Chapter 11

Kate

It’s hard to focus on painting when I’m nursing three brand-new romances.

Somehow, I muddle through a morning at the Pink Lady without having sex (a literal miracle).

I don’t even cave when Brooks takes his shirt off halfway through the workday, using it to mop sweat from his brow. Beads of liquid glisten on his pecs, his abs, slither down to the waistband of his jeans. Fuck. I force myself to turn away and climb the scaffolding, searching for any necessary touch-ups.

We’re almost done here, and the feeling of accomplishment is bright and exhilarating in my chest. It’s like a lantern, warming every bone, heating my blood. The house looks beautiful, stately and fresh and obnoxiously pink against the gray ocean in the west.

I set my paintbrush aside and flop into a more restful position, one palm braced behind me, legs kicked out, ankles crossed. As I sip my water, I study the hulking green house across the street. The Carson Mansion is one of the most beautiful historic homes in the country (in my opinion). I know for a fact that the club that owns it hires painters from out of state, even flies them in to do the job.

Humboldt Bay, just one block over, is a harsh mistress. Salt and fog strip color from these old houses like a lurking monster with an appetite. When the Carson Mansion needs to be refreshed with a new paint job, maybe the owners will look across the street and see what I’ve done for its pretty little sister.

I close my eyes and enjoy the sunshine, the sound of the waves, the chatter of the men down below.

A breeze tickles loose strands of hair across my face as I open my eyes … and find several cars pulling up to the curb on either side of my truck. People get out. People with phones. And GoPros. And selfie-sticks.

Shit.

I deal with the paint and the brushes up top, shoving several into the pockets of my overalls, and then I rappel down the side of the scaffolding in my harness. I try not to rush because I’m not even sure that a witch can survive a fall from that high up, but it’s hard to stay calm knowing that we’re about to be ambushed.

Thus far, the foreboding spell on the house has prevented people from knowing where we go when we leave. They’re just not around to see our truck or track our movements. But I guess the cat is out of the bag. It was only a matter of time.

“Put your shirts back on,” I choke out when I turn around and realize that all three of the men have shed their tops. “Quickly.” I glance over at the table where our witch hats are sitting. I understand that they store magic over time, that they make casting easier, but oh God …

I grab a tarp and toss it over them.

“What the fuck is happening?” Marlowe demands, yanking his shirt over his head.

Tanner and Brooks are slower to comply, their attention on the wrought iron fence that surrounds the property and the people that’ve just shown up to film us.

“Shirts. Please. ” I yank my phone from my pocket and open my socials.

There’s a video of us, right there in my feed. I don’t even want to click on it because I fucking know what it’s going to show me, and I’m terrified. How … how did somebody film this?

I tap the video as all three men peer over my shoulder. Lots of sweaty, muscular male pressed all up against me, and I can’t even appreciate it because I’m staring down the barrel of yet another nightmare.

Somebody. Filmed. The. Zombie.

They filmed it floating through the dark, empty woods around the Witch’s Tree. The woods that nobody can access without shitting their pants in terror. The shadow hands don’t show up, but it’s more than enough to see the corpse do its shambling walk (that was me) and then fling its hand into the trunk of that god-forsaken tree.

There’s us, four idiots with no shirts and witch hats. There’s the zombie, shoving itself into the Witchwoods like someone trying to jam a square block into a round hole. Only … nobody is touching it. The corpse is twisting and shoving and disappearing all on its own.

Drawing sigils in the dirt. Chanting in whispered tongues. Dancing around a fire. Bleeding ourselves into the dirt.

Luckily for us, whatever fucking trail cam was used to capture this footage can’t see us having sex since we’re on the opposite side of the tree for that. But … that’s only a small consolation.

No, the footage can’t capture the Hag Wytch. Or the glowing vulture. Or the magic inside the sigils we drew. But does any of that matter?

I start scrolling my feed, and I see that the original video was posted early this morning.

How did I forget about trail cams?! When was that even installed? Before the fear spell? After?

No, they had to have done it after because there aren’t any videos of my friends going through the tree.

I click on the account that posted the video, and I see that they have a bunch of others. One is titled Overwhelming TERROR in the Witchwoods—and How We BEAT It. Quickly, I scroll through and see that the fuckers who run this account experimented to find the edge of the fear spell. Took a step forward, let the terror wash over them, stepped back and realized it was all fake.

They basically shoved their way through the magic, sobbing and shaking and even pissing themselves. They weren’t brave enough to put their hands in the tree, but they left the trail cam behind.

I close my eyes.

I want to scream.

I want to hunt these influencers down and show them how very real the magic is.

I want to use my affinity with the earth and strangle the people on the other side of this gate with plants.

Can’t do any of that. Have to be rational. Have to make myself breathe.

“Let’s pack up and go home for now.” I drop my phone by my side, ignoring the small group outside the gate. Just three people. For now. The zombie video has five million views already. Five million. It’s been up for a matter of hours. “We’re ahead of schedule anyway. What’s a few extra days?”

“Should we spell ‘em off?” Tanner asks, reaching under the tarp and pulling out a small charm. It’s shaped like a miniature book. He fans the pages with his thumb, but I’m already shaking my head.

“No. No spells. No magic. No shirtlessness. Keep yourselves clothed and pretend to be human.” I eye the tarp and try to figure out what to do with the hats. Mine is trying to chew a hole through the blue plastic already. Of course it is. Of course. “Gather these up and don’t let anybody see them. Don’t talk to those people either, no matter what they say.”

“Hey!” a guy calls out, waving at us from the direction of the sidewalk. “How about an interview? I’ve got two million followers on my channel.”

“No talking, no spells.” Tanner smiles meanly, and my heart jumps. I wonder if he has a bite mark on his shoulder from when I bit him last night. “How about some good old-fashioned ass kicking?”

“I wouldn’t mind beating some YouTuber’s ass.” Marlowe’s dark eyes shine as he narrows them in the direction of the still-shouting asshole and cracks his knuckles. He and Tanner share a look of companionable violence.

Aw, bromance. So cute.

“No bloodshed,” I add with a sigh, reaching up to rub at my temple. “What did I tell you last night? Murder is not the answer to every problem.”

“No, it’s the answer to some problems,” Tanner corrects, and Marlowe smirks in agreement. That threesome did them some good, didn’t it? Did me some good, too. I learned a lot about them both. “Not this one though. I’m not suggesting we garrote the man. Just some fisticuffs between friends.”

“Fisticuffs?” I’m watching the street and hoping that a crowd doesn’t form. Not only would that be hellish on our coven in general, but I remember that Tanner in particular doesn’t like crowds much. He really wouldn’t like a crowd of influencers with cameras pressing in all around him.

“They’re both right, Kate.” This is from Brooks, who’s supposed to be the most rational of the three. I glance back at him to see that he still hasn’t put his shirt on. I sigh and turn to face him with my arms crossed. From the corner of my eye, I see Robin Madsen making her way down the porch steps. “We’re not going to live our lives on the whims of other people. Either they fuck off or we make them fuck off. Whether that’s through magic or other means, we do what it takes. I didn’t escape the Witchwoods to become a slave to … reporters.” He chooses the best possible word in his lexicon, but he has no idea.

Everybody is a reporter nowadays. The whole world has a camera. And everyone is watching.

“Could we compromise and put our shirts back on?” I ask, hoping Brooks doesn’t push back for the sake of pushing back. He lifts one corner of his mouth at me and, thankfully, drags the cotton over his head. I love the shape of his lips beneath the white fabric as it scrapes over them, the way his red hair catches the sun when it reappears through the neck hole, the peek of his green eyes. “Fine. If you want to finish out the day while being filmed, fine by me. You just need to understand that once these people start posting our location, more will show up.”

“And we’ll deal with it then.” Brooks picks up a bucket, and my eyes go wide, darting back to the house. We’ve been careful with the magic paintbrushes and rollers, using the disinterest powder and some cloaking charms off the men’s hats to keep them hidden. Those precious charms though? The ones they spent months working on in the woods? They’re running out.

Then what? We don’t have time to make more. We have to close that goddamn gate.

And yet everything you’ve done to close the gate, to make things better, has only made it worse.

“Kate.” Brooks leans down to look at me. “Take a breath for me, okay? It’s going to be fine.”

“I don’t think you”—I turn to Tanner—“or you have any idea what the internet is like. Even Marlowe doesn’t fully understand it. People are ruthless and vicious. A couple of high school kids with their phones out, that’s one thing. But an influencer with the chance of going viral? We’re career-making material, and you have no clue what some clout-chasing asshole might do in order to get footage of us. They’re pushing through the fear spell to get to that tree. One stupid, piss-their-pants step at a time.”

I huff and push my hair back, closing my eyes and already missing that sweet, quiet moment I stole for myself at the top of the scaffolding. This morning in bed with Tanner. Brooks’ pastries. Hugging Marlowe in the quiet, stained-glass-painted light of the foyer.

Alright, Kate. You’ve got this. They’re just people. Not the Hag Wytch. Not killers. Not your ex-boyfriend.

Plain, ordinary people.

I open my eyes to find all three men standing in front of me. Brooks is still holding that heavy bucket of paint like it’s nothing. Tanner is using his shirt to wipe the sweat from his face—revealing his recently tanned midsection in the process. Marlowe has one hand in his pocket, his phone held in the other. He’s scrolling and frowning like he didn’t grow up with flip-phones and pixelated games of Snake.

“You okay, Kate?” Brooks asks, his smile smug and knowing but somehow still soft. No, maybe smug isn’t the word. It’s confidence. He’s brimming with it, but he doesn’t understand.

Marlowe snorts and takes his hand from his pocket, tapping something out on his screen.

“Didn’t think I needed to say this, but I have another rule.” I reach out and grab onto Lo’s phone, but he won’t let me have it. I gentle my fingers, and he releases it immediately. Wow. I love that. I love that gentleness is his great undoing. “No posting on social media.”

I look to see what Marlowe’s done.

He’s on what looks to be his mother’s Instagram account. She’s been bombarded with comments, some of which are really messed-up. Marlowe’s replied to the one with the most likes.

It reads: Your son is long-dead, deal with it. Social media stunts will only get you so far. BTW, nice ass, MILF.

Marlowe’s response? You’re lucky you’re online. Next time you leave a comment like that, we’ll take it to the streets.

I groan, but I don’t delete the comment. He has a right to defend his mom against some basement-dwelling douche.

“Next rule: don’t look at social media. Don’t interact with it. Don’t even think about it. If you do, it’ll take over your brain and make you crazy.” I hand Marlowe his phone back, and he flicks his tongue against the corner of his mouth. It’s a small movement, but it may as well be a threat.

“I thought I was the boss?” Brooks is teasing, but only a little. He’s serious. “Boys, whatever Kate says goes in regards to … this shit.” He gestures at the people on the sidewalk, turns, and heads for the back of the house with his paint bucket in tow.

Tanner wraps the hats up like I asked, bundling them into his arms to carry back to the truck.

That leaves Marlowe.

He clamps a strong hand on my shoulder, and I can’t help the involuntary sigh that escapes me. Two-Million-Followers Guy is still yelling about an interview, but at least the two women aren’t screaming at us.

One does follow Tanner over to the truck, but she doesn’t touch him. Please don’t touch him. Dear God, do not touch him.

I look back at Marlowe and try on a smile that I don’t feel.

“I cannot fucking wait for internet culture to move on from us.” I gesture loosely in the direction of the fence, and Marlowe offers me a smile in return. He draws me into his arms, his lips against my hair.

Marlowe. This is Marlowe we’re talking about. I almost can’t believe it.

Images flood my brain, flickers of Tanner standing above him like a demon. Feelings of being left and lost and forgotten. I snuggle deeper into the fabric of his t-shirt. Licks of sin hit the back of my brain, memories that Lo probably didn’t mean to share. How tight I was around his fingers. How he tried to be clinical about my capture when what he really wanted was to unleash.

How much he hates himself for what he’s done.

How sure he is that he would never do it again.

“If this is bothering you, let’s deal with it,” Lo growls against the top of my head.

I reach up a hand, snagging his sweaty shirt and loving the hot press of the sun on my skin. We don’t get weather like this in Humboldt County very often. I prefer rain, but I like the way the sun heats Marlowe’s skin, the fresh smell of his sweat, the corded muscles in his arms as he brings them around me.

That’s enough to fortify me, the feel of him.

“No, it’s okay. The gate comes first.” Just thinking about the two known people trapped down there is harrowing for me. Although … if we stopped the social media frenzy, maybe that would buy us time to deal with the gate?

I resolve to ask Brooks at the end of the workday.

“Lemonade?” Mrs. Madsen is standing off to one side with a knowing smile. Even though she hit on Brooks and Tanner, she’s a nice person. I feel bad about the bags under her eyes, about the ghost that’s haunting her house. Really, all of that is our fault, a direct result of our actions.

Marlowe was right.

I am selfish.

I would sacrifice the world to save the people I love.

Does that make me a villain?

“Lemonade sounds great,” I tell her, taking one of the glasses. Lo does the same. Robin hesitates, two extra glasses sweating on that metal tray. I give Tanner a look when he comes back, and he sighs before taking one. I grab the last, so I can give it to Brooks myself. “How’s the haunting?”

I try to keep my voice lighthearted, but Robin frowns. Sighs. Tucks the tray under her arm.

“I saw it last night, Kate. The ghost. I actually saw it. All this time, it’s been teasing me. Moving objects. Breaking things.” She shivers and reaches up a hand to touch her ear. “Breathing on me and whispering.”

She saw it? The guys and I exchange looks.

“Ghosts are bad omens,” Marlowe murmurs around a sip of his lemonade.

I want to tell Mrs. Madsen that we’ll help, that we can make the ghost go away, but there is no time in our schedule for collecting corpse fingernails. More than that, I’m realizing that magic is just energy. Just like I can’t run more than a mile or two without needing to stop and rest, I can’t cast like that either.

“Here.” Marlowe reaches into his pocket and removes a charm. It’s just a dried flower with a hook through it (a pale, white hook that may or may not be made of bone). He passes it over and Mrs. Madsen’s eyes shine like he’s her savior. “Keep that on you. It’ll help.”

“It’s beautiful,” she says, examining the flower on her palm. It’s a Witchwoods flower with too many petals and a dark center, nothing at all like I’ve ever seen before. My grandma loved flowers, and I’ve seen a lot. “Thank you. Truly. I already have peace of mind.” She pats him on the shoulder, and then lets her gaze slip to the influencers on the other side of her fence. “Did you need me to call the police? It’s silly nowadays, how made-up videos can get so much attention.”

“No, no police required,” I tell her with a forced laugh, and she smiles at me, slipping the charm into her pocket before moving back toward the house. “Made-up videos. God. Half the world believes we’re performing skits for attention and the other half actually believe we’re witches. I can’t decide which is worse.” I glance over at Marlowe, and this time, I don’t have to force a smile. “That was nice, you know, to give her that. What does it do?”

“It repels ghosts,” he says with a shrug. “When I first got to the woods, they were everywhere. The Hag’s eaten most of them since then, but I couldn’t stand it. None of them have eyes.” He licks his lips. Hot. “I only gave it to her because she reminds me of my mom.”

There’s a beat of tense silence between the three of us as the ghost clacks her blue and white fingernails against the glass of the nearest window.

“She saw it,” Tanner grumbles, taking the extra lemonade from me. We head around to the back of the house to find Brooks. It’s more secluded back here, harder to see from the street.

Brooks accepts the lemonade from his East, studying me before he downs the entire glass in a few artful swallows. The way his throat moves. The slight edge of stubble on his skin. His parted lips. Ugh.

These men are still driving me absolutely crazy.

It just hits different now.

“The homeowner can see the ghost,” Tanner reports, like a general. Brooks’ eyes harden, and the edge of his lip curves up in a grimace. Marlowe looks a bit pale, hands shoved in his pockets. The sun continues to burn away the sea fog.

“Fuck.” Brooks passes the empty glass back to me. “Just … fuck.”

He stayed up all night again last night. I might’ve been drunk, but I also definitely missed having him in bed with us. Poor Southwoods. I need to learn how to write spells, too.

“Let’s bore ‘em to death,” I tell the men, gesturing at the influencers. I might not be able to help with the ghost stuff or the spell writing, but I can handle this. “Once they know there’s nothing to see, they’ll move on.”

Brooks, Tanner, Marlowe … they’re plenty to look at on their own.

The missing Witchwood Boys returned at last.

I finish my own lemonade and return all four glasses to Mrs. Madsen. The ghost watches me the entire time I’m in the house and even though Marlowe is right—she has no eyes, just black pits where eyes should be—I know she can see me.

We pack up at the end of the day, and I’m relieved to see that there’s only a small group of people waiting for us. Maybe ten in total. We carry our supplies right through them, ignoring their shouts for interviews, the heckling questions, the total bullshit they spew.

Marlowe and Tanner both look like they might throw down, so I touch them. That’s all it takes, my hands on their arms. Brooks, I trust him to control himself against words. If someone were to touch him, it’d be a different matter altogether.

We hop in the truck with Brooks in the driver’s seat. He eases us out of the mess we’re in and takes us back in the direction of the house.

I can’t wait to get there. Grandma’s house has always been my sanctuary. Today, more than ever, I need that. It’s always been home, but having the men live there with me? It’s my favorite place in the world all over again, just like it was when my grandma was alive.

People. People make home. I have people now.

I’m smiling despite the day, but only until we get onto my street.

That’s when the nightmare starts.

Our little side street, with woods across the road and only a handful of houses, it’s swarming.

There are regular people en masse, armed with phones and cameras. I see a drone flying over my roof. There are vans, too, with the names of news stations on them. Unwanted visitors crowd our porch, cluster on our lawn, block our driveway.

“What the fuck?” This from Marlowe as he peers out the window with wide eyes and tight fists. “Did the foreboding spell come down?”

“Goddamn it, don’t these people have any shame?” Brooks asks, stopping the truck in the street as faces turn to look at us, the collective energy of the crowd directed our way.

“Should we go somewhere else for now? Have dinner? Try to come up with a game plan.” This from me. I’m feeling panicked all of a sudden. My house is my safe place. Our safe place. This is our retreat from the world and the Witchwoods both.

Tanner says nothing, staring out at the horde of internet zombies surrounding our house.

“No.” Brooks is stern, hands tightening on the wheel. “I already told you: we are not living our lives according to the whims of other people—especially ones we don’t know and wouldn’t fucking like.” He turns the wheel sharply, hits the gas, and surges up over the curb.

People scramble out of his way. Lucky them because I think he might’ve hit them if they hadn’t. We roll across the grass and park partially in the driveway. Two large vans are parked right there in our space.

The four of us open our doors in unison, heading for the porch steps as a group.

Reporters hound us, yelling and thrusting their mics in our faces. Selfie sticks are jammed into our personal space. There are hands on my arms. Tugging at my clothing. Shouting. Condemnation. A man with a cross is screaming about witches.

“Burn them! They’re satanic! Burn them all!”

The crowd heaves and shoves while treacherous thoughts consume me.

It’s in those few strange seconds that I wonder if it would be such a bad thing, to let the Witchwoods take over the world. Does it really matter? Are the creatures from that place any worse than the ones from this one? We should leave the fucking gate open, see how they like the Hag Wytch singing them to sleep at the end of a moonless night.

Brooks and Marlowe are physically moving people out of our way, but Tanner, he’s as much a zombie as his dad was in the woods. He’s moving, but I can see his shadow looming above him, invisible to the crowd but a block of pure night sky to me, a blot against the yelling and the screaming.

“ Burn the witches!”

“ Kate, we all know you weren’t camping. Where were you?”

“ Can you reveal your identities? Put the Witchwoods legend to rest? There are grieving families out there. You’re preying on their sympathies. Are you okay with that?”

We’ve managed to fight our way from the van to the bottom of the porch stairs, but it’s a struggle for every step. With each person that Brooks and Marlowe move, two more take their place. Tanner is stoic, but resigned …

… until somebody attacks me.

A man snatches me by the hair, and I cry out as my head jerks back.

That does it.

The Eastwoods breaks.

Tanner reaches out and takes the attacker’s arm in-hand, snapping the bone with a tight grip on wrist and elbow. The man—the religious guy, as it so happens—screams bloody murder, but fortunately, with the tight press of the crowd, it’s unlikely that anyone got video.

The screaming only riles the group further, and the crush of bodies presses tighter. The volume of the crowd cranks up. Flashes and recordings and drones and yelling and vehicles and body heat and smells. Body odor, perfume, cologne, and greed.

I feel a warm hand on my side, but a welcome one this time. Tanner wraps his strong arm around my waist and tucks me protectively against him. At the same time, he spins us both to face the sidewalk, turning toward the crowd instead of away from it.

Silver eyes hard.

Mouth in a flat line.

His tattoos writhe on his skin, and I’m grateful that nobody else can see that.

Tanner draws in a long, slow inhale, like he’s trying to calm down. All of the air in the front yard seems to follow that path, flooding in toward him until I see people clutching at their throats. Gasping for breath. Swaying where they stand.

He’s suffocating the entire crowd, all at once. My eyes go wide as I turn to him, but as easy as a blink, everything goes still. No more inhaling. No breeze. Perfect quiet.

“Oh, shit.” That’s Marlowe. The only sound. I hear nothing else.

Tanner exhales, and that’s it.

I see a ripple, almost in slow-motion, hit the crowd. It pushes out in a circle around us, leaving only me, him, Marlowe, and Brooks unaffected. Like a sonic boom, the people closest to us are hit first, like they’ve all been simultaneously punched in the midsection. They fall back as the people behind them double over next, and it’s like a circle of dominos falling around us.

Bodies hit the ground with grunts and cries, some of them still choking for air.

And then they go flying backward, sliding and rolling and tumbling across the ground like they’re caught in a hurricane. My head whips over as a screech sounds from the driveway. First, one white news van and then the other, they fall onto their sides with a horrific crash. The scrape of metal on cement, and they’re no longer on our driveway. The pair of them lie in a street filled with groaning humans.

Marlowe was right: oh, shit. Oh fucking shit. Oh my God.

Tanner has pushed every single person that was on our property off of it. The vans. The religious man with the now-broken arm. The newscasters and the influencers and the busybodies. Not a single person is any closer than the sidewalk.

Sound floods back in. Rough, ragged inhales. Gasps. Whimpers. Cursing.

“Did you get that on camera?” someone asks, and there’s a chorus of responses that range from I think so to fuck yeah, I’m livestreaming! I don’t blame Tanner for what just happened, but I’m in panic mode now.

“Stay calm,” Brooks commands, and the sound of his voice is like an iron rod being shoved into my spine. Straightening it. Keeping me still and rational. He strides over to the truck, opens the tailgate, and yanks out the tarp.

Witch hats fall to the ground in a heap as the yelling starts all over again. A man tries to walk onto the property, and all Tanner has to do is blink. The guy goes flying, slamming into three other people and sending all four of them to the pavement.

Brooks picks up the hats and passes them out.

He yanks his onto his head while staring at the three of us.

“Quickly.” He holds out his hands for the men to take. I grab onto Tanner and Marlowe, and we adjust our circle until we’re each situated in the correct direction. Brooks begins to hum, so I follow suit, catching and holding that eerie tune without issue. I hate performing under pressure. But … I perform better under pressure. Catch-22.

Spontaneous combustion—thanks to Brooks—occurs at my feet, a bonfire springing out of nothing. Overhead, clouds roll in and it begins to rain. It feels like I should be contributing to this magical storm, but I have no idea what to do.

Vines spring from my confusion, spiderwebbing out from where I’m standing. Flowers join the party, blooming in eerie celebration, turning the grass around us into a carpet of orange petals and star-shaped pistils. Pollen is thick and heavy in the air.

We start to dance, and it takes everything I have inside of me not to look at the people around us. Not to think about being filmed. This is why I don’t want to be the leader, I realize. Because I’m trusting in Brooks to get us through this, and I have no idea what else we can do.

We drop hands and throw our arms up, spinning in a circle, skipping, flinging our hands at the fire until it grows larger. Shadows rise behind us, too tall and thin and wicked to be human.

Our audience is wilting away from us like they’ve been poisoned.

My pollen in their noses. Marlowe’s rain on their hair. Brooks and Tanner working together to push the smoke across their eyes, blinding them.

When the boys reach up to tug charms from their hats, I do the same. Tanner reaches out and corrects my grip, from one charm to another. We tug them off, and I try not to notice how barren the cones of our hats have become. We’re going through these charms much faster than the men made them.

We toss the items in the fire, little glass bottles cracking, purple and green liquid oozing and bubbling. The orange flowers in the grass are maturing into pumpkins, big plump squash all around us. How … very apropos.

I’m sure that was all me and my personal perceptions of what a witch is. Doesn’t matter. I imagine the effect would be the same if I summoned a sea of roses or a field of daisies, a chorus of irises or a symphony of lilies.

The dance slows, and Brooks steps forward, right through the flames. He walks through the fire like it’s nothing, takes my face in warm hands and kisses me with such perfect intent and roughly banked fervor that I tremble. An entire conversation happens in that kiss, and I love it.

I’m grabbing at him and leaning in, gripping his shirt and pulling him down to me.

Brooks draws his thumbs down my jaw on either side, stripes of heat left by ember fingertips.

I can handle this. I will handle this. Settle, Kate. His words are in the strength of his touch.

My body presses flush to his, and I can feel his approval for me in his cock. Oh yes, South. Yes.

The moment is cut short by the smell of pollen and smoke and pumpkins that are actively ripening on the vine. By the smell of rain and the now disoriented crowd.

We’re casting the foreboding spell again, aren’t we? But it’s not the same. There’s something more in those charms, in this miasma of energies we’ve created.

Brooks pulls our lips apart and grits his teeth, turning away like he’s in pain. His absence makes room for Marlowe, looming big and angry and dark-eyed out of the smoke the way he emerged from the shadows in the woods.

He was my attacker then. He’s my lover now.

My breath catches.

My heart stutters.

It feels like I am the one that’s being put under a spell.

Marlowe doesn’t touch me with his hands. He leans over me, the brims of our hats crashing together and wrinkling. The teeth on mine catch the fabric on his and, without my permission, my hat’s tongue sneaks out and licks the side of his neck.

I taste his emotions: wide-eyed awe, cruel satisfaction, a slick heat I could drown in.

He kisses me.

It’s a quick, rough, messy kiss, something peppered with emotion. It’s nothing like the practiced, almost sly kisses he gave me before. Some of them were intended to cut. Some were rough, meant to bruise. This is … a gift.

Marlowe ascends as quickly as he descended, moving away from me and leaving space for Tanner.

Oh.

Gold and black hair plastered to his forehead. Shirt stuck to his broad shoulders and strong chest. Silver scar down his face. Tattooed hands reaching for me and falling on my hips.

The press of Tanner’s skin is hot, catching that narrow space between my overalls and the crop top I wore underneath. He warms up my rain-soaked skin, pulling me close and wrapping me up in his embrace. More than that, he cuts through the assault of scents. My lids flutter closed, and I breathe in what feels like pure fucking oxygen mixed with forest and earth and rage.

He wants to be violent.

But not with me.

Never.

I twine my arms around his neck and kiss him back. As our mouths come together, hot and wild in the rain, I hear a rumbling all around us and the ground quivers. I don’t know what it is, and I don’t care.

I nip his lower lip, and he returns the favor, nipping mine. I bite him. He bites me. My entire body is flushed as he hauls me up so that my toes aren’t even touching the ground anymore. I bite him on the neck—hard.

Tanner makes a sound and slides an arm under my ass to hold me as he carries us both up the porch steps and into the house. I look up and over his shoulder just briefly at the last minute, and what I see takes my breath away.

There’s an eerie fog settling over the front yard and the street. People are stumbling down the pavement without their phones and cameras, leaving bags and other items behind them. Nobody is talking.

Marlowe and Brooks are collecting the leftover items in trash bags while pumpkins rot in the front yard, and the unnatural summer rain comes down in a concentrated rush above our house and our house alone.

We’re fucked now. Even with this clean-up, it won’t matter. People were live-streaming. Some of what happened today will make it out into the wide world of the internet.

I can’t bring myself to care at that exact moment.

Tanner gets us to the couch and then turns, slumping down on it. I expect him to fuck me, but then the wave of exhaustion hits so hard that I crumple against his chest and he laughs at me.

“You tired, kitten?” he murmurs gently, lips near my hair. And then, ticked-off and frustrated: “Fuck, I shouldn’t have done that.”

“No,” I correct, lifting my head up to look at him. “ They shouldn’t have done that. Swarmed us at our home.”

His silver-blue eyes shimmer, and he offers a slight shake of his head.

“I could deal with that. What they shouldn’t have done is touch you .”

Despite my exhaustion, there’s a creeping heat in my skin that I can’t shake.

My hand comes to rest softly against the side of Tanner’s face, and he closes his eyes, relaxing into the touch. We should probably go back out and help Brooks and Marlowe, but I also know that Tanner needs this space to decompress. The cleanup can wait a minute. Besides, that fog outside hasn’t gone anywhere, blurring the edges of the world and making it feel like our house is the only house in the world.

Just like the Witchwoods.

One cottage and no other people.

It’s relaxing to step outside of society like this. I take a sudden breath, and it tastes like freedom. Our coven does exist outside of the world. I can take a break from everything with these men.

Even going viral.

I can escape that, too.

But not the Wytch. The Wytch. The wicked Wytch.

“I almost killed the one that grabbed you,” Tanner grumbles, sliding his thumb along my bottom lip and collecting rainwater. He licks it off, and I mimic the movement, cleaning my own lips off with my tongue. Tastes like salt and smoke. More than that, I taste like Tanner. I kiss him again, just a quick press of lips to refresh the taste and enforce it. “I should have killed him. No, what really should’ve happened is I shouldn’t have let him get ahold of your hair in the first place.”

Tanner is furious, but doing an admirable job of controlling himself. He thinks he screwed up. Maybe he’ll forgive Marlowe for the Witch’s Tree incident now? I hope so.

“Life doesn’t always go the way we want or expect, Tanner. Don’t worry about it. You had my back. That’s all I could ever ask for.” I press my forehead to his and he deflates the way Marlowe does. Both of them are slaves to a soft touch. Brooks is a little different. “I don’t need or want you to be perfect. I’m certainly not.”

Tanner relaxes back into the couch cushion, and the grandfather clock ticks slowly away in the corner. Counting down the seconds. Counting down until what, I haven’t decided yet.

His eyes find mine as I rest my hands on his shoulders, encouraging my soft body to mold to his much harder one. I’m happy here on his lap. I could sit here forever. Although, it’s quite possible I’ll fall asleep soon.

Spellcasting is exhausting work.

He catches my chin in his fingers, and I bite down on his thumb.

We both like that.

Tanner reaches up with his free hand and shoves the brim of his hat out of the way so that he can see me better, wolf ears half-cocked. He flicks the brim of mine up with two fingers, and nearly cuts himself on one of its sharp fangs.

He brings my mouth in toward his, but he doesn’t kiss me. He hovers, and it’s frustrating.

I really fucking want him to kiss me.

I try to kiss him instead, but he tightens his fingers on my chin, putting a stop to that.

“You’re wrong, Kate. We’re perfect together .” He gives me a shit-eating grin, and I scoff.

“There’s one of those hotshot lines again,” I start, but then he finally kisses me and the words are stolen away by hot tongue and cool wind, a breeze ruffling the curtains behind Tanner’s head like a haunting.

I reach down to undo his pants, and he stops me with a hard hand on my wrist.

“Just because it’s a hotshot line doesn’t make it untrue, Kate. You’re just the only woman I’ve never lied to.”

Oh.

I finish undoing Tanner’s pants and only leave his side long enough to shed my overalls, climbing over him and sinking down on his cock until our bodies meet.

With the front door thrown wide, and an eerie mist creeping into the foyer, I fuck my man while the unease of foreboding spreads across the city. When the other two come back, I fuck them, too.

And still, the grandfather clock ticks.