Chapter 16

Kate

Three beautiful shadows stare down at me, their hats wicked and sharp, their expressions hidden by the darkness of early morning. The sky is on its way from ebony velvet to deep navy blue, but it's still early enough that most rational people aren't awake yet. I can't see anything but their large forms, lined up in a row on my porch.

Slowly, I take the steps up to stand in front of them.

They even smell good to me, but I pretend not to notice.

"Let's start with showers and clean clothes, okay?" I move past them without touching my skin to theirs, opening the front door and leading them back inside. They crowd around me in the entryway as I lock the door and wonder if bolting these men into my house with me is a bad idea. "I'll get the towels."

I head for the linen closet on the first floor and try not to think about how most of the towels in there were washed and folded by my grandma. It's just me here, so I don't use a lot of towels and even then, I generally use the upstairs bathroom.

When I put my hand on the knob and turn, all three of them are right there with me.

" Your tits, huh?" I ask, addressing Tanner. He's the easiest of the three to deal with. "What a way to introduce yourself to my best friend."

"Just plain facts," he says, his expression much lighter now that Georgia is gone. "Would you have appreciated me flashing her my dick?"

I ignore him and pull out a pile of towels, starting with Brooks. He doesn't take it when I offer it out, and I sigh in frustration, closing my eyes tight to gather myself.

"Please take the towel. I'll show you which bathroom to use. There's one upstairs and one down here. You and Tanner can—"

"We'll all use the same shower," Brooks says, and I open my eyes to find him staring down at me with those absurdly green eyes of his. My gaze shifts to Marlowe, waiting once again for a protest that doesn't come.

"This is ridiculous. I know you guys are probably scared—"

"We're not fucking scared," Brooks tells me with a dry laugh, looking around like he's taking in the place. "We're a coven."

I wait for further explanation, and for once, he takes pity on me. Or maybe he's learning? I have no idea.

"Our magic works better when we're in proximity," Brooks continues, gesturing at me with a huge, callused hand. I should've left him to die in the tree, let the Hag eat him. "You're not going anywhere, and neither are we."

I just stand there and stare at him, a stack of towels in my arms. Marlowe appears to have gone mute, and Tanner is trying to hide a smile by dropping his chin down and smirking at the floor.

"We're back. We did it. We're done now," I tell him, feeling the skin on my face get tight. My muscles are tense, and there's enough stress in my shoulders and back to make me hunch. "It's over."

"Over?" Brooks repeats, and there's a thread of outrage in that single word. The big eye in the center of his hat goes wide, showcasing its bloodred iris. "You don't listen, do you?"

"No, you don't listen!" I shout back at him, panting. I throw the towels at the men and they hit Brooks in his bloodied chest before falling to the floor in a heap. Flick is growling, side-eying the men like he's ready to go in for the kill. I snatch his collar, just in case. " I didn't get myself trapped in the Witchwoods. I didn't agree to any of this shit."

"Yes. You. Did." Brooks leans down to get in my face, and Flick lunges. Fortunately, I have his collar, so he stays by my side where he belongs. "Were you in the woods that night, casting that spell, binding your heart and soul to ours?"

"I didn't have a choice, " I tell him, and that's where it really hurts. Maybe I would've liked all of this somehow, someway if I'd been able to choose. But I didn't. We're back to that. I didn't choose any of this.

"None of us had a choice," Marlowe growls out, casting a dark expression toward Tanner and Brooks that mirrors the feelings inside my own heart. He became the thing he hated, that's how badly he wanted to be free.

"Not even me," Brooks admits, like the admission costs him something. He bends down and picks up the towels, holding them away from his bloodied chest so that only one of them is stained with red. Our eyes meet over the tumbled cotton. "We're not fated by the stars. We're not even friends. Just strangers tossed together by chance and circumstance." He keeps his gaze fixed to mine, and it's so intense that I feel sweat beading on the back of my neck. "But we belong to you now, and you belong to us."

"I don't belong to anyone," I bite back at him, losing what little I had left of my patience. I've given them all that I had to give, from the moment that Marlowe forced that first word out of me until right here, right now.

I'm dirty and hungry and exhausted. All I want to do is sleep. I can't deal with this

When none of the men respond to my statement, I throw my arms up and head for the stairs. They follow, a trail of dark witches and magic, until we reach the second-floor bathroom. I throw the door open, start the shower and then step back with my arms crossed.

"You want to share a shower, the three of you? Be my guest." I stay where I am as Tanner moves over to the water and holds his hand under it. I smile tightly. "Old house, old pipes, cheap water heater. Takes a while to heat up and doesn't last long."

As if to prove me a liar, steam fills the air of the bathroom and Marlowe looks right at me.

"No, it doesn't," he says, kicking his boots off and shoving his pants down his hips. His cock is flaccid, and somehow that's an embarrassment to me. Why should he be turned-on right now? I'm not.

I shift my gaze to the side, uncomfortable with the reality that's looking me straight in the face.

Even here, even back home, the magic is real.

We can do magic.

But only if we're together.

I focus on controlling my breathing as the other two strip down and wait their turns. There's most definitely not room for all three of them in the old clawfoot bathtub. Hell, there's barely room for one of these monsters.

"Aren't you guys thrilled over seeing a shower again? It's been a while, hasn't it?" It's a dumb question. I know exactly how long it's been. Just over two years for Brooks. A year and some change for Tanner. Eight months for Marlowe.

"Before Lo showed up, it was a pain in the ass to warm the water for bathing, but it wasn't impossible. After, it was like having a hot spring on demand. I didn't miss showers." Brooks is talking, but he isn't looking at me. He's studying the ceiling, the mirror, the counter with my products scattered across its surface.

He reaches out and picks up some face cream that Tacy gifted me. Rolls it around in his fingers. Puts it back. Looks at me again. His expression is unyielding, hardened by the harsh nature of the Witchwoods. I think again about Brooks' missing posters, and the bright smile he wore in the black-and-white photo.

"You need to wash up, too, kitten," Tanner tells me, leaning the knuckles of one hand on the counter and using the other to swipe away the steam. He stares at himself, and I wonder if he had any access to a mirror.

"Kitten?" I ask dryly, and then I take a seat on the closed lid of the toilet. "I'll go last."

I wait for the three of them to wash their hair, their pits, soap their muscular bodies while steam drifts in the air. I don't look while they're doing it. I refuse.

When they're finished, they stay in and around the bathroom. Marlowe steals my robe from the back of the door without even asking and slips into it. Fine by me since it means his body is no longer on display. Brooks wraps a towel around his hips to hide his junk, and Tanner towel-dries his hair with absolutely no intention of covering up.

"Let me just grab something ..." I start, moving toward the door. In response, the three of them shift into the hallway, and I slam the bathroom door and lock it. Fuckers. I step back and strip down as quickly as I can, but it's not quickly enough.

There's a crunch, a crack, and then the door is swinging inward and hitting the wall with a bang.

I just stand there holding the bone necklace, barefoot and topless, but with my pants still on.

I expect to see Tanner standing there, assuming he's the culprit. But it's not him. It's Brooks.

"Close the shower curtain, if that's what you want," he says without inflection. "But don't you dare try to put a door between us."

I let out a scream of frustration that gets Flick agitated. He's pacing the bathroom floor, baring his teeth at Brooks again. With my pants still on, I hop into the shower and fling the curtain across the metal bar, the silver rings clanking.

By all rights, I should be relaxing. Should feel relieved and happy to be home. Should be ecstatic at soapy bubbles and hot water and the comfort of my grandmother's house.

Instead, all I can think about are those fucking Witchwood boys waiting for me on the other side of a very flimsy, nearly see-through shower curtain. Everything I do in that shower is perfunctory and quick, and I'm frustrated by that. I love long, lazy showers, and it's all ruined because I've brought three stalkers home with me.

Before climbing out, I reach past the shower curtain and snag a towel, drying off and then draping it around my body. When I reemerge, skin pink and hair hanging in wavy hanks on either side of my face, I find them all exactly where I left them.

Marlowe is still checked out, Brooks is brooding and silent, and Tanner watches me like he thinks I might bolt. If I do, he'll chase me. Our eyes meet, and he offers a smile that sits only on his lips. The skin on his forehead remains tight, nothing wrinkles. That is what it means when a smile doesn't reach someone's eyes.

He's still naked and, unlike Marlowe, he's hard as a rock.

"I don't have men's clothing in my house," I begin, and Tanner snorts a laugh.

"That's a relief." He cracks his knuckles as I press my back to the wall to get by him without touching his skin. He notices, and shakes his head at me. "I didn't want to have to get back here and kick a man out of my house."

"This is my house," I snap, because while I can tolerate a lot of bullshit, I will not allow Tanner Skye or anyone else to lay claim to the legacy that my grandmother left me. "And if I do have a partner then he's certainly none of your business."

Tanner cuts me off, blocking the hallway with a towel slung over his neck. He grabs either end of it with his tattooed hands and cocks his head at me.

"You don't have a partner other than me," he says, and I laugh at that. "If you do, then he must not mean much. You didn't bring him up even once while we were in the woods."

I reach over to my right and open a door, pointing into a room that I haven't touched since my grandma passed away. There's a twin bed and a mountain of fabric and craft supplies. It's the only room in the house that she ever let get properly messy. Me ... I'm a different story.

"One of you can sleep in here. There are extra pillows and blankets in the linen closet if you need them." I nod with my chin in Tanner's direction, indicating a room at the end of the hall. "There's a guest bedroom through that door. Somebody will have to sleep on the couch downstairs." I glance over my shoulder at Brooks and Marlowe. "I'll order some food to be delivered, and then we'll get some sleep. I can't deal with you guys tonight."

I yank open the door to my own room and try to slip inside.

Doesn't work.

Brooks is there, slamming his arm into the door and forcing it open. Tanner and Marlowe—despite the animosity that simmers between them—are right behind him.

"Why aren't you putting up a fight?" I yell at Marlowe. Brooks is a bossy asshole. Tanner is seemingly obsessed with me. But why is Marlowe making my life a living hell? "You and I, we don't like each other. So why are you here? Why are you following me around?"

Marlowe lets his head fall back and an insidious laugh slips out, one that he does nothing to hide. He's bitter and exhausted and fractured. I shouldn't poke the bear, but something about him makes me want to prod and pick until I get a reaction.

"Listen to me, North," he says, dropping his chin and running his hand over his dark hair. His expression is disturbing, calm in the way the ocean looks before a tsunami, the water peeling back from the shore with a slurp. "I am twenty years out-of-date. I never graduated high school. I lost the woman that I was in love with. My parents are unlikely to believe a single fucking thing about my disappearance. No money. No ID. Nowhere to go."

He stalks up to stand in front of me, putting his hand on my shoulder and pushing me back until I fall to my ass on my own bed. He parks his hands on his hips and bends at the waist to stare at me, nose to nose.

"With you—with these fucks —I have access to magic. The closer we are, the better that magic works. The longer we stay close, the higher this pyre builds. I want to cast big magic and change my pathetic life into something worth living. If that means chasing you around, breaking down doors, and fucking you, then guess what? That's exactly what I'm going to do."

I move to knee him in the balls, but he catches my leg and shoves it away.

"Unless I invite you to touch me, keep your hands to yourself." His mouth edges up into something cruel and ugly. "I'll extend the same courtesy to you which"—and here he laughs again, that same hideous laugh from before— "these other two most certainly will not. "

He steps aside, raiding my closet since the dresser is occupied. Fine by me. There's nothing important in there.

"We have our own arrangement, don't we, Kate?" Tanner asks, settling himself onto my bed. I stand up and head for the door, frustrated to the point of tears. Frustrated to the point of triple-homicide.

Brooks blocks my exit with his massive body.

" I will sleep on the couch then." I cross my arms and wait, blood boiling. I have my limits. In the bedroom, I love this shit. Outside of it, I'm annoyed. I don't know these guys well-enough to let them get away with this crap.

"Like hell you will," Tanner says with a laugh from behind me. I can hear the bed creak, and when I look back, he's in my pillows, naked and fucking lounging. One arm up behind his head. No smile at all on his face. "No woman of mine is sleeping on a goddamn couch."

He rolls out of bed and walks over to my dresser drawer, opening it and pulling out a pair of my panties.

I slap him.

I don't mean to do it. He genuinely seems surprised, like he was opening the dresser to find something for himself to wear. I'm almost sure he was annoyed with me a few seconds ago, that he'd stopped flirting and started demanding.

But I touch him.

I touch him, and I know exactly what he's going to do.

Tanner takes my wrists in his hands and slams them up against the wall above my head. My towel falls off, and he notches his naked thigh between both of mine. Nudges my pussy with his knee. I don't have time to breathe, let alone protest.

Those thighs of his are thick with muscle, easily strong enough to support my entire body. He props me up with one, sliding his hot skin against my embarrassingly wet pussy. My own thighs quiver, spread over his and casting strong contrast between our bodies.

He moves his leg, just enough to feign friction. A fake out. I could stab him.

"What's wrong with this situation?" he asks me, spiking my blood with fire when he licks the side of my neck. "I'll tell you what's wrong with it." His leg rubs up against me a little harder, and I go completely soft under his touch.

Goddamn it.

I want him to leave my house, but I also want to keep fucking him.

That's ... a me problem, isn't it?

"You assaulting me in my own bedroom?" I whisper, turning my face toward his. The smoothness of my check rubs against the stubble he didn't bother to shave off. The other two did, shaved themselves smooth.

Not this one.

"Nope." Tanner bites me harder than I expect, and my hips buck against him as a moan escapes me. It feels good to have his teeth scraping my heated skin. "You, pretending like you don't want this when you fucking love it."

"Let go of me," I snarl and then ... he does. Just drops my wrists and drags his knee across my swollen cunt before pulling away. I'm not on my tiptoes anymore. He isn't touching me.

Tanner lifts up both palms in surrender. You've got my juices all over you, asshole.

"Yeah, no," he murmurs, shaking his head. "What about consent? We're back in the real world now, right? I can be civil."

"Can you?" I retort, glancing at Brooks and Marlowe as I hastily gather my towel from the floor. Tanner returns to the dresser, discarding my panties from earlier, and trying different drawers until he finds my sweatpants.

Fortunately, I love men's sweatpants. Women's sweatpants just don't fit me as well. I like them loose and baggy, and I buy them several sizes too big so that I can fold down the waistbands a few times. I just like the way it looks and feels.

They're all going to be wearing my sweatpants. Something is weirdly possessive about that act.

"If you can be civil, then leave me alone. I'm sleeping on the couch." I start toward Brooks again, but he still won't move. He's dead silent and staring at me, a challenge in his eyes that I meet with one of my own.

If I charge him and try to push him out of my way, he'll fight back, and he'll treat me like an equal. Probably the same way he treats Tanner and Marlowe, like they should obey. It's not much of a change in status to be a man in this coven.

"Safewords only work during sex, and, kitten, this is not sex." Tanner is dressed by the time I look back at him, flipping the covers down and gesturing at the bed. "Climb in. I won't touch you. Not unless you ask."

I want to murder him. I want him dead. I wish I had the fortitude to back those thoughts up.

My soft squishy heart is hell. I hate it. I don't want to care what other people think, but I do anyway. The three of them are fixed on me, and there's so much attention that comes with that act. I'm ... I don't even know what I am anymore.

"Remember when you asked me if I wanted to be the leader?" I ask Brooks, and he hesitates, but he nods. Uncrosses his arms. Tucks his thumbs into the edge of his towel. It loosens, but doesn't fall. "I said that I wouldn't have the first clue where to begin. But if you want to be the leader here, tell me: how do we obtain food?"

Brooks' mouth quirks a bit on one side. It's so small that I almost question its existence.

"How do we obtain shelter here?" I continue. "How do we buy clothes with a contactless pay method that we do not have ? How do we deal with this TikTok problem? We're going to be viral." I step a little closer, my breasts brushing his bare chest. Yes, I'm wearing a towel. Yes, it's still electric.

Magnetic.

I don't like Brooks, but he's gorgeous.

"How does one make hot pancakes with real maple syrup appear on our doorstep at"—I glance at the clock on the wall, the one shaped like a bat—"five in the morning?"

I wait for him to answer me.

Brooks steps aside.

"Get the pancakes then." He does smile now, but it's tight and mean. "You're still not sleeping on the couch because I am not sleeping on the couch and we are sleeping in the same room."

He moves around me and into the bedroom, grabbing a second pair of sweatpants. The one's Tanner has on are slung low, black, and decorated with the words Area 666 across the crotch. On the legs, there are green UFOs.

The ones that Brooks chooses are white with pink writing on the sides, the name of some local band that Tacy's last boyfriend played drums for. The Humboldt Honeys was their name. There's a heart on the crotch. I would never wear something like that in public, only around the house. He looks ridiculous in it.

Marlowe ... he's got my robe on, so he's in no rush. He's testing out the chair in front of my bookshelf, cursing about how shitty it'll be to sleep on. Uh-huh.

I ignore them all, heading back down the stairs and into the bathroom where the washer and dryer are located. I dig through a basket of clean clothes for the most acceptable pajamas and put those on—with the door cracked but mostly closed. The only man allowed inside with me is Flick. A compromise.

When I emerge in blue linen pants with a missing drawstring and holes on the knees, an oversized t-shirt in an offensive burnt orange color on top, it doesn't change the way they look at me.

"I don't see pancakes anywhere," Tanner goads when I open the door, finding him with the TV remote in his hand. He turns away from me and presses the button to turn it on. The home screen shows up, decorated with apps like Netflix, Amazon Prime, Rakuten Viki, Hulu. He just stands there, waiting. Then he tries to change the channel.

It goes static.

"There's no cable. Just use the smart TV features. Who the fuck has cable nowadays?" I saunter over to him, steal the remote from his hands and start up Netflix. I don't want to freak these guys out too badly, so I start with something more from Marlowe's time. The Mummy with Brendan Fraser will do. We'll work up to modern movies slowly. "Who here knows how to use this thing?" I ask, not-so-subtly directing my question to Brooks.

"Who gives a fuck?" he asks me, tucking his thumbs under the waistband of his new pants, the ones with the vibrant pink heart on the crotch. I'm fighting a smile that I shouldn't be having. I'm dreading the thought of opening social media of any kind.

If we do go as viral as I'm afraid we will, we're fucked.

People will show up here. People will accidentally try the tree on a moonless night. People will cross over and be eaten. I shake the chills off by handing the remote back to Tanner and continuing with my Grubhub order. I'm so used to ordering for myself that I'm not sure what to get them.

They're all big guys. Huge. They probably eat a fucking ton. I look up and realize that they're going to have to work for my company just so I can earn enough money to provide them food.

In the Witchwoods, I was helpless. I couldn't do anything right. Here, I'm going to have to do everything—at least for a little while.

I've rescued some of the Witchwoods victims, I realize, adding extra pancakes to the order. No need for anyone to go hungry on their first night here.

Marlowe appears on the staircase dressed in boxer shorts that used to belong to Nathan. I stole them from him when we broke up. I've always loved them as pj's because they're comfy as hell.

"No men's clothes in the house, huh?" Marlowe asks dryly, sweeping past me. "Fucking liar."

"Screw you, you stupid prick!" I shout back at him, but he just flips me off and plunges onto my sofa. He closes his eyes and rests an arm behind his head, ankles crossed, face distant and empty. My ire flees as quickly as it came, and I sigh, putting the food order through with a tap of my thumb on the screen. "Estimated delivery time is an hour from now."

"Delivery, huh? So it's not just pizza anymore. Good to know." Tanner is watching the movie with a half-smile on his sensual mouth. He doesn't even look at me. He ignores me. I feel like that has to be on purpose, to punish me or something. Make me admit that I like their attention when i just said that I fucking don't.

If he plans to play this game with me, he'll lose.

"I'm going to smoke some weed," I tell them, heading in the direction of the kitchen with my dog trotting beside me. I cup a hand around my mouth and shout back at them. "It's legal now! You can wait in your car at a dispensary, and they'll deliver pot straight to your hands in broad daylight."

Tanner and Brooks follow me outside, but Marlowe does not.

"So, I can't be away from the group but he can?" I ask, opening a drawer and withdrawing a glass pipe and my matching red grinder. I don't smoke often, only when I'm feeling completely overwhelmed with the world.

Tonight? I've never been more grateful for legal weed.

"He's just realized what I've known since the first day I ended up in the Witchwoods," Brooks explains, following me onto the deck. He walks right up to the railing and rests his inked hand on it, staring out at the woods behind the house.

It's my favorite part of the property, those woods.

"He didn't believe it until he saw the house," Tanner adds, and I look over at him with furrowed brows. One of the porch lights goes out, causing our shadows to skitter around wildly. We're out here in the half-asleep morning hours. It's dark, but getting lighter by the minute.

I assume that Tanner's talking about Marlowe's parents' place.

"Realize what? Believe what?" I ask when neither of them rushes to explain. Bad habit of theirs.

"That he's lost everything." Tanner whistles and Ebon flits down to land on his shoulder, cocking her head at me. I pause to grab a piece of kibble from Stix's bowl, offering it up to her. She takes it in her beak and trills at me. Fast friends, me and this crow. "That he's starting with a clean slate."

The first sentence is depressing; the second is hopeful. What do I make of that?

"Poor stupid Marlowe," Brooks breathes, watching the sun limn the evergreens in color. I suppose he hasn't seen a sunrise in years. Color breaks through the trees, bathing his face in gold and orange. It burnishes his hair with fire, softens his hard edges.

Oh.

I turn away to find Tanner watching me, stroking Ebon as absently as I'm petting Flick.

"Fuck, how long for these goddamn pancakes?" he asks, and I almost smile again. Shit. He rakes his rain-on-pavement gaze over me. Digs his teeth into his lower lip. Calculated pretty. Devastating. Tanner Skye is a trap. The kind of mistake that feels good even when it hurts.

"Could you make them appear any faster?" I ask with a quirk of my brow.

Tanner turns away and heads into the kitchen. I should ignore him, leave him in there while I smoke outside, but I'm curious. I pause in the doorway, balancing the items on the small table next to it, and pack myself a bowl while he digs in my cabinets.

"Pancake mix. You're not entirely unreasonable, now are you, Kate?" Tanner checks around, looking for a mixing bowl and a whisk. He reads the instructions and furrows his brow but then shrugs and unscrews the top from the plastic bottle.

It's one of those just add water and shake pancake mixes that don't taste very good and are probably really unhealthy, but that I can't resist on early mornings. I want hot pancakes, but I don't want to cook them from scratch like my grandma did.

Tanner mixes the batter, gets out a pan, and checks the fridge for butter. He finds it, one of the few items that Georgia didn't throw out. I watch his strong back muscles move as he works on cooking and flipping the pancakes.

Fuck.

I hold the lighter to the ground-up green flower in the bowl of my glass pipe. Inhale, hold it for a minute, exhale. I'm going to get my ass kicked by my own logic. They're never going to leave my house now.

When Brooks steps up beside me, I offer the pipe and he accepts it.

"Where I come from, marijuana is considered the devil's lettuce." His mouth twitches again, like he wants to smile but won't. He could be in shock and not know it. Coming home after two years, after seventy years, that's a lot. "It's practically poison."

I shrug.

" When you come from, you mean. More for me then." I try to take the pipe back, but he won't let me have it.

"Never said I didn't smoke on occasion. This is Humboldt County, after all." His eyes shine as he watches Tanner in the kitchen. "Don't get used to this: he doesn't cook. He's only doing this to prove a hard-won point." Brooks glances down at me as he inhales, pauses a beat, exhales. "I do all of the cooking."

"Because you're not good at anything else?" I return dryly. Brooks finally smiles, and it's wide and dangerous. Confident, self-assured, measured. Annoying.

"Because I'm good at fucking everything, North." He takes my pipe back to the edge of the deck, and I slump into the doorjamb, staring down at the plate of pancakes in front of my face.

"Did they come faster?" Tanner asks me, but just like Brooks earlier, I have nothing to say.

Oh wait. Yes, I do.

"These are crap. They're undercooked and doughy. My pancakes are handcrafted from farm-to-table ingredients and they come with real maple syrup." I don't mention that his cost me less than four dollars and mine ... cost a hundred-and-twenty.

Desperate times call for desperate measures and, apparently, my debit card still works. Thirty days is a lot, but it's nothing like what the guys experienced when they were missing.

"Fuck you, they're not undercooked," he says, folding an entire pancake into his mouth. There's a pause there where I just know that he's bitten into some raw batter, but he hides it well, swallowing and then smiling at me. He eats another, and I get pleasure out of knowing he's suffering to tell me a lie that I don't believe. "Delicious."

"Fuck you, too." I turn away from him, and I don't think about the way I'm hot and swollen between my legs. When I shift my thighs, it almost hurts. I'm so horny that I could cry, and yet, I'm not going to let those emotions control my actions.

I think about what else might bother the men, so I pull up Georgia's Spotify and ruin her recommended music algorithm by blasting Dragostea din tei by O-Zone aka the Numa Numa song.

Marlowe appears in the kitchen and he is fucking pissed. He grips the doorframe on either side of me, fingers digging into it. I wonder how Brooks is taking this? Didn't they have, like, gramophones in his era? Radios? I'm seriously lacking in modern history trivia.

Witchwoods facts, I've got down pat.

"There's something wrong with you," Marlowe says to me, picking up the speaker, shoving past me and then throwing it as far as he can into the woods. I hear music for several seconds, and then it's too far away for the Bluetooth connection to reach.

Damn, he threw that hard.

"Do that again, and I will fuck you until you scream. Hear me? Next time you play that song, there is no safeword—you're mine." He turns back toward me and then grabs a pancake off the plate, unsmiling as he takes it with him into the living room. "If you want to try me, go ahead and play it again. I'd be down for a quick release in a tight, hot channel."

The only satisfaction I get is a cringe from Marlowe when he bites into Tanner's god-awful pancake. I'm going to spit in his food when it gets here.

"Here's my guess," I tell him when I head toward the front door a few minutes later. I keep a cadence in my voice that says I've been thinking about this for a awhile, and here's the conclusion I've come to. "Something about that song is special to you and Miriam, and when I play it, you play an image of her kissing Dennis in your head."

It's a risk.

I take it.

He ignores me which is frustrating, resuming his closed-eye, crossed-ankle position on my couch. I purse my lips as I unlock and open the front door, retrieving the bags from the porch. Yay for contactless delivery.

"Food's here." I toss the items on the coffee table and wait for the men to dig in. Nobody moves, so I start unpacking containers and setting them out. "Who's the fucking provider now?" I murmur, and then I take my own pancakes over to the chair in the corner and try to pretend like my heart isn't pounding while I eat them.