Me and You and a Ghost Named Boo

by Selene Charles

  Kneeling until we were eye level, I held his unsure stare. We communicated in the way of the wolf, not with useless words that meant nothing and cost so little to say, but through a bond we’d forged from the very first moment he’d locked eyes with me.

  “Hey”—I gripped his thin shoulders hard—“I will always be here for you, Steven. So long as I live.”

  His small hand clamped onto my wrist, gripping me with the budding strength of his kind. I let him because that small, wonderful boy had been through hell and back and needed to know that, no matter what came, I would always be his sister.

  “You promise?” Unshed tears shone back at me.

  He was so brave, staring at me with an unflinching gaze. Small and thin though he was, Steven had the blood of ancient shifters running through his veins. Even at his age, pride meant everything to a wolf.

  Drawing him to me, I squeezed him tightly, running my nose along his head and inhaling the lavender-scented shampoo I kept in my bathroom. I loved that pup, probably more than I loved most anything else in this world.

  Steven and I might not have actually been blood, but I couldn’t have loved him more if we had.

  “I promise. Now, c’mon before you’re late and Mr. Matthews tans your hide.”

  He chuckled and nodded then yanked on the book bag beside his foot, slinging it over his right shoulder. He followed me to the truck and hopped in, and I drove him to school.

  I knew he could’ve walked himself. He was on shifter soil, and no one would dare mess with the Alpha’s son—even if said Alpha was currently under investigation and in all likelihood would be forced to renounce his claim to the throne. Still, I wanted to give him time to fully compose himself before someone else saw him vulnerable like this.

  “Scar?” he said just as I made the final turn toward the school.

  “Pup?”

  “When you...” He paused, took a deep breath to steady himself, and pressed on. “When you did that thing at the mall the other night, I saw something.” His voice was low, quiet.

  I went totally still. “What? What did you see?”

  I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. In fact, a part of me was pretty sure I wouldn’t like what I was about to hear. My brother wasn’t making eye contact—never a good sign. Clenching his tiny jaw, he stared out the window, looking up toward the nighttime sky blanketed with stars just as I parked.

  Squaring his shoulders, he looked back at me. “You. Scar. I saw you. But it wasn’t you, either. You were black, like shadow, and had strange eyes, and... and you were a stranger. You wanted to kill me too.”

  The blood that’d been sluggishly running through my veins moments before suddenly felt as if it had turned to ice.

  Our eyes locked, and the secret shame I’d buried so far down deep came welling up because I remembered too—remembered the call of something wild and untamed roaring to life inside me, remembered the desperation to save him followed by something so repugnant and vile I’d refused to acknowledge it. For just a second, a brief second where I’d been overcome by that power, I had wanted to kill him—him and everyone else around me. Death had curled like a lover’s caress all around me, and I’d wanted to watch the world burn, but the powerful emotion had been fleeting, and I’d convinced myself no one had noticed, no one had seen.

  I blinked.

  Twisting one corner of his mouth upward, he reached for the door handle.

  “I’d never do anything to hurt you, Steven. Do you hear me?”

  Eyes wide and pulse fluttering like a hummingbird’s wings in his throat, he nodded.

  “What is that thing, Scar? That thing that lives inside of you?”

  I desperately wanted to deny it, wanted to tell him he hadn’t seen what he thought he’d seen, but I just couldn’t.

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. But I promise I’ll never let it hurt you.”

  He didn’t say anything else after that—just opened the door, hopped out, and ran to catch up with his classmates filing into the one-room building.

  Only once he was inside did I look into the rearview mirror, and for just a second, a brief instant, I saw a flash of fire burn through my eyes, there one moment, gone the next.

  A demon was living inside me. Maybe it was tied to my vampiric heritage—I still knew so little about my kind—but something in my gut told me my story was a lot more extensive than anything I could ever imagine.

  Chapter 9

  Scarlett

  Squaring my shoulders, I pushed the doors to the den open, taking a moment to refamiliarize myself with the place that’d been almost like a second home to me ever since my rebirth into death.

  I’d kept my distance from the place for the past few weeks, mostly to help preserve my sanity.

  Most of the shifters inside knew me, so I garnered little more than cursory glances before they resumed what they’d been doing. Letting the doors swing shut behind me, I soaked in the welcoming scent of gin and whiskey and the pheromones of relaxed shifters.

  I glanced at the jukebox Mercer had gifted me for my birthday, actually surprised to note the thing was still there. I’d half expected him to toss it out, considering how little we’d been interacting until just recently.

  A live band was playing an old Charlie Daniels tune, “The Devil Went Down to Georgia.” Some humans were inside, though not as many as usual. The night was a slow one, and most of the faces I recognized.

  Only one face actually looked happy to see me.

  Blue was walking in my direction, and I couldn’t help but grin back. Dressed in skin-tight jeans that looked painted on and a baggy blue-and-gray raglan shirt, he looked yummy and somewhat more male than usual. Blue was proud of his androgynous looks and often played at being more one sex than the other. Though all male fae were somewhat feminine in the looks department, I’d never come across another who’d embraced his inner Venus quite like Blue.

  “As I live and breathe, the vampire has come back from the dead. Thought I might have to send the dogs out to drag your dead carcass back soon. Where the hell have you been, fanger?” he said as he approached then swiftly grabbed me and wrapped me up in a preternaturally powerful hug. Blue smelled of moss, musk, and male.

  Happier to see him than I thought I would be, I gave a one-shouldered shrug. “Here. There.”

  “Pft.” He rolled his eyes dramatically, causing me to note that he’d applied a little eye shadow and mascara too. “Whatever you say.” Then he leaned in and sniffed. “Don’t smell sex on you, vampire. How long has it been? Ages?”

  I guffawed. “Gawd, Blue, only you would go there. And that’s none of your GD business.”

  “Yeah, well.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and swaggered closer. Feminine in so many ways, lanky but absurdly striking, Blue had always been a bit of catnip for me, and he knew it too, the beautiful bastard. “Anytime you want a bite, beauty”—he trailed a long finger down my cheek—“just say when.”

  Vampires and fae... God, we’d obliterate each other if we ever could manage to do anything about the burning attraction that went back eons between our kinds. Too bad our blood would literally kill each other if we tasted even one tiny drop of it. That didn’t mean we weren’t always flirting with danger, though. That was half the fun of living.

  “In all seriousness,” he said, voice going deep and making me shiver despite myself as his starlit eyes gazed deep into my own, “how’s my favorite girl doing?” His touch went from sexual to—dare I think it—gentle and even loving.

  Slightly confused, I made a joke. “Bet you say that to all the girls, you sexy devil.”

  He snorted, and in a flash, that familiar rascal I liked despite myself was staring back at me. “Not likely. Until you, Scarlett Smith, I’ve always preferred my company to be more of the XY persuasion. But for you, I’ll always make an exception.” He chucked my chin.

  Oddly flattered and realizing I had indeed been in a bit of a dry spell lately, I shrugged. “I’m fine. Kind of. Ac
tually, it’s why I came here to find Mercer. You seen him?”

  “So ready to quit my company.” He grabbed his chest. “I’m wounded, girl.” He winked, showing his words for the lie they were. “Saw him walk into the back some time ago.”

  I nodded, ready to say my goodbyes, when he grabbed me by the elbow, stalling me.

  “Heard a little chatter on the winds recently.”

  Knowing immediately what kind of chatter he was referring to, I glanced over his shoulder, making sure no one else was paying attention to us. Even though the music was blaring and we were speaking low, our conversation wasn’t necessarily private, not around a bunch of shifters who could literally hear a pin drop if they cared to.

  I lifted my eyebrows, telling him without words to tread lightly. He nodded his understanding.

  “Birdie told me you’d be needing a gown soon.”

  “Who? What? How?” I shook my head. As far as I knew, only Carter and I knew about the ball, and Carter wouldn’t be talking about it. He wasn’t that type.

  Blue chuckled. “Got my ways. Anyway, know a seamstress, makes all my cocktail dresses. Last thing in the world you wanna do is show up there in rags.”

  “I was gonna go to the department store.”

  He snorted then chortled loudly, not caring that several sets of eyes suddenly turned on us, looking on with perplexed irritation.

  I glared at them. Soon enough, the eyes turned away.

  Blue was wiping at the tears spilling down his cheeks. “Oh, sweetheart, and this is why I love you so. You never cease to amaze me with your sheer naiveté. Show up in anything less than the best, and you’re sure to make enemies. Trust me on this, sugar cake. Now, I made an appointment with Jolene.”

  “What the—”

  “Nuh.” He gently shut my mouth and tsked at me. “Now, this isn’t up for discussion. I’ve already made an appointment. Meet me here at dusk tomorrow. Prompt. It takes months to weave her masterpieces, but for me, she’s willing to work a miracle in under a week. Don’t make me regret calling in that favor.”

  “I never asked you t—”

  Moving so quickly he was nothing but a blur, he kissed my cheek, lingering just long enough to inhale deeply and suffusing my skin in a wash of goosebumps.

  “Gods, I love your scent—more now that you’re growing so warm,” he whispered heatedly against my cheek.

  A second later, I smelled a scent that sent my sluggish pulse into overdrive. From the corner of my eye, I caught Blue frown, then in a move I should have seen coming but hadn’t, the pretty boy glamoured me.

  Blue was a dark fae. He was also a sex fae, meaning he derived power from the pleasure of others. Death by orgasm... God, what a way to go. I squirmed, moaning and groaning and not fighting the thrall the way I normally would.

  His grin grew wide as he continued to pump me so full of glamour I became a living, breathing pillar of sexual napalm. I moaned, ready to orgasm on the spot from the slightest breeze or caress.

  “Let her go, dark fae, before I toss your ass from the bar.” Mercer’s voice was a low growl behind us.

  Chuckling, Blue took the threat in stride, just as he did most everything else. “Yeah, I get it, shifter. Dibs and all that.” Then, looking back at me, he winked and smirked. “Remember. Tomorrow. You’ll be a female fit for the gods when I’m through with you.”

  Then taking my hand, he gave it a soft squeeze before releasing me and tracing on the spot, a method of transportation all fae had—literally there one second and gone the next.

  Still feeling slightly disoriented and discombobulated by Blue’s flirtation—which could be as deadly to a vampire as a stake to the heart—I shook my head, trying in vain to shake off the rush of need and heat he’d built inside my bones. Blue hadn’t been aiming to hurt me, only to remind me that other males of interest existed besides Mercer.

  Being glamoured was bad enough, but what was worse was being glamoured and then being forced to hold the steady gaze of the man I’d wanted to sink my fangs into since the moment of my rebirth.

  Feeling hot, needy, and itchy, I fought to get my excited nerves under control. I’d gone there that night with a mission, to get Mercer to be my plus one. I couldn’t start things off by being waspish or, worse yet, tossing myself at him, shoving his clothes off, and having my dirty, dirty way with him in front of God and country, but I doubted it would go over well.

  His nostrils flared, and I wanted to kick my own ass because, of course, the shifter was scenting my need.

  I might have resented Mercer right then, but with his Nordic good looks; strong and unbelievably fit body, which looked ripped from the pages of a muscle-and-fitness magazine; and Wranglers so snug that they left very little to the imagination, I was lucky I wasn’t combusting at his feet.

  Several other sets of eyes were suddenly looking at me, projecting their willingness to slum it with a juiced-up vampire, if only for one night.

  I hated Blue so much right then.

  “Can we talk?” I asked, sounding like Marilyn Monroe after a lengthy sex marathon.

  Mercer’s pupils dilated, and I swallowed hard, scratching at my arms and neck, trying in vain to get at the glamour and yank it out of me.

  I could do nothing other than let the thing run its course. Even if I got sex, I’d be insatiable for more and more and more. Many lesser immortals had died that way. I should have known better than to ever let Blue touch me, but I’d always been weirdly weak to the dark fae.

  Clearing his throat, Mercer nodded, turned on his heel, and marched toward the back room. Curling my hands into fists, I followed, ignoring the pressing and heated stares of those around me.

  ~*~

  Mercer

  He’d been in the liquor closet, going over inventory, when he’d smelled Scar’s lushly dark scent. Wanting to speak with her, he’d stepped outside, only to spot Blue pumping his female full of carnal scent, and Mercer had needed all his self-control to not snap twig boy’s neck.

  He’d not died over and over the previous night just to have another male attempt to move in. The only thing that’d stayed his hand was the fact that he didn’t want to scare Scarlett away with the strength of his fury.

  But Blue had known. The fae had smelled the mating scent on Mercer and had wisely left.

  “Close the door.” He forced himself to speak gently to her, affected more than he cared to admit by the spoor the dark fae had drenched her in.

  Her steps were agonizingly slow, and Mercer knew any other female would likely be weeping and begging for release, but sex in that state of heightened arousal could be, and often was, lethal to those involved.

  Thus, he wet his lips and forced himself to sit behind the desk.

  Mercer couldn’t blame Blue for what he’d done, for Scarlett looked incredible that night, sleep tousled and sexy as hell with that dress showing off her shapely thighs. That didn’t mean he didn’t want to kill the dark fae for doing it, though. The little shit deserved it, but he was Scarlett’s friend, and she’d forgive him for his prank, just as she’d forgiven him for so many other things because that’s who Scar was.

  “You wanted to speak with me,” he said in a slow and measured tone.

  She cleared her throat, crossing her legs and squeezing tightly, as if to ease some of the strain between her thighs. Mercer fought like hell to suppress his moan at the sight of her in such a sexually aroused state.

  Her dusky skin was flushed with what little blood ran through her veins, making her look almost human again. Seeing her in yellow was like gazing at his sunshine girl anew, the one who’d been innocent and fragilely human before having been turned into a monster.

  Thank God the replacement desk Scarlett had bought for him was concealing his own struggle with Blue’s parting gift.

  Giving a weak chuckle, she rolled her shoulders. “Okay, first, elephant in the room. I’m sorry if I say or do something stupid right now. I’m not exactly myself.”

  He grunted
. “Ditto.”

  “Hmm.” She twiddled her thumbs before biting down on the corner of her lip, then giving a low, sultry chuckle, she shook her head. “I can do this. So just bear with me.”

  Right then, the only thing he wanted to do was her. He wanted to march around the desk, yank her up, shove her against the wall, and fuck her until she forgot everything but his name.

  Closing his eyes, he nodded as a muscle in his cheek twitched in rapid fire from his clenching down on his back teeth.

  She sighed. “Okay. Short, quick, and to the point. I need you for a plus one to the vampire’s ball.”

  Eyes flashing open, he sat straight up in his seat, fear temporarily overriding the thrum of dark magick. “What? Vampire ball.”

  She held up a hand, practically vibrating on her seat. “Please don’t ask questions right now. I don’t think I have the energy to sit here with you all night and not toss myself at you and fuck you like an animal.”

  His eyebrows shot up, and his dick jolted. She must have been slammed pretty hard to say something like that. Against his will, a corner of his lips twitched because he damn sure wouldn’t mind, but she wasn’t looking at him right then, which was probably a good thing.

  “Look, the master vampire of the Clan Infantes sent his lawyer down to the precinct last night, grilling me pretty hard about what went down at the strip mall the other night.”

  “What’d you tell you him?” he growled, anxiety for her helping to keep his muddled thoughts somewhat focused.

  “The truth. Only omitting certain things.”

  “Such as?”

  “The fact that I turned her to cinder just by looking at her.” Her eyes suddenly met his, pupils dilated, and at their center burned a fiery light. A few months before, that would have made him uncomfortable, but all he felt was a warm thrum of satisfaction.