by Sierra Cross
“Well, yes.” Matt didn’t seem to think it was funny, either. “But don’t worry, as a witch your magical fire bolts will dust demons automatically. It’s only physical weapons – since they have no intrinsic magic -- that have to be etched.”
My head was spinning again as I pulled the car into the Dick’s Drive-In lot, which was bathed in the yellow and orange neon from the sign above. Lines of pre-clubbing snackers milled around the front of the building, and it was clear we’d be waiting in the drive-thru line for a while. Unable to wait another second to find out what my mother left for me, I dragged the velvet bag onto my lap. “Shall we see what we just risked life and limb for?”
“I don’t know what’s in it,” Matt warned me. “I do know it’s the gift she planned to give you on the night of your initiation to the coven.”
Eagerly I pulled the drawstrings open and reached my hand inside the heavy deep blue fabric, ignoring the drywall dust that fell on my jeans as I did. Inside the bag was a slim linen-covered book not written in English—as a matter of fact not even written in the western alphabet. A charm, hanging from a long silver chain, with an etched stone that looked like blood-red amber. A short satin ribbon with a cut crystal on the end that I knew was a pendulum meant for scrying—having failed at trying to use one with Aunt Jenn. A green opalescent stone the size of a chestnut felt good to hold in my hand, but I couldn’t figure out what it was for. A small curved blade with a hammered leather sheath fell out next. Then a mesh bag containing beads of varying shapes. Discs and cubes, and spheres and octagons. Spellbeads. I didn’t know all their uses, but my mother had once counseled me to spend them wisely. Whatever that meant. A handful of silver balls rolled around loose in the bottom of the bag, one larger than the rest. Whatever I’d expected, I couldn’t bury my extreme disappointment. I’d hoped that at least something in the bag would mean something to me.
I stuffed it all back into its velvet pouch, though my fingers wanted to hold onto the green globe. “It’s just a bag of stuff. Magical…junk.”
Matt gave me a long look and I thought I saw sympathy in his eyes. But when he spoke he was all guardian, the mix of sternness and encouragement I remembered from his very first “ghost” visits. “Your mother told me once, ‘Matt, the world’s changing. You need to change along with it.’ I say, you’d better find a way to figure out how to use that ‘junk.’ Because even if you don’t believe in your magic, the demons do. They’re going to be coming after you—now that they know you’re back to revive the coven.”
I couldn’t help but notice this was the third time he’d mentioned me reviving the coven. “Like I said, I’ll put you in contact with Callie.” Reminding him to keep his expectations of me and my involvement low. “Hey!” A crazy idea came to me. “My magic isn’t so hot, but if the coven restarts maybe I could be like an honorary guardian. I mean, I did kill a demon today.” I couldn’t help feeling triumphant at the memory.
I don’t know what I was expecting—praise for my awesome fighting skills?
“About that, next time leave the physical combat to me.” Matt’s voice had a sharp, commanding edge to it suddenly.
“Why? I’m a good fighter,” I said, equally edgy. Not a fan of being ordered around. “If you trained me I could be gr—”
“The ancient laws exist for a reason, Alexandra.” Then, seeming to collect himself slightly, he added in a calmer tone, “We learn it from the first day of training. I forgot you’ve only been at this for a day.”
Oh-kay…that was weird. Obviously I hit some kind of conversational landmine?
His sudden shift to sternness made me pull back a bit. All the emotions of feeling a connection to someone who mourned my mother and saw my magic were battling with the fact that he seemed determined to obey some ancient rulebook. One that prevented me from kicking ass.
We finally moved up in the drive-through line. I caught the scent of the hand-cut fries and realized I was starving. Two hamburgers and a chocolate shake later, I was stuffed. Matt was still chowing down on his own comically large order—the cashier, assuming we were feeding an army, had packed a three-inch stack of napkins—and showed no sign of slowing. He was definitely a hamburger man.
As if reading my mind, he asked, between starving man bites, “All right. It’s your first night back in the mortal realm after ten years, what meal do you choose?”
“Pancakes from Glo’s Café.” I didn’t even have to think about it.
“Breakfast, at night?” He made a face, like he couldn’t believe my depravity.
“I’m a born rebel,” I quipped.
“That’s becoming rapidly clear.” He tossed a playful smile my way. To my relief, he seemed over whatever had tweaked him earlier. Maybe he was just hangry?
As if to highlight the red-letter nature of this day, we found parking right in front of my apartment.
“Home sweet home.” I unlocked the heavy front door and used my body to hold it open for Matt. I lived in a grand old dame of a Victorian house—you might even call it a mansion—that was converted to apartments fifty years ago. It was well kept and unique but the units were small with no modern conveniences like dishwashers or three pronged outlets. And there was no elevator. But the fourth floor offered a peekaboo view of the skyline and ferries crossing Elliot Bay that I could watch for hours.
Bartender Brett, who’d been my friend with benefits for a year, had never glimpsed this view. Toward the end of our non-relationship, he’d complained that my strict policy of not letting guys sleep over was a “symptom” of the larger “issue” of my being “emotionally unavailable.” Brett may have been clingy, but he wasn’t completely off the mark. I liked having my space to myself.
Letting Matt crash on the couch felt different, though. He was a guardian, a professional magical warrior. Not some guy I brought home from Sanctum for a good time. Still, I didn’t want Matt to know it was a big deal for him to be here. That he was the first.
“Make yourself at home.” I turned on the foyer light and almost let out a laugh when I saw how much of the space he took up.
He busily looked around the room. “Hey, I need to use your phone—”
“No problem.” I pointed him to the cordless on the wall behind him.
“To make an international call,” he finished. “To Barcelona.”
I blinked. “Seriously?”
“Guardian Headquarters. It’ll be morning there, and I’m ten years late checking in.”
He knew the number by heart, of course. From the moment he started talking—at first in Spanish, then back to English—Matt’s voice grew more clipped and at the same time more formal. I sat on the couch next to him to eavesdrop as he checked in with a long serial number and a password ritual that had four parts. He accepted curt condolences on the loss of his brethren. Briefly described how he’d spent the last ten years imprisoned in a limbo-like realm, and how he’d gotten out. My ears really perked up when Matt described me, his rescuer, as, “Alexandra Hill, Daughter of Suzanne Hill Marcus, daughter of Vera Jeffries Hill, of the Northmost Bloodline of the Coven of Fire.” Chills went down my spine when he did the same for Callie and Liv, stating their full names, maternal ancestors, and blood line. I didn’t know if he’d had all this stuff memorized or was repeating information the guy from HQ was feeding him.
Matt soon got down to business, explaining that we planned to restore the coven and would soon need backup—at least one more guardian, he figured, and a budget for weapons and supplies.
“January third?” His voice betrayed a hint of disappointment. “Yes, understood. Hong Kong, understood. Thank you.”
“What’s going on in Hong Kong?” I asked when he hung up.
“The demonic equivalent of a sun spot. All spare guardians have been put on planes heading there.” He replaced the phone, his expression troubled. “Normally it wouldn’t make such a difference, but it seems our numbers have dwindled in the last ten years. And with them our budget.”
&n
bsp; “Well, don’t worry, I won’t charge you to sleep on the couch.” I meant it as a joke to lighten the mood. But Matt looked even more uncomfortable.
“I’m sorry to put you out like this.” Everything I knew about Matt told me he was too proud—too much a stand-up guy—to mooch off others. “It won’t be for long, I promise.”
“Please, you’ve been stuck in solitary for ten years, I think I can give up my couch for a few days while you get on your feet. Can I get you anything to drink?”
He started to shake this head, then ventured, “I’d take a beer if you got one. Or hell, a straight shot of whiskey. It’s been a night.”
I covered my mouth to keep from laughing.
“What?”
“Nothing, it’s just that I’m a kick-ass bartender. Was,” I forced myself to add. “You know I mix you a better cocktail than you’d get almost anywhere in the city. But you’re…well, you’re clearly not the craft cocktails type. No offense.”
“None taken.” His eyes crinkled with genuine humor. “I’m a simple man, Alexandra.”
To take the chill off the room, I flipped the switch on the gas fireplace. When I came back with two shots of whiskey, he was sitting in front of the fire, arms loosely wrapped around his knees. He’d pulled off the football jersey I had loaned him. Through the holes in his T-shirt the fire light was reflecting off his golden, scraped-up skin.
“It feels so good.” The simple words were a stand-in for a ton of emotion I saw behind his eyes.
“What? The fire?”
“Everything.” He looked around as if in wonder. “The warmth on my skin. The taste of whiskey. The smell of your perfume.” He paused. “It feels so good to feel and taste and smell.”
I wanted to say something but what can you say? I couldn’t imagine what he must be going through. I decided to give him a moment. Ducking into the bathroom, I broke out the first aid kit from my medicine cabinet. The burn on my hand didn’t look nearly as bad as the pain lead me to believe. After I rinsed and disinfected it, I tucked the first aid kit under my arm and marched back into the living room.
“Let’s get those cuts of yours cleaned up.”
“I’m okay,” he protested, his posture stiffening as I sat down and scooted in close.
“No arguments.” I poured antibacterial wash on some cotton balls. “Some of these gashes look pretty deep.”
He looked like he wanted to argue but didn’t. When he pulled off his ripped T-shirt and sat in front of me half-naked, I lost focus but caught myself—hopefully before it got embarrassing—and got down to business. I started on his back, cleaning each wound. As I worked, I felt his muscles relax under my touch.
He leaned into me ever so slightly and half-smiled.
“If the guys were here, they would give me so much shit.”
“What? They don’t believe in proper medical attention?”
“Sure, they do . . . for severed limbs. Anything else, it’s duct tape and keep fighting. We used to joke that was the official translation of our order’s motto. Igni Ferroque.”
“Nice. What’s it actually mean?”
“With Fire and Iron. Fire refers to the coven, of course. Iron is us guardians, since we fight with forged weapons. But in Latin, that expression also means scorched earth. Means we won’t give an inch to the demons. We’ll fight to the death.”
I froze in mid cotton-swab swipe, stunned by the realization that many of the cuts I was cleaning up were from the night my parents died. To his body it had barely been twenty-four hours. “Matt?” Not wanting to invade his privacy, but needing to know, I ventured, “Does it feel to you like the battle…just happened?”
His gaze narrowed and tilted his head, seemingly pondering how to answer. “It’s the strangest thing. I know in my heart that everyone I loved has been gone a long time. But I can’t shake the feeling that I saw them all just yesterday, at the solstice party.”
Tears stung my eyes. I missed them, every day, but I’d had a decade to move on. For Matt, time had stood half-still. “You must miss them a lot. Your brothers.”
The near minute it took him to answer told me I nailed it. “They…wouldn’t want me to.” His gaze was shiny but he met my eyes without any shame. “They’d want me to get right back on the horse. Rebuild the Brotherhood. Live up to our code. Do what I was born to do.”
As he talked I could feel his unwavering purpose, his dedication to the cause, and I felt wistful that I hadn’t grown up in magic the way he had. Knowing my place. My role in the universe. I also felt another surge of anxiety—what if my magic wasn’t sufficient, or I wasn’t trainable, or otherwise not good enough to restart the coven? But mostly I felt grateful that Matt was finally able to process his pain. The ten-year-old pain that was still so fresh for him. I moved around to the cuts on his front, one that I thought could use stitches but he disagreed. I kept my face down, staring at the wounds, afraid that if I looked into his eyes again I wouldn’t be able to keep myself from wrapping my arms around him. It wasn’t just that he was the hottest male specimen I’d ever seen shirtless. It was that I’d never seen his face so open with emotion, vulnerable. It made me feel closer to him.
When I could find no more scrapes to treat, I scooched back. “I should let you get some sleep. If you need an extra blanket, there are some in the linen closet outside the bathroom.”
“Thanks.” He tugged on the ripped T and sat on the couch. Dwarfing it. Right away I knew this would never work unless he slept in the fetal position.
“On second thought, you’d better take the bed.”
“I’m fine here.”
“I sleep on the couch all the time—I fit.”
He grabbed the pillow and blankets and plopped down in front of the fire. “No way I’m kicking you out of your bed. Besides, compared to a brotherhood training facility, this is five star accommodations.”
As I tumbled into bed after 2:00 a.m., I wondered if I’d ever fall asleep knowing this man was right outside my bedroom door. I lay in bed alone, hearing Matt’s every breath. Then I crept up and pulled the velvet bag from the chair by my front door. Even though this was just a bag of junk to me, it was from my mother. Brushing my hair away from the back of my neck, I slipped on the necklace. My skin tingled and felt warm where the metal touched it, but it might have just been from my raw emotions. Back in bed, I hugged the bag to my chest and fell asleep.
Chapter Seven
“Alexandra.”
My head was buried in pillows and I was desperately clinging to sleep, but someone kept calling my name softly, over and over. Thinking it was the promise of sexual favors, I started to stir. I reached my hand across the bed and found it empty. Of course it was. I never brought guys back to my place.
“Alexandra.”
I growled and dug deeper into my bedding as it all came rushing back to me—demons, the frat house, half-naked Matt in my living room.
“Up and at ’em.” A firm hand shook my shoulder. “We have a lot to accomplish today.”
“It’s not even day yet.” I muttered. It was barely light out. Didn’t this guy know the etiquette of sleeping in on Saturday mornings? Every muscle in my body hurt, I felt like I’d run a marathon, and the blisters on my right hand burned. Last night I was thinking he was irresistible, but this infraction had me seriously peeved. “Please just go away.”
And much to my surprise he did, though his scent lingered. He must’ve showered, using my toiletries, but the fragrance he left behind was all him. Fresh and clean and masculine. It infused my thoughts as I drifted back to sleep…
The bed shook, and I woke with a start wondering if it was an earthquake.
I opened my eyes to see Matt standing next to the bed shaking it with his knee.
“What is your problem?” Truly grumpy now, I sat up and checked at the clock. It was 6:45 a.m. “I don’t function on less than eight hours.”
“Clearly. That’s what this is for.” Undaunted by my frustration, he sat on the e
dge of my bed and I saw he was holding out a mug of coffee. “Here.”
“God, I hate all you good-morning-lark people.” I harrumphed and crossed my arms in front of my chest. Just for a moment his eyes dropped from my face like he couldn’t help himself; and I realized the top I was sleeping in was just a thin white cami.
He caught himself and a guilty look crossed his face. Even in the semi-darkness of my bedroom, I swear I saw him blush. “Get dressed.” He was all business again. “Every minute you’re not part of a coven you’re in danger.” He stood and set the coffee down on my dresser. “I’ll be waiting in the living room.”
On top of making us coffee, he must have done a load of laundry because—I couldn’t help but notice as he walked away—his jeans were clean and form fitting. My huge Seahawks jersey stretched taut across his well-muscled back…but it was still 6:45 a.m. and he was still a jerk. As much fun as it was to ogle him from behind, I had one goal. Going back to sleep.
As if reading my mind, he yelled from the other room, “This time it was hot coffee. If you’re not out in five, next time it’s cold water. Us ‘morning lark people’ go hard.”
“Can’t believe I thought having you be my trainer would be hot,” I mumbled under my breath. Groaning as every muscle twinged, I tugged on my jeans and a sweater. Coffee in hand, I stomped across the hardwood floor to the bathroom. The ceramic tiles felt freezing on my bare feet. In contrast, the coffee was warm and sweet as it hit my tongue—exactly the way I liked it. His lucky guess on that just irked me even more.
When I stepped into the hall, a stack of clean folded clothes greeted me in the laundry basket. Matt sat on the couch. He’d washed my whole basket of dirty clothes along with his jeans. The pillow and folded blankets he’d stacked neatly in the corner by the bookshelves. He’d been a busy bee.
“Wow,” I blurted out. “I didn’t think you’d be the type to do housework.”
Looking puzzled, he glanced up from the coffee table, where he’d been reading something. “You didn’t think I’d be a functioning adult?”