Chapter 17
Chapter
Seventeen
Ididn’t throw up this time. Progress.
Caelan reached out and caught me as I lurched in. I swayed and pressed my hands against his lean chest to steady myself.
“Like a damsel in distress,” he said with a glint in his eye.
I got myself to rights and stood on tiptoe to press a quick kiss to his lips. “Where do you want to check first?”
“His house.”
I’d never been there. “What’s the address?”
I pulled it up online and formed a good picture in my head, then reached in and unwrapped one of the bottles. Caelan took it and whistled.
“How in the hell has she been able to source so many of these?”
“Trade secret,” I said. “You’ll have to ask her.”
His eyes narrowed, but he didn’t press. “We should leave soon. We’re on a break and there’s only a few minutes left.”
I held out my hand. “Mine is still active. Drink it, holding the picture of Ben’s home in your mind. We’ll have about two hours.”
Caelan nodded and tipped the potion into his mouth. I slid my hand into his and thought of Ben’s house.
A moment later we stood before a well-kept manor home, less than half the size of Caelan’s. Maybe even smaller. The place had a large, wraparound porch with several empty hanging baskets. A large swing sat off to the side, the seat covered in snow.
“No one’s here,” Caelan said quietly. “Check the land, and I’ll go inside and see if I can spot anything.”
I nodded and waited as he cleverly picked the front door lock. I’d have to ask him about that later. I could break through a lock using my magic, but his skills made me wonder if he’d been a cat burglar in a past life. Once he was in, I walked off the porch and ventured further onto Ben’s land.
His magic had saturated the earth, the strange yet vibrant cool magic he used when healing.
I bent and tugged one of my gloves off, touching my index finger to the snowy ground.
Sending a pulse of power through the earth, I searched for anything unusual.
It took me a minute, but I found something toward the front of the house.
Blood. Ben’s blood.
A strand of hair that didn’t belong to him, and a disturbance toward the front of his driveway told me Ben didn’t go willingly. I rose and put my glove back on. My teeth chattered, and I shoved my hands into the pockets of my jacket.
Midwest cold was far different from the Texas cold.
I knocked the snow off the swing seat and sat down. Caelan’s sense of smell was extraordinarily keen, and I didn’t want to risk messing his concentration up if I walked inside. Glad I’d chosen to change, I zipped my jacket all the way up to cover my nose and waited.
He was out a few minutes later, a grim expression on his handsome face. “Signs of a struggle inside. Ben put up a hell of a fight, but…” His voice trailed off.
“They shouldn’t have been able to take him like they did. Drugs might have been involved.” He sat down beside me. “Find anything?”
“Blood. Signs of a struggle toward the front of the driveway. I think they put him in a car and drove somewhere.”
Caelan rose and held his hand out. “Let’s check it out.”
More blood dotted the area. Ben was injured, but not enough to kill him. Caelan grimaced. “I need to shift.”
“In the snow?” I shuddered.
A flash of teeth as he smiled. “You forget about all the fur.”
“Yeah, but you have to get naked first.”
Caelan winked. “Hold onto my clothes?”
“As long as you let me ogle you for a moment.”
His eyes glittered. “Ogle away, flower girl.”
Time was of the essence, so Caelan didn’t linger over his clothing. But he did wiggle his eyebrows and do a slow turn before a flash of light overtook him and a giant wolf stood in his place.
I laughed and ran my fingers through his fur. “Very bitable,” I agreed.
He nipped at me then put his nose to the ground. I watched as he thoroughly examined the area. When he was satisfied, he’d found everything, he shifted again and dressed.
“Whatever vehicle they’re in has an oil leak. That won’t narrow it down much, but it could help.”
His phone rang. Caelan grimaced after looking at the screen. “Thorvin is trying to get a hold of me.”
I looked around at the blanket of white surrounding us. “We’re on foot in rural Michigan. Pretty shortsighted on our part.”
Caelan shook his head. “This isn’t his Keep. I’ve been trying to convince him to stay with his shifters, but he’s been strangely resistant. We have one more place to check, and they’ll have vehicles we can use.”
“How far away is the Keep?”
“A few miles.” He pulled up another picture. I studied it for a bit and nodded.
We joined hands as the world fell away once more.
Wolves converged on us as soon as we popped onto the edge of Ben’s property. Caelan held his hands up. “I’m here to help.” Before anyone could say anything, Caelan said the words that got everyone’s attention. “Your Lord is missing.”
A flash of light and a male, tall and deadly looking stood in the wolf’s place. “Lord Caelan.” He dipped his head before turning his attention to me. “And you must be the Floromancer.”
I winced. “Evie.”
“I am Christian, Ben’s Second.” His skin was a dusky olive tone, and his eyes were a gorgeous, green-dominant hazel.
A large scar bisected his left cheek, ending at his lip.
It took a lot of damage to disfigure a wolf to the point where their innate healing abilities didn’t override any scarring.
Instead of taking away from his allure, it only served to heighten his good looks.
“Ben didn’t show up to the Lord’s meeting,” Caelan said. “We went by his house—”
A flicker of something in Christian’s eyes. He disapproved of Ben’s residence choice, too. “Someone took him.”
Caelan nodded. “I’m afraid so. We’d like to borrow a vehicle if you’ve one to spare.”
“Of course. We can provide an escort.”
Caelan shook his head. “I’m happy to take a couple of you, but I want to have the element of surprise.”
Christian’s eyes narrowed. “Who do you believe is behind this?”
“I don’t want to say yet. Not until we find them.”
Christian looked like he wanted to argue, but kept his mouth shut. “Very well.” He jerked his head back. “Pax! With me!”
A massive white wolf stepped forward and shifted. I’d never been around this many naked dudes since I accidentally walked into the wrong gym bathroom when I was in college.
Correction. This many hot dudes. I kept my eyes firmly on the collarbone and above and tried not to fidget.
Shifters were used to nudity all the time.
Floromancers, especially this one, were not.
Not that we were prudes about it, usually, but shifter packs had very few women, and I was a woman in my prime.
Caelan stepped closer, almost like he’d seen my internal struggle not to ogle and slid his fingers over my arm. Proprietary and steadying.
Christian’s eyes glimmered with amusement, but he turned. “Follow. The garage is toward the back of the keep. There’s a private road out. Pax and I will lead, if you allow it, Lord. We’ve become familiar with some of the places Lord Ben frequents.”
Caelan inclined his head. “Of course. I’m here to assist only.”
They led us to a large, multiple car garage. A large, dark SUV already waited for us, the engine running. Two bags sat by the driver’s side door. Christian and Pax each grabbed one.
“Excuse us for a moment,” Christian said.
He and Pax disappeared into the house.
“Do you think we’ll find him?” I asked in a low voice.
“With his wolves helping, there’s a much better chance than before.”
The two wolves stepped back outside dressed in t-shirts, joggers, and slip-on tennis shoes, the uniform every shifter adopted once they got tired of shredding clothes every time they shifted to animal form and back.
The quiet, blond wolf opened the back passenger door, gesturing for me to get inside.
“Thank you,” I murmured.
Pax said nothing, closing the door gently behind me. Once we were all inside, the vehicle roared out of the Keep.
Everywhere I looked there was white. The ground was a sheet of ivory, the trees skeletal, limbs bowing with the weight of snow. “I wonder if there are other Floromancers living here,” I said mostly to myself, but Christian met my eyes in the mirror.
“The weather proves challenging,” he admitted. “We had one several years ago, but she didn’t stay long. We’ve been unable to lure one here since.”
Caelan’s eyes narrowed, making the other wolf laugh. “I have no designs on your woman, Lord Caelan, but Floromancers are good for a wolf’s land.” He snorted softly. “Shit, they’re good for the world.”
I nudged Caelan. “I like him.”
Caelan snapped his teeth at me.
“For serious magic, I have to be connected to the earth,” I told Christian. “I can imagine it might be a challenge to do so with so much snow on the ground.”
“Do you require bare skin?”
I thought Caelan was going to lose it. “Yes, when I’m deep into my magic, at minimum, my feet are against bare earth.
I usually try bare legs too, but sometimes, I lie down all the way.
But there are other times, when the earth requires me to be completely bare, and I will wake up unclothed.
” I chuckled. “I’ve lost some good pieces of clothing that way, though it doesn’t happen often. ”
“If you know of any other Floromancers who seek a good home, Ben has proven to be a good Lord, and we would welcome one. Though, if I’m not mistaken, you and our Lord are familiar with each other?”
Caelan snorted.
“Yes,” I said slowly. “We’ve had our ups and downs,” I admitted, “though things are growing easier between us.”
Christian looked over at Caelan, his eyes lingering for a moment too long. “Ah,” he said finally. “I see.”
“You see nothing,” Caelan said softly. “Evie and Ben are acquaintances, that’s all.”
I sighed. “So dramatic.” Shaking my head, I met Christian’s eyes in the mirror once more. “I like your Lord, and if things would have been different, who knows what might have happened.”
Caelan let out a loud sigh. I grinned at him. “You know it’s true.”