by Anthology
Her parents hadn’t wanted Gelsey to go the way of black magic and neither did Stephen. He’d already risked his life and his freedom to ensure it. Now he would risk his heart.
Gelsey stirred in his arms as they left the building, but didn’t wake. It was nearly seven o’clock, but the sun had yet to set and the evening light glowed pink and gold. Cicadas hummed in the cooling air and the smell of sweet clover and freshly plowed earth was thick and heavy as Stephen ran toward the grove at the edge of the small town.
It was a night for magic if he had ever seen one. Now if he could just keep from being slain by Minos coven members who would no doubt be lying in wait, convince Gelsey to give up her familiar and earn the astral favor of the familiars of his own coven, all would be well.
Might as well do all that standing on your head. Just to really give yourself a challenge.
“Get out of my head, Warren. You didn’t think I could sing and dance either.”
And you sure showed me. You prance real pretty, like a little faerie princess.
“Just keep watch, you bastard,” Stephen growled as he passed Warren’s hiding place inside a giant concrete tunnel at the center of the town’s playground. He was glad Warren had come to help, but a little more help and a little less raging telepathic pessimism would be appreciated.
The woman hates you. I mean, I think she might want to fuck you, but her last thought before she passed out was that you had no heart. She’s never going to promise herself in handfast, and if she doesn’t promise—
“Shut up, Warren.”
I’m just trying to—
“Shut. Up. Warren.”
Fine. But be careful, Stephen. The Minos ride tonight. I feel their death magic on the air.
Stephen ignored the hairs rising on his neck and ran faster. He would make it to the grove and he would make love to the woman in his arms, show her with every touch the magic they could create together. And maybe, just maybe, the night’s events would unfold smoothly, according to the plans of the gods and of the Sambucus coven’s wise elders.
And maybe we’ll all die. You take heads, I’ll take tails.
“If you don’t leave my thoughts, I’ll kill you myself.”
Stephen felt a slight pressure at his temples as Warren’s awareness left him. Good. He didn’t want a third party observing his first time with Gelsey, and if the Minos found him before their goals were accomplished…
No, he wasn’t going to think on that or fear it either. He would do what he had to do to ensure the safety of his coven and the balance of magic in the world, even if that meant his death. Hell, he’d half expected this mission would be his last. Now only time, and a night of magic, would tell.
Chapter Two
There was music playing, faint fiddle music that reminded Gelsey of home. Ireland, the only home she’d ever known. She could practically smell the soda bread her mother was cooking, feel the cool stone floor beneath her bare feet. She’d only been six years old when her parents had died and the executor of their estate put her on a plane to America. Sometimes she had a hard time remembering their faces, but she could remember the smell of the herb lotion her mother made in her huge vat on the stove, and the way her dad’s eyes crinkled around the edges when he grinned.
“Gelsey. Wake, little witch, the sun sets and the Rite must begin.”
As soon as the male voice spoke, the music in her head fled with dizzying swiftness, only to fade back in, softly, when a warm summer breeze swept over her bare skin. It felt so delicious to experience the wind this way, without any clothes between her and the—
“Where are my clothes?” She sat up fast, eyes flying open as her arms crossed over her breasts. Her first instinct was to jump to her feet and make a naked run for it, back to the theatre, when she saw him. All of him. “Better question, where are your clothes?” She meant for the words to be harsh, accusatory, but they came out breathy, an unmistakable invitation.
“Can you really call that thing ‘clothes’? It itches something fierce.” He sat cross-legged on the simple brown blanket, as naked as the day he was born, a huge mixing bowl cradled between his legs. “Felt like I was wearing wool pantyhose clear up to my neck.”
“How do you know what pantyhose feel like?”
“Good question. But if I told you, I’d have to kill you.” He smiled, a wicked grin that lit up his face and transformed the usually handsome Mackenzie Fellows into something extraordinary. He was gorgeous, he was naked, he was showing signs of a sense of humor and he’d kidnapped her for some sort of kink-fest out in the woods. On the surface, it was exactly what she’d wanted from this man.
So why was her every instinct still screaming that she should get up and run—fast—and not stop until she was leaving the state of Indiana?
Maybe because he did actually kidnap you! And strip your clothes off while you were unconscious and take his own clothes off too and now—
“Mac, this is very…flattering, but—”
“Stephen. My real name is Stephen. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, but you didn’t seem able to keep a secret to save your life.” He smiled as he said the words, but they still stung. What did he know about her? Or her ability to keep secrets?
“Excuse me, but what the hell do you know about—”
“You talked nonstop about the entire cast’s business while you were fitting me. I assumed you did the same with everyone else. I couldn’t risk telling you too much.” He dipped a finger into the bowl between his legs and began casually tracing a red symbol on his bare chest—which she couldn’t help but notice had the perfect amount of chest hair, not too much, not too little. Not to mention that he was muscled like a warrior, not a musical theatre performer. Mac—Stephen—looked like he could handle himself in the ring, or on the battlefield if the faint scars marking his skin were any indication.
Gelsey felt another whisper of unease raise the hairs at the back of her neck. There was something wrong here, something more than a man reluctant to reveal he had a stage name.
“In fact, I think this is the first time I’ve seen you speechless.” He grinned again and anger quickly banished her fear.
“I talked nonstop because you stood there glaring at me and—”
“I never glared,” he said, glaring.
“You did! You always—”
“I wouldn’t glare at a woman, especially not one so terribly important to me. Or so beautiful.” A trace of an Irish accent, a trace she’d heard before, found its way into his voice, making her shiver. Then she met his eyes, eyes filled with passion and, more surprisingly, sincerity, and shivered again.
“Are you ever going to let me finish a sentence?” Gelsey swallowed hard and fought the desire beginning to unfurl low in her belly. She was glad she’d kept her hands in front of her breasts. At least he couldn’t see how her nipples tightened, aching for him to touch them, for him to trace crazy red symbols over her body and then follow the path with his tongue.
“I just did.” He finished the final mark with his finger, closing off the last in a series of four triangles, each pointing in a different direction. “Now it’s your turn. Will you become the bone of my bones, the flesh of my flesh, making us one flesh bound by—”
“I’m sorry, I have to go.” Gelsey leapt to her feet, no longer caring if Stephen caught a glimpse of her thigh dimples as she turned and fled. The man was insane, probably a serial killer from the sound of it. She’d been a fool to sit there as long as she had. “Flesh of my flesh” didn’t sound like any foreplay she’d ever heard of. No matter how much she wanted this man, she needed to haul tail back to civilization, reality, any place where she had more sense than to let her hormones lead her straight into an unmarked grave.
Graves, the dead, the power of the…
Gelsey shivered as the dark thoughts invaded her mind, so much stronger than they’d ever been before. Her head spun and her feet suddenly refused to move. The night wasn’t safe, something within her knew it
as well as she knew her own name. Tonight she’d do much worse than raise a few pets from their resting place in the backyard or make a dead body sit up in its casket. If she let that strange power loose tonight, she would never have the chance at a normal life again.
She couldn’t leave this grove, but she couldn’t stay either. She was trapped, a realization that made a strangled sound escape from her throat.
“Wait, relax.” Stephen’s arms were around her before she could step off the blanket, thick bands of hard muscle that wrapped across her aching breasts. He pulled her back, gluing her back to his front, letting the crevice of her ass cradle his thick, heavy erection.
Damn, he was as big as she’d thought, bigger even. If that mixing bowl between his legs had been any smaller, there was no way he could have concealed his cock. And probably no way she would have been able to run. She wanted him, lusted after that hard length with a ferocity that was frightening.
“What are you going to do to me?” She closed her eyes and struggled not to arch her back, to press into his arousal like an animal in heat.
No matter that she was afraid or that she really didn’t know this man, she ached for him, had been aching for him to fuck her since the moment she set eyes on him. If he were to force her to her knees right now and take her from behind, she knew she wouldn’t protest. In fact, the mere thought made a rush of liquid heat pool between her thighs and her breath quicken with excitement.
“What do you want me to do to you, ah chumman?” His voice was husky, soft and his arms gentled around her. One hand traced the sensitive skin beneath her bare breast while the other feathered over her ribs. Gelsey stifled a moan and brought her hands to his, stopping his caresses.
“I want you to tell me why you brought me here, why we’re both naked and why a part of me is scared to death to leave you.” She took a deep breath, tamping down the desire that threatened to overwhelm her. “And why a part is scared to death to stay.”
“None are easy questions to answer.” He bent down and breathed the words against her neck, his hot breath on her skin making her pussy throb. God, how she wanted to feel that warm breath against her thighs as he kissed his way up to her sex. She wanted him to force her legs apart, bare her to him completely and tease through her slick folds with his tongue. She wanted his thick fingers shoving inside her, making her come, making her scream her release to the trees arching over them with a protective air.
“Are you saying you can’t answer them?” Gelsey asked, biting her lip as Stephen pressed a kiss to her throat, over where her pulse fluttered wildly.
“I didn’t say that.” Another kiss, the flick of a tongue, teeth dragging across her skin. Dear god in heaven, what had those questions been again? She was starting to forget everything but his touch, his smell, the burning heat of his arousal pressed so intimately against her backside. Even the tight ring of her anus was beginning to ache for Stephen’s touch, for the push of his slick thumb inside her ass as his cock tunneled into her core.
“Then you’d better start talking or I’m out of here.” The words sounded strong and she was glad of it, especially considering that with a few soft touches he had her body screaming for satisfaction, threatening mutiny if she dared to move an inch out of his strong arms.
“You can’t leave or you’ll break the circle.” He pointed to the ground, but not before he’d smoothed the flat of his palm down over her belly, perilously close to where she so desperately wanted him to touch her.
“Are you saying I can’t walk over that line?” The red circle was traced just outside the blanket and looked to be made of some sort of sand.
“Of course you can, but you’ll break the circle of protection. It’s not meant to keep us in, but to keep the others out.” His words sent a shiver over her skin and she pushed back closer to him against her will. “You can feel them out there, can’t you?”
“Feel who?” The hairs on Gelsey’s arms rose. She knew who. The bad guys, the really bad guys, the ones she could sometimes feel watching her, following her, driving her from town to town, too afraid to settle down lest they catch her.
“The Minos. They call to you, to your magic, that’s why you don’t know whether to stay or to go.”
“What magic?” Now she was really confused, and afraid.
How did Stephen know about her power? She hadn’t told anyone about what she could do. Ever. The only one who had known was Aunt Claire and she’d died when Gelsey was fifteen, murdered in the home they’d shared. Before she’d died, she’d warned Gelsey never to reveal her gift to anyone, that if she did she’d hasten her own journey to the grave.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Gelsey said, fear making her words remarkably firm. “This little pagan seduction thing you’ve got going is creative, but you really are crazy if you think—”
“Don’t play games.” Stephen’s arms tightened around her again, enough to hurt, to make the air rush from her lungs and a small, strangled sound escape from her throat. “There isn’t time. You must abandon your familiar, abandon all sources of power except that of the earth and your—”
“Please, I really don’t understand.” There were tears in her voice now, but Gelsey knew it wasn’t fear of Stephen that put them there.
The darkness was closing in, she could feel it like the beating of her own heart, a dark rhythm that would steal her soul. The restless tattoo thrummed through the air, carried on the wind that rustled the leaves above their heads. The branches creaked and groaned, as if urging her to hurry, to run, to escape before it was too late.
“The cat you call Dorothy. You must sever all ties to her power as your familiar, free yourself from any Minos influence.”
“You really think I’m a witch,” Gelsey murmured, eyes sliding closed as her body grew cold.
“Gelsey? Gelsey!” Stephen spun her in his arms as her knees gave, the black power swelling so thick and heavy inside her that she could barely stand.
“Shit, we were wrong, Warren. She doesn’t know. Warren, are you…”
Gelsey tried to hold on to the sound of Stephen’s voice even though it sounded as if he were talking to someone else. But it slowly faded, making way for that voice that came to her in the night, curling its forked tongue into the shell of her ear.
Surrender to the call. The dead are waiting. The power is waiting. The graves of the innocent are—
No! Gelsey struggled to open her eyes. This couldn’t happen, she couldn’t allow the darkness to take control. She hadn’t spent ten years running away from evil only to sink into its clutches without a whimper of protest.
“So, take me as the bone of your bones, the flesh of your flesh, making us one flesh bound by the mark of our coven? Gelsey, answer me! Goddess, please, let her open her eyes.”
Stephen’s tormented face swam into focus and Gelsey could suddenly feel the trembling fingers that traced across her body. She lay flat on her back and he hovered over her, his hands caressing her breasts, her stomach, her thighs, building a heat that chased back the cold fingers of the wicked power. With every touch, every caress, desire flamed, bringing her back to herself until she writhed beneath his talented hands.
“Goddess, you’re beautiful.” He rolled her nipples between fingers and thumb and spread her thighs with firm hands behind her knees. “Will you have me, Gelsey? Will you take the mark?” He teased gentle fingers up and down her quivering flesh, then finally, finally moved between her legs.
“God, yes!” She moaned as his fingers slid over her clit and found the molten heat below, shoving into her with an air of possession that felt inexplicably right.
“Our coven honors the Goddess, but a ‘God, yes’ is good enough for me.”
Before she could make sense of his words, Stephen’s lips were on hers, bringing her body to life with a wild, primal electricity. She bowed off the ground, pressing closer to every inch of hard male she suddenly found on top of her, pinning her to the earth as red and golden light
danced behind her closed eyes. For a split second, she felt a flash of pain somewhere deep in her core, but then the desire she’d thought couldn’t flame any higher grew even hotter, fiercer, until she was clawing at Stephen’s back, desperate for a satisfaction she sensed only he could give her.
“Fuck me, please,” she moaned against his lips, around the tangling of their tongues. He tasted of campfire smoke, the mist off a cold ocean and pure, wonderful man. Stephen was by far the best thing she’d ever had in her mouth, bar none, better than all one hundred varieties of beer on tap down at the local tavern. And Gelsey liked beer, a lot.
But she didn’t love it, not the way she knew she could love this man.
Could. Who was she kidding? She loved him already, had loved him since the first time he’d looked down his nose at her and asked exactly how many colors there really were in that “ridiculous skirt”.
“Please, Stephen, make love to me.”
“Nothing could keep me from it,” he said in a voice that made her believe every single word. Nothing would keep him from her, not wild horses, not armed soldiers, not even the fiery-eyed monsters that hovered above their heads, screaming in wordless fury.
Chapter Three
Gelsey screamed, a high-pitched shriek that made Stephen’s teeth rattle. No matter how much he’d like to, there was no mistaking that for a sound of passion. The death riders must have found them, which wasn’t going to allow time for any hearts and flowers and slow “let’s get to know and love each other” sex.
Stephen stole a quick look over his shoulder. They were death riders, all right, the black magically raised spirits of evildoers—half ghost, half demon, all pain in the ass. Thank the Goddess the sacred circle he’d cast protected them from above and below, as well as three hundred and sixty degrees around. They were protected from the glowing red eyes that could suck a mortal soul straight from its body and make a witch wish for death.