Chapter 23
I grabbed his mug and mine and took them to the sink. Flicked the power off on the coffee maker, emptied and put away the kettle, butter, and bread, and followed him to the bedroom, where he was turning down the linens.
We brushed our teeth in the same sink like an old married couple then shuffled off to his giant bed. The air conditioner had the room hovering at a crisp sixty-eight degrees and the sound of ocean waves played softly from a speaker on his nightstand.
“I can’t believe I finally have you in my bed, and I’m too exhausted to do a damn thing about it.”
“I was thinking the same thing,” I said.
He opened his arms. I snuggled into them, my head against his chest, and immediately fell asleep.
I awoke with a gasp two hours later. Sat upright in the bed and covered my mouth to stifle the scream in my throat.
“How bad was it?” Ronan’s groggy voice was soothing.
“Awful.” I was still shaking.
In the dream, my mom had held my head and Sexton my feet. They pulled on me like a tug-of-war rope until my body tore in half. Belial, the demon that had nearly killed me a few weeks ago, bellowed a laugh when I screamed, and Lucien waded through my blood, stabbing at my remains with the white blade.
“Come here.”
I did, and he wrapped an arm around my waist and eased me into the little spoon position. My ass rocked against his groin, and he let out a low growl.
“Stop wriggling. Let me rub your back to help you sleep.”
“I’ve heard that one before.”
“Hey, I meant it.” He pressed his thumbs into my shoulder muscles, and I arched my back. “I reserve the right to invoke the foreplay massage at any time in the future, though.”
“Pro tip: women don’t like when you tell them they’re getting a relaxing massage then insert your penis into the session—unless they’ve been forewarned.”
“Consider yourself forewarned,” he said. “Next massage you’re gettin’ the full treatment, baby.”
I tried to hold in my laugh, but he was rubbing my back and could see my shoulders shaking.
“Quit making fun of my dirty talk,” he said.
Laughter spilled out of me. “You sound like a dude from an old porno.”
“Hey there, sexy mama,” he said, in a clunky, flat delivery. “Lay on this table, and I’ll give you a massage, wink , wink .”
I matched his tone. “Okay. That sounds good. This is what normal friends do.”
“You’re so tense. Let me loosen you up with my magic hands.” He danced his fingers over my shoulders until we both dissolved into laughter.
And just like that, he’d chased away the dregs of the nightmare.
His “magic hands” worked the stiffness from my lower back and shoulders, and I felt my eyes sinking shut.
“Ronan?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.”
“For the massage? Anytime.”
“No—well, that, too. What I’m trying to say is thank you for being there for me today.”
“Sweet Betty.” He kissed my shoulder. “Why would you thank me for being exactly where I want to be?”
I awoke at noon, twisted in the sheets of Ronan’s bed.
Platonically twisted, which was a bummer, but also probably smart considering how sore I felt. Turned out being whacked upside the head and stabbed in the heart had a negative effect on my muscular system.
A note lay on his pillow.
Had to leave early. Your busted phone is charging on the nightstand. Fingers crossed. Coffee’s warm and there are cookies in the cabinet by the fridge. Stay as long as you want. Days, weeks, months… If it sweetens the pot, I’ve got an entire cabinet of herbal bath salts and I’m getting a bakery delivery this week. —R
I was tempted to climb into his tub and soak away my soreness—and sadness. However, I had things to do. So I drank some coffee, watered the succulent in the sink, and set it in a patch of sunlight, and ate a pink polvoron from a container in the pantry. I wrote him a note on the back of his.
Had to run an errand. I’ll be back later. Also, living plants are not decorations. Get a fake one for your dark bedroom. Or grow mushrooms. Thanks for everything, magic fingers. —B
I left the note stuck to his fridge and grabbed a fresh pair of sweatpants he’d left out for me. No bra, but on my list of worries for the day, not binding up the girls was dead last. I dressed quickly, brushed my teeth and hair, washed my face, and headed out on foot. At least I still had my boots, even if they did look strange paired with sweatpants.
Wicked was busier than usual, so I waited until Bronwyn finished with her customers before approaching the counter. She smiled and beckoned me over.
“Mind if I sit down?” I asked. “Still not a hundred percent. Plus, I walked over here from Ronan’s pub.”
“Of course. Come back behind the counter.” She gave me her seat then unfolded a step ladder and sat down on it. “Where are your eyebrows? I wanted to ask you yesterday, but it wasn’t a casual conversation sort of moment, was it?”
“No, it wasn’t.” Understatement of the century. “They burned off in an explosion. If you have a brow pencil handy, I’d love to borrow it.”
“Are you sure you’re okay?” She dragged a pink bag out from under the counter and beckoned me close. “I was going to say you look awful, but that’s not the first thing I’d want someone to say to me.”
“So you made it the second thing?”
“Technically, it was the third, after pointing out your lack of eyebrows.” She swiped the pencil over my bare brow line then stood back to admire her work with a bright, happy smile.
“Thanks.” My lips twitched. “You have the most aggressive form of sunshineyness I’ve ever come across. You brandish it like a sword.”
“Now you know my secret: pathological good humor.” She put the makeup away and retook her seat. “Are you here about the charm?”
“The what?”
“The one from last night—er, this morning.”
She was doing everything she could not to mention the coven, even though we both knew it was one of Margaux’s charms. Her sunny smile had started to falter, and I didn’t like being the reason for it.
“No. I know what I need to know about that thing. Just Margaux out there selling her magic to the highest bidder, as usual.”
For once, Bronwyn didn’t try to correct me. Instead, she asked, “If not that, why are you here? Not that you aren’t welcome, but you usually have a reason.”
I took my phone out of my pocket and brought up photos of two of the hex bags I’d found buried in my soil. “Have you ever seen anything like these?”
She gingerly pinched the cracked screen, tapped, turned it this way and that. “I’ve seen similar knot magic, though not exactly in that combination. Any idea whose hair it is?”
“Mine.”
“Seriously?” Her eyes widened. “You’re absolutely sure?”
“Yes. I need to know what they are.” I didn’t tell her Mom had planted them. Or that they’d been soaked in her blood and Sexton’s. I wanted the witch to look at them as having come from a malevolent viewpoint, not a loving mother planting demon and human blood curses all over my property.
“Yeah, you do, if they used your hair in it.” Some of her sunniness faded, and she took a longer look at the photos. “There’s blood. Dark magic? Where’d you find these things?”
“Buried on my property.”
“The Siete Saguaros?” She looked up from the phone, her expression stricken. “How many were there?”
“Just those two,” I lied.
I hadn’t shaken my apprehension about bringing this question to a La Paloma coven witch, but somewhere along the way it’d become more important to know the truth than worry about what the coven would think.
“I’ll look into it,” she said.
“Hey, I know you have to tell the coven when you come across things like this, but I’d appreciate it if you’d tell me what you find out first. Even if it’s only a minute before. I don’t want to be broadsided by another witch.”
She handed me back the phone and held out her hand. “Give me a dollar.”
I dug into the sweatpants pocket. Pulled out a gumball-sized piece of quartz I’d found on the walk over. “I don’t have my purse, so I don’t have any money. How about this?”
“Even better.” She opened her cash register and dropped the rock into the section with the quarters. Then she wrote something on an invoice pad, tore the bottom sheet off, and handed it to me.
“Professional consultation. Privacy guaranteed,” I read.
“If you’re hiring me, I am bound by the goddesses and my honor to respect your privacy. As we well know, the goddesses hate a snitch.”
“True. They tend to get fiery mad about things like that,” I said.
“Just don’t tell me anything I’ll have to agonize about not sharing with the coven.”
I thought back to last night. She’d seen a lot of things I’d rather the coven didn’t find out about. Particularly who my new grandpa was.
“It’s retroactive by twenty-four hours,” she said without meeting my eyes. She indicated my phone. “Text me the photos. I want to take a look in our family grimoire to see if there’s anything like it in there. You didn’t see it in yours?”
“No.” A wave of nausea washed over me, and I leaned back in the seat and pinched the bridge of my nose.
“Betty, you have to take it easy. It’s only been a few hours since you were healed. Do you want me to call Ronan to come pick you up? I’d take you home, but I’m expecting an appointment soon and I can’t leave. Sorry.”
Call Ronan? No. Maybe Ida. It would be weird to call Ronan. We weren’t really even dating. I mean, sure, we’d slept together— platonically —but we were more friends who had sex— eventually, with any luck —than anything else. Our relationship was casual. Chill.
I was so full of it.
“Betty?” Bronwyn set her hand on my shoulder. “I can always set up a cot in the storeroom if you need to rest. It’s the coolest room in the place. Always a perfect sixty-eight degrees. Just don’t make direct eye contact with anything on the back aisle.”
“No, it’s all right. I already feel much better.” I pulled myself out of my thoughts and texted her a photo of the hex bag. “Thanks for looking into this. Send me a bill for your time. I may not have money on me at the moment, but I’m not paying you with a damn rock.”
“Rocks aren’t bad currency,” she said with a smile. “I’ve taken worse.”
“Same here. One time, I took an aquarium of frogs as payment.”
“You’re kidding.” She lowered her voice and leaned closer. “What in the world did you do with them?”
“Freed them, of course. A witch contact of mine had a huge pond. He needed some peace charms, so he took the frogs, and I gave him the charms. For some reason, he felt rehoming them wasn’t payment enough and gave me two crows he’d raised from eggs.”
“Oh no, you got caught in a barter loop,” she said, laughing.
“The crows went to an air mage who raised carrier pigeons. They were very happy there.” I grinned. “The whole thing ended up with me hauling home a half cord of enchanted firewood. That was much easier to get rid of, though. Fire elementals love the stuff. And I gained a favor in return.”
“Favors are the best currency.”
“Speaking of,” I said. “You have one from me for keeping quiet about … everything. Anytime you need to cash it in, give me a call.”
She shook her head. “The goddesses would roast me if I broke my non-disclosure agreement. And don’t forget, I still owe you for taking care of the giant pitcher plant.”
“You paid me back for that, remember?” I stood and stretched, my muscles stiff. “I don’t give out favors lightly, Bronwyn. Take it. Who knows? You might discover a carnivorous fern on your doorstep one of these days.”
She raised a single slender finger. “I have an idea. Instead of exchanging favors, how about we become the kind of people who don’t make every agreement between us transactional? How about we just admit there could be the slightest chance we might actually be friends?”
I stood there. Thought about it. “That would be nice.”
Bronwyn gave me a wide, sunshiny smile. Because of course she did.
The walk back to the pub was quicker than the walk to Wicked had been. I thought about what Bronwyn had said all the way to Ronan’s.
Was she my friend? The jury was still out, but she’d moved further into that category than anyone else I’d met in the last couple of years.
Except for Ronan.
I stopped by El Rancho Grande, a hole-in-the-wall taco shop downtown, and picked up some adobada tacos for Ronan and a couple potato for me. It felt like a normal thing to do, and I craved normality like I craved tacos.
“Thanks,” he said, when I plopped the bag on his desk. He was typing furiously on his laptop and grumbling mild threats. “Emailing a supplier. She shorted me two cases of?—”
“What are we?” I blurted. “You and me.” In case he hadn’t figured out what I was talking about. “Are we the kind of people other people call to come fetch us if we’re not feeling well?”
“Disturbingly specific question.” Ronan continued typing. “What do you want us to be?”
“Great. Lob the question back. Never mind.” I peeled the foil off my taco and bit into it.
“I wasn’t lobbing anything.” He finished whatever he was typing and closed the laptop. “Look, are we eating tacos or talking about us? I’m not sure I can do both at the same time.”
His flippancy stung a little, but it wasn’t like I hadn’t acted that way with him a time or two. “Eat your tacos before they get cold.”
He opened a music app on his phone and put a seventies hits playlist on shuffle. We ate to Pablo Cruise’s “Love Will Find A Way” and “Whatcha Gonna Do?”
Ronan frowned down at his phone. He opened a different playlist and “When You’re in Love With A Beautiful Woman” by Dr. Hook began. He scowled.
By the time the Dr. Hook song ended and E.L.O.’s “Sweet Talkin' Woman” started playing, he’d plowed through his tacos—eight to my two.
“Thanks for lunch,” he said.
“You’re welcome,” I replied stiffly.
I gathered up our trash, shoved it into the paper bag, and tossed the whole thing to him. Opened the office door.
“Ida’s picking me up out front in a few minutes. I need to check in with my partners and evaluate the damage to the park. Ida said the protection spell is holding, but I want to be sure. Thanks again for everything. See you later.”
I walked out without waiting for a goodbye. If he didn’t want to dissect whatever it was we were doing, that was okay. We’d figure it out eventually.
Gladys wasn’t working. There was a new woman behind the bar—late forties, with sable brown hair, eyes, and skin. I’d met her briefly. Yvette, Edith, something like that. Everyone called her Edie. She was a shifter, but I didn’t know what kind.
I nodded hello to her, and she returned the greeting.
Angel the betta fish swam happily in his aquarium behind the counter. Edie shook some food into his water, and he shot to the surface to gobble it up. A few shifters sat at tables sipping drinks along with a couple of paranormals I knew.
I vaguely recognized two of the three people at the bar and forcibly, shockingly recognized one.
Mason Hartman.
What I could see of his skin under his suit was smooth and unmarred. The only sign he’d been through anything traumatic over the last couple of days were the gray circles under his eyes.
I didn’t acknowledge Mason, and he gave me little more than a flick of his eye. It was like seeing a one-night-stand at the dentist’s office the next day. Uncomfortable and sort of uneasy, like he might make a scene.
Ronan’s arm slid around my waist. I was so busy pretending not to be aware of Mason I hadn’t heard him walk up behind me.
“We aren’t finished talking, Betty.” He spoke the words into my ear, the intensity in his voice giving me goosebumps. “You asked if we’re the kind of people other people call to come fetch us if we’re not feeling well.”
“I did ask that.” I turned around in his hold and cocked my head to direct his attention to the presence of Mason. “In private .”
“And I’m answering you in public.” His eyes glimmered around the edges. “The answer is yes. I want to be the person other people call to fetch you. But even more than that, I want to be the person you call when you’re sick or sad or lonely. Or when you’re happy, horny, and celebrating.” I unsuccessfully tried to hide a smile as he tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear. “But no matter who calls, I will always come for you, Betty Lennox.”
His eyes, which had only been shining before, now glowed so brightly there was no way anyone could mistake him for human.
“I’ll always come for you, too,” I said.
“You’d damn well better, because I’ll be waiting impatiently.” He pressed his lips to my ear and whispered, “What are we? Together . That’s what we are. And I don’t give a damn who knows it.” He let out a low, rumbling growl, and my goosebumps got goosebumps. Then he drew my body tight to his and kissed me.
This wasn’t the light brushing of mouths from earlier. This was searching tongues, and searching lips and the slightest bite of teeth. This was a precursor to more , and as the world fell away and there was nothing left except his body against mine, I realized that it was exactly what I wanted.
Finally, I lifted my head. “So you’re saying we’re together.”
He grinned. “If it’s all right with you.”
I tapped my finger against my lower lip and pretended to think about it. “Why not?”
“Smart ass.”
He grasped my hand in his and gave the room a panoramic grin, starting and ending at the bar. “What can I say? The woman brought me tacos. What was I supposed to do?”
“Tacos, you say? I’m shocked you didn’t jump her bones sooner,” Edie said, and everyone in the place laughed.
Everyone except Mason.