by R. E. Butler
“Asking a question.”
“With me pressed against you? What is this, some kind of vampire lie detector?”
He snorted. “I can smell a lie, so I have no need to touch you. What I want is an answer.”
“Why did you lose your nerve?”
“Stop answering my questions with more questions.”
She liked him getting all growly. She thought shifters were the only ones who growled.
“I thought you didn’t want anything to do with me romantically,” she said.
“Do you want something to do with me romantically?”
“Weren’t we not supposed to answer questions with questions?”
He smiled, which took his sexy features and amped them up by a thousand. “Indeed. I’m a chickenshit asshole who can’t be around you without getting tongue-tied. I’m not perfect, and my background is pretty fucked up, so I don’t think you deserve someone like me. It’s been hard keeping my distance, but it’s even more difficult not being around you.”
“So you do like me?”
“Of course. How could I not? You’re gorgeous and powerful, strong and independent, and you’re just about the nicest person I’ve ever met. But more than that, is that I feel connected to you on a soul-deep level, and I can’t keep things going the way they are without at least flaying open my chest and letting you know the truth.”
“I don’t know what to say.”
“Say you like me back and you’d like to go out with me.”
She glanced down at her pjs again. “Tonight?”
He shook his head. “I’m working, but tomorrow night? We have a lot to discuss.”
“I’d love that.”
He bent and kissed her cheek, and her whole body jolted at the contact. Damn he caused reactions in her!
He inhaled briefly and hummed. “You smell amazing, beautiful.”
She didn’t know what to say to that, so she just smiled at him and laid her hand on his smooth cheek. “It took you six months to ask me out.”
“You could’ve asked me out.”
“I would have, but I got tongue-tied around you, too.”
“I guess we’re two of a kind, then. Now,” he said, clearing his throat and reluctantly releasing her, “I need to get back on rounds. I’ll keep an eye on the rescue and let you know if anything comes up. For our date, how about I pick you up at nine and we get dinner?”
She didn’t normally eat that late, but she realized if she was going to date a vampire, then she’d need to change some of her daytime habits.
“Sounds perfect.”
“I know it sucks in the summer with the late daylight hours, but it gets better in the winter.”
“It’s okay. I’m looking forward to it.”
“Me, too. Sorry it took me so long.”
“I am, too, but it goes both ways.”
She walked him to the door where he kissed her cheek a second time, lingering briefly before stepping onto the porch. “Have a good night, Delaney.”
“You, too. Be safe.”
“Always.”
“Good night, Chief.”
He nodded at her and walked to his cruiser. When he pulled away, she leaned against the doorjamb with a breathless sigh, and then she started to laugh. She grabbed Mimo and hustled across the yard to Kinsley’s house. She pushed open the door and said, “I need some fashion help!”
“I’ve been saying that for years,” came the reply.
“Oh ha ha. I’m serious! Brody asked me out on a date!”
Kinsley walked into the family room with her mouth open. “He did? When?”
“Just now! He stopped by to ask about Flora and promised to patrol more often around the rescue and then he asked me out! I need something special to wear for our date tomorrow night.”
“I know just the thing. Text Hadlee and tell her to bring over her mint-green strappy heels. You’re going to look amazeballs.”
Delaney texted her other bestie, and the three of them spent an hour discussing outfits, hair, and makeup before they split for the night to rest. Delaney couldn’t believe how her night had turned out. It had been a regular old night, and then the sexiest vampire on the planet had stopped by to ask her out.
Her luck was definitely turning around.
Chapter Four
The following day, Delaney carpooled to work with Kinsley and Hadlee. They both lived on either side of her in their own homes.
“Did you sleep well?” Hadlee asked.
“I had a hard time getting over my excitement,” she said. “I can’t wait for tonight.”
“It’s nice to have dreams come true,” Kinsley said. “Did he say where you were going?”
“Nope. But he did text me to say good morning and that he was looking forward to tonight.”
“Swoon. You’re so lucky, D,” Kinsley said. “Where’s my knight in shining armor?”
“Knight in fanged armor you mean,” Hadlee said with a giggle-snort.
“You’ll find him when the time is right,” Delaney said.
“Maybe you already met him and he’s a chickenshit like the chief,” Hadlee said.
“Possibly, but I don’t think so. Delaney said she felt drawn to him. I don’t feel drawn to anyone.”
Delaney was glad that Brody had made the first move. She’d like to say she’d have asked him out soon, too, but she knew that wasn’t the truth. She was just as worried about rejection as he appeared to be.
“Well, whatever made him change his tune and ask me out, I’m thankful for it,” Delaney said.
“I guess Flora was good luck for you,” Kinsley said. “Maybe she’ll be for me, too.”
When they arrived at the rescue, Delaney was the first one in the door, checking on Flora and the others.
Hadlee sat at the computer and booted it up, then picked up her phone. “Sunday night is the full moon. I’ve got some herbs I need to enchant, so don’t let me forget about that.”
Their three-person coven was responsible for the spells in Sable Cove and the surrounding towns. There was one other witch in town—Mother Gibson—who ran the Magic Emporium. Generally, covens had at least four so there was one person for each of the Corners, but after Delaney’s mom passed away, they hadn’t replaced her position. Mother Gibson, a woman the locals colorfully referred to as the “crazy cat lady,” was always willing to stand in as a fourth if they needed all four Corners for a particular spell. Fortunately, those types of difficult and powerful spells weren’t needed all that often in the sleepy town of Sable Cove. The most interesting thing that happened related to spell casting was someone requesting a seeking spell to locate a lost item or the occasional unlock spell to open a door without a key.
“What herbs?” Delaney asked as she and Kinsley set about getting the animals breakfast and cleaning their cages.
Hadlee spun to face them and ticked a list off on her fingers, “Frogwart, Ginseng, Rosemary, Turmeric, and Marshmallow.”
The herbs used to create certain spells worked better if they were enchanted during the full moon.
“I’ve got some stones to energize, too,” Kinsley said. Stones used in various spells or to promote healing would lose their efficacy as the days and weeks passed but could be re-energized by being exposed to the full moon’s light.
“Sounds like we’ve got a busy full moon,” Hadlee said. “Should we call Mother G?”
“Nah, I think we can handle it without her,” Kinsley said.
Delaney busied herself cleaning the front room which contained a few wooden benches under the windows, a long counter with a computer and printer, cabinets full of supplies for new owners, and a small bay window area with thick carpet for sitting on the floor and getting to know the familiars. The cats often lounged in the bay window on the plush cushion that Delaney had to de-fur daily.
At nine on the dot, she flipped the closed sign on the front door to open and walked back to the counter to drop off the window cleaner and throw away the used
paper towel, exchanging them for a long-handled duster.
The front door opened a few minutes later, and two women walked inside—one older, one a teen.
“Hello, welcome to the rescue. How can I help you?” Delaney asked, tucking the dusty duster under the counter and meeting the two in the center of the room.
“Hi,” the teen said. “I’m Tamara. This is my mom, Bernadette. We’re from a coven in Maryland.”
Delaney called her friends, and then introduced the two visitors. When everyone had shaken hands and greeted each other, she said, “What brings you to our rescue?”
“I’m seventeen,” Tamara said. “Mom said she found her familiar at sixteen, but I haven’t found mine yet. I signed up for the alerts for your rescue, and I saw you have a new kitten here. I begged Mom to bring me so I could see her.”
Delaney smiled. “I’d be happy to bring Flora out to you. Normally, we’d bring all the familiars out to meet someone new. Is that okay?”
“Of course,” Tamara said, nodding exuberantly. “I can’t help with the big spells until I find my familiar. I thought it would be a cat, but Mom’s is a dog, so who knows.”
“Where is your familiar?” Delaney asked.
Bernadette set her bag down on one of the benches and looked toward the door. “Faust is in the car. He’s a golden retriever and has zero sense of personal space. I didn’t want him frightening or upsetting your other familiars.”
“Aw,” Delaney said with a chuckle. She turned to Tamara and explained their process. “So you understand that it’s not just whether you like a familiar—the familiar itself has to choose you, too. Sometimes, we’ll really like a familiar, but it won’t be the right one for us.” Before she found Mimo, she’d met a dog familiar, and while she liked him and had even felt connected to him on a minor magical level, she’d known he wasn’t hers.
“I understand,” Tamara said. “But how do you know if it’s the right one?”
“You feel it in your heart,” Hadlee said. “Like, you think, oh there’s a familiar, and then suddenly it’s like a part of you was missing and is there. My gram used to say it was like falling in love but with an animal that won’t break your heart.”
“That’s a really great way to put it,” Bernadette said. “Faust immediately became my best friend. I can’t imagine what my life would be like without him.”
Delaney felt the very same way about her little turtle. “I don’t want you to be disappointed, we don’t have a lot of familiars here. But maybe you’ll get lucky today.”
“I hope so, but I know if it’s not right it’s okay, too.”
While Tamara and her mom went to sit in the bay window alcove, Delaney and her friends went to gather the familiars and bring them out to the main room. Hadlee gathered the birds, and Kinsley and Delaney brought the four cats out. Hadlee set the owl and raven on wood posts secured into the walls on either side of the windows, and the cats were set on the carpet in front of the window.
Kinsley introduced each animal by name, and then the three witches stepped aside to give Tamara privacy to greet the animals herself. It was an exciting time in a young witch’s life to find her familiar. Delaney loved being part of the process. She wished they had a hundred familiars for witches and warlocks to meet, but they only had a few.
“You can sense familiars?” Bernadette asked Delaney.
“Yep. I can tell on sight whether an animal is a familiar or not. The same way that we can recognize another witch or warlock on sight as well. My power knows what familiars are.”
“That’s really neat. It’s wonderful what you do here. I’m surprised there aren’t more familiar rescues.”
“Me, too. It just seemed like a good idea.”
“I don’t think any of them are mine,” Tamara said with a wistful sigh. “They’re all very sweet, though, especially Flora.”
The little kitten had stretched out on Tamara’s lap and was pawing the air, her little jellybean toes appearing and disappearing with the flexes of her paws.
“I’m sorry,” Delaney said. “I wish one of them was for you.”
“Me, too. I actually feel better now, though.”
“What do you mean?” Bernadette asked.
Tamara shrugged. “I was nervous. I wondered if I’d ever find my familiar. But now that I’ve met a bunch of them, I feel calmer. Like they’re letting me know that I’ll find mine when the time is right and it’s okay for me not to be doing the big spells at this point in time.”
“I think we’re always looking forward to the next big moment in our lives,” Delaney said. “It’s tempting to want to rush into it. We can’t wait to be sixteen so we can drive, or eighteen so we can be an adult, or twenty-one so we can drink. With magic in the mix, our eyes are always trained on the spells we can’t do because we don’t have a familiar or our power isn’t strong enough. Instead, you can focus on what you can do.”
Tamara nodded and lifted Flora against her chest, tucking the purr machine under her neck. “Thank you,” Tamara whispered. “I hope you find your master soon.”
Delaney let her take the time she needed to say goodbye to each familiar. While she’d only met them a short while ago, she said farewell as if she’d known them forever, and it was both sweet and sad at the same time. Tamara hugged Delaney and called out a thank you to Kinsley and Hadlee, who returned it from the back room. When Tamara and her mom were gone, Delaney closed the front door and turned to the animals. She stopped to pet and coo at each one, and then took only Gally back to his cage to rest for the day. The cats found spots in the morning sun, the older cats letting Flora climb and play on them.
“No luck?” Hadlee asked as she turned around in the desk chair.
“Nah. But she was a good sport about it. I’m sure she’ll find her familiar soon.”
“It would be nice if we could just let any witch or warlock take whatever familiar they wanted, like the humans do with the regular animal rescues.”
“Even normal animal rescues have a process that involves a background check of one sort or another,” Kinsley reminded them. “It’s not as if they just let ya walk into the place and take an animal and go.”
“Good point,” Hadlee said. “But it would be nice if a mutual like between familiar and magical person was all that was required.”
“It is what it is,” Delaney said. She shut the cage and pulled down the cover over Gally, whispering goodnight to him.
“You’ll be sad when someone takes him,” Hadlee said.
“Of course. He’s the last link I have to my mom. But I wouldn’t want him to be without a master for the rest of his life.”
She’d probably be more than sad; she’d most likely mourn. But she didn’t add that part. Somewhere out there was the master of her mother’s bird, and when the day finally came, Delaney would be happy for the two.
For now, she’d take care of the owl until that day came, just as she had with each of the others that came through their doors.
Chapter Five
Brody spent Friday trying to rest ahead of his big first date with Delaney, but his brain absolutely wouldn’t turn off. He finally fell asleep in the afternoon and was glad that Venice hadn’t messaged him during his rest over any police issues.
He wasn’t much of a cook and bought most of his meals prepared from the grocery or diner. There were nice restaurants in the surrounding towns, but he decided he wanted to do something more special for her than a typical first date, so he’d enlisted Venice to pick up dinner for them at the diner. Tyce and his sister Tia had put together a picnic basket to Brody’s specifications and Venice was going to drop it off at eight thirty. Brody’s SUV was packed up and ready to go, all he had to do was finish getting ready and wait for Venice.
He was actually taking a night off work. He hadn’t done that in six months. It was fitting that the first time he took a break was for something special like taking Delaney out on their first date.
He was rolling up the sleeve
s of his dress shirt when the alert chimed that Venice had arrived. Brody opened the door and let him in.
“I put the basket in the trunk. They loaded it up with heated pads for the hot stuff and ice packs for the cold stuff.”
“Thanks for picking it up for me.”
“No problem. I was grabbing dinner for myself anyway.”
“You got any plans tonight?”
“I was thinking about heading to the bar for a drink, but then I remembered I’m on call for you tonight, so I won’t be doing that.”
Brody patted his shoulder. “I put a call in to the county police department, and they’re going to send two cars to patrol tonight for us, so you can go get that drink.”
“No shit?”
“No shit. The chief owed me a favor for helping out with a vampire case they had a few months ago, so I thought it was a great idea to take advantage of it so we could both have a night off.”
“You should hire another deputy. Then we could have more time off.”
“I’m thinking about it, trust me. If things go well with me and Delaney, then I’m not going to want to be working seven nights a week.”
“What is this wondering if things will go well? You’re mates.”
“I know, but it’s still new. We hemmed and hawed for far too long.”
“Meh. It’ll be great. Just make sure you get that kiss after the date. You gotta end a first date with your mate with a kiss. It’s a law, I think.”
Brody grinned. “Go have a drink and a good night. Maybe you’ll find your forever girl.”
“I’m not looking. But you have fun, too.”
Brody said goodbye to his friend and finished getting ready. He headed out to his SUV and drove to Delaney’s house, arriving a few minutes before nine. He lifted the bouquet of wildflowers from the passenger seat and then walked up to the front door. He rang the bell, and she opened it a few moments later with a bright smile on her face. He was momentarily stunned by how great she looked.
He thought she always looked great, even when she was wearing those adorable pajamas the night before. But now, she stood before him in a white sundress dotted with yellow flowers that brushed the tops of her knees, with her hair pulled up at the sides to expose the curve of her neck. Her eyes glittered with happiness, and he knew it was reflected in his own eyes.