Chapter 22

Twenty-Two

Thomas drives me home in the morning, asking me questions about my car that make it clear he doesn't approve of the tiny thing.

He even mutters "death trap" under his breath.

I smile and let him fume instead of telling him I've already started looking into something that will fit five more comfortably.

It's a quiet holiday morning, a light drizzle makes the windshield wipers necessary at any speed, but stopped at lights, the water from the perfectly gray day isn't too much to worry about.

I drop my head to Thomas' shoulder and squeeze his arm tight.

"If we wore you out last night, you're welcome to nap for the trip back to your place."

"You did, but I don't need sleep." They never kept me from getting enough of that either.

We cross over the border that delineated the town proper, and I glance in the back seat. Wolfish eyes meet mine and I have a feeling…

"Why do they show up when they do?"

"After the visit to the coven, they're a little more protective of you. And since I spend a lot of time with one or all of you… they've taken to following the one they're attached to. You'll only see them when you're looking for them or something's wrong."

The lights flash in the rearview mirror and I groan, dropping my head back against the headrest.

"I knew it was too good to be true to think he'd actually leave me alone. That would be asking for a miracle."

Thomas glares into the mirror too as he pulls off the side of the road and waits for the sheriff to make his way to the window.

"How many times has he pulled you over?"

"Enough."

I can't say more before Thomas has to roll the window down.

"Miss Mathis I don't know why—Oh, hello Thomas."

"Sheriff."

But he leans down to look at me, across Thomas. "We need to talk about your dog."

"I'm not sure how many times I have to tell you this, but I do not have a dog."

"I saw it in your back seat again." He looks at the back seat with a scowl. "I don't know where you're hiding it."

"I'm not hiding a dog from you."

Thomas shifts in his seat so he's turned toward the sheriff.

"I can assure you, there hasn't been a dog in this car." He pauses and then looks up at the sheriff with a harder glare. "So you want to tell me why you're actually harassing my girlfriend?"

Brows pinching, the sheriff looks confused. And I can't decide what part of the encounter has caused it.

"I've had complaints."

"What kind of complaints?"

"About that damned dog she keeps saying she doesn't have."

"Since she doesn't have a dog, maybe you need to deal with the people filing false reports."

The Sheriff shakes his head as if it's gone foggy. "I can't just take your word for it. You have certain biases."

"Okay. But you're taking Connor's word for it? What evidence have you found that this non-existent dog actually exists?"

He blinks and this time, I definitely see the faint slick across his pupils. He's definitely been bewitched, but it's not a strong enchantment… and I wonder if this is Aphrodite's way of keeping me busy to keep me out of her business.

"Derek," I say, drawing his attention. "You do know that Connor's been harassing me to sell him my land, right? I filed a complaint with your office last year that he was tearing down my fences and trying to move them back so he could pretend his property line was further west than it is."

Mouth screwed in a line, the Sheriff looks like he's thinking real hard.

"Maybe my biases aren't the ones you need to worry about, Sheriff." Thomas looks at him with a hard glare and it takes a moment, but the man straightens and seems to shake something from his shoulders.

"I guess we'll just have to see, won't we?"

He hits the top of my car twice, the metal making dull thud under his hand, and heads back to his own.

"I thought he was a decent guy… Looks like I was wrong."

"How he is normally varies, but he's bewitched… didn't you see him acting like he was waking up? He's fighting the spell, but he's not strong enough to break free of it entirely."

"Should we try to get him free?"

"Yes… but his fixation seems to be on me and I can deal with the harassment for the moment."

We both watch him turn and head back for his usual hiding spot.

"We'll ask the guys if he pulls them over when they get to your place." Thomas pulls out onto the all-but empty highway, and we make it all the way to my drive without incident.

It's always weird coming back to the house after being away. There's a strange hollowness in that moment before I step inside. As if my arrival displaces something in the ether.

But the wolf bounds through the car and into the house and that disappears before it has a chance to take hold this time.

Pulling out bags from the back seat, Thomas stops in the drive and looks the house over. "Have I mentioned that this place looks like you?"

"Is it the woodgrain in my skin?"

He smiles, but there's a faint scolding in it. "No… It's small and looks perfectly respectable… but you know it has secrets. And," he adds, "I can't wait to get inside it."

Shaking my head at him, though I can't hide my smile, I unlock the door and let him in, along with the cool breeze and smell of damp pine.

He sets the bags down and I walk straight through to the kitchen.

"How can I help?" He's close on my heels.

"Do you want to get a fire going?"

He looks at the hearth and then toward the living room. "Which of the five fireplaces would you like me to light?"

"There are only four. But this one and the one in the living room are good for now. We can start the bedrooms later this evening, depending on the actual sleeping arrangements."

He brushes his lips across my forehead. "It's easier to be one of the ones sleeping alone when your bed isn't in the equation."

"That comfy?"

He shrugs and heads for the wood stacked by the hearth. "Something in the symbolism."

I let him work as I clean up the remains of the last week. By the time I'm done with the kitchen, the fire is crackling, and Thomas is in the living room.

It doesn't need more than a simple tidying to be ready for company, but I join him as he stands from the flames licking at the fresh log.

"Your furniture looks fragile."

"I don't think it was designed with werewolves in mind." I look at the antique velvet sofa where his ethereal wolf lounges. "But as long as only one of us sits on any one piece of furniture, we should be okay."

"Joshua said there's a sturdier couch here somewhere."

"In the conservatory," I nod toward the doorway that leads into that oasis of greenery and glass.

"I think we should take a look at that sofa, don't you?"

"I thought you came with me to help me prep?"

"I definitely came with you to get between these legs all on my own." He tugs me into the conservatory, looking around only for a moment before he nudges me back to the couch. "I'm really glad you don't like wearing pants."

"It's not because of the easy access, but I'll admit, you guys have made me happy about that too."

Slipping off my shoes and stockings, he sets them aside.

"Do you usually run around your house barefoot?"

"Yes."

"Good." He flips my skirt up and licks his lips. "I wonder…"

He hooks his finger in the front of my underwear, sliding his finger down my skin. "At some point, it might be smarter to just stop wearing these at all."

"They're useful sometimes."

"Sure." It doesn't sound like an agreement as he slides them down my legs.

Draping them over the arm of the chair, he tugs me forward.

"Maybe you'd rather—"

I don't finish that sentence. The look Thomas shoots me makes the words die in my throat.

"I told you this was my favorite." He grins at me from the floor. "Let me give thanks."

"Just don't hurt your knees."

And then, I stop thinking about knees.

Thomas worships me with his mouth, hand flat on my stomach, holding me down.

He watches me as his tongue strokes and teases and swirls, and I lose myself in those blue eyes.

The creak of the front door pricks at my hearing, but I don't move, I can't contemplate trying to stop this. The way his gaze shifts, even if it's only momentarily… I know he heard it too.

But he doesn't stop either. His focus shifts and I have to screw my eyes shut as he presses his fingers into me and that wicked tongue flicks at my clit… My hips rock against him and then, he sucks my clit hard enough I want to fly off the couch and I come so loudly, I'm sure the windows rattle.

When I come down, those windows show me the first glimpse of our audience.

"God damnit, Johnny. Why did you put chilies in our breakfast?" Chase's scolding holds a laugh.

"Because I'm really shitty at planning, apparently."

"No wonder Thomas had cereal." Joshua chuckles as he leans against the door jamb. "It wasn't a dig at your cooking, he was scheming."

The grin Thomas wears as he helps me to my feet tells me that's exactly what he was doing.

"Now that we're all here," Chase takes my hand from Thomas and pulls me against him, kissing me so deeply I can't help but arch against him.

When he lets me go, I take a deep breath and have to close my eyes and try to keep my mind from running wild.

"We brought you a gift." Johnny holds up a drooping and sad little monstera with a cautious smile on his lips. "Or maybe just a job, but I hoped…"

"It's great. Let's see if we can revive the poor thing."

Taking it from him, I go straight to the kitchen sink.

"See," Johnny whispers and I see him nudge Joshua with his elbow. "I told you she'd love it."

I put it with the cinnamon basil—it's sprung back to life, but the straight stalk only has a few leaves back on it so far. I'd guess it needs another three weeks before it is ready to find its way into a new pot without dying from the shock.

The sad boy they brought me though… He needs to go straight into a new pot.

While I pull him free and wash the dirt from his roots, I hear them trying to sort out logistics for how they want to work out sleeping arrangements. Turning the living room into what amounts to a pillow fort is highest on the list and I'm happy to go along with that suggestion.

"Um… is that going to be okay?" Johnny asks from the counter beside me.

I know it's startling, but… Sometimes, they need a fresh start with fresh soil and a root trim before they can make it back to the land of the living.

I hold up the plant to show him the chunk of roots that are black, not from the soil that once clung to them, but from the rot that had taken hold.

Thomas details our run in with the sheriff as I go about repotting it in fresh soil, and I only add comments when I need to.

"If he's been spelled to harass you, we need to take care of that soon."

"I can deal with a little inconvenience for the time being." I look back at him over my shoulder and set the pot on the windowsill above the sink. "I've had my fair share of experience dealing with annoying men before."

I don't know which one of them growls.

When I wash my hands and turn back to them, I see the look they give each other.

"If there's a question you want to ask, just ask it."

"I think we need a full explanation of what this life and death relationship we have now is."

"You sure I can't tell you that I trust you to never hurt me and then we'll move on?"

"Nope. Give us the good, the bad, and the ugly.

"Which of the three do you want me to start with?"

"How about the bad? Rip off the bandage."

I sit, but they remain standing. "The basics are… pretty simple. You die, your wolf disappears. I die, you get your wolves back and everything goes back to the way it was before you met me.

"If there ever comes a time or a reason, you can take your wolves back. It is a conscious choice. You have to mean it… but you will get the wolves back. So long as one of you remains tied to me. The others will only change into your wolf-man forms on the full moon."

"And you don't die."

"Correct. If you take your wolves back, you will have to change, albeit only partially while I'm still alive. There's no way to reverse taking them back until the next Samhain blue moon."

"So, nineteen more years of changing."

"Correct."

"You can change us back into wolves though…"

"Yes, but I will never do it."

"Not unless we ask you to."

"Right." I nod and look down at my hands. "If you all take your wolves back… you will change, without the moon, and your wolves will devour me. My magic won't work on them anymore, and especially in a four against one fight, I'll never win with those odds."

None of them look happy.

"Those are the bad and the ugly. Want the good?"

They nod, but none of them look hopeful either.

"You're not going to take your wolves back. Even if you hated me… all you have to do is tell me to stay away, and I will. I can't think of a way I could possibly make you take them back, not one I think would make you actually go through with it."

"Don't get me wrong," Thomas says, "I love the way you taste, but I definitely don't want to eat you. Not like that."

"If the spell hadn't existed, I might never have met you, and we probably wouldn't be here right now.

"You never have to change on a full moon again, unless you actually want to."

Joshua looks irritated, but his focus is on the beams in the ceiling. "When did you buy this place?"

"I didn't." It was a bequest. The land has been in the family for generations. It's got spells buried in every corner and there are plants that grow on the property that have been maturing for a century. I had to tear down the original house—my grandmother had lived in one that had been build back around the great depression and it was starting to crumble.

"You could have built a bigger one."

"True, but before I met you guys, I had assumed it would just be me and one other witch, at most… if he was an actual part of my life at all, and then a daughter… maybe two." I look around the house. "At the time, it had seemed like it was the perfect size."

"And now?"

"Now, it might be a touch too cozy. But it fits us all okay for now. And besides, changing it would be an undertaking. These walls aren't going to move without a fight."

"Physical or magical?"

"A little of both, honestly."

"There are secret cabinets all over the place." I lean over and pop open a piece of paneling to reveal shelves stuffed with my ancestor's grimoires and recipes.

"Okay, I like the house a little bit more now." Joshua goes to the shelves and starts inspecting the woodwork.

My mother would be pissed if she knew I was giving away the family "secrets."

"Enough talk about construction!" Johnny drags a pair of bags off of the floor. "Who's ready to help me fake a Thanksgiving feast?"