Order of the Akasha: A Reverse Harem Paranormal Romance (Complete Series)

by E. M. Moore

  I shook my head. “I’m going to be fine. We all are.” A surge of adrenaline shot through me. At the same time, it seemed to die out way too soon. Talking with Granny kept me alert, but I had a feeling that as soon as she left, I’d be passed out. I didn’t have a clue as to why I was so tired. Maybe that talk earlier with the guys had taken a bigger toll on me than I thought. Or maybe it was the fact that we hadn’t been a unit that had taken its toll on me and this was the aftermath.

  “All I know is, I’ll be right here for you. I’ll always be right here for you.”

  The familiar pain of losing Granny struck me again. I knew enough not to reach out to her as she slowly faded away, but it made it all the worse to lose her again and know that not even trying to catch her would work. “Miss you, Granny.”

  “Did you not hear what I said?” She shook her head as the shadows rolled in, taking her away.

  I couldn’t help but smirk. She was always so literal.

  Somewhere in my unconsciousness, I was still there. Caught somewhere in that strange realm of dreaming and not dreaming. When Granny came to me, I wasn’t dreaming. I was fully conscious of it all even though my body was in a state of sleep. I didn’t understand it, but I was one of the lucky ones. Still able to see the most important person to me in this life even after her death.

  I yawned again, my eyes stinging. I tried closing my eyes, wishing I’d go back into sleep. Back where I wasn’t conscious of the fact that I was just laying here on top of Randy. This only happened when Granny came though.

  I opened one eye. Was she fully gone? Maybe she was coming back.

  I looked around the room. I couldn’t see her. Her usual flourish of fog and haze was gone. I saw everything just as it was before we went to sleep. Gabe sprawled out on the opposite sofa. Travis in the recliner. Liam on the floor in front of me while Randy and I took up this couch.

  I closed my eyes again, waiting for this part of my brain to turn off. Or was this a magical thing? Did I control it before and not know it? “Sleep,” I mumbled.

  Nothing.

  I breathed in deep, frustration overwhelming me.

  Wait.

  I breathed in again. A smell perforated my senses until all at once it felt like a blanket of fog was all around us, and that blanket of fog smelled like rotten eggs.

  Gas.

  In my mind, I was alert again. My eyes flew open. I struggled to move, but I—the me that was my physical body—was still asleep. No. No, this wasn’t happening. I sent out alert messages trying to get someone else to wake up. I couldn’t move. I focused on my fingers, trying to get them to wake up. If they could move, maybe the rest of my body could too.

  If this place was filling with gas, we could die. Or maybe it was a dream. Or maybe it wasn’t gas at all. Bad magic smelled like rotten eggs.

  I breathed in again, almost choking on the foul aroma. Maybe someone or something had gotten through the wards. Maybe someone spelled us into not waking up.

  In my head, I turned toward Travis. Granny had been able to come to him before. Maybe I could come to him too. Maybe I could send him a message to wake up. To help us out of this. In my head, I knew something was going on even if I didn’t know if it was magical or real-world problems.

  When you’re magical, but you can’t even save yourself from dying a normal death. Ha. Hashtag real-world problems.

  “Travis!” I shouted. My lips didn’t move, but I felt the urgency straight through to my toes. “Wake up, please, Travis! Something’s going on.”

  I pictured his faith in people. His love for me, and his coven. His leadership qualities, and of course his assholishness that sometimes knew no bounds. But at his center, he was so good. So kind.

  “Travis, we need you!”

  His eyelids fluttered. It was working! I refused to think that my mind was making this up. I couldn’t think like that.

  “Travis, get up! Something’s going on and I can’t move. I can’t get out of here and if I can’t, maybe the others can’t either.”

  His eyes flew open. He stared at me. Still not moving, our gazes locked. Fear rang through his. If he was trying to talk to me the same way I was talking to him, I couldn’t hear it, but I hoped he smelled what I did. And if he did, I hoped he could do something about it.

  “Get up!” I urged him. “Figure out what’s going on!”

  His nose moved first. Then his lips. Then his head started to shake. The movement worked its way down his body until every appendage of his moved. Fingers, legs, and even though I couldn’t see them, his toes probably did too.

  His face strained, he sat up. He dropped down onto all fours in front of me, narrowly missing Liam’s head. He stared down into my eyes. I wasn’t sure what he saw. Did he see the me I felt now? The me with her eyes wide open pleading with him to do something? Or did he just see what I saw in the rest of them. Me sleeping there calmly, wrapped up in Randy’s arms.

  “What’s going on?” I heard him say.

  He looked around, taking a deep breath. Immediately, he started to focus. He stood, his feet shuffling from side to side as if his equilibrium was off. At the same time, a spark of red came from his hand. He moved to the center of the room and I the red grew. At first it was just centered on the outside of his hand in one little pin point. Then it got bigger and bigger until it encompassed his whole hand.

  Then I felt it, the wind. My hair tracked over my face and goosebumps sprouted over my body.

  The window by the door flew open, and Travis’s wind blew that direction. For a few moments, it felt like we were inside a tornado. The lid to the pizza box flopped wildly and empty beer cans topped over onto the rug.

  Gabe moved next. He woke much quicker. His eyes only blinked a few times before he threw a hand over his face. “What are you doing, man? It’s in the middle of the night.”

  The wind died. “Gabe!”

  “Mate, you’re making a mess.”

  “Something’s wrong. Get up,” Travis said.

  In my own head, I tried and tried to move. My body just wouldn’t cooperate though. The air was better in here, fresher. I didn’t smell the overpowering gag-worthy rotten air as much though it had traces.

  “Wake everyone else up,” Travis said. “Get them up.”

  I could see Gabe sniff the air. In in an instant, he was up and off the couch. He jumped over the coffee table and landed just in front of Liam. He kicked him, “Get up.”

  Liam grunted.

  In my head, I reached out to Gabe. I was trapped in a prison of my mind. This was the worst feeling. Like, no matter what I did, I wouldn’t be able to make a difference.

  “Norah, Randy, wake up!”

  Randy grunted, and the sound made my heart crack. He was always such a bear to get up. He slept like the dead.

  He tried to roll away, but I was still there. “What the fuck?” he muttered.

  Gabe punched him in the arm. “Get the fuck up, Mate. Something’s wrong.”

  I felt him move behind me. Liam had sat up, his head in his hands. His body vibrated from a yawn that seemed to overtake him. “Why am I so tired?”

  “I don’t know what happened,” Travis said. “But something just went down.”

  He spun on his heel, finding me. He knelt. In my head, I was screaming at myself to wake up. “Norah?” he said. “Norah?” he said again, shaking my shoulders.

  Fear rounded his eyes.

  Hearing it in his voice, Liam spun around too. He took me by the hips and shook me. All at once, they all were saying my name, trying to wake me up. “Norah!” Randy bellowed.

  It was so loud it made me cringe, but this was just the me that was in here. The me that was out there couldn’t do anything.

  “What’s wrong with her?” Gabe asked.

  His blond hair was sticking up on its ends. It reminded me of the first morning I woke up with him.

  Another fissure was workings its way through my heart. I felt so removed from then. Not able to tell them I cou
ld hear them and see them.

  “I heard her,” Travis said. “In my head while I was sleeping. I don’t know,” he shook his head. “She told me to wake up. She told me something was wrong.”

  “Bad magic,” Randy said. He pulled himself out from behind me and they laid me down on my back. He came around. His shirt was off, and his gym pants hung low on his waist. I loved Randy like that. His muscles, tattoos, and piercings on full display. He was never more himself than when he was shirtless to me.

  I reached out. “Please!”

  My limbs never moved.

  “We should take her to the hospital,” Liam said.

  “But if it was magic…” Gabe said.

  “We don’t know that,” Liam said. He’d already put his glasses on and turned to look in all the obvious places for the car keys.

  At once, they all moved to the background. I could still see them, hear them, but something else moved forward. A dark mass with two razor red circles for eyes. It was like when Granny came to me, but Granny never gave me chills right down to my bone.

  “Norah…” it sang.

  My jaw clenched. I knew right away who it was.

  “Do you feel that, Norah? Do you feel that debilitating fear that you’re right there, but you can’t even talk to them?”

  “What do you want?” I shouted.

  “You already know that. Revenge. Revenge in all the ways I was wronged. I want everyone to understand what not having magic did to me. What not having a coven did to me.

  A growl ripped through me. The guys were so close. They were so close, but it was as if I wasn’t even there at all.

  “Do you feel that?”

  “I hate you.”

  He laughed, loudly. The sound so evil it made me cringe. “This was so much fun. Please do tell them it was all me.”

  In an instant, everything went back to normal. I sat up straight on the couch, taking in a deep breath as if this was the first time I’d been able to breathe in a long time.

  “Norah!”

  I stared back at Travis. He reached for me and I felt his hands on my forearms. I squeezed his arm, too, my limbs moving when I asked them too. I never thought I’d be so relieved to feel that way. To know that I had control over my own body. “Jax,” I said. “It was Jax.”

  “What was Jax?” Travis asked.

  Liam stood right behind him. All four pairs of their eyes were on me. “Jax. He made it so I could see everything that was going on, but I couldn’t move. I couldn’t even talk. I woke you up,” I said, staring at Travis.

  He nodded. “I heard you.”

  I breathed in a rugged breath. “He said he wanted me to feel what it was like for him. He also wanted you guys to know it was him who did it.”

  A muscle in Travis’s jaw feathered. Liam looked down, his head shaking back and forth. Gabe ran his hands through his hair. And Randy? Well, Randy cracked his knuckles in front of himself as if he was preparing for a fight.

  Jax had invaded me. He’d gotten into my head. He—

  My skin tingled.

  “What are you doing, Norah?”

  “Nothing.”

  Pin pricks started all over my body. I looked at the four of them surrounding me and smiled. I was back here with them, and I could feel all their energy intent on keeping us safe.

  “You’re doing something,” Gabe said.

  I glared at him. They were ruining this moment for me. This moment of true love I felt just bursting from me in waves. If I’d felt this when I was trapped inside my own head, there was no way Jax could’ve ever been there at the same time.

  “Sweetie,” Liam said. “You’re glowing.”

  6

  I stared down. The most brilliant white infused purple shone from me as if I was my own personal spotlight, lighting up everything within a few inches from me.

  Travis pulled his hands away from my skin, then put them back on me. “You’re so warm. It’s overflowing.”

  Randy’s face scrunched. “Does anyone else think this is really weird? The only other time one of us glows with our color magic is when we’re using our elements.”

  Liam echoed the word at the same time as if the same thing dawned on him at the right moment.

  “So, what’s Norah’s element?” Gabe said. “Lighting up like a Christmas tree?”

  “Maybe it’s light?” Liam asked. He moved forward. He put his arms on my shoulders as Travis touched my forearms. “He’s right. She’s so warm right now. Not hot, but just…” He almost sighed.

  Each of them held their hands out to me. “You feel like a bonfire,” Randy said. “Like a bonfire that would never burn me if I got too close.”

  “That is the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard,” I said, rolling my eyes.

  Randy shrugged.

  “You’re beautiful,” Gabe said, his voice in awe.

  “Okay, okay.” I stood and pushed away. I hated when they all looked at me like that. It felt like a lot of pressure to be something perfect and I was a far cry from that. “I’m just me.”

  Liam cocked his head. “You’re dimming.”

  I sucked in a breath. What was it that Granny had said? “Those who burn the brightest dim the quickest.”

  “What?” Liam asked. He moved closer.

  “It’s something Granny said.” It was odd how the fact I saw my dead grandmother didn’t even seem to faze them anymore. They all just stood there waiting for me to continue with my story. “She told me Jax and his demon are more than just our problem. It’s every witch’s problem.”

  “We’ve kind of all seen that,” Gabe started. “Jax just hasn’t been focusing on us. He’s drained and killed witches, too.”

  “You tell her she’s not the first to come up with it.”

  Gabe stilled and looked around. “She’s not still here, is she?”

  I smiled. “No, she’s gone. But she just said that we should be getting everyone with us to fight against him. She also said that we don’t need the Order to fight against something that’s not right. Everyone should be doing that.”

  Liam eyebrows raised as if he was impressed with Granny’s sentiment. “She’s right.”

  “Oh, she knows,” I said. “Trust me.”

  “He’s hurt a lot of people,” Randy said. “There’s a list too long to even say.”

  Travis swallowed. I knew he hated us talking like this, but what were we supposed to do? We couldn’t just act like none of this happened, or act as if it wasn’t his childhood friend that was doing all that.

  “Are we okay in here?” Gabe asked, looking around the apartment once again. It took me a moment to realize he wasn’t looking for Granny and that he actually meant Jax.

  “I don’t think Jax was actually here,” I said. “I think it was just all in our heads.”

  “That’s somehow way worse,” Gabe said.

  Yeah, I didn’t think of that. I was just too preoccupied with thinking that we needed to be physically safe, but what if our minds weren’t safe from him? He’d already tried to take us apart by separating us, though he probably hadn’t even intended to do that.

  “I vote someone stays awake just in case,” Gabe said. “It’s two in the morning. The rest of us can sleep, and then when we wake up, that person can take a nap.”

  “I’ll do it,” Randy said. “I’m awake now, anyway.”

  Around me, the guys settled in again. Gabe took his spot on the opposite couch, Travis sat in the armchair and Randy gestured toward the sofa. Liam took it and looked up at me. “I’m going to need a moment,” I told him.

  Randy walked away. He headed toward the bathroom and I heard the shower go on.

  Liam nodded and laid down by himself. As sweet as ever, he still squished himself into the inside in case I changed my mind.

  My fingertips buzzed. The sour taste from the beer last night was still in my mouth, so I followed Randy into the bathroom. “It’s just me,” I said when I walked in. I put some toothpaste on my finger and pr
essed it onto my tongue. I swished it around in my mouth and spit it out, my mouth feeling so much more refreshed right afterward.

  My hand started to shake afterward, and I had a feeling I knew what was going on. That light, or whatever had come from me, if it was my element, I’d probably used a lot of magic to get it to do it, even unwillingly. I was about to crash.

  At least Randy was awake. I pulled the shower curtain back and peeked inside. Randy faced me, pulling his hands through his hair as the water from the shower cascaded down over him. Rivulets of water ran down his body. Over his tattoos. Over his pierced nipples and further. Past his abs and off his cock. “Psst,” I said.

  His eyes immediately opened, and he stared at me, startled at first. “Yes?”

  “Meet me in your room?”

  A wicked smile pulled at his lips. “Be right there.”

  I gave him one last smile and then I put the shower curtain back before moving to Randy’s room. I wish I had a selection of lingerie to choose from. Randy enjoyed stuff like that, but I had no idea where any of my sexy stuff was at the moment. Most likely in a box one of them threw together from headquarters, or it could still be in Liam’s parents’ house for all I knew. I hadn’t thought about being sexy for one of them in a long time. At least it felt like a long time. When you enjoyed sex as much as I did, a whole day was a long time. We hadn’t been in that frame of mind recently, but something clicked earlier today.

  The door creaked open and Randy walked in. He hadn’t even bothered to dress himself. Standing there in all his glory reminded me of the first encounter we’d had in this room. How he’d brought me home here from the bar after a ride on his motorcycle. How I’d stopped us from going too far even though I knew how amazing it could be between us. Come to think of it, that was one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do.