Chapter 41

Cole

Central Business District, New Orleans, Louisiana

“ W here’s our staff?” Cole asked, one eye on Evie, who was crunching over the glass towards the center of the room. Every ounce of his being was demanding that he go bring her back, but she wouldn’t appreciate him restricting her freedom. Had, in fact, demonstrated aggressively and memorably how much she wasn’t willing to accept boundaries on her ability to roam free by breaking his wards and returning to the forest by Uber—a fact that still shocked him—at the first opportunity after he took her from the forest. So instead he kept a careful watch over her, ready to intervene if he needed to.

“You sap.” Hayden punched his shoulder lighty. “She’s got you wrapped around her little finger.”

Cole shrugged. No reason to fight an obviously true statement, not that he wanted to. “Yeah.” Evie tilted her head back to stare at the ceiling, her curls falling back from her face, and he was reminded viscerally of her in bed that morning, head canted back just like it was now, mouth opened on a moan. He shifted, widening his stance as desire coursed through him. Why the fuck are we here again? The crunch of glass under one of their shoes brought him back. Right. The earthquake. Employees. Focus, man. “Where are our employees?”

“After the earthquake, I sent everyone home to telework until we had a better plan. Honestly, some of them acted like it was the best news they’d gotten all year. I got more victory cheers over that than I did when we announced the company-wide pay raise.”

“I bet they did,” Cole muttered. Given the type of work they did, they couldn’t let their staff go fully remote, a point of contention for many of their employees, which they tried to make Cole and Hayden’s problem. Suffice it to say, it was a sore spot for both of them. “So everybody’s working from home then?”

“Yeah, except—” Hayden’s voice was cut off by a woman shouting. He winced. “Except Mina. She posted up at a coffee shop across the street.”

The voice grew louder until Mina, their receptionist, tottered in through one of the broken windows. “Cole!” she cried. “Baby!”

Goddamn Mina. Cole glared at his best friend before turning to the blonde bombshell now approaching. He hadn’t slept with her, not that she hadn’t tried. And tried. And tried again. With each rejection, she got more aggressive and her behavior escalated. The most recent incident was the memorable holiday party where she got drunk, dumped egg nog all over his crotch, then dropped to her knees in front of him to try and lick it off. It was disruptive enough that he and Hayden agreed to reorganize the reporting structure so that Cole didn’t have to be the one to deal with or fire her. Under Hayden, she had gotten nominally better, but she was still committed to being way too familiar whenever she saw him.

Like now, when she had managed to cross the broken glass with remarkable and was swiping her hands all over his chest, cooing, “Where have you been? I was so worried about you.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw Evie turning at the slow speed of a horror movie slasher, her hair rippling in a nonexistent wind. He couldn’t see her face, but he had a feeling that Mina should be afraid.

Grasping Mina’s wrists in one hand, he pulled her hands off of him, lightly pushing her a few feet back before releasing his grip. “Mina, we discussed this. You’re not to touch me.”

“But I’m just trying to make sure you’re alright, silly.” Her glossy lower lip jutted out in a pout.

Cole’s mouth tightened in irritation. Before Evie, Mina was frustrating as hell. Yeah, he played hard, but when he was at work, he was at fucking work. The women he employed weren’t up for grabs. After Evie, though? Well, after Evie, Mina was infuriating because no one in this or any other world, much less the woman who was practically stalking him, could compare to his Angel.

Around them, the glass started jingling against the floor, the shards bouncing in ways that defied gravity. Cole’s gaze slid to Evie, whose eyes were the neon blue of death, not a hint of gold lunar magic to be found. Holy shit, she was livid , which was somehow both concerning and a turn on. Who knew?

He shook his head at her lightly, willing her to get that Mina wasn’t an ex, just a deeply sad and lonely person who believed that sexual harassment was socially acceptable. Unfortunately, that was a lot to pack into a single look, and, based on the look of fury on his witch’s face, she wasn’t in the headspace to get nuance.

Hayden all but leapt in front of Mina when she stepped toward Cole again, but she wouldn’t be stopped. The leggy blonde shoved past Hayden to Cole. “I tried to call and make sure you were alright, but your phone just kept ringing to voicemail.”

Shit, he had changed his number after she got ahold of it on Valentine’s Day. How had she gotten the new one? He was working his way through that puzzle when he felt a delicate palm slide across his arm and down to his hand. A slow smile took over his face—this was who he wanted touching him. Glancing down, he almost swallowed his tongue at the ethereal being standing next to him.

Evie was practically crackling with energy, her eyes radiant with her magic, her hair drifting around her, her feet raised from the floor until only her toes were touching it. All around her, the shattered glass was pulled off the ground by invisible hands, floating in the air like tiny brittle pieces of shrapnel.

Mina’s eyes lasered in on Evie’s hand entangled in his, completely ignoring every other unexplainable thing happening in the lobby. “Who are you?” she demanded.

“I’m Evie,” she responded. “Cole’s witch. And who do you think you are?”

Beside them, Hayden snorted.

“I’m Mina.” Her eyes were steel on Evie’s. “Cole’s girlfriend.”

Cole’s softly uttered “What the fuck” was drowned out by Evie’s, “I don’t fucking think so.” Had Mina gone full on Fatal Attraction? He didn’t have a pet, but, for some reason, he was suddenly concerned for all of the animals in his vicinity.

“Well, I am!” Mina cried. “He promised me that we would see each other.”

“At work, you idiot. As in I would see you at the office. I was being polite,” Cole snapped. This was way past enough. “An office you no longer work at. Mina, you’re fired.”

Mina’s eyes flashed. “What?”

“You’re fired. Get the fuck out. Now. This is long overdue.”

“H—h—how could you?” Mina stammered. “After all I did for you? All I ever wanted was to be with you!”

Rolling his eyes, Cole sighed. He should probably be more accommodating, but he was long past caring about the receptionist they should have fired months ago and far more concerned about his ticking time bomb of a witch. “Get lost.” He squeezed Evie’s hand and bent down to her ear. “Angel, there’s nothing between Mina and me, never has been,” he whispered. “She’s just got no sense of boundaries.”

“And a hard-on for Cole,” Hayden muttered.

Without looking at Hayden, Cole snapped, “Not helpful, man.”

“Wasn’t trying to be helpful, just trying to be accurate,” his best friend quipped. “If your girl’s going to turn our former receptionist to dust, I think she should know what’s going down.”

Mina had drawn herself to her full height. Her gaze was locked on Evie, a dangerous smile cracking her mouth. “You’re going to pass on all of this,” she demanded in a voice entirely unlike the airy one she usually used as she gestured to her body. “For some little witch bitch? Oh, Aidoneus, I thought you were smarter than that.”

What the actual fuck? Cole opened his mouth, but no words came out.

Hayden’s head whipped around, his face furrowing in a scowl. “I know that voice.”

“Oh, god of sleep,” Mina cackled. “Getting high on your own supply of magical sand hasn’t done your mental powers any favors.”

Hayden squinted at her for a few seconds, and then his eyes grew wide. “ Minthe? No, it can’t be. You died. I saw Kore kill you.”

“No.” Mina rolled her eyes. “You thought you saw me die, but my father protected me all these years, brought me back to health.”

“Minthe?” Cole repeated. “Why does that sound familiar?”

“Jesus Christ, man, just read your damn family history. Just once for me,” Hayden pleaded. “Minthe was… ”

“The naiad consort to the first Aidoneus before he found Kore,” Evie spoke from beside him, her angry tone at odds with her words. “According to your family’s archives, Kore drowned her because she kept pursuing Aidoneus.” At his astonished look, Evie raised a shoulder lazily. “I read the book before you woke up yesterday.’

“You're incredible,” he breathed, brushing a kiss across her cheek. She shivered at his touch, and, for the first time since Mina showed up, the intensity of the magic around her lessened a tiny bit, the sound of thousands of shards of glass falling to the floor ringing around them. “That’s right, ma petite sorcière , let down your magic. It’s okay. She’s no threat to you.”

“Oh, for the love of Zeus,” Mina snapped. “This forest trash doesn’t deserve you. Aidoneus, come with me.” She reached for Cole’s hand one last time. That one attempted touch was all it took, though

“You’re right, love.” Evie’s head tilted eerily to the side, an unsettling smirk spreading across her face. “She’s no threat. But I am.” Mina’s fingers had just touched Cole’s hand when Evie reached out, magic flaring around her, and laid her hand on Mina’s shoulder.

There was a scream, a sharp blinding burst of blue followed by a horrifying shattering that sounded like bones being crushed. Then nothing.

“Where’d she go?" Cole looked around for Mina, but she wasn’t anywhere in the lobby. "I’m gonna getting a restraining order this time, I swear to god.”

“Um, Cole?” Hayden said, his focus trained on the ground. On a small… plant? That hadn’t been there before. Had it?

“Was that here before?” Cole joined Hayden in staring at it.

“Nope.” Evie’s voice chimed in. She sounded almost normal again, nothing like the dark goddess that had stood beside him seconds ago.

“Is that… ”

“Yep,” she singsonged, hinging at the waist to reach down and pick up the mint plant now sitting on the lobby floor. “That’s your ancestor’s former consort who wanted to become your whore. Doesn’t she look so much better this way?”

Cole just stared at his dream woman, who bore a small vindictive smile on her beautiful mouth, while she held the mint plant that was his firm’s former receptionist.