Chapter 17
Chapter
Seventeen
Rachel was sitting in my driveway when I made it home that evening. My steps slowed and stilled until I stood at the edge staring at the woman testing my wards to see if she could get through.
I cleared my throat.
Rachel whirled around. “Oh!” She laid a hand over her throat. “You scared me!”
Her words were a little breathless, her expression was innocent, but there was a gleam in her eyes I didn’t like. “Can I help you?”
I made no move to come closer.
Rachel’s brow furrowed. “Can we talk inside?”
“Nope,” I said cheerily.
She huffed. “It’s freezing out tonight.”
“You’re a shifter. The cold should be nothing to you.”
Rachel rolled her eyes. “That’s some ward you got up. Having some trouble?”
I crossed my arms over my chest and watched her. “I don’t know. Am I?”
I didn’t like the way she was looking at me. People who weren’t naturally friendly had trouble faking it. Rachel was smiling at me, but she was using too many teeth, and the expression didn’t reach her eyes.
When she didn’t answer, I nodded. “Does Caelan know you’re here?”
“Why would he care if I was here? I’m new in town. Maybe I want a friend.”
“Do you always try to break the wards of your friends?”
She gasped. “I’m not trying to break your wards! I’ve never seen any quite like this, so I was curious about them. My father is always interested in ward work.”
I stayed silent and watchful. When I didn’t respond, Rachel sighed and leaned against the hood of her car. “You aren’t very nice, you know.”
“You don’t know me, and you haven’t been very nice to me. Now you’re on my property, and I caught you messing with my wards. Tell me what you want and leave.”
A sheen of color rolled over Rachel’s irises. “You’ve got a sharp tongue for someone who has no claws.”
I almost laughed. Claws were in plentiful supply on this property, but I wouldn’t show them unless she forced my hand. “Do I need claws this evening? If you’re here to make a friend, you’re doing a poor job at convincing me.”
“So suspicious.” Rachel rolled her eyes and pushed off her vehicle. She walked toward me stopping a couple of feet away. “I’m having a party at the Keep and wanted to invite you.”
“Caelan would have told me. There was no need for you to come by. A phone call would have sufficed if he didn’t have time to message me.”
Rachel smiled. “I’m afraid he is quite busy.”
The way she said it meant to wound, but I wasn’t in the mood for games. “Yes, he is,” I agreed. “Being a Shifter Lord requires devotion and time. He can’t afford distractions right now.”
“Very true,” Rachel agreed. “Which is the other reason I’m here.”
Oh, this should be good. “You’re leaving?” I asked. “Not surprising. Caelan has very little time for company these days.”
Her eyes flashed with fury. “I’m not going anywhere,” she seethed.
“I don’t think it’s up to you.”
A familiar ping on the ward announced Rowan’s presence at the back of my property. There was no use signaling for him to stay where he was. He would have heard our voices by now, and the man could rarely resist poking his nose into everyone’s business.
He came around the side of the house quiet as a cat. I kept my eyes on Rachel.
“Caelan rarely gets caught up with gutter trash like you, but every once in a while, he lets his guard slip. Not surprised someone like you took advantage of his vulnerability.”
A golden sheen rolled over Rowan’s eyes at the words. He crept closer and closer.
“Gutter trash?” I snorted. “That’s not even worth responding to. If you think Caelan is vulnerable, you haven’t learned a single thing during your time apart.”
I sighed and shoved my hands in my jacket pockets.
“I don’t have time to fight with you. There is no fight.
I don’t care if you like me or not. I don’t care if you want to rip my throat out.
I don’t even care if you want Caelan for your own.
I’m too tired to get down in the mud you’re rolling in, and I’m certainly not in the mood to get dirty. ”
I opened myself to my power and felt the earth respond. Vines snaked from the ground and wrapped themself around my calves, twining up my thighs. A phantom wind blew my hair away from my face, and a crimson sheen rolled over my irises. “Leave now before I get annoyed.”
Rachel’s eyes widened. She took a step back and bumped right into Rowan’s broad chest. She squeaked and spun around, her eyes widening when she saw who stood behind her.
“Rachel, I presume.” Rowan tilted his head, his golden eyes casting a sheen over her pale skin. “Your Lord won’t take kindly to your behavior this evening.”
The shifter stood frozen, her mouth working as she scrambled to find some excuse for her behavior. An annoying thread of empathy filled me, but as I was about to say something, Rowan shot me an amused look as if he knew what I was about to do.
“If I were you, I’d listen to Evie’s warning. I’m not the one you should be afraid of.”
Rachel frowned, her attention returning to me. “A little bit of Floromancy isn’t enough to make me tremble in my boots.”
For the last minute or so, a vine had been creeping up Rachel’s leg. More than done with her shenanigans, I issued a mental command. Seconds later, Rachel was jerked off her feet. She slammed into the ground with a wild screech.
Rowan leaned over her, his hazel eyes sparkling. “You’ve never met a Floromancer like Evie.”
We grinned at each other. With a flick of my finger, the vine lifted her up and tossed her off my property. The quiet evening shattered with the sound of a high-pitched scream of “AIEEEEEEE!”
Rowan lost it. He threw back his head and burst out laughing which made me laugh, until both of us were standing bent over in the driveway wheezing for air.
An hour later, we were in the greenhouse sorting through the seedlings and cuttings I’d set aside for him.
“How was today?” I asked as Rowan studied a new strain of petunia I’d been working on.
“Same bullshit, different day.” He pulled the sketch over and peered down. “You really created a triple bloom petunia?”
“Sure did. It performs like the waving variety, so it produces a ton of flowers that mount and vine, but the blooms themselves are in triplicate.”
Rowan shook his head and straightened. “You could be filthy rich, Evie.”
“No desire for it. I do it for the thrill.”
He snorted. “What a pair we are. You thinking about selling the seedlings?”
“Not sure yet. I doubt it. Humans still don’t know all the things that go bump in the night actually exist, and these bad boys aren’t made with only science. If I do sell them, I may have to force residents into signing an agreement not to move the plants outside of Joy Springs.”
He grimaced. “Hard to enforce.”
“I’ll sic Caelan on them if they violate it.”
Rowan chuckled and pulled the next seedling over and studied that one just as intently.
“Tess is missing,” I said after a few beats of silence.
Rowan’s head jerked up. “Elaborate.”
I told him everything I found out. When I got to the part about my mother, he pushed the seedlings and sketches away. “Things have changed between you two.”
“They have.” I sighed and pulled a flat of basil seedlings over. I brushed my fingers over the tops and let magic trickle from the tips. “My father is being a real shit lately.”
Rowan’s attention sharpened. “How so?”
“He didn’t come right out and admit it, but I suspect he dropped Rachel onto Caelan’s lap.”
His low whistle made me sigh. “Daddy doesn’t approve of Caelan for a husband?”
“I don’t think Daddy would approve of anyone other than a pretty fae male, so the blood will run true.”
Rowan’s eyes narrowed. “He doesn’t want shifter blood in his line?”
I’d been wanting to tell him what I was for a long time now, but I still couldn’t bring myself to utter the words. Trust wasn’t the issue.
I was afraid.
Not of Rowan, but what he’d think of me, how he might change the way he looked at me. Change our friendship.
I liked the way things were, even if I were holding back one of the most important parts of myself.
“Evie?” Rowan coaxed. “Lost you there for a moment.”
I shook those thoughts off. “No. Cernunnos wants to keep the bloodline as pure as possible. He considers additional shifter blood a dilution.”
His eyes flashed gold. “And you’re sure it’s the shifter blood and not Caelan?”
I chuckled. “I can’t tell if my dad likes anyone to be honest. Maybe I should ask him to be more specific.”
“Mixing bloodlines can be a volatile practice.” Rowan pulled the next flat, this one full of herbs, over to him. “But it’s necessary to breed outside the lines to ensure the future health of our species.”
“A healthy outlook,” I mused.
The wards tingled over my skin. “Caelan’s here.”
Rowan nodded. “Let me finish looking this over, and I’ll take my toys and leave.”
“There’s no need for you to rush off.”
Caelan stepped inside the greenhouse and nodded to Rowan. I smiled and jerked my head toward the table. “Come help me pot these. Then I’ll feed you.”
He flashed a smile and came up behind me to drop a kiss against the back of my neck.
Rowan let out an aggrieved sigh. “Can’t you two at least wait five minutes for me to clean this up?”
“Nope,” Caelan said cheerfully.
He tugged a pair of gloves on and reached for some of the larger pots. “I heard something interesting tonight,” he mused as he popped one of the oregano seedlings from the tray.
Rowan and I exchanged looks. He gave me a sympathetic wince and dropped his gaze. “Oh?” I said.
Caelan snorted. “Garrett reported seeing a woman being flung through the air from the vicinity of your property. He noted the woman looked a lot like the Keep’s visiting guest.”
“Huh,” I said. “I wonder who it was.”
Rowan huffed a laugh. Caelan sent him a withering look. “When you two get together, there’s always trouble.”
Rowan held his hands up. “I got here after things had already escalated.”
At Caelan’s disbelieving look, I snickered. “He’s telling the truth. I tossed her while Rowan was here, but he had nothing to do with it.”
“Would you like to share why you chose to toss her?”
“She was being a bitch.”
Rowan couldn’t hold his laugh in that time.
Caelan sighed. “Evie.”
“She came onto my property, tried to get through my wards, then insulted me numerous times. Rachel deserved much more than I gave her.”
Caelan pushed the tray away and leaned against the potting bench. “She’s at the Keep Healer.”
“But alive,” I emphasized. “Maybe a few broken bones will keep her from showing up here again.”
“If her father hears about it, we might have trouble.”
“Then I’ll throw him off my property, too,” I grumbled.
Caelan’s eyes flashed gold. “Evie, you have to get better about your temper.”
Rowan’s hands stilled. His brow furrowed, and I saw his inhale. He opened his mouth, but I interrupted him, shooting him a warning look. There was no need for him and Caelan to have issues over something that involved me.
“And what about her?” I asked quietly.
“What about her?” Caelan snapped.
“She trespassed on my property, attempted to interfere with my warding, then implied I was gutter trash.”
Caelan stared at me for a long moment. “There were other ways of dealing with her than using your magic to toss her half a mile.”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “But none were as fun as that one was.”
He didn’t smile. A moment ago, I’d been annoyed, but now I was full-blown angry. “Why is it that I can get harassed from all sides and yet, when I react, it suddenly becomes all my fault?”
His jaw tightened. “I’m not blaming you.”
“Oh? Just my temper?”
Rowan repacked the plants and seedlings I’d gifted him and nodded at me, a warning in his eyes.
See you later, he mouthed, before slinking out the door.
“You have to admit you have an impressive temper.”
“A temper that never comes out unless someone, nine times out of ten connected to you, decides to do something to violate my boundaries.”
“So, it’s my fault now?”
“It sure as shit is not my fault!”
“Are you saying you are not responsible for what you might do when someone…annoys you?”
I laughed, though there was no amusement in the sound. “We’ve had this fight a dozen times. I will not apologize for defending myself or my property. You are the one who invited that dreadful woman into your home. Why are you here getting onto me for reacting to her antagonizing me?”
“Because I am a LORD!” he roared. “Because there is decorum when dealing with shifters! Because I cannot afford to take a wife who reacts with adolescent mischief when someone pisses her off!”
The words peppered against me like thrown stones, each sentence making me flinch.
When he finished, his eyes widened. He reached a hand out for me. “Evie.”
I stepped away, tears burning the back of my eyes. “Get out.”
“I—I didn’t mean that. I’m frustrated and aggravated, and I’m—”
“I do not care. Get out of my house before I react with adolescent mischief.”
Caelan closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, a ring of gold swallowed his irises. “Evie. Please. We can sort this out. We’ve already agreed that we needed to do better.”
“That was before I realized my fiancé is someone who will not stand up for me when I need him the most. I understand politics, Caelan. What I do not understand is bending over backward to soothe the ego of someone who is actively trying to ruin our relationship. She is the one who made the error in judgment. The only thing I am guilty of is reacting. But I won’t lie down and let a bully kick me.
Politics or no politics, I have a spine. But I’m no longer sure you do.”
Color flushed the tops of Caelan’s cheekbones. Rage flickered in his eyes. “Evie,” he warned.
“This is your last warning,” I said softly. The ground rumbled underneath my feet. “Leave now.”
A phantom wind rose, brushing my hair away from my neck.
Caelan’s upper lip curled into a snarl. “Is this how you want it to be?”
An otherworldly note turned my voice deeper. “I’m not the one who chose this.”
Caelan took a step back and turned on his heel, slamming the door behind him as he exited.
I waited for him to come back in, to apologize, to say something to end this unbearable silence, but he didn’t. The wards tingled one more time as he passed through, and I wondered…
I wondered if maybe I wasn’t cut out for affairs of the heart.