14. Conall
Conall
The cottage is small and clearly made for one person.
Ivy glares at me from the bottom of the stairs.
She’s given me a brusque tour. Back at Laz’s, she’d been adamant that I not be allowed inside her house, but when I explained the number of creatures I’d had to dispatch because they tried to kill her, she changed her tune.
“I’m still not sure I believe all of this,” she says.
I turn to her. The lights are low, but I can still make out her dark eyes, the freckles scattered across her cheeks, and her disheveled brown hair.
“Would you like me to change back into my true form?” I ask.
Her eyes go deliciously wide. The look lands straight in my gut and lower. I like her surprised more than I should.
“No,” she breathes.
I nod. “So, guest room?”
She snorts. “This is a one bedroom house.”
I let out a wide smile, all teeth, just to see that look again. “Just the one bed then, Freckles?”
This time her eyes don’t go wide, but pink warms her cheeks, and I watch her throat work on a swallow.
“There’s a couch. If you have to stay, you can have that.”
I glance at the couch. Floral and sagging, likely purchased sometime during the time of disco. Backache made into furniture.
“No,” I growl.
She shrugs and turns to the stairs. “If you don’t like it, you can always go back to your own place.” She flashes a sickly sweet smile.
“I can’t leave until the spell is resolved and you’re out of danger. It won’t let me.”
“What won’t?” she asks.
“The spell. It’s persistent.” And my hound, who has made it very clear he never wants to leave her. I’m not saying that out loud.
She glares back. “Then I guess you’ll make do, because you’re not sleeping in my bed.”
My hound rumbles low and unhappy at the idea of being separated from her. Even by one flight of stairs. Fucking spell.
She climbs up to her room, and a ragged blanket and a lumpy pillow land with a soft thump at the bottom of the stairs. I gather them up, drop my duffel next to the couch, and make the best of it. Above me comes the soft pad of her feet.
I close my eyes.
Break the spell, free myself from this woman.
Break the spell, free myself from this woman.
I try to hold the chant. But my hound keeps pushing through.
Must protect.
Must keep.
Must breed.
I bolt upright. What the fuck?
There's nothing but growling in response. I’d thought only the ward spell had gone wrong. That’s what Laz told me. But what if he was wrong? What if the transfer of the contract went wrong too?
“Fuck,” I say out loud.
Ivy’s voice floats down from the second floor. “Shut up! Trying to sleep.”
My hound has been magically bound. And now he strains for her like a beast possessed.
“Fuck,” I whisper, falling back into the pillow and wondering what fresh hell tomorrow will bring.