Witch Glitch

by Robyn Peterman

  I was silent as I shoved more cookie dough in my mouth and wondered why I felt like crying. Naked Dude sat silently and watched. In my weirdly magnanimous mood I offered him some dough off my saliva fork and he gratefully accepted. I watched his Adam's apple bob as he swallowed the raw sugar and spit. Dropping my head into my hands I groaned.

  "You're not playing fair. All that stuff about poop and pee and puke is kind of beautifully horrifying," I mumbled through my fingers.

  "I'm good that way," Dude said with a gentle smile. "I missed a lot. I can't make up for not being there for you. I also can't say I want to slurp spit on a regular basis, but I would die for you. I fell in love with you the very first day you found me in the dumpster."

  "You were kind of hard to avoid," I said as I remembered trying like hell to keep walking past the pitiful mewing on that fated day.

  For some unknown reason I stopped and peeked. He was the most mangy and stinky little furball of a cat I'd ever seen. I was repulsed by him, but shockingly it didn't stop me from saving his feline ass. Of course I regretted it daily for the whole two years since. He'd followed me around like a deranged shadow and drove me nuts, but now at least it made more sense why.

  I suppose I'd seen something of myself in the odiferous dumpster diver. Both of us were starved for affection and totally alone.

  Introspection though was not my forte so I shoved that profound little nugget to the recesses of my brain. This getting to know you crap was becoming messy. I didn't do messy. However, there were some things I wanted to know.

  "Did you love my mom?" I asked.

  It was a question I'd always pondered. My mom was not very lovable. I loved her—kind of. It was more of a perfunctory thing. All creatures were supposed to love their mothers. However, if the mother didn't love the creature back it became an exercise in futility and a need for therapy as an adult.

  Naked Dude put his elbows on the table and put his chin on his palms as he clearly fought for a way to tell me he didn't love her. The thought depressed me, but I had expected no less.

  "I thought I did," he said quietly. "I didn't know her very well when we started seeing each other."

  "You mean screwing each other," I supplied. No time or need to mince words here.

  "Well… um, yes. That would be one way to put it."

  "So you did her and left?"

  "Not exactly," he hedged. "I honestly didn't know her name the first several times."

  I gaped in horror. "You're a total man whore."

  "Was," he corrected. "I was a total man whore. Now I'm simply a warlock who misses licking his balls."

  I closed my eyes and pinched the bridge of my nose. The visual he'd just conjured up threatened the contents of my stomach. When he'd been my cat he had an unhealthy obsession with cleaning his nut sack. Clearly it was still an issue.

  "All right, let's get back on track here," I muttered. "You nailed her a few times. She got pregnant and you left?"

  "Nope."

  "Enlighten me," I snapped. As much as I wanted to keep the past in the past, I needed to know.

  "Apparently I wasn't the only one nailing her. I left when I found out I was one of many," he supplied with a shrug.

  "How many?"

  "You really want to know?" he asked with a grimace.

  "Do I?"

  "I'd say no."

  "Oh fuck, now I have to know. Let me guess. Tell me if I'm hot or cold," I said. "Four."

  "Frigid."

  "Eight?"

  "Very cold."

  "Holy shit… um, twelve?"

  "Shivering."

  "Motherfucker—pun intended. Twenty five?"

  "Cool-ish"

  He was correct. I really didn't want to know, but I'd come this far. I wasn't a quitter. And apparently neither was my mother.

  "Is it an odd or even number?" I asked needing to narrow the field a little. I was truly on the verge of getting sick.

  "It's an odd number ending in five and is ten higher than your last guess," Dude said ending the game before I projectile hurled on him.

  "Wait," I said as the circus in my stomach went ballistic. "How do I know you're actually my sperm donor? It could be one of thirty-five," I choked out.

  This was not fair. This guy had found me and told me he was my dad. Told me he loved me. And as much as I had no intention of admitting it, he was growing on me. My head spun and my vision narrowed.

  "Look at me," Dude demanded as I gulped for air. "Now."

  I glanced up from my panic attack and saw a mirror image of myself. It was certainly hard to deny I was his by looks.

  My heart slowly stopped hammering in my chest and my breathing returned to normal. I was his. I didn't want to deal with the fact of how happy that made me so I settled for a small smile and a nod.

  "You are from a very powerful line of witches. Only our line has red hair and can heal," he said as he took my shaking hand firmly in his. "Our responsibility to our race and others is rather large and somewhat overwhelming. You should have been trained since the time you were a child, but I didn't know. I didn't know you were out there."

  "Wait. You're a healer too?" I asked.

  "Yes, but the witches in our line are far more powerful than the warlocks."

  "So I could kick your ass?" I asked as a smirk pulled at my lips.

  "Yes. Yes you could."

  Naked Dude chuckled and pulled me close. It felt nice so I let him. Getting used to this sappy shit was dangerous. However, living on the edge was another one of my mottos.

  "Are you going to train me?"

  "My sister, your Aunt Hildy, would have been so much better, but yes—I will have to suffice."

  "I'm not a very good student," I admitted as I disengaged myself and dove back into the cookie dough before I asked him if I could cuddle up on his lap.

  "You'll be fine. You've already proven your heart by selflessly healing and defending the Shifters. Controlling the magic is what you need to work on. You have the potential to blow up the continental USA."

  My stomach lurched. No one needed that much power and a loose cannon like me had no business possessing that kind of magic. Whatever. It was what it was.

  "I should probably change my name to Walking Time Bomb," I mused as I picked the chocolate chips out of the batter. I knew I should stop stuffing my face. I was going to lunch with Mac, but eating kept me from revealing too much of myself to Naked Dude.

  "You are no such thing," he chided. "That title belongs to your mother."

  "Here's something I don't understand—at your age and with your level of magic, I'm not clear how she was able to put a spell on you. You are one powerful mother humper," I told him.

  "Literally or figuratively?" he inquired with a raised eyebrow.

  It took me a moment, but when I got it I grinned like an idiot. "Both, I suppose."

  Naked Dude considered his answer. His knee bounced and I could literally feel him wracking his brain to come up with an answer that would satisfy me.

  "No lies," I insisted.

  His head dropped to his chest and he shook it from side to side. He heaved a sigh and then stared at the ceiling. "She said she would harm you unless I dropped my magic and let her do what she wanted."

  "She harmed me my whole life," I countered. "Mostly emotionally."

  "She never killed you," he replied woodenly.

  That certainly shut me the hell up. I mentally calculated how much fucking therapy it was going to take to get rid of the lovely knowledge that my own mother had threatened to kill me.

  "Well, that's fanfuckingtastic," I said with a hollow laugh. "Would she have done it?"

  "Honestly, I don't know," Dude admitted. "I was not going to take that chance. You're my daughter."

  "So you let her turn you into a cat?"

  "I wouldn't say let… I had no clue what she was going to do," he said as he stood and removed the now empty bowl from in front of me.

  "Oh my Goddess. She could have killed y
ou."

  The small bit of feeling I had for my mother had now evaporated. She was a monster.

  Wrapping my brain around the fact that Fabio would have willingly died for me was more than I could handle. It made me happy, sad and furious all at once. The burning in my gut raced throughout my trembling body. The tablecloth was on fire before I even knew what had happened.

  "Shitballs!" I shrieked.

  Thankfully Naked Dude was one step ahead and doused the flames with a flick of his hand.

  I really didn't have control of my magic. Fury was going to either get us all killed or burn my house down.

  "Sorry," I mumbled as I quickly sat on my hands. "We should probably start my lessons soon. Like yesterday."

  "We will start them tomorrow. I'll tell you all about your Aunt Hildy, and we will figure out how to keep you from being a magical menace," Dude said.

  "Do you think the world will be safe from me till then?"

  "I certainly hope so. I have a yoga lesson at five."

  "Um… that's just weird."

  "You think me doing yoga is weird after everything we've just talked about?" he asked as he rinsed the bowl and placed it in the dishwasher.

  "Yep, I do."

  "My kid says the darndest things," he replied with a delighted smile.

  "Oh my Goddess." I groaned and giggled. "You loved saying that, didn't you?"

  "Yes. Yes I did."

  Chapter 3

  Mac looked good enough to eat and smelled like heaven. Dark wavy hair, blue eyes, lashes that belonged on a girl, a body to die for and a face that would make the Goddess weep.

  Tall, dark and redonkulously handsome, I was into him like I'd never been into anyone. This of course meant I had to give him a lot of shit. It was unacceptable to let him know how much I liked him—very dangerous for a commitment-phobe loner like me.

  "So, pretty girl, you ready for seven today?" Mac asked with a lopsided grin that made me want to jump him and play tonsil hockey.

  He leaned on my front door jamb and waited for my answer.

  Wait. What the hell was number seven?

  I picked imaginary lint off of my dress while I ransacked my brain trying to figure out what he meant. Shit, I knew what sixty-nine was, but seven? Not so much. Should I just pretend I knew what position number seven was or did I come clean? I mean, I wasn't wildly experienced, but I wasn't a virgin either. Was number seven some kind of weird Shifter sex term that I was unaware of?

  Son of a bitch. Thirty years on this earth and I had no clue what number seven meant.

  "I thought this was number six," Naked Dude remarked sourly as he sat on the couch and pretended to read the paper.

  "Holy shit, there's a number six I don't know about too?" I asked bewildered.

  Both of the men in my life stared at me as if I was daft.

  "You lost me," Mac said.

  "Me too," Naked Dude added as he gave Mac the 'evil dad eye'.

  "Fairly sure I'm lost too," I mumbled as I tried to push Mac out the front door before we all had to work this one out.

  "Oh dear Goddess," Naked Dude choked out, tossing the paper aside and joining us in the foyer. "You thought it was a sexual position?"

  "You know what," I groused, as I felt the heat crawl up my neck and land squarely on my cheeks. "Fathers who still wish they could lick their own nads should not talk to their daughters about sex. You are excused from the room. Now."

  Fabio slunk away desperately trying not to laugh. I was definitely rethinking my irrational need for a parental unit. I didn't need anyone to embarrass me. I did fine on my own.

  "The seventh date," Mac said graciously as put his hand over his mouth to hide his smile. "This is our seventh date of fifteen where no one can die."

  "I knew that," I lied without making eye contact.

  Mac was sure I was his mate. I considered his claim to be utter bullshit. I was a witch and he was a wolf. Witches mated, but usually with other witches and it wasn't exactly binding. Shifters on the other hand mated for life and we all lived a freakin' long time. I had no plans to blow out puppies. The sexy wolf had repeatedly assured me that this would not be the case. However, I was still investigating.

  I was wildly attracted to the bossy, hotter than asphalt in August alpha wolf, but I was also terrified. First of all, the mating ritual involved biting—the kind that broke the skin. While I was down with a little spanky-spanky, biting didn't sound very appealing. Not to mention the fact we didn't really know each other that well.

  My solution to the entire matter was that we date each other. He had to take me on fifteen dates where no one died, considering our first date a whole bunch of bad guys died. To be fair, I'd killed most of the bad guys, but it felt like bad karma to start out that way. Fifteen dates also bought me time to run if I couldn't handle it.

  "I didn't know that," I admitted sheepishly. "I thought it was some bizarre Shifter sex thing."

  "I can certainly make that a reality," Mac said as he ran his thumb along my jaw and raised my chin so our eyes met.

  "I'm sure you could," I replied primly and tried not to giggle.

  Mac was a freakin' animal in the sack or on the floor or in the shower or on his motorcycle. I hadn't had many lovers, but I was quite sure he'd ruined me for other men.

  "So date number seven," I said as I leaned into his warm body.

  "Yep, gonna have a good old death-free time."

  There wasn't a whole hell of a lot to do in Assjacket, West Virginia and I wondered what he had in mind for our outing.

  "Actually, I was thinking we could go to the woods by the river and play Little Red Riding Hood," I suggested. "You know, I say, 'Oh my, what a big tongue you have'. And then you say, 'The better to lick you with'."

  "Are you sure that's how the story goes?" he inquired with a grin as he copped a feel of my ass and gently pushed me out the front door.

  "Yes. Yes, I am positive that's how the story goes."

  "That is NOT how the story goes," Naked Dude shouted from somewhere upstairs in the house.

  "Oh my, what big ears you have," I yelled back before I grinned at Mac. "Let's get out of here before he insists on joining us."

  Mac shuddered and quickened his pace. "Good thinking, Little Red—very good plan."

  ***

  We did go to the woods, but it wasn't exactly deserted enough for me to start spouting sexed up lines from a fairy tale. Nope. Mac took me to a house in the woods. To be more specific—Mac took me to his house.

  It was enormous, a beautiful log cabin with a rustic wraparound porch. It was nestled into the side of a tree-covered hill and looked like it belonged in a magazine. The roof was covered with skylights and I counted at least four chimneys. It was masculine and big—just like its owner. A shiver skittered up my spine. This was getting messy. Messy was bad.

  "I'm not sure we know each other well enough for me to see your home," I said as I held my seatbelt shut in the front seat of his monster pick-up truck.

  "Zelda, I've been to your place every day for the past few weeks. We've had sex in every room except your father's. It's time to for you to see our house."

  He had mumbled the end of the sentence, probably hoping I missed the our part… I didn't.

  "Can we play Little Red Riding Hood here?" I inquired as I screwed up my courage to get out of the vehicle and see the home of the man I'd been having illicitly spectacular relations with.

  "It's not beyond the realm of possibilities," he said with a sexy grin. "But my cook has prepared lunch and I thought I could get you to help me with some ideas for redecorating."

  "Very crafty," I congratulated him. "Food and spending money on pretty things. Nice date."

  "I thought so," he said as he unsnapped my seat belt and pulled me to him.

  His lips grazed my jaw and he buried his face in my neck. Another shiver consumed me, but this one was far more pleasurable.

  "Come on," he said as he pulled me out of his truck.

 
His excitement was cute and somewhat contagious. However, my tummy was flipping like a clogging festival on moonshine. This felt serious. Serious was not part of my repertoire. It reminded me of having to meet the parents of my former boyfriends. Parents never liked me. Of course Mac's parents had died so I couldn't use that excuse for my trepidation.