by E A Price
“Ah, I see.”
“Ahem, I didn’t agree to that!” whispered Zara furiously.
Holt looked at her impatiently. “Zara, you’re my mate.”
“I haven’t agreed to mate you!” Had she missed him getting down on one knee? Because she thought she would have remembered that!
Holt tried to shrug, realized he couldn’t while in chains and settled on wiggling his eyebrows. “It’s a given.”
“What?”
Sabrina tut-tutted loudly, making them whip their attention back to her. “No, please, I have all day.”
“What do you want?” demanded Holt. “And it better not be anything to do with babies or killing people.”
“I want you to find someone for me.”
“Okay,” agreed Zara. That didn’t sound too bad.
“I lost track of him ten years ago, and I want him. His name is Alcide DeFontaine – or at least, that’s the name I knew him by.”
“Made up name,” muttered Holt.
“Bring him to me, and I will free the baby from the spell. You have until the end of sunset today.”
“But that’s only a few hours away!”
“What will you do to him?” murmured Zara, looking pained.
A smile spread across her thin lips. “That’s my business.”
She leaned back in her seat slightly as Simpkins entered carrying a tea tray. She snapped her fingers, and the chains restraining them disappeared. Sean, still a gorilla hooted and huffed while Holt dragged Zara into his arms.
“Be warned,” purred Sabrina as she poured herself some fragrant pink tea, “if you do succeed in bringing me what I want, your uncle will return to the state he was in when he made a deal with me. Now, Simpkins, would you show them the exit.”
*
Showing them to the door meant throwing them through it. Simpkins looked refined, but he had the manner and fighting skills of a heavyweight champion.
“How exactly are we supposed to find someone she can’t?” grumbled Sean as he dusted himself off.
Holt pulled Zara to her feet, inspecting her for damage as he blocked her view of his brother. Since he shifted, his brother had shredded his clothes and was now disgustingly naked. Not that Holt had an issue with being naked. No, he just had an issue with other males being naked in front of his mate.
“We don’t have a choice,” he said as he patted Zara’s ass one last time, checking it was still lovely and intact. “We have to get Rachel’s baby back.”
Zara was strangely quiet, not even slapping his hands away as he took far too many liberties with her body.
“We’ll find him, right cactus flower?” he prompted.
Zara finally looked at him, her eyes wide and afraid. His gorilla hooted in sympathy for his mate. She had been through so much because of him. No wonder she was scared. But he would protect her. He would always protect her.
“Don’t worry, flower,” he murmured, rubbing her tense shoulders. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”
She shook her head. “It’s not that. I… I already know where he is.”
“He?”
“The man she wants!” she cried.
They both looked at her in shock before Sean let out a whoop.
“Thank hell for that!”
Zara scowled at him. “It’s not that simple.”
“Where is he?” demanded Holt. They were so close to retrieving his cousin’s baby. Well, his nephew really. Rachel really was like a sister to him – he would always think of any baby of her’s as his nephew.
“He’s in my apartment.”
Holt and his gorilla frowned. “How could he… No. Not…”
“He prefers to go by his real name,” she muttered shrugging away from his hands.
“What’s going on?” asked Sean, bewildered by their exchange.
“Let’s go get him,” rumbled Holt.
“Why are you smiling?” she snapped, glaring at him. “I can’t just hand him over just like that. Sebastian is my friend.”
His gorilla huffed. “My nephew isn’t even a day old.”
“We will talk to Sebastian,” she hissed, backing away from him.
“We will hand him over,” said Holt through gritted teeth.
Zara shook her head and looked at him sadly. “I can’t just let you sacrifice him like that.”
“Zara,” he warned, “don’t do anything…”
It was too late. Zara was already in the driver’s seat of their car and speeding away before either he or Sean could stop her.
“Stupid,” he finished lamely.
He watched as the taillights disappeared.
Damnit! Rawr!
Chapter Seventeen
Zara flew through her apartment door, locking it behind her and pushing as much furniture against it as possible.
She still wasn’t sure what she was going to say to Sebastian, but she knew she needed to do something before Holt careened through that door.
Sebastian had been in prison for repeated illegal magic casting – lust spells and the like. He hadn’t caused too much damage, but that was sheer luck. Real love spells cannot be cast – only lust can be conjured, and sometimes that took dangerous turns. Often those infected by lust killed anyone they suspected to be threats. The circumstances could have been dire. Perhaps Sabrina was someone he had infected, or perhaps worse.
Zara could only imagine what the woman would do to him. She was going to sacrifice a baby for crying out loud. A sleazy male witch definitely wouldn’t be considered off limits – particularly if he had done her wrong in the past.
Sebastian purred at her as he licked at his paws. He was sitting by the window, idly enjoying the sunshine. Zara left it open to allow him to come and go. At first, she worried he would run away, but where would he go? He was a cat. Even if he found someone to break the spell, he would still be on the Council’s shitlist, and if they caught up to him, they would send him right back to prison.
“We need to talk… quickly. Holt will be here any moment.”
“Humph, Dolt. He’s all wrong for you,” he said dismissively in between licks.
“Yeah, maybe,” she agreed absently. “Not sure he’ll want to talk to me again anyway. Do you know a woman called Sabrina?”
He froze. “Why?”
The words tumbled out of her at breakneck speed. “She cast a spell to kill Holt’s baby nephew, and she said the only way she would break it is if we gave her you!”
Sebastian blinked at her for what seemed like a lifetime but was really only a few seconds. “I see.”
“What does she want with you?” asked Zara. She paced, wringing her hands while nervously glancing at the door.
He huffed out a laugh. “Knowing Sabrina, a pound of flesh and in this form, I don’t have many to spare.”
Zara jumped a foot in the air as someone started banging on her door. Someone – ha! It was Holt, and he was pissed, and she didn’t blame him. Zara gnawed at her lip.
“That’s…”
“Dolt,” sneered Sebastian. “Let me guess? He wants to hand me over no questions asked.”
Zara nodded. “It’s his nephew, well, second cousin, but more like a nephew to him, and the baby’s barely a day old and…”
“Why not just let the idiot hurl me into a sack and toss me at her?” interrupted Sebastian crisply.
Her shoulders slumped and she gave him a sad, pleading look. “You’re my friend. I don’t want to see you get hurt, but… we’re talking about a newborn baby.”
Sebastian sniffed as the bangs got louder. An arm came through the wood making Zara yelp.
“Open up, Zara,” Holt demanded in a rough voice.
“Maybe you could talk to Sabrina,” she suggested, ignoring the gorilla beating down her door. “She clearly knows you, so maybe you can reason with her.”
“You cannot reason with the unreasonable,” he murmured dryly, his eyes glued to the doorway and Holt’s progress.
Holt bello
wed and shifted to his gorilla. Zara flinched as the door finally gave, and the armchair she had dragged in front of it was tossed aside. Sebastian let out a howl, his fur standing on end, and he flitted out the window as Holt lunged at him.
Holt roared shifting back to human and glaring at Zara. He was furious with her, and she hated herself at that moment. Part of her wanted to burst into tears, another to throw herself at him and beg his forgiveness. Instead, she gave him a level look and waited for him to tell her he hated her, that she was a monster. She tensed waiting for it, fearing how much it would hurt.
It never came. Holt growled and stomped out the room.
Zara let a single tear trickle down her cheek. For six months she thought she’d lost him, and now maybe she really had.
But now was not the time for self-pity. Nope, she had a cat to find. She grabbed her laptop and set to work.
*
Zara found him on a park bench, forlornly watching a young couple enjoying a picnic and kisses while sprawling on a blanket.
Sebastian didn’t glance in Zara’s direction, but he had to know she was there. Probably heard her coming a mile away. He didn’t move, even after she dropped onto the bench next to him. She covertly watched the couple too. They were feeding each other strawberries and looked infinitely happy. She didn’t look at them too directly. People wouldn’t pay attention to a cat doing it, but a woman watching might be considered creepy.
Finally, Sebastian spoke. “I take it I have a chip in me.”
“Yep.”
“Because I’m a cat or because I’m a parolee?” he asked wryly.
Zara picked at the hole in her jeans. Her mother chastised her for walking around like a ‘hobo’ in tattered clothes, but Zara refused to throw away a comfortable pair of jeans until they fell apart.
“Both, I reckon. One of the Council rules.”
His whiskered twitched. “It was probably in the contract I signed when I agreed to become a cat. But honestly, I barely glanced at it. I considered that freedom was nearly in my grasp and I would have signed anything they put in front of me. Besides, I had bigger things to worry about.”
“Oh?”
“Like what type of pet I would be. They gave me an option you know. Dog, cat, guinea pig, snake…”
Zara scrunched her nose. There was no way she would have taken him if he were a snake. A cat would have been her choice of animal too – she bet most witches felt the same. “Why a cat?”
He seemed to smile and regain a little of his twinkle. The couple was now licking each other’s fingers.
“I imagined I’d be more likely to find a home with a female as a cat. It was much more appetizing to share a bed with a female.”
“Pervert,” she said mildly. She called him pervert at least once a day.
“To the bitter end,” he snickered.
The couple was kissing passionately, their food completely forgotten
Sebastian flexed his claws, sharpening them on the bench. “I was watching them while considering all the regrets I have for my life, all the things that I wished I had done when I had the chance, and you know what?”
“What?”
“I already did them.” He jutted his head at the couple. “That was me, twenty years ago. Well, actually if that had been me, we already would have been sneaking off behind the trees for a quick romp.” He licked his lips before adding, “Well, not quick.
“I had a wonderful life filled with pleasure and doing things I really shouldn’t be doing, and I suppose my only regret is that I got caught.” He sighed. “However, I did a lot of other things I never got caught for, so I can’t really complain.”
He closed his eyes, thinking of all the women he had debauched no doubt. Speaking of…
“How do you know Sabrina?”
Sebastian opened his eyes again, longingly watching the young couple. “We dated, and she wanted to get married. I was scared and ran off with another woman. She then stole all my money.”
Zara waited for more, but none seemed forthcoming. “That’s it?”
“Isn’t that enough?” he scoffed. “After that we spent years torturing one another, trying to get back at one another and never really succeeding in anything but upsetting each other more.”
Uneasily, Zara thought of the last six months and the ways both she and Holt behaved to one another.
“You should take me to Sabrina, and save the child,” declared Sebastian, puffing out his furry little chest as far as he could.
“You said you didn’t know what she would do.”
“I don’t. Sabrina is quite tempestuous, incredibly powerful and less inclined to behave herself than I am.”
“I’m sorry,” Zara said dully.
Sebastian shuffled closer to her and rubbed against her leg. “Don’t be. I’ve been very selfish all my life, and I suppose it was overdue for it to catch up with me. Perhaps I could go out in a blaze of glory. Though knowing Sabrina, it will be a blaze of painful glory.”
“Oh!” Zara’s voice choked in her throat. She had become so fond of her devilish little kitty cat. The idea that he might… No, she couldn’t bear to think about it.
“You are a good friend. I regret that I will never get a chance to turn human and ravish you.”
Perhaps there were parts of him she would not miss. Zara placed a hand on his head and scratched his ear.
“As if I’d let you.”
He started purring. “As if you would have any power to resist me. I am a phenomenal lover.”
“Aha.” Hey, he was probably about to get vaporized by Sabrina – let him go out in a delusional bubble.
“I suppose you will just have to settle for Dolt.”
“Mmmm.” It seemed unlikely he would want her anywhere near him after today, but she wasn’t going to burden Sebastian with her pathetic love life. Nope. Save baby now, cry over never-ending spinsterhood tomorrow.
“Wow, they’re really going at it,” she murmured.
The couple was now dry humping one another, complete with disgustingly erotic moans. Though, the way they were clutching at their clothing suggested it wasn’t going to stay ‘dry’ for long.
“Indeed.”
“We should go.”
“Ummm.”
“Seriously?”
“Just a few more minutes,” Sebastian entreated. “I don’t see him lasting longer than that.”
She considered forcing the issue and dragging Sebastian away, but he was about to set off for an uncertain doom, so maybe she’d give him this last hurrah.
“Okay, you have two minutes, and I’m closing my eyes.”
After less than a minute Sebastian sighed. “It’s over. I’m almost as disappointed as she is. Let’s go.”
Chapter Eighteen
“Your female is stubborn.”
“Shut up,” Holt growled at his brother as his gorilla paced.
Zara had called. She found Sebastian and was bringing him to Sabrina’s house.
He had tried reasoning with her that he would meet her and bring Sebastian himself, but there was a cat’s yowl in the background and Zara hung up on him. He didn’t want her coming back - into danger. Didn’t want her facing down Sabrina or his uncle, who was already in there with Sabrina.
While chasing after Zara, he left Sean waiting by the house, ready to intercept his uncle and the baby if they showed up. After Zara had ditched them, he commandeered a car, flagging down a couple of lissome humans in a sports cars, easing them out of it with a display of his muscles and then driving away in it – something he’d probably have to answer for later.
He had hoped to grab the idiot cat - but damn Zara for being all sweet and kind and compassionate. Things he loved about her. She tried to be tough, but inside she was a big marshmallow. He could tell. But she couldn’t hide it. His little witch visited a nursing home every week to read to the residents. She ran marathons for charity. She was a good little runner, with an excellent set of pins. Shapely pins. She wasn
’t that tall, but they seemed very much to go on forever, but when they finally ended, it was with a pert little rear that was very peachy and ripe to the touch.
Holt shook his head. Focus.
Sean had tried to stop his uncle and get the wailing baby away from him, but the male was surrounded by half a dozen gorilla shifters. Sean put up a good fight but was ultimately stopped by a very waspish Sabrina who threw thunderbolts at them and chided them for fighting on her doorstep.
She allowed Aleck into her house but assured Sean that she would wait until sunset as agreed. That did not go down well with their uncle. The roars could still be heard now. Becoming even more frantic.
Zara arrived moments later, hauling a cat carrier out of her cousin’s car. He surged forward to take it from her, but the violent movements and howls from the cat inside halted him.
Zara looked at him uncertainly. He scowled in return. Why must she insist on putting herself in danger?
“The baby’s inside,” he growled, trying and failing to contain his furious beast.
Zara nodded. She put the carrier down on Sabrina’s front lawn and opened it up.
Holt and his brother moved forward, worrying the cat was going to run away, but he merely sauntered out the carrier and rubbed himself against Zara’s leg. She grasped him to her chest. His gorilla was virtually going out of his mind at this display.
“Dolt,” said the cat insouciantly. “How awful to see you again.”
The gorilla wanted to tear the tiny beast limb from limb, or at least throw a witty come back at him – like ‘shut up’ or something – but he refrained. He had to think of Rachel’s baby – he was all that mattered.
Amid Holt’s irritated grunts, Zara placed a kiss on Sebastian’s head, and he swore the damn cat smirked at him.
“Thank you,” she murmured.
“You are most welcome,” he purred. He made sure Holt was listening before adding, “I have enjoyed sleeping beside you, watching you get dressed, watching you while you were showering…”
Zara blinked at him. Holt curled his hands into fists, resisting the urge to pound the cat to a pulp. The cat was saving his nephew – he had to tell his gorilla that over and over. If he wanted to be a complete dick then, Holt just had to let him – no matter how infuriating it was.