She drew her arms between them, pressing her forearms into his chest to break his hold. He seemed reluctant to release her.
“The kitchen?” she prompted. Maybe the lightheadedness was low blood sugar and not raging hormones.
A woman could hope.
“Of course.” He nodded. This time he walked beside her, keeping an eye on her as they made their way downstairs.
Andrea tried to force him to walk faster by quickening her pace. She could think of little else knowing that food was close.
Chapter Seven
Shadows moved across the ceiling. Their shapes kept Andrea awake. Her attention focused on how they changed, as if answers to unasked questions would reveal themselves if she were patient enough. Sometimes life required a person to stop and pay attention. She felt the pressure of the pillow against the back of her neck, the smooth sheets against her naked legs, the weight of the heavy comforter against her chest.
She’d been so hungry that she’d ate three sandwiches. The food helped to clear her thinking. The way she saw it, she had three problems: Mama Cecile, mysterious portals, and the whims of a toddler. She wasn’t sure which was the most frightening.
Well, there was a fourth problem, but being attracted to your boss was more of a human issue than a supernatural one. After dinner, Kenneth had given her a tour of the house and her mind couldn’t help but find all the secret locations in which they could have found a private moment.
Her vision blurred and her eyelids drifted closed.
Tick.
Andrea gasped, forcing her eyes to open, unsure if she’d heard the noise or if it was the beginning of a dream.
The ceiling shadows appeared to form a misshapen arrow pointing toward a window. Andrea pulled the comforter off her body. She wore the t-shirt as a nightgown. It barely covered her underwear. There were more clothes in her car, but when she’d tried to leave the house, the front door would not open.
She leaned against the wall, hiding her outfit behind the curtain as she peered at the lawn. The moon wasn’t full but there was enough light to see shadows. Two short figures ran across the grass toward the parked cars, one chasing the other. Before reaching the drive, they changed directions, running around the house out of her eyeline. It looked like kids playing.
Andrea frowned, whispering, “Where do you two think you’re goin—?”
Tick.
The noise came from behind.
Andrea spun around to look at the dark room. She hadn’t imagined it. Her back pressed into the curtain. She held her breath, listening for signs that she was not alone. When nothing happened, she leaned forward.
Movement caught her attention, forcing her to turn. Red-rimmed eyes stared at her from directly outside the second-story window. The moonlight silhouetted strands of hair.
Mama Cecile.
Andrea inhaled sharply. Her throat squeezed, keeping her from screaming. The apparition’s finger lifted to the window pane and tapped…
Tick. Tick.
…then scratched down the wooden frame.
Scrrich.
The sounds did not match the actions, but that hardly mattered.
Tick, tick, tick…
The spirit’s hand stopped but the sound continued. Mama Cecile stared at her, the intensity unmistakable.
Tick, tick…
The window began to shake. Andrea looked down to see the line of brick dust vibrating. The powder danced forward and began to sprinkle onto the floor as it fell from the windowsill.
Tick, tick, tick….
The sound began to pick up pace, each dreaded dull note causing that ball of fear to twist inside her chest.
Andrea wasn’t sure how she managed to convince her stiff legs to move, but she inched backward toward the door. The vibration became louder and faster.
Tick-tick-tick-tick…
“I meant no disrespect,” Andrea whispered. “I mean no harm. I wish… I wish…”
“No!”
Andrea yelped as Jewel called out behind her.
“Bad!”
The shout was followed by the sound of small running feet padded by carpet. Jewel darted past her toward the window.
“Bad old lady. Bad!”
Andrea reached toward the child to stop her but found it difficult to move. The girl’s words were clearer than the babbling she’d done before.
Jewel reached up and slapped the window with her hand, even as she was too short to see out.
Mama Cecile’s eyes lit with fire and then her face disappeared in a swirl of smoke.
“Not nice!” Jewel slapped the window a few times. The girl turned around and smiled. Her eyes were filled with flames.
The tightness in Andrea’s chest began to lighten and she inhaled a deep breath. She wasn’t sure how much more her heart could take.
“Holy crap,” Andrea whispered. “I was just saved by a two-year-old.”
“Tsk, tsk.” Jewel clicked her tongue as if trying to mimic the ticking sound. Her hands lifted into little claws. “Tsk, tsk, tsk.”
Andrea lifted her hands before her in defense and backed away from the magickal kid.
Jewel giggled. “Tsk. Scroot. Tsk.”
Chapter Eight
It didn’t matter how many times Kenneth discovered his daughter missing from her bed in the middle of the night, a small parental panic still filled him. He hated to admit his ma was right. He needed help with Jewel. When the others weren’t around, he was lucky to get in two hours of sleep in one stint.
Too bad the help he now had was terrified of him and his daughter. He’d tried to act like he didn’t notice, but most of the time Andrea stared at him as if she waited for him to throw a fireball at her head. At least she took the knowledge of real magick without having some sort of episode. That was something. With her background, it would keep the rest of the family from threatening to erase her memories. Unless it was a tiny two-second incident, like a woodsman seeing one of them throw an energy ball, the erasing process never went smoothly. Humans needed memories to connect their emotions.
He stepped barefoot through the hall from his daughter’s room, digging the bracelets out of Jewel’s discarded leggings. For a while it worked to put the bracelets inside her clothes so she couldn’t kick them off, but then she learned she could just take off her clothes and do whatever she wanted.
He had tried to get a message to the maker of the bracelets, Jewel’s maternal grandmother, but Trina Castelaww had yet to answer his plea for help. He had left a message with one of Jewel’s uncles, but they’d warned him that Trina was still in mourning and would not be available anytime soon.
Kenneth’s ma would be livid if she found out. Trina and her sons had attacked the MacGregors. To be fair, Trina thought Kenneth had kidnapped her phoenix daughter. None of that mattered to his ma. Margareta would never admit it, but she saw Trina as a threat to her position as favorite grandmother.
“Come out, come out, wherever ya are,” Kenneth said. The incantation didn’t always work, especially when Jewel didn’t want him to find her, but it was worth a try.
A tiny flash of blue light zipped past him toward Malina’s bedroom.
“Dammit.” Kenneth hurried to where Andrea slept, hoping his daughter didn’t have her held hostage in playtime. The door was open and he knocked lightly on the frame.
The bedding was disheveled but no one slept on it. A sliver of light came from the cracked bathroom door.
“Bat.” Jewel’s voice came from the bathroom.
“Jewel?” Kenneth went toward the door. He knocked lightly. “Jewel, honey, it’s not bath—”
The door inched open under his knock. His eyes met Andrea’s. She sat in the tub with his daughter. Massage jets ran at full force, churning the water so the tub filled with bubbles. Andrea wore a dark t-shirt. His daughter wore a sparkly pink swimsuit with a glitter butterfly on the front.
“Da, bat,” Jewel happily announced, her head surrounded by a growing white cloud of bub
bles.
“I’m so sorry,” Kenneth said.
“It’s my fault,” Andrea answered, holding the child’s waist for support when Jewel would jump in the water. “It was the only thing I could think of to distract her from pretending to be a levitating monster.”
“She’s not a monster.”
“I said pretending,” Andrea insisted. “I know she’s not a monster. She saved me from one.”
Kenneth started to smile, but realized she wasn’t making a joke. “What do ya mean?”
He didn’t give her time to answer as he went to the bedroom to check. Each of the MacGregors had been born with unique talents, what they called their burden. Kenneth happened to be skilled at incantations. Like his brothers, his burden was that he was also a shifter. Somewhere in their ancestry, a relative had been struck with some kind of rogue magick that caused a mutation. His parents didn’t like him calling it a mutation, but it was the only way he could explain the claws trying to grow from his fattening fingertips in response to his protective feelings.
Erik was a cat, Euann a fox, Niall a wolf, and Iain a bird—all sleek animals. Kenneth ballooned out to a whopping one-thousand pounds in the form of a Kodiak brown bear. It’s not something he enjoyed and it had been years since the animal scratched the surface. The last thing he wanted was Jewel seeing her da in his animal form. It would give the girl all kinds of ideas. However, now, he found his eyes shifting to see better in the dark and his chest broadening in warning.
Traces of magick lingered in the air, but that was hardly uncommon in a home filled with warlocks. And, with this being Malina’s bedroom, it was even more so. Every outfit hanging in his sister’s closet had been materialized from magazine pictures. Fading magick clung to the walls like hairspray residue.
Kenneth could detect no one in the room with him so he went to the window overlooking the front lawn. A concentration of small round marks marred the window pane. He rubbed his hand over the glass and found they’d been made on the outside. The brick dust also appeared as if it had been blown into the room from outside.
“Reveal yourself,” he said.
A couple of tiny blue light came from within the trees, which he could reasonably assume were deer. No other living creatures were around.
“Rawr!” Jewel pretend roared.
He turned in time to see his bubble-covered daughter running at him. He instantly caught her and lifted her into his arms. She proceeded to smoosh kisses on his cheek while transferring bubbles onto his face and shirt.
“I don’t see anything,” Kenneth said loud enough so Andrea could hear him in the bathroom. His daughter had been known to conjure things in her past lives.
Andrea appeared in the doorway with a towel wrapped around her waist. Her t-shirt clung to her body. Kenneth averted his gaze.
“I thought I’d have more time before she found me,” Andrea said.
Kenneth frowned and drew his eyes back to hers. “Who?”
“A few years ago, I came across an angry spirit in the swamp. Locals had nicknamed her Mama Cecile. She’s been chasing me ever since.” Andrea crossed to the window and drew the back of her hand through the brick dust to straighten the line. “She was coming for me tonight but Jewel told her to go away.”
“What does she want?” That didn’t sound like the typical haunting. Spirits didn’t normally chase people across the country unless they’d stolen some kind of sacred object. He glanced at her ear to where the white hair had been growing. She’d colored it dark brown to hide it.
“To finish what she started. I was the one who got away.” Andrea studied him holding Jewel.
“Is that what happened to your hair?” he asked.
She self-consciously touched the locks.
“My Aunt Cait can help. Trust me, ya won’t be the first one in this family to prematurely gray. She can reverse what was done, if ya want.” He didn’t mean to make her uncomfortable. “I only mention it since ya don’t seem fond of the white. I think either way would be pretty on ya.”
If he wasn’t mistaken her cheeks flushed a little at the compliment. “You need to convince your daughter to let me go. It’s not safe for all of you if I stay here.”
Kenneth took a deep breath and thought for a moment. Then, shaking his head, he stated, “No.”
He moved to carry Jewel toward her room.
“What?” Andrea hurried after him. “What do you mean no?”
“No. This is clearly why ya were brought here. It’s not safe for ya to leave.” He kept walking. To his daughter, he said, “Jewel put on your fuzzies.”
Jewel’s magick flared and the swimsuit disappeared to be replaced by zebra-print fuzzy pajamas.
“That’s a good girl. Now we’re going to play the sleeping game. See if ya can beat me to dreamland, little love.” He placed Jewel on her bed. She was asleep before he slipped the bracelets over her legs and tucked her in.
Andrea waited for him at the door. He lifted his finger for her to stay quiet as he left the room. He pulled the door shut.
Jewel might have been dry, but Kenneth’s shirt was still wet from holding her. Without thinking, he pulled it over his head and wadded it in his hands.
Andrea gasped, staring at his chest as he stood before her in cotton pajama pants and nothing else. They were in the hallway but the house was quiet and they were alone.
“What happened to you?” she whispered, not hiding the fact she stared at his scars. They formed a series of broken spirals in his flesh.
“Mountain magick,” he answered. “It’s a long story.”
“I have time.” Her hand fisted around the towel at her waist, holding it up.
Instead of answering her, he studied her face. “That is where I know ya.”
Andrea frowned. “Uh…?”
“When Jewel was a baby, ya came into our home.” It had taken him awhile to remember where he’d seen her before. His brain had been half frozen at the time as he’d been thawing out of his ma’s magick.
Andrea slowly nodded.
“Ya saw me.”
It wasn’t a question but she nodded again.
“Why are ya back now?” he asked. “Why did ya come then?”
“For me it was yesterday,” she said. “I heard a baby crying in my motel bathroom and when I went to investigate, I was brought here… apparently two years in the past. I wanted to help you, but I didn’t know how. I don’t know why any of this is happening.”
“I dreamed of ya,” he admitted. “I couldn’t remember your face, not clearly, but there was something about your…”
“My…?” she prompted when he took a deep breath and didn’t finish.
“Your essence.”
Her lips pressed together for a moment before she smirked. “My essence?”
Kenneth nodded. Even to him it sounded like a lame come-on line. Trying to start a romantic relationship with the new nanny-hostage wasn’t the best of ideas, but the more he was around her, the more he felt the same awareness he’d had in his dreams.
This woman was special.
He knew her, felt her.
Her smile fell and he realized he’d been staring at her.
“I’m sorry I didn’t free you,” she said. “I wanted to.”
“Ya couldn’t have,” he dismissed. “The only cure for that spell is time.”
Andrea picked at her wet shirt, peeling it away from her skin only to have it adhere once more.
“Follow me. I have a dry t-shirt ya can borrow.” Only after Kenneth went to his bedroom next to Jewel’s and opened the door to invite Andrea inside did he realize what he’d done. He must be out of practice with women. “Is this inappropriate?”
Andrea arched a brow and passed by him. “Offering me a dry shirt? I don’t think so.”
Kenneth automatically lifted his hand toward the fireplace, lighting it with a spark of magick. He’d intended it for warmth, but the orange glow cast his room in an intimate light. All that was missing from his
unintentional seduction was sexy music and wine.
“Do you mind if I…?” Andrea gestured to the bottle of scotch on a tray near his bed. “It’s been a long day.”
Correction: sexy music and scotch.
“Help yourself.”
Andrea went to pour herself a glass. “This isn’t one of those salty tea bottles, is it?”
Kenneth chuckled. “No, it’s safe. I stole it from Raibeart’s stash. I was going to drink it and then refill it. He always has the good stuff.”
She tossed back a drink and then coughed. As her body jerked the towel slipped off her hips. Lace panties hugged her ass. Kenneth couldn’t look away.
“Whoops.” She reached to pick up the towel. “Well, that’s slightly embarrassing.”
Blood rushed down his body to settle in his groin. She wrapped the towel around her waist, but the image of her thighs burned into his brain.
It had been so long.
He took a deep breath, trying to steady his shaking hands.
So fucking long.
Though the memory of them were hazy, he was pretty sure his dreams had led him down this path several times. She’d been just an idea, a face he couldn’t see clearly, but the attraction was real.
“Kenneth?” She tilted her head as she stared at him, holding the glass out and swinging it side to side so the liquid undulated. “Would you like one?”
He couldn’t look away. A surge of emotion filled him, more powerful than anything he’d felt in a very long time. It caused him to step toward her.
Kenneth wanted to speak, to find his reasoning, but instead his hand lifted to hover by her cheek. He was not this man. He didn’t have sex with women he’d just met. Not anymore.
He was responsible now.
He had responsibilities.
He…
He…
Kenneth watched as she reached back and set the glass on the nightstand without looking. She leaned into him. He was unable to think or move. Her hand lifted, mimicking the hovering gesture of his.
“I’m not sure what I’m doing,” she whispered.
Andrea looked at his mouth, hesitating as he hesitated.
Magick and Mischief (Warlocks MacGregor Book 7) Page 7