousy at the time.

  And I thought I had reason to dislike Melinda… he must be desperate to keep me on lockdown if he was willing to risk her company in her own house.

  The rune heated in my palm and its warmth pooled in my fingertips. “It’s time,” I breathed. We crowded close to the metal door, green paint flaking from it onto our suitcases.

  I gripped the rune tightly, envisioning Rosethorne as I gripped the door and pulled it back hard.

  We stood in a greasy street under a gray sky, but opened the door to sunshine and the thick, lush scent of magnolias. Bright white marble gleamed underfoot as we stepped through, dragging the suitcases with us.

  I barely heard the door slam behind us as I breathed in, grinning despite myself. The gates of Rosethorne were delicate wrought-iron, manicured vines of ivy draped languidly over the twists of metal. Joss leaned on them casually, his eyes fixed on me, and a blond teenage boy- Felix, still gangly, with Melinda’s golden hair- was perched on the retaining wall. Melinda was standing with perfect posture, not a hair out of place on her perfectly-coiffed head. She had likely picked her expensive white linen sundress from a human magazine.

  Her servitor was a handsome human man in his early thirties, his muscles visible even through the buttoned linen shirt he wore. Looking at his thick dark hair, I knew exactly why Melinda had chosen this one to be her most trusted advisor.

  She really had an eye for pool-boys.

  Melinda was examining me just as intently as I was examining her, her eyes lingering with barely-disguised horror on my low-cut shirt, the ripped-out knees of my jeans, and the knee-high boots. My smirk became a genuine grin. If she wanted to get feisty with me, I’d just irritate her right back.

  We exchanged proper greetings, guaranteeing me safety in her coven, before she introduced her servitor as Raphael DeLuca. I nudged Eric as we followed them up the flawlessly paved drive to Rosethorne proper.

  He only shook his head, unamused by the uncanny resemblance, and I found myself falling in next to Joss and his little brother.

  The new master of Rosethorne draped an arm around my waist, pressing a kiss to my hairline.

  “Long time no see, Felix. What’s the petition we’re working on?” Eric had caught up to Melinda and was already bombarding her with questions about security, ignoring her roaming eyes.

  Felix Thorne was giving me a strange look. Nervousness prickled over me, then I realized it wasn’t as bad I was imagining. He looked impressed. I supposed the last time I’d talked to him, I’d just been Mor, a silly teenage witch. Now I was a covenhead, and probably the subject of a lot of talk.

  “It’s a bad one,” he admitted. “Maybe a succubus, or a nightmare… there’s a hotel that’s been haunted by it since the 1920s, and there’s at least twenty deaths attributed to it.”

  “It definitely prefers men,” Joss added, his mouth twisted. “I have no intention of sending my little brother in alone.”

  A grim knot twisted in my stomach. “I see.” I’d had no intention of hitting the library so soon, but that news changed things. Twenty deaths in that span of time meant the spirit was definitely capable of taking corporeal form.

  “I haven’t had much luck seeking it out when I’m not a strong mirrorwalker,” Felix added.

  I cut my eyes at him sideways. “But I am. Isn’t that what I’m here for?” It was hard to hold back from calling him kiddo, like I had when he was younger, which no seventeen-year-old warlock could possibly appreciate.

  Felix just shook his head morosely. “Eric would never allow it. And I can’t ask that of you when you’re still jacked up from the accident.”

  “I’ll be there, too,” Joss said, his eyes on Eric’s back. “If Morena and Adrian can’t handle it together, we’ll contain it in the catacombs.”

  “You’re going to bring Wolfe into this?” Felix demanded. Did he know about Joss’s close friendship with Adrian, or did Joss keep it under wraps from his family?

  I ignored the fire burning in my knee. It was nothing. It was trivial. “Absolutely. I’m not going to sit around while humans are being murdered and fed on, and neither are you. We’re stronger together than apart. I had to deal with a lot of shit to learn that myself.”

  “That’s why you’re with me, doll,” Joss said, his arm tightening around me. The pleasant prickle of thorns ran through my wards, his satisfaction a low purr.

  We glided under the magnolia trees, thick petals raining down around us. It smelled like summer, a promise of the future. Like discipline and pain. I couldn’t survive on reputation and birthright alone anymore. I needed to prove myself, or Rosalind would win.

  Rosethorne loomed before us, a monstrosity of white marble and gilt trim. Felix huffed, and went ahead to catch up with his mother.

  Joss sighed.

  “Thanks for helping him out,” he said. “Melinda’s babied him too long, and he needs to figure it out. But if you die, I swear I will find a way to bring you back so I can kill you again myself.”

  “Deal,” I said with a grin. “Joss performing necromancy. Sounds like a fun time.”

  Joss wrapped his arms around me, burying his face in my hair, and I slid my hands up over his shoulders as I kissed the corded lines of his neck. “You’re going to let me do this, right?” I asked breathlessly. “Eric’s already an overprotective bear.”

  “Yes,” he whispered. Melinda and Eric turned a corner ahead, trailed by Raphael and Felix. “You and me and Adrian and Eric. We’ll do it together.”

  Eric was bound to me by love and duty, and I would find a way to make things right between us. Joss had dragged me back from the darkness of the human world where I was wasting away. Adrian would teach me more than I had ever anticipated knowing… and if the taste of his lips was anything to go by, he and Joss would teach me more than how to break the rules.

  We’d have to figure out how to work together before moving against Rosalind. I saw her in my mind’s eye, flanked by the tall dark woman who watched from the deadside of the mirror with a fathomless gaze.

  She had power and hunger, but I had strength, discipline, and the men who would stand by my side the entire way.

  The Underworld was calling. All I needed to do was answer.

  The End

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  THE CIMMERIAN CAGE TRILOGY, set in the world of Roses and Revenants

  Kissed by Wildfire

  Kissed by Moonlight

  Kissed by Midnight

  BONDS OF BLOOD

  Read ILL WILL, the first book of Victoria’s Trilogy: a reverse harem bully romance set in an urban fantasy universe!

  Mercilessly beautiful cruel. Relentlessly sensual vicious. Utterly delicious vile.

  Marrying into the famous Godalming slayer-clan was supposed to be my family’s big break. Our clan is fractured, my brother is dead, and my mother’s spirit was broken by the
ordeal. I’d do anything to make her proud and see her truly smile again.

  I’d even spend a year in the snobby, prestigious Libra Academy with Lord Godalming’s gorgeous son.

  I don’t know what I did to earn Will Godalming’s seething hatred, but he’ll do anything to get rid of me for good, even if he sometimes seems like the only one who understands me. Sura Enver is almost irresistible with a cruel streak a mile wide, but he’s hiding dark secrets under those knockout looks. And when I put a dying vampire out of her misery, I end up at the very top of an ancient warrior’s hit list. No sane slayer angers Càel the White Wolf, the fiercest knight of the vampires’ Clouded Court.

  They’re unstoppable. Wicked. Malignant. And each wants to make me suffer. Between the torment of Libra’s eat-or-be-eaten rules and the rising threat of a new vampire king, enemies prowl on all sides.

  But they’re messing with the wrong slayer.

  Ill Will is the first book of Victoria’s Trilogy in the Bonds of Blood universe, a steamy, medium-burn reverse harem bully romance in a college-age academy setting. This book is for mature audiences and contains triggers.

  BAD BLOOD: Book 2 of Victoria’s Trilogy

  Forgiveness is divine weak. A woman who desires revenge should dig two five graves. An eye for an eye makes the world blind is incredibly satisfying.

  Will and Sura made me believe I was one of them, only to betray me in the worst way. With a second chance to prove I deserve to be in Libra Academy, I’m going to serve the pain back in spades. I’ll destroy Will’s pride and unearth Sura’s secrets, annihilate their family honor… and stab their accomplices in the back for good measure. If they die, they die, but I’ll be the last one laughing.

  My hate for the Shadowed World has been turned inside out, in no small part because of my alliance with Càel, a knight with an inexplicable desire for me. Who’d have thought a vampire would be the one to defend me from my own kind?

  With my unlikely ally at my side, I’ll have my revenge on the ones who tried to ruin me. No punishment is too harsh for them. But our feud isn’t the only one, and there are others who want me dead and gone.

  Unfortunately for them, I’ve got vengeance to spare.

  DIRTY DEEDS: Book 3 of Victoria’s Trilogy

  Things I've won in Libra Academy: An expensive education. A vampire sworn to me forever. An incubus on a leash. A man who'd give up everything to save me.

  Things I've lost: My dignity. My honor. My mortality.

  My blacklist has been narrowed down to two: the king of the vampires, and the slayer who helped him. I'm no longer welcome as a student in Libra Academy, but I can't leave New York until I save my new home: the Clouded Court. I've promised my stalwart knight I'd do anything to destroy his Maker, and I've got plans to put a new queen on the throne.

  I have Càel. My new sisters. A demonic Prince's infernal spy. And the son of a man who might have a far darker soul than I ever imagined.

  We're a crew of misfits, but sometimes that's who you need for dirty deeds.

  And against all odds, those deeds might just be the way to my newly-immortal heart.