Chapter 27
Chapter
Twenty-Seven
Living with Nico was freaking torture.
After a week, Delainey had to consciously stop grinding her teeth as she picked werewolf fur off the couch cushion. She considered whether or not it would be ethical to entice Reece’s wolfy other half with Milk Bones.
She hadn’t been that surprised to find him stalking around the house in his wolf form when she came out of the shower a week ago. In fact, she had been kind of grateful for it.
They could now easily get further apart than six feet, which meant they could have some semblance of privacy, but they were still stuck in the same space. It was difficult to ignore another man who was right there.
A dog, on the other hand.
No, it was really weird. And she was still trying to figure out the appropriate way to treat him, because Reece wasn’t a dog.
He left muddy footprints by the front door when he came inside. She thought he was sneaking in to eat human food when she was asleep, and she had heard the shower running at strange hours, so he definitely wasn’t in his wolf form the entire time, but he could have fooled her.
It was getting a bit lonely, which was strange.
Yes, Delainey lived with four other women in something between a family home and a sorority house, but those were her sisters, her chosen family, her coven. Reece was not any of that.
She should have been happy that he had taken care of the situation. She should have been like, “Suit yourself.” It was almost like they weren’t bound together if they couldn’t discuss it.
Really, it was just like having a giant dog. A giant dog who could transform into an annoyingly attractive dude who she had let get her off in the woods a week ago.
Fuck. Why was she thinking about that?
Delainey glared at her phone. She had texted Aya for an update and received a frowning face emoji in response, which she took to mean they had made no progress.
Emerson was still hanging around the house, which Delainey didn’t like. He shouldn’t get to be there when she was stuck out here in the freaking woods, and she hoped whatever his work thing was ended soon, so he’d stop bothering her sisters.
As if summoned by her grumbling, her phone rang. Elise’s number came up. “How are you doing?” the young healer asked.
“Oh my god, you sound like I have cancer,” Delainey grumbled. “I’m sorry that I’m living in your little love shack.”
Elise choked. “That’s not why I called,” she protested.
“Uh-huh. I’m sure it’s definitely not wearing on you and Nico after you finally were supposed to have your private space.”
“Get over yourselves,” said Elise. “I don’t even know why I try and help you.”
“Because you love me,” Delainey responded.
She could practically hear Elise roll her eyes. “Have you killed him yet?” Elise joked, and that wiped the smile off Delainey’s face.
She hadn’t thought much about it, but if this tether was connected to the manacles that had bound them together, then they still had that option to escape each other, not that she was going to mention it to Reece.
At this point, she was almost certain he would not kill her to escape her, and she wasn’t about to kill him. Neither of them deserved that, and murder was wrong, even if it would get them out of an awkward situation.
But she remembered the way the life force had begun to drain out of Reece during the ritual, the way her heart had nearly cracked in two at seeing it, and the way she had responded.
“No, I haven’t killed him yet.” Delainey aimed for sounding normal, joking even, and wasn’t sure she succeeded. “He’s been in his werewolf form most of the time.”
“Really?” Elise said. “That’s weird.”
“Is it?” She didn’t know much about werewolves, and Elise was the closest thing they had to an expert at the moment, given that she spent half her time with Nico these days. But none of them really knew what it was like to be a shifter.
“I would think some people spend more time than others in their wolf form,” Delainey mused.
“I guess.”
“Okay, he’s avoiding me,” she admitted. “He’s being weird about it. I’d get it if he wanted a little privacy, but all the time? He’s even sleeping outside.”
“Maybe it’s more comfortable than the couch,” said Elise. “Or did you want to share the bed with him?”
“No.”
It came out quickly. Too quickly, Delainey knew, but what else could she say?
She had spent one terrible, wonderful night in bed with Reece, and that had almost led to disaster. Out here no one would interrupt them if they started making out, if she got her hand on his cock again.
She had to remember that before she did something very stupid.
Elise didn’t pick up on any of Delainey’s anguish. “I was talking to Emerson.”
Delainey groaned. “What?”
“He’s an incredibly skilled witch, and it’s not like we can hide this from him.”
“I know,” said Delainey. A headache was forming at the back of her head. She massaged her temples. “What did Emerson say?”
“He suggested we take this to Wallace Grove, see if they have something in their books that might give us a direction to go in.”
“No.” Delainey was firm.
“We might have to,” Elise insisted.
“It’s only been a week, and we’re trying our best. Let me come to the house and help.” It would mean bringing Reece with her, but he could sit and watch TV while she went into the basement and worked.
“Haven’t you gone through the books we brought over? I don’t know that working over here is such a good idea.”
Delainey groaned. Shortly after the manacles had been broken and she and Reece had figured out how far apart they could be, she had gone with her sisters into the basement where they kept most of their magical gear, wanting to help figure out the direction their research needed to take.
Some of the pots on the shelves had started vibrating.
A jar of St. John’s wort had vibrated itself off the counter, crashed to the floor, and sent glass flying everywhere.
Delainey hadn’t actively been using her magic, but it seemed that the energies in the basement, from the constant use of magic down there, had reacted to whatever was going wrong with her powers from this stupid manacle and tether.
“We don’t know that wasn’t a fluke,” Delainey insisted. “It could have been power left over from the ritual.”
“It could have been,” Elise conceded. “Briana says we won’t call for outside help without your okay.”
The ‘for now’ was implied.
“But you should really think about it. I know my parents are—” Elise trailed off, and Delainey didn’t offer any suggestions for what Elise’s parents really were.
“Something else,” Elise finally settled on.
“But this is the kind of problem that magic scholars live for. There are a dozen people in Wallace Grove who are not my parents who would love to crack this nut.”
“I don’t want to be a test subject,” Delainey said. If it was just her, she would have put up with it. But she had seen the way Reece flinched away from magic. There was no way he would accept going to Wallace Grove for help, and it had only been a week. There was no reason to give up hope yet.
“Fine,” said Elise. “But think about it.”
They ended the call. Delainey slipped her phone back into her pocket and wished there was some answer she could give.
She hated being out here, alone with her werewolf pal, unable to do anything except read dusty old books, ignore the freelance work she was supposed to be doing, and pretend that everything was okay.
If she stayed in the house for one more minute, she might go slightly insane.
She pushed up off the couch, slipped into her shoes and jacket, and went outside. It was a nice day, if a little chilly. The sun was bright overhead, though the canopy of trees did a lot to block it out and cast shadows everywhere.
It smelled like nature, but in a good way.
She had worried their involuntary camping trip might put her off the outdoors forever, but now that they had a place to stay, surrounded by a werewolf pack who didn’t like her but didn’t want her to get murdered, she could let herself appreciate the natural world around her.
Reece was lying on the grass beside the gravel driveway. She had expected his fur to be red like his hair, which was probably misguided.
He was a gray wolf in this form, the species and the color, though each of his paws were covered in black fur that tapered lighter as it crawled up his legs. That fur looked so soft.
Delainey’s hands itched to touch it, but she had to remind herself he wasn’t actually a dog. She couldn’t pet him without answering some very uncomfortable questions, if he ever bothered to turn back into his human form.
The air smelled damp, like it might rain later, but Delainey didn’t see any clouds that were worrying her.
“Come on, Fido,” she said. “I want to stretch my legs.”
Reece stared at her for a beat, and she wondered if she was going to have to find some sort of makeshift leash to force him to walk.
He stood up and padded to her side. Standing, his head came nearly level with her hip, and she had to resist the urge to rest her hand on his back. She let him guide her into the woods. This was his home, after all, and he knew the paths.
It was strangely peaceful, walking silently with Reece. Just a woman and her dog and the woods. Except that the dog was really a werewolf, the woman was really a witch, and they were in the middle of pack territory.
She was tempted to tell him at least part of what Elise had suggested, but the words got lost in her throat and she didn’t find the need to say anything.
The deeper they walked into the forest, the more her legs started to burn, and the rain scent in the air was getting stronger. Maybe Delainey should have checked the forecast before going on this walk.
She tried to turn around, but Reece snapped at her.
“You’re not a freaking dog,” she told him. “If you want to say something to me, say it.” She might have fallen on her ass if human words had come out of his mouth at this point, but Reece huffed at her again and took off running.
“You bastard,” she called after him, feeling the tug at her chest that made her have to sprint to keep up.
She didn’t know what sort of game he was playing, but it only took her a few minutes to realize that it was, indeed, a game.
When he got too far away, he would slow down to let her catch up. His tail wagged. There was a canine grin on his face as she lunged for him and nearly tackled him, but he dodged out of the way with surprising spryness. Delainey tilted her head back and laughed and gave herself over to the game.
Her lungs burned and her gym shoes slipped on the damp leaf litter with every turn, and she could feel the blister on her right heel reopening where the shoe rubbed, but she didn’t care, the running felt good after a week cooped up in six hundred square feet of borrowed cottage.
She didn’t realize how far they’d gone until she felt the magic ripple over her.
The ward line that Serena and Briana had set.
“Reece,” she said, suddenly serious. He didn’t seem to sense the magic, still playing, still tugging on her to go further.
“Reece, get back here.” She put as much command into her voice as she could, for all the good that did.
A sixth sense had her raising a personal ward just as a blast of magic hit them from deeper in the forest. The impact struck like a wall of compressed air, hot and electric, and it bent the saplings in a ten-foot radius outward from the point of contact, stripping leaves and sending a shower of bark spinning past her face.
She threw up a stronger shield, or she should have, but her magic was still wonky, and a blast of power leveled a sapling in front of her.
The young tree snapped at its base with a wet crack, splintering into pale yellow shards, and the concussive force of her own misfire kicked dirt and leaves into her eyes.
Fuck.
“Reece, get back!”
With no better idea, she ran for the ward line, knowing that Reece had to chase or the pain would possibly kill them both.
Branches whipped across her forearms as she crashed through undergrowth she hadn’t noticed on the way out, and the tether screamed between them, white-hot now, dragging him after her.
She ran thirty feet past the ward line, just to make sure he would cross into safety before she stopped, then looked back.
She cast out her senses, trying to feel where the magic had come from and what it could have meant.
But this far back from the ward, with it keeping them safe, it was useless.
Reece padded up to her and looked at her with a serious face, and it was strange to realize she could read the expressions on a wolf’s face almost as easily as she could on a man’s.
“We can’t go exploring that alone,” she reluctantly agreed. “We don’t know how many of them are out there.”