by Cherie Marks
“You know Clooney?”
“Yeah! Familiars like to know who else is in the area. We’ve been hanging out for a while.”
“Have you seen him lately?”
He licked his paw lazily before saying, “As a matter of fact, I haven’t seen him in about a week.”
My heart plummeted. I’d really hoped to learn something about where he was currently.
“Tell you what though. That cat thinks the world of you. He went on and on and on about his Evie until we had to tell him to shut the hell up. Guy couldn’t talk about hardly anything else but how proud he was of you. You guys are lucky to have each other.”
Dane took my hand again, and I walked away with him, feeling like complete and utter shit. Clooney had bragged about me. He’d been like the proud parent I’d never had. And how had I repaid him? By chasing him away with snarky comments. I didn’t want that to be how things ended between us. What was I saying? I didn’t want things to end. Period.
One thing was for sure, whatever it took, I was going to find that little hair-coloring furball, and when I did, I was going to make sure he knew how I really felt about him. I loved that little guy, and I didn’t ever want to be without him again.
Chapter 12
It was almost the end of September, and though the party had been weeks ago, three things were still on my mind. One—exactly what horrible, world-ending baddie was I up against and would I be anywhere near ready to do whatever it was I was supposed to do? Two—where had Clooney gone and how was I going to find him to get the chance to be the bigger person and tell him how sorry I was? And three—most importantly, how was Zelda so frickin’ cool? She was my new hero and role model extraordinaire.
Like me, she hadn’t asked for her Shifter Whisperer assignment. Instead, she’d just been trying to live her life, and with the…cough…cough…encouragment of Baba Yaga, had to take on a job she didn’t sign up for at all. And another thing that impressed me was the way Zelda refused to actually use Baba Yaga’s title. She usually changed it to something much more irritating, and therefore, music to my ears. Needless to say, Baba Yaga wasn’t the highest person on my list lately.
When Zelda had called her “Booby You-know-whada” and several other made-up versions for the title of our leader, it had taken a minute for me to recognize exactly who she was referring to. When I finally did, I nearly spewed my beer all over everyone in front of me. Fortunately, I managed to keep it contained somehow and found new respect for witches. Well, at least for one witch. I’d also met Sassy, Zelda’s former jail cellmate and current neighbor. She was a little strange, but that just made me like her all the more.
As nervous as I’d been to meet other people like me, now I couldn’t wait to hang out with them again. It would certainly beat being ignored by Celia and the others every day.
Since the odd exchange the last time we met, I hadn’t spoken to Celia once. Liz, Matt, Selena, and she had closed their circle to me and now Mr. Frederick had taken my place. Of course, with all my trainings, I didn’t really have time to be too worried about being left out of Friday night get-togethers.
As a matter of fact, it was about the time when I would normally be getting ready to go out after a long week of teaching, but all I wanted to do tonight was crawl into bed, flip on the digital video recording device and binge on all the shows I’d taped this week. It sounded like the perfect way to soothe my sore muscles and rest my exhausted brain.
Dane’s trainings were getting more and more intense, as were our make-out sessions, but still, he refused to take things any further. I was getting downright frustrated, and I told him as much tonight. From the quick look I took at the front of his shorts, he was probably dealing with a mad case of blue balls every night, too. Maybe I didn’t have it nearly as bad as I thought I did, but I didn’t quite understand why he didn’t try to get me into bed. Goddess knows I had tried every tactic I knew. However, he seemed to have some strong drive to be a gentleman. Go figure!
I didn’t even train in clothes anymore. Butt-naked, which is why we had to move our sessions indoors. Now, we mostly battled in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of town. But even the sight of bouncing boobs and bare ass didn’t seem to be enough to make him take the necessary actions to ease both our frustrations.
Of course, thoughts of easing it by myself occurred to me, but I wanted Dane. Plain and simple, I wanted him. Nothing else would do.
He was all I thought about day and night, and even though I was supposed to be figuring out exactly what I was going to do when the forces of evil broke through the veil or whatever, I couldn’t focus on anything other than getting into bed with Dane Calvin.
As I was changing into a pair of sexy, little pajama shorts and a spaghetti strap top to match, a loud noise outside drew my attention. Part of me got excited as I jumped up and started for the front door. No lie, I was hoping it was Clooney returning home.
I peeked out the window to see if he was the source of the loud bangs still carrying in the air outside. But as I spotted the familiar group of people, I nearly went to my knees. Celia, Liz, Matt, Selena, and Mr. Frederick were on the sidewalk in front of my house, and Celia was banging loudly on the metal, spinning lawn decoration she’d gifted me when the weather had started warming up right before summer.
Shock kept me in place. I hadn’t expected anything like this tonight or ever. I’d just assumed they’d moved on without me. It was actually surprising to see them in close proximity to me again. I wasn’t even sure how to handle it.
Then, in a split-second, things went from freaky to flat-out scary. From the shadows, stepped a person I hadn’t seen in about ten years. I shuddered at the sight of her. Her white hair was even longer than I’d remembered, and I was surprised at how little had changed with her. At her age, she should be bent and wrinkled from top to bottom. Yet, as I peered at her, she didn’t even look a little different from how I’d remembered her. Karrena hadn’t aged at all. How was that possible?
I thought back to some of the amazing things she’d done. Opened dimensional wormholes, protected us from discovery, gathered every necessity for us to live—these hadn’t been normal behaviors.
There was only one explanation that made sense. She wasn’t human. Most likely, as I’d found out recently, had the metabolism of a witch, so aged much, much slower. And that meant one thing I would’ve never guessed in a million years. The woman who’d told me my entire life that witches were wicked, and that I needed to suppress my magic or become wicked myself, was clearly a witch. Hypocrisy was a bitch…literally. More clear to me as she raised her hands in the air and Celia swung the stick in her hands faster and harder, until the lawn decoration was just a pile of used-to-be on the ground and pieces of the stick lying at her feet, she had cast a spell over my friends.
Without a doubt, I knew exactly what to do now. I closed the curtains and picked up my phone. Dane answered on the first ring and appeared beside me before I could push the button to end the call. He rushed to the window and looked outside. Feeling brave with him here, I looked out the window again too but I stared, astonished, at the empty sidewalk where they’d stood only moments before. The crumpled metal on the ground the only evidence that they’d been there.
“Are you sure it was her?”
“I will never forget her face. It was exactly the same as I remembered.” I hugged my mid-section as memories of her came back. “And it was clear she had control over Celia and the others. She must’ve been controlling them all this time. What a bitch! She made me think my friends hated me. I thought there was something wrong with me.” I turned away to hide the tears that threatened to spill down my cheeks. I hadn’t realized just how much the rejection I’d been dealing with had affected me. I liked feeling like I belonged, and the fact that Karrena had taken that away from me hurt. It was painful even now to think about how often in the past month I’d missed Celia and everyone else.
Dane’s embrace was exactly what I needed,
and though I wanted to sob all over his white t-shirt, I didn’t want to waste anymore tears on Karrena and the horrible things she’d made me believe about my mother, myself, and now, my friends.
After a few sniffs, I got myself completely under control and pulled back to look at my protector and the star of my wild, sexual fantasies. The sight of him with me here, in my space, was amazing.
I stopped thinking, stopped breathing at the reality of Dane standing in my living room in nothing more than a t-shirt and boxer briefs. He looked like a model for an underwear commercial, and one thing was for sure. I was done waiting. I was going to pull out all the stops, and we were going to get naked, and do naughty things to each other.
“I think you should stay here tonight. You know, for safety reasons.”
“That’s probably a good idea. The outer protections should hold, but I don’t want to leave you tonight.”
I felt something rise inside me, something warm and full, and I realized nothing would stop me from fucking Dane’s brains out tonight.
Feeling his gaze on me, I watched him look me over.
“You like?”
He growled low in his throat. “I want.”
“What do you want, Dane?”
He roughly ran a hand through his hair. “I want to forget what’s right and just feel tonight. I want to be a damn caveman, throw you over my shoulder, carry you to the bedroom, and fuck you. But above all, I want you to want that, too.”
I stared at him in disbelief. “How could you doubt that? I’ve been throwing myself at you for weeks.”
“Yeah, I’ve noticed.” He tapped the side of his head. “I can block most of your thoughts, but the loud ones still get inside. But I don’t want it to be something you do because of how closely we work together. It’s easy to fall into something due to our situation. I mean we spend so much time together. I want you to want me the same way I want you.”
“And how’s that?”
He reached out a hand and stroked it through my hair once before coming to rest on my face. He cupped my cheek and looked into my eyes. “From the moment you first walked into the library that day, I haven’t been able to take my eyes off of you. You’re the first person I think of when I wake up and the last person I picture before I drift to sleep at night. Your naked body is the only thing that takes me to the edge and over, and I’ve rubbed my dick thinking of you so many times, a damn genie should’ve come out. I don’t just want you for a quick fuck, and I don’t want you to want that either. I want it all with you, Evie. I don’t want you to hold back because I fucking don’t plan to.”
In that moment, all my previous concerns about getting too involved with Dane flew out the door. The end would come, one way or another, and in that moment, I’d regret not taking this chance more than taking it. I wanted to share something special with him before it was too late. I placed my hand over the one of his that still cupped my face and gave him my sexiest smile.
“Thought you’d never ask.”
I grabbed his hand and led him to the bedroom. As soon as we were inside, he grabbed my waist, turned me to face him, and lowered his mouth to mine. His tongue swirled slowly against mine, and my heart began to race faster than ever. He broke the kiss as he pushed us both toward the bed. He sunk his face in my hair and breathed in deeply as if trying to memorize the smell. When the backs of my legs hit the side of the bed, he didn’t stop. As I sat and scooted backward, he crawled onto the bed, straddling my lower body until he hovered above me on elbows and knees.
He brushed my hair aside and lowered his mouth to my neck, placing small kisses along the right side that drove me crazy with need. Without thought, I lifted my hips against his lower body. He groaned and pushed hard against me. The feel of his hardness sent shivers through my mid-section. I wanted him inside me now. This taking our time was going to kill me.
“I need you, Dane.”
He raised his head and looked down at me. “I’ve wanted to hear you say that for so long.”
With shaky hands, he made quick work of my barely-there top. I hadn’t bothered with a bra for bed, so my breasts popped free, and Dane looked like he’d uncovered an incredible treasure. His eyes shined with delight as he pumped his hips against mine and lowered his mouth to my nipple and sucked it inside. An electric wave shot through me at his touch. Everything else faded from my mind as I got caught up in the moment. He moved to give my other hardened peak the same attention and I moaned and raised my arms above my head. This. This is what I needed right now. My life might be a complete mess right now, but I didn’t care. I wanted to be right here, right now, doing this exact thing with Dane.
He backed off the bed, and I nearly stopped him until I realized he was removing my pajama bottoms and panties. Now, I laid naked before him on the bed, and he looked like he couldn’t be more pleased with what he saw. Any self-consciousness I might have harbored when it came to my body melted away as he rubbed a hand over the stubble on his lower jaw and stared like he couldn’t believe his luck.
With a swift motion, he reached over his head and pulled his t-shirt off, quickly followed by a dropping of his boxer briefs. Damn! I nearly crossed my legs at the sight of the huge erection that sprang forth. It bobbed and extended as he stood there, and I bit my lip wondering if I should put an end to this right now. His size concerned me simply because I wanted him to pound me hard, and now that I knew what we were working with, I had to wonder whether I could take it.
He didn’t give me a chance to really worry though. The next moment, he was spreading my legs wide and lowering his eager face to my aching pussy. I almost protested until I realized I didn’t want to stop him. With the first touch of his tongue, I hissed a curse at the hot spindles of sensation that engulfed me. He was licking and sucking every inch of my sex, and I was growing ever closer to satisfaction. When he switched his focus to my clit and began to suck there, my hips bucked once uncontrollably, and I felt a tightening like a rubber band before it burst free and radiated from my core to flow throughout my entire body. My orgasm continued for a long time before it finally faded, but he didn’t give me a chance to catch my breath.
In the next moment, he crawled over me, taking my mouth with a feverish kiss. He impaled himself inside me with two thrusts, and I gasped at the fullness as he sat still, his eyes rolled back in his head. Ecstasy!
He met my gaze, concern in his eyes. “Are you okay? Was I too rough with you?”
“It feels amazing. Don’t stop, Dane!”
He began to thrust again, and I gasped at the incredible sensations his movement gave me.
“Your taste drove me crazy. I needed to feel you around me.”
“So good! Give it to me, Dane! Give me all you got.”
His hips began to pump faster and harder, with longer strokes, and I was losing control, feeling the pressure beginning to build again.
My breath stopped right before the rhythmic pulse of the walls of my pussy began to squeeze around him. I cried out his name just as his thrusts began to become erratic and he bellowed above me, my name on his lips.
“Feel you squeezing my cock. Damn!” He was up on straight arms with his head thrown back, and as my second orgasm faded, I felt dazed at the strong emotions roiling through my chest. I wanted more. I wanted to do this again. For the first time ever, I wanted something long-term, and that scared me as much as it thrilled me.
Dane pulled out and rolled onto his back beside me, his legs hanging over the side of the bed. We hadn’t even turned length-wise. It occurred to me, we hadn’t thought of a lot of things. As I felt the warmth of his ejaculate, I realized a very important thing had been forgotten.
“We didn’t use protection!”
Dane didn’t seem concerned as he threw an arm over his eyes. “I had a clean bill of health as recently as last month when I had to get my physical to work for the school system. You?”
“I’m clean. Checked every year at my annual, and I don’t have sex…usually. Hav
en’t in like two years. But, what about pregnancy?”
“Nothing to worry about. It’s highly unlikely.”
“What are you talking about? It’s possible.”
“I’m sterile.”
“You are? Since when?”
He finally uncovered his eyes and leaned up on an elbow to look down at me. “Since an incident when I was younger. You don’t have anything to worry about.”
“Oh. Okay.” I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. It didn’t change my feelings about Dane, but I did want children…someday. This seemed like something we should talk about, but not right now. I didn’t want to think about the future. I wanted to stay in the moment and enjoy the glow.
“Of course, just to be clear, it could also be that I can only get the one woman who is meant for me, and me only, pregnant. As long as you’re not her, we’re safe.”
Shit!
Chapter 13
The next three weeks were blissful with Dane. I trained in the morning, taught through the day, trained again in the afternoon, and made love to Dane every night. I couldn’t wait to get to that part each day, and he always made it worth my while. After that first time though, I insisted on wrapping his dick up in a condom every time we had sex. The last thing I needed was to get knocked up right before I had to battle the forces of evil.
Of course, that was closer than ever. As a matter of fact, tomorrow night was Halloween, and while all the kids of the town would be dressing up and going door-to-door, I’d be in a clearing in the woods, ready to cast the biggest spell of my life.
Dane said I was ready, but I didn’t feel like I could take on such a big task. I still wasn’t entirely certain what or who I was battling. All I knew was that I’d mastered spells to conjure water, fire, air, and earth. I’d even learned how to use them as weapons, but even Dane couldn’t tell me what form the forces of evil would take. The only thing he told me was to be prepared for anything, and that he had something important to tell me before tomorrow.