Epilogue
A Few Months Later
Sammy holds my hand harder than necessary as we approach the front door of Damien’s house. The man called us with an urgent request I couldn’t say no to.
One I didn’t want to say no to.
“You sure you want to do this?” Sammy asks, as if he can read my mind.
I squeeze his hand back and knock on the front door. “Definitely.”
The entry swings wide to reveal Marisol. The teenager has on a brave face, but there’s a watery quality to her eyes as if she’s been crying or is about to.
“Thank the gods,” she heaves out the prayer. “She’s in the kitchen.”
I follow behind the teenager, tugging Sammy along with me, and we come on an odd scene. A white woman with waist-length brunette hair sits on the kitchen island. Damien stands beside her, holding a blood-soaked rag against her arm.
An arm that has a long piece of metal piercing it.
“Ava is here,” Marisol announces, hurrying to the woman’s side. “I’m sorry, Silvia.”
The woman looks at Marisol with a distracted kind of curiosity. “Why do you keep apologizing for something that’s not your fault?” There’s no sign of pain in her voice. In fact, her tone is relatively flat. “That’s a bad habit.”
“You tripped on my bag,” Marisol wails before burying her face in her hands.
Silvia’s eyes widen a touch. “Damien, I think your sister needs a hug. From you. I’m not good at hugs.”
“I don’t.” Marisol sucks in a few breaths, clearly trying to calm herself. “I’m good.”
Damien keeps the bloody rag in place and turns his own wild eyes on us. “Ava. Your magic. Can you do anything?”
I can feel Sammy’s cloud of worry beside me, but I let go of his hand and cross the kitchen. I’ve never studied anatomy, so I don’t know if the metal has punctured anything important, but I can instinctively tell where the woman is injured and that the bleeding will increase rapidly once the metal is removed.
“Hi.” I smile up at the woman. “I’m Ava Bellarose. A witch with healing specialty.” I assume Damien bringing up my magic means this woman is in on the whole mystical world thing.
“Silvia Harlow. Stoner. Though that doesn’t seem to help me from injuring myself with the element.”
“Maybe if you kept your space more organized, this wouldn’t have happened.” Damien growls the words, sounding more intense than I’ve ever heard the man.
Silvia gives him a blank look. “I know where everything is. That’s all the organization I need.”
“Yeah, you’ll never lose track of your materials when they’re lodged in your flesh!”
“Marisol, your brother needs a beer,” Silvia says. “To calm his nerves. He’s experiencing hysterics.”
“I’m not hysterical!” he hollers. The kitchen sink turns on without warning, the aggressive spray complementing the Squid’s seething.
My bet: Damien is anger-induced.
I bite my lip, suddenly wildly interested in getting to know Silvia better.
But first, let’s make sure she doesn’t bleed out.
“I can help,” I say, taking control of the conversation. “Do you have a marker?”
Marisol turns the water off then yanks open a drawer and pulls out a Sharpie, brandishing it my way. I accept it with gentle fingers and sneak in between Damien and Silvia. He seems intent on staying close to her side.
“Since you’re a Stoner, we shouldn’t have to worry about infection. We’ll just slide out the metal, and I’ll set to work healing the muscles, veins, and skin. Okay?”
“Yes,” Silvia says without a hint of wariness in her voice.
I lean in close to get a better look at the wound. It seems to be a smooth piece of metal, which is good.
“Are you able to tell if there are any splinters?” I ask. “Or when we take it out, would you be able to sense if there’s any piece we missed?”
She nods. “I’ll know. I would have taken this out myself, but I thought these two would faint at the sight.” The Stoner tilts her head toward the Cortez siblings and Damien scowls in response.
“You need a healer,” he insists.
She huffs out a breath and gives me a go-ahead wave.
Knowing her skin must be tender, I’m gentle as I sketch symbols around the injury. “Can you take the cloth away and wash off the blood quickly?” I ask Damien. “I just need to write a few more.” There’s already gore on my fingers, but I need relatively clean skin.
Jaw tight, Damien nods and removes the cloth. He twists his wrist, drawing a stream of water from the sink. Then, with gentle wave motions, the Squid cleanses the woman’s skin, the hovering orb of water turning pink as her blood mixes in with the liquid.
More blood immediately starts to seep from the punctures, but I write faster, surrounding the wound in witch’s language.
“Okay. Ready. Do you want to magic it out, or do you want us to slide it free?” I ask my patient.
Silvia sighs. “Damien can do it if he has the stomach for it.”
The man’s strong fingers pinch the end. “Tell me when.”
I rub my hands, feeling the tingle of magic from what Sammy did to me in bed this morning. “Go.”
The Squid slips the metal out with a sucking noise, Silvia lets out a slight gasp, and I push my magic into her wounds. The symbols guide the power, and in a matter of seconds we watch her skin knit together. But I keep pushing, knowing there’s healing needed deep in her arm. Only when I feel nothing left to mend do I step back, shaking the sharp pricks from my hands that make it feel as though I sat on the limbs and they fell asleep.
“That’s quality work.” Silvia examines her arm.
The rigid quality of Damien’s stance relaxes, and he turns grateful eyes on me. “Thank you.”
“No problem?—”
“We’re using the master bathroom. To clean up,” Sammy announces, setting his hands on my shoulders and guiding me away from the kitchen group, through the Cortez house. Down a back hall, we come upon a large bedroom with a massive bed. Sammy maneuvers me around it to a lovely bathroom equipped with a full tub.
I wonder how filling it up coincides with strict water regulations. Maybe Squids have special water reservoirs they can pull from.
Sammy runs the sink for me and even squirts the soap in my hands so I don’t leave bloody fingerprints everywhere. As I scrub under my fingernails, I smile. I feel spent, but good, glad I could help our magical community in this small way. And now that I’m working a job I enjoy and regularly sleeping with a man I love, I have magic to spare.
I dry my hands, then turn to find Sammy crowding me back against the counter.
“Touch yourself,” he demands.
“What?” I gape up at my normally easygoing boyfriend.
“Right now,” he growls. “In front of me. Show me that pretty pussy. Finger yourself until you’re soaking.”
“Goddess. I just finished washing blood off my hands. Do you have a period kink?” I quirk an eyebrow at him. “If so, that’s going to have to be a shower sex situation.”
“I didn’t think I had one until you said shower sex. We’ll come back to that.” Sammy reaches down to fist the hem of my sun dress and pushes it up over my thighs until he has an uninterrupted view of my turquoise cotton boy shorts. “Did you pick this color for me? For your Squid?”
“I don’t know why you think calling yourself a Squid is sexy,” I chide him, chills racing over my skin.
“I don’t call myself a Squid.” Sammy’s thumb fiddles with my waistband. “I call myself your Squid. And I think you like it.”
“Oh really?”
He makes an affirmative noise in the back of his throat as he sinks to his knees. “Know how I know?”
“I’m sure you’ll tell me.” I try to sound flippant, but my words come out breathless as he presses a hot kiss to my mound through the soft fabric and his rising lust stirs the sparks of magic under my skin.
“I know because you clench these lovely thighs together whenever I say Squid.” Damn him, the move is involuntary and sandwiches the hand he placed between my legs. “And because I saw that toy you bought yourself. The one in the bottom drawer of your bedside table.”
Fuck. I’m caught.
“It was a gag gift from Harley.” Which is true.
“Maybe so. But that didn’t stop you from using it. From slipping that tentacle dildo into your tight pussy.” He smirks up at me from his lower vantage point. “Admit it. You’ve got a squid tentacle kink.”
My pale skin flushes pink. But this is Sammy. I can tell him anything.
“Fine. I have a tentacle kink.”
“And…?”
“And I think it’s sexy when you call yourself a Squid,” I mutter.
“That’s a good witch.” Sammy whispers the praise as he tugs down my panties. “And good witches deserve all the lust magic they can handle. I plan to fill you to the brim, Ava.”
His thumbs part my folds, and at the first swipe of his tongue I grasp the sink hard to support my weak knees. Every part of my body is alive with pleasure and magic fed by Sammy’s arousal, which only amps up my ecstasy, knowing how turned on he gets by tasting me.
“You’re impossible,” I moan as he dips his tongue in deep, teasing me with my dirty fantasies. He hums in the back of his throat and slips my underwear all the way off so he can guide one of my legs over his shoulder. With that support, I pry off one of my hands and delve it into his silky hair, fisting the strands and holding him to me. “Be a good boy and make me come,” I tell him. His fingers clutch me harder. The possessive move warms me, and even as the pleasure in my body builds, I find myself softening. My hold gentles, and I stroke Sammy’s head as he takes care of me. As he feeds his lust by inciting mine. Gazing down, I find him staring up at me, the skin around his mouth wet with my arousal.
I smile and tell him, “I love you.”
Magic bombards me—rich peanut butter on my tongue—almost as much as I receive when Sammy orgasms while buried deep inside me. My love turns him on, and the simple joy of that has me laughing before I gasp through a delicious release.
When I come down from my high, Sammy is standing, his arms wrapped around me, holding my body close to his as the last shudders ripple through my muscles.
“You didn’t want me to be without magic for even five minutes?” I ask, finally catching up with why he’s been so anxious this afternoon, and why he practically jumped me in this bathroom.
Sammy was worried. And that makes me love him even more.
“Never.” His chin rests on top of my head. “I know sometimes they sneak through. The migraines. That your magic doesn’t always hold them back. But I’ll do everything I can to make those times rare.”
I have to swallow hard, choking on the amount of love I heard in that simple declaration.
“Thank you.” I tilt my chin up, resting it on his sternum to gaze into his ocean eyes. “But even if you couldn’t, I hope you know I’d still love you.”
His dark blue stare holds mine, and his normally teasing face stays serious. “I do. I know.” Sammy cradles my cheeks with his warm palms.
That’s taken him some time, believing I want him without any kind of exchange. But therapy and my constant reassurances are helping.
I smirk. “I think Damien has a crush.”
Sammy’s grin is a slow wave washing over his face, but it doesn’t recede. “I thought the same thing.”
“She seems unaware,” I add.
My Squid nods, more delight sparking in his eyes. “What a shame. For him to be pining after a woman who could give a shit. Almost makes me feel bad for the guy.”
“Almost?”
Sammy’s evil delight softens. “Those women—the ones that don’t need you—they’re dangerous.”
I hum in the back of my throat.
He presses a kiss to my forehead. “They could destroy a guy. But sometimes, they love you back. And then you’re the luckiest fucking Squid in the world.”
“I feel pretty lucky myself,” I murmur.
“Good,” he says, wrapping his arms tight around my body. “Because I’ve tentacled you. And I have no plans to let go.”
No complaints here.
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