by Mary Hughes
“And if I don’t turn into King, it worked?” He nodded. “All right. Just in case, we should find a plan B.”
She sighed and finished dressing. “Right. I’ll do more research.”
Noah’s eyes followed her fingers, the silver of his irises almost molten. He cleared his throat. “I’d better stay out of your way. I’ll just poke around for something to protect us while you read.”
“Sounds good.”
She hit the books while Noah prowled the store. She squirmed a bit as she read—the burst beaker hadn’t entirely broken the mood. But as she worked she cooled down and became absorbed in a blue grimoire. Absentmindedly, she lifted the book and took it to sit on a couch in the reading section. He eventually found a book, slid into a nearby chair, and started reading too.
It was nice. Companionable. As the minutes turned into hours, she relaxed, feeling almost like being at home.
She’d found a reference to a possible eliminator potion when Noah made a strange whuffing noise, as if he’d been punched in the gut. She jerked from the book. “What’s wrong…?”
The sun speared through the front window. Noah wasn’t there.
The doglet, quivering with anger, stood in his place.
“Stars and moon. I’m so sorry, King. Or should I say, Noah.” Failure ripped her gut.
He yipped. Three times, like, It’s okay.
“It’s not. I tried but…Noah, I need to look at the mirror.”
Yip, yip, yip. No, no, no.
“I have to.” Stomach churning, she rose, set the blue grimoire on the couch, and strode to the mirror. Noah yipped at her heels the whole way.
Resolutely, she grabbed the sheet and yanked. It slithered to the floor.
The glass revealed was old, yellowed, and so ripply it could’ve been from a funhouse. Cavorting around the darkling glass were carved cherubs.
And snarling demons.
Every hair on her body stood straight up. She jumped back. King/Noah yipped in concern. Mr. Kibbles, who’d just come in, flashed under the linen cupboard and hissed.
“Yes, yes, you warned me.” Any serenity she’d found reading with Noah was gone. She leaned against a nearby display case and let the shakes work their way through. She didn’t like this out-of-control, endangered feeling. “I’ll be okay. Maybe something hot first. Coffee or tea.” She managed to pick up the sheet and throw it back over the mirror before starting for the kitchen.
Noah cut her off, bumping against her ankles. Turning her toward the upstairs.
She tried again. He herded her as efficiently as a sheepdog.
“What do you want?” She blinked at him, then the stairs. “There’s nothing upstairs but sales items and bedrooms…oh.” That was why she felt so trembly. Except for passing out for a few hours, she’d been up for twenty-four harrowing hours straight. “You’re right. I’ll be more efficient with a nap. The daytime wards will let me know if Rodolphe comes back. I’ll research those demons when I’m fresh.”
She slogged upstairs, set the alarm for ten a.m. and slept right through it.
She woke, groggy, when the sun was low in the sky. She stumbled into the shower before remembering Rodolphe then washed fast. But hot water and a good scrub made her feel better. She’d donned her suit pants and was about to shrug a plain white blouse over her bra.
Thoughts of a silver-eyed male stopped her.
No, she didn’t want to tempt more wolf/witch forbidden action. But wowing him a little couldn’t hurt, could it? The suit had a skirt. She changed into it and a pair of thigh-high hose. Then she dug through her luggage for her executive heels and The Camisole.
From her pre-banker days, the camisole was a spaghetti-strap tank with a built-in bra. Great for kicking around college bars, out of step with her current mature image, but she’d kept it because she felt sexy as hell in it.
And yeah, not to tempt taboos, but she hoped Noah might like it.
Besides, under the suit coat it would look staid enough. She wiggled into the spandex top and glanced at herself in the dresser mirror.
She looked smokin’ hot.
Her cheeks heated. She quickly threw on her jacket and reached for her executive-row tall pumps, four inches of stiletto death.
She slid her feet in, took another look in the mirror and saw legs a mile long. Long enough to wrap around all that was tall, dark, and bangsome.
Face hot, she went downstairs.
Noah-as-King lay at the bottom, stretched out in front of the stairs, his eyes shut. He looked dead.
Her heart goosed. “Noah?”
His lids sprang open. He yipped, What’s wrong?
A soldier, sleeping when he got the opportunity, but still protecting her. Her pulse slowed. “Nothing. Look, I thought of a Plan B. I’m calling my brother for help.”
Noah’s tail wagged.
She speed-dialed Gabriel. He greeted her with, “Found Auntie yet?”
“She phoned. Said she’s okay.”
“Did she say why she isn’t home?”
“She hexed someone accidentally. Well, it started out as a hex. The spell rebounded a few times, altering it. A picture and a mirror. Actually, that’s why I called. To bounce some ideas off you.”
“Heh,” Gabriel said. “Bounce, mirror.”
Sophia paused. Her world was all out of whack and her brother was making puns. A profound sense of normalcy comforted her. “You have a weird sense of humor.”
“Adorable, not weird. That’s my secret ploy to weed through the many females who throw themselves at me. The woman who loves my humor will be my true love.”
“You mean the one who loves you in spite of your humor.”
“That works too.”
“Look, about the mirror.” Sophia told him about the carvings.
Gabriel said, “Shoot me a picture.”
She removed the sheet, careful not to touch the glass or the frame, aimed her phone, and clicked. She wasn’t actively using magic, but she still had the potential locked inside her, and some artifacts could respond to that. “I’m worried how the demons might’ve affected the spell.”
“So Auntie wasn’t practicing safe hex?”
“Twirl my broomstick. I hope bad puns aren’t infectious.”
“Pfft,” he said. “They’re hereditary.”
“You’re probably right,” she mourned. “But sex-linked, like male-pattern baldness.”
“Good one.”
Noah trotted closer, maybe trying to see what she was doing.
“Don’t touch.” She waved him back. Bad touch for her was potentially explosive touch for an innately magical being—like a hexed werewolf.
“Who are you talking to?” Gabriel said.
“Someone in the store. Here’s the picture.” She sent it to him.
There was some keyboard tapping and humming. Suddenly the humming stopped. “We’ve got trouble. The resolution on your jpeg was for suckage but I have an interpolating program that—”
“You hear that sizzle? That’s my brain frying.”
“Hah. You want my help or not?”
“The price may be too high.”
He laughed. “Okay, I’ll give it to you straight. I tweaked the image to show magical detail. For which you owe me, Biggeth Timeth.”
“No way. You made me drive up here. I don’t owe you diddly squat.”
“Who taught you cussword math? It’s diddly over squat, where squat is really shit. Means small and stinky, worthless—”
“Do you have a point?”
“Those demons mean the mirror was a malifier.”
Sophia’s heart plunged out her feet. Then she shook her head. “I don’t believe it. Auntie wouldn’t have kept something pure evil in the store.”
“I said was. Auntie added cherubs. She made it an assistere instead.”
“A helping mirror? That’s good. Right?”
“Well…”
“That doesn’t sound reassuring.”
“The hex struck the mirror, t
hen your picture, right? You’re tied in.”
“Yes, that’s why I feel this overwhelming need to be with…” She trailed off as the implications hit. Gabriel thought she was helping Noah, not because she wanted to, but because she’d been spelled to.
The attraction was all the hex.
“Need to be with who?” Her brother’s voice was brightly inquisitive. “Spill.”
Spill about kissing…and more…with a wolf? Immediate distraction was in order. “So is the mirror helpful, or not?”
He chuckled. “Avoiding the topic. Oh, it’s got to be good. Okay, the cherubs are helpful, but like pepper in a stew, the demons will still have an effect. There’s a fifty-fifty chance you’ll hurt the hexee rather than help him.”
“No.” She gasped the word through a suddenly tight throat. “I might hurt Noah?”
The dog growled. No words but the meaning was clear. You’d never hurt me.
“Noah?” Gabriel’s brightly inquisitive tone cut through. Nosy brother alert. “The hex hit Noah? Or is he the one you feel this overwhelming need to be with—?”
“Oops, bzzt. Sorry, can’t hear you bzzt crackle crackle. The techmeld must be wearing off.” She hit end.
Good gods. A fifty percent chance she might hurt Noah? Even one percent was too high. She slid the phone into her coat pocket, darkness seeping into her bones. Noah was certain she’d never harm him, but what did a doggie werewolf know, even one whose mother worked for a wizard?
Was it helpful that, just as she visited Marlowe’s trailer, Killer happened home to take a chomp out of King’s hide? Was it helpful that evil-blast-from-her-past Rodolphe was here?
No, it was not helpful. Even Noah’s lusting after a witch in the first place was Not Helpful with a capital NH.
Just like that poor transplant patient four years ago. Sophia meant to help, but instead she was putting on the hurt. It was happening again.
As if to underline her dismal thoughts, a rock sailed through one of the front windows—and all hell broke loose.
Chapter Thirteen
Shattered glass pocked against the floor in front of the window in a tinkling shower. Then a crowbar thrust through, clearing the pane of glass, sending shower after shower cascading musically to the floor.
Amid the tinkle of glass, Noah’s drill-sergeant yip got Sophia’s attention. He nosed her behind a couch. She clutched the back of it and stared at the destruction of her aunt’s window.
A howl from the front sidewalk froze her breath in her chest.
The little dog that was Noah leaped in front of Sophia’s couch, legs braced. His tiny growl was pure menace.
A snarling wolf jumped through the window and landed with an audible whump on the floor. He was a big, barrel-chested gray with scraggly fur. A second, dark gray wolf leaped in behind him.
The barrel-chested wolf howled its challenge.
Just as the last of the sun set.
In front of Sophia’s eyes, Noah’s little legs wobbled. He fell.
She cried out and skirted around the couch to help him.
Black smoke roiled up from the dog’s form, obscuring it, billowing larger. She reared back. The smoke cleared.
In the dog’s place, Noah leaped to his feet—naked. He shook his head as if to clear it, black hair shuddering.
From the front of the store, the barrel-chested wolf launched into a run, thundering toward them.
Noah snapped to attention, his silver-sharp eyes stabbing at the wolves as he gently used a barred arm to urge Sophia behind the couch. She went, thinking he’d join her. But he only stood there, tall and proud and naked.
The wolf had almost reached him. In the front of the store, the other wolf began shifting to human, joints popping, bones snapping, lumps sliding under his skin.
The barrel-chested gray, fury in its yellow eyes, leaped.
With a roar, Noah charged to meet it, his arm crooked before him like a raised shield.
The wolf ripped a chainsaw snarl and to her horror, chomped onto Noah’s raised forearm.
Noah whirled, grabbed a carousel of jewelry from a nearby counter, and smashed it upside wolf skull. The gray yelped and let go.
Noah’s arm was red and raw like chewed meat. Sophia, eyes brimming with tears, glanced around her, desperate for something to bandage that arm. The linen cupboard. She rose to a crouch, prepared to dash the length of the store.
Beyond them, the other wolf’s limbs elongated, his spine unrolling. He stood with a crick of neck.
It was Killer. He pulled a knife from one pocket and charged with a roar.
No time for first aid. Get in the fight. She dug in her pockets for a weapon.
Noah, face set like a locomotive’s grill, raised the dented stand. His arm weeping blood, he ran to meet Killer’s charge.
They met in a clash. Noah swiped the stand into Killer’s arm. The blade flew. It clattered to the floor, spinning to rest a few feet from Sophia.
She crept out from behind the couch and reached for it. It was a slender switchblade.
Killer dove for the knife, nearly plowing into her, and came up with the knife in his hand. Their eyes met. She flinched. Killer raised the knife to cut her.
Noah seized Killer’s wrist from behind and jerked. Killer spun up to a crouch. They grappled for the knife.
Behind them, the big barrel-chested wolf stumbled to its feet.
Pepper spray. Sophia jabbed a frantic hand into her coat pocket.
The stupid wand that wasn’t hers kept getting in the way.
Killer switched his knife to his free hand and slashed the blade across Noah’s face. Noah flashed an arm up, deflecting the knife and stopping it from taking his eye. But it cut to the bone.
Blood sheeted down his cheek, dripping from his chin.
“First fuckin’ blood.” Killer grinned viciously.
“No!” Sophia finally found the small can. She leaped to her feet and dashed in with the spray.
Lightning-fast, Noah punched Killer, bang in the Adam’s apple. Killer fell back, hacking. Noah smashed the stand into Killer’s skull, so hard the stand burst into a pile of metal rods.
But behind him, the barrel-chested wolf braced on four paws, quivering, and leaped onto Noah’s back.
Sophia pivoted to let loose a stream of pepper spray directly into the wolf’s beady yellow eyes.
It howled and fell to the floor, scrabbling.
“Sophia!” Noah spun and shoved her aside.
The wolf blindly chomped where her hand had been. Wolf teeth punched Noah’s arm and grimly hung on. Noah let out a soft groan.
Sophia screamed and beat wolf skull with her fists. The wolf let go. Bone and tendon were visible in Noah’s arm before the red holes filled with blood. Her stomach swapped with her throat, but she kept pounding the wolf.
Killer stumbled to his feet and lurched toward the front of the store. As he passed Sophia he shouted, “Attila, here!”
The gray wolf cringed from under Sophia’s beating hands. He staggered toward the voice.
The blinded wolf took refuge behind Killer, who slashed the knife side to side in a clear “back off”.
Screw that. Sophia raised her pepper spray, aimed for Killer’s face.
“You fuckin’ win!” Killer raised a hand in surrender, his other on the wolf’s ruff, backing slowly away.
Behind her, Noah released a low groan. Sophia glanced over her shoulder. He leaned heavily against a counter, bleeding from numerous cuts and bites. Red rivulets forming on the glass scared her.
The fight was over. Noah needed her. Needed bandages.
“Don’t move.” She mimicked shooting Killer with the pepper spray before pocketing it and sprinting to the armoire. She threw open the cupboard and grabbed a sheet to tear.
“Hey, Sophia Blue,” Killer rasped from the front door.
Clutching the sheet, she turned.
He held up something long and psychedelic as the wolf limped out the door behind him. Aunt Lind
a’s not-a-vibrator. “Your old mentor says hi.” He lobbed the mushroom at her.
She flinched.
Noah’s hand shot up. He grabbed the mushroom out of the air.
Whole, uninjured skin filled her vision.
Noah lobbed the thing back at Killer. The wolfman caught it automatically. In a double-take, he looked at it in his hand, looked again, and swore.
Noah started for him.
Killer scooted.
Noah pursued him, slashes and bites gone but still distinctly naked.
She dropped the sheet and ran toward him. “Noah. Wait.”
He stopped. Turned and strode to meet her and swept her into his arms. “Are you all right?”
“I should ask you that.” She ran her hands over his skin, hardly believing there wasn’t even a scratch. Healed through shifting? She’d only been turned an instant. Incredible that he could shift—twice—in that short time. In her relief she wrapped arms around his neck and blurted, “It was me. They were after me.”
“No, Sophia. Those are two of the assholes I was telling you about. Their hard-on is definitely for me. This is the last straw. When this hex is gone I’m taking them out permanently.”
“You’re not listening.” She pulled back to look into his eyes. Make him understand. “They had no way of knowing you were here. They came to hurt me. Didn’t you hear Killer? Rodolphe sent them. He sent those two wolves to attack, and you were injured—badly—because you were forced to defend me.”
He frowned as he searched her eyes. “I wasn’t forced to do anything.”
“You don’t know Rodolphe. He’s sly. He hurt a little girl through me.” Her fear bubbled like acid. “He hurt you, because of me.” Because of the hex, and it would only get worse. She would not, could not let it.
Key to magic be damned. “I have to go.” She pushed out of his strong arms and ran upstairs.
* * *
Noah watched Sophia’s slim backside disappear up the stairs. She was leaving again.
Noah’s wolf howled out against it. Stop her.
But how, besides tying her up? Which wasn’t appealing in the least—until he added naked on a bed. Then, the idea was alarmingly interesting. Though, if she wasn’t into it too, it was likely to earn him a nail-clipper neutering.