27. Autumn
Istared at myself in the mirror and for the first time in my life I absolutely did not recognize the girl looking back at me.
My eyes were bright and alive and I was finally wearing my tattoos with pride and holding my head up high instead of looking down so my hair could cover as much of my face as possible.
The guys had asked me to have dinner with them out in the greenhouse tonight. Just us.
They were up to something and by the the sly looks Ariel had been giving me all day the others were in the know on what was going on here.
I wished someone had let me in on the secret so I wasn’t such a bundle of nervous energy.
I had asked Ariel what she thought I should wear. She’d told me whatever I was comfortable in, so no help there. She wasn’t a very good girlfriend and when I told her this she laughed and called one of her husbands, handed the phone over to me after he’d answered, and then left me to it.
I would have called her out for it if the man hadn’t helped me sort myself out and pick out what he’d called the perfect outfit for my very first date night.
Date night.
That had made the nervous energy even worse, and I now had butterflies floating free in my stomach.
Ariel’s husbands had wanted me to go all dressed up for this dinner but I wasn’t exactly comfortable with going all out. It seemed excessive and insane to me. Damion made me show him everything in my closet and his partner had tried to balance his excitement out by being the rational calm one of the two.
In the end I hadn’t gone with what either of them had wanted me to wear. I went with what I felt the most comfortable with and I didn’t think I had gone overboard in the slightest. I thought I’d done quite alright, if I did say so myself.
I’d chosen a dress.
It was so long that the hem touched the floor when I walked. It was thin but soft and meant for summer I thought. I paired it with tall socks that went up to my knees and a white cashmere button up sweater that was big, slouchy, and very comfortable. I left it unbuttoned though so you could still see the dress.
I didn’t think Ariel’s prissy husband would have approved but thankfully I wasn’t having dinner with him.
It was pretty but still casual enough that my guys wouldn’t think I was trying to hard.
I wanted to try too hard though. I wanted to give it my all and I really wanted them to want to keep me as badly as I wanted to keep them. But I didn’t want to come off as desperate or being too much.
I left my face makeup free and my hair down, something Ariel’s husbands had actually encouraged. I mostly did this because I didn’t know how to put makeup on and I didn’t think I’d ever care to learn. After reading what Liam had given me about my tattoos I’d never do anything to cover any of them up.
Not ever.
I couldn’t stall for time anymore. It’d be rude to be late and keep them waiting for me.
Ariel was on the phone in the living room and as soon as she saw me she immediately hung up on whoever she was talking to.
Clearly, she wasn’t concerned with being rude to anyone ever.
“You don’t have to agree to anything. I just want you to know that it’s okay to say no and even though it might not seem like it, you have plenty of options.”
Someone touched my shoulder and I turned to see Rain standing next to me staring intently at his daughter.
He looked down at me with kind eyes that I hadn’t seen much of since that very first time he’d looked at me.
“Go ahead and go, sweetheart. They’re waiting for you. Don’t listen to my daughter. She means well, but it’s time for her to mind her own business now.”
“Dad—”
“No,” he said in a stern voice, cutting her off. He pushed gently on my shoulder, guiding me in the direction of the door. “Go claim your men, girl. They’re waiting.”
My men.
Yes.
I liked the sound of that a whole lot. It set a flurry of butterflies free inside my belly.
I grinned at him nervously and gave him a little hand wave bye before I ran out the door, completely ignoring Ariel and her negative attitude.
When I entered the greenhouse I stopped dead in my tracks because the space was always magical to me but tonight it had truly transformed into something so special it threatened to rob me of breath.
The space was beautiful and had been transformed but it was the men standing there, the coven waiting for me, that really did it for me.
They were hopefully my future and everything I truly wanted. Everything I truly needed.
I just hoped they wanted me as much as I wanted them.
I had never been a girl with hopes and dreams before and now that I had them I didn’t want to get them crushed before they were ever really able to be fulfilled.
Liam was the first to greet me and he smiled shyly at me as he took me by the hand and pulled me into the room. “You look beautiful tonight, Autumn. Come on, let’s go sit down with the others and eat.”
I smiled back at him but for once I wasn’t so sure if I actually could eat. I was so nervous and I just wanted to blurt out that I wanted to stay with them just to get it and their reactions out of the way. Then maybe I would be able to eat.
They all greeted me sweetly as Mason pulled my chair out for me. I sat down at the table with Raven on one side of me and Liam on the other, with Raven being at the head of the table. Gunner and Mason sat across from me with Scout at the end of the table, across from Raven.
Raven handed me a glass and said, “It’s champagne. Tonight, hopefully, we’re celebrating. But drink it slowly because I don’t want it to go to your head straight away.”
I frowned at him as I took a sip of the drink. It was sweet, bubbly, and I immediately loved it.
Liam leaned into my ear and whispered, “It’s alcohol, that’s what he meant by that.”
Ah.
Okay.
So this was my first drink of alcohol. We didn’t have anything like it back at the camp.
“What are we celebrating?” I asked as I sat the glass down on the table instead of gulping it down like my nerves wanted me to.
“Hopefully you staying with us on a permanent basis,” Scout blurted out.
Everyone but me turned to glare at him. I grinned because he seemed as nervous as I was and I couldn’t believe that.
“Not cool, brother,” Mason grumbled. “She deserves a little more finesse than that. You’ve got no skills, obviously.”
I laughed at them as Liam placed his hand on my thigh under the table, making my heart race.
Raven sighed as if he was being harassed and picked up his drink that had dark brown liquor swishing around inside it. He drained it dry and sat his empty glass back down onto the table.
“I wanted to ease into this for your sake but it’s clear that no one at this table, including yourself, seems to have the patience for all of that.”
I almost felt bad for him because he had all of us to manage all of the time and it seemed like all of his wants always came in last.
Still, I didn’t feel as bad as I probably should have though because I was as impatient as he claimed everyone to be.
“Autumn,” he said as he reached across the table and took hold of my hand. “We would all like to formally ask you if you would honor us by joining our coven. I know you just agreed to joking the Council and that’s already a big deal, so if you need some time to think about it we’ll all completely understand and respect that. It’s a big responsibility for you. So is joining a coven. It’s a lifelong commitment and something you need to be certain of before you say yes. I want you to be sure that joining us is what’s right for you.”
“It’s right,” Liam whispered as he squeezed my thigh again. “You belong with us. There’s a connection. We all feel it to some degree. There’s no telling where that connection will lead for the relationships between all of us but there’s no denying that it exists. It’s up to us what we make of it though. And it’s not something that we should ignore because a true connection is something that’s rare and beautiful to find.”
“But you need to be sure,” Raven stressed. “Female witches have choices now and it’ll always be your choice.”
“Raven’s grandmother never got a choice and she ended up going into hiding with her baby and one of her men,” Scout told me conspiratorially, as if Raven wasn’t sitting at the table listening to every word being said. “That’s why he feels so strongly about this. Because he’s seen first hand what the damage can be done when the choice is wrong or there was no choice to begin with.”
“Thank you for sharing that,” Raven growled angrily.
Scout shrugged unapologetically. “If she’s going to be one of us then I see no point in keeping her in the dark on anything.”
“We tried with another female before,” Gunner shared and my heart immediately sank somewhere down near my butthole. “We never offered her a place amongst our coven but she did come here and stay with us to see if we’d be a good fit for her. It obviously didn’t work out or you wouldn’t be sitting here right now.”
“She wasn’t like you at all,” Liam whispered for just me. “She was selfish and evil. We didn’t have enough money at the time to satisfy her needs. She totally snubbed us and moved onto Ariel’s coven. That was before Ariel, of course.”
“Quinton, the head of Ariel’s coven,” Mason chimed in, picking up where Liam left off. “Isn’t a man you fuck with. She tried to ruin them and tear their coven apart. She ended up finding herself being the one who got ruined instead. She left them completely scarred up on most of her face.”
“Eventually she ended up with the Council where she met her end after they used her all up,” Liam continued to whisper his side of the story. “That was right before Ariel destroyed all of them.”
Whoa.
I sat back in my chair and looked around at all of them with wide eyes.
It was only Liam who seemed to get some sort of pleasure out of that part of the story.
“She was evil,” Raven muttered under his breath as he poured himself another drink.
If he was going to drink then I should get to too. I picked up my glass of Champagne and drained it. It went straight to my head and I almost giggled.
It also gave me the courage to say what I had to say next.
“I don’t know what all that’s about but you’re going to have time to explain it to me because I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying right here and if you’re asking me to join your coven the answer is yes, I’d love to.”
Liam laughed happily as he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into his side. “That’s the very best thing you could have ever said. Yes! Welcome to the family, sweetheart. You belong here with us. We were meant to find you in the woods that night. It was divine intervention.”
I completely understood and agreed with him. They found me for a reason and I was meant to be here with him.
They were my people and I had finally found where I belonged in the world.
It might not make sense to anyone looking in from the outside but it made perfect sense to me.
Raven refilled my glass and handed it back to me. “I was trying to make this a special night for you. One you could look back on and remember with fondness because we asked you to join our coven in a way you’d want to remember forever. You guys are ridiculous and totally ruined the moment.”
I placed my hand on his arm, stopping him from retreating any further from me. “Nothing has been ruined here, Raven. I promise you that. This is a special night to me that I’m going to remember always. Perfect is overrated and likely non existent. This is us, the start of us, and it’s whatever we make it to be. I’m more than happy with that.”
“Hear hear,” Gunner, Mason, and Scout cheered.
Liam just laughed again. I had never seen this side of him but thought it was cute, if a little crazy.
“Let’s fuckin’ eat,” Scout groused. “I’m starving and I’ve been too nervous to eat anything all day.”
Aww. Was he saying he’d been so nervous about my answer that he hadn’t been able to eat all day? It was kind of sweet because I had felt very much the same way. I had been a nervous wreck until I’d talked to Rain actually. He’d been the one to calm my nerves.
I shouldn’t really have been so surprised by that because I think Rain had only stayed this long to make sure I was okay and settled in with my new coven. I didn’t think he’d actually planned for me to leave here with them at all. He was a very wise man, that’s for sure.
Liam leaned into me again and this time he got so close that his lips kissed my ear. “If you want, to celebrate, we can eat you for desert.”
I almost choked on my champagne.
My wide eyes met his and my lips parted at the heat and mischief I saw dancing in their depths.
I would have to watch out for Liam, that was becoming very clear.
“Drink up, sweetheart.” he grinned devilishly and I thought he might have just given me excellent advice.
The nerves were back now in full force.
But now they’d brought butterflies dancing in my stomach in excitement with them.