Chapter Seven

Hayden

Good Time Glenda's voice reaches me before I make it to the gate with Wren trying to shield me the entire way. I break into a run, pushing past him as I round the last curve. "Glenda, thank goodness you're okay."

"Me?" She clings to the gate like she's wrapping her ghost fingers around prison bars. "We came to bust you out before the Big Bad tears apart your soul."

We? I glance around at the ragtag crew, blinking against the sunlight because I forgot to grab my prescription shades. They'd been the last thing on my mind when I'd been wrapped in thrumming shadows, surrounded by seductive darkness, and one moment away from insisting Wren have his way with me.

Wooing .

Who the hell needs wooing? Not me. Not after ten long years of teasing and endless sexual tension only he can satisfy.

Sure, I had one glorious orgasm with him eating me out like I was a gourmet delicacy.

Fine, it'd been absolute bliss to have him lift me as though I weigh nothing and run his shadows beneath my dress to the point I felt more exposed than I've ever been naked.

More than that—I felt worshipped.

But when had my Shadow Daddy decided I needed to be babied rather than bossed around?

Glenda's hands pass through the gate as she reaches for me. "We've come to help you escape. I gathered everyone who haunts the local graveyards and the few others willing to brave a Render. Bertie the Bard here says a Render can't pass through iron bars." She gestures toward a ghost who looks as though he escaped from a muddy Ren Faire with a turkey leg still gripped firmly in his fist.

Wren's magic wraps around me, his shadows teasing against my ear. "Bertie the Bard should've studied his folklore better," he whispers, his deep voice making me shiver regardless of how mad I was at him only seconds before. "Iron works against fae, maybe a few witches, and some ghosts—although obviously not this half-dressed one."

"She's my friend," I tell him. "It's not her fault she died without pants. Or a skirt." Or probably undies although I've never looked too closely because her shirt's bubble-lettered Here For A Groovy Good Time seemed a clear sign not to. "Would iron do anything to revenants?"

He pauses. "It might stun them. I've never tried."

"Does iron hurt you?"

"Definitely not. It has no effect on reapers. I used it in my own wards to keep you safe. Give me a moment, and I'll deal with these intruders."

"No." I move to the gate, pressing my fingers as best I can to Glenda's ghostly ones. "Wren won't hurt me. Just like he won't hurt you, right?" I call to him over my shoulder.

"Depends," he mutters. "Will she interfere in my wooing you?"

"I don't need wooing," I say.

"Ooh, wooing," Glenda announces at the same time with a not at all scary wooooo ghost sound. "Every woman deserves wooing."

"See," Wren argues. "Your friend agrees with me." Suddenly, he's a Glenda fan. Sort of. Close enough.

Maximus chooses to appear that very moment in his fuzzy chihuahua form, tongue out and tail wagging.

"The legendary black dog," Bertie the Bard calls out on a wheeze. "A portent of death. We're doomed."

Okay, the oooh ghost noise is getting old. Also, I'm pretty sure Bertie choked on that turkey leg he's waving around.

"We're already dead, dummy," Glenda says.

I pick Maximus up and cuddle him before the weird medieval-wannabe ghost creeps him out. It doesn't matter that the pup can transform into whatever wee three-headed beastie he became before. No one needs to be picked on. Especially not by a doomcaster like Bertie.

"Wren isn't here for you," I tell them. "Nor is Maximus. They're after the revenants."

"Sure." Bertie huffs a mean laugh. "Like anyone will believe those exist. You're just lying to cover for your soul-eating boyfriend." He disappears before Wren can get past the arm I fling out to stop him.

My Render has magicked his purple skull mask on and he looks ready to tear through the Veil to get to the little weasel. The sneer that stretches from ear to ear across Wren's face shouldn't be so scary. Or so hot.

"Bertie's a crackpot," Glenda says, interrupting my lust fest over my thirst trap of a boyfriend who is totally rocking the Special Ops Reaper look right now. "No one's buying what he's selling. Right, guys?" One by one the ghosts behind her vanish, leaving her standing alone on the other side of the gate. "Chickens," she mutters.

"Thanks for checking on me," I tell her. "Seriously, you risked everything and came to rescue me. You're the best friend ever." I glance at Wren. "It doesn't matter that I didn't need saving."

He makes a stiff bow that seems oddly gentleman-like considering the contempt in his voice earlier when he'd been talking about the ghosts in general and Glenda's lack of pants.

Maximus leaps from my arms, through the iron bars, and into my friend's waiting hands. Her face immediately lights with a giant grin. "Who's a good baby ghost dog, huh?" she asks on a coo. "You are. Yes, you are."

I glance at Wren, startled because Glenda can hold the dog and—what the hell—I've held the dog, things that should be mutually inconsistent. "How come your tiny dog is a ghost with a corporeal form?" I keep my voice low which is likely unnecessary between the dog's excited yips and Glenda's steady praise. "Did Maximus make a deal with a demon, too?"

Wren's mask contorts into a look of shock before he drops it altogether. "No, but my bargain probably explains your ability to pick him up right now. When I found Maximus, he'd been abused and abandoned in his life in this realm, and his spirit was fading on the other side."

"He's a rescue?"

"I couldn't just leave him there," Wren says as though he's explaining a simple fact.

Except the truth has to be that someone else did. Probably multiple someone elses. "So you saved him like you did me?"

"You weren't a rescue. You're my mate. You also had a life to return to. He didn't. I imbued him with some of my magic to keep him from fading into nothing. Look closely at his coloring, and you'll see it."

I do as he asks, taking in the pup licking my friend's face from his pointed ears to his curled tail. His fur gleams black, but in the sunlight, the deep purple undertone beneath the glossy ebony is obvious.

My Render shared his magic, his essence, his friggin' life force with a rescue dog. Talk about a massive moral compass.

Suddenly, his insistence that he be allowed to woo me before we go further physically makes an odd sort of sense. It could even be considered charming and old-fashioned instead of condescending.

I stare up at him, his face hooded and undetectable now except for his eyes. "How long do you plan for this wooing to take?"

"The month Theodopolis has given us. Time enough to make sure you're convinced we're mates destined to spend whatever time the gods grant us."

"I don't need?—"

"Because a mating bond requires full consent, to know that you'll be with me for the rest of our years—for better or for?—"

"Yeah, yeah, I know the spiel." I don't remind him how I've literally been with no one else but him in fantasy form for the past decade. "I'll give you two weeks to figure out I made up my mind years ago."

"Three weeks," he counters. "I won't rush this. Not like I did last time."

I want to ask him what he means, but he closes off. The purple of his magic goes dim, shrouded entirely in shadows. He is offering to compromise on his timeline. I should probably take the win even though my body screams now , now , now . "Fine. Deal?"

"Deal," he says solemnly.

My hormones hate me already.