I woke up to weak morning light filtering into my room, half expecting Sam to be gone, but as I became conscious of my surroundings, I realized that the hard surface beneath my cheeks was his chiseled chest, and he hadn’t gotten up in the middle of the night or just before dawn and fled the scene as I’d assumed he might.
Aware that I was awake, he smoothed back
I spent most of the day in the woods, recharging my energy, though I did go inside for lunch because that seemed like the responsible thing to do. I had to get used to the idea that I was the only one who was going to take care of me now, without my parents or my grandma around to do it. I wanted to be as much like an adult as possible, and that meant remembering to eat three meals a day and all of that jazz.
“What is it?” I asked Raven, not sure what it might be she wanted to tell me about. The fact that she thought we should have a conversation before she moved in made sense to me, but if she wanted to talk about her feelings for me, I wasn’t sure I was ready for that.Raven blew out a hot breath. “Before you moved here, I was in a lot of trouble with
I didn’t sleep well that night. It had less to do with Raven being there, though her story did weigh heavily on my mind. It was mostly the wind and rain that kept me tossing and turning so that I didn’t even wake up until almost 9:00, which might not have seemed so late if I didn’t have a new houseguest.By the time I was awake enough to realize that Rave
We dropped Sam’s stuff off at the house and then headed to the diner to talk to Ben. It was too early for lunch, and a bit too late for breakfast. It seemed like most people preferred the donut shop for breakfast anyway. There were a few older people sitting in booths, eating eggs and bacon, and a couple grabbing an early lunch with sandwiches and fries on their plates, but the place was much quieter than the last few times I’d been in.
Having my entire pack beneath the same roof was pretty amazing. I hadn’t felt that content since we’d moved from Sacramento. Maybe even since I was a little girl, before my dad died. It had taken some work getting everyone moved in, but by the time we were all ready to get some sleep, Joshua and Ben’s beds were situated in what used to be a dining room. We’d hung a curtain between them so they’d have some more privacy since the room was big enough for that, unlike their own room. Horace hadn’t been there when we’d gotten everything out, but if he had, I would’ve given him a little more of the same of what I’d given him before.
Sam was so gentle with me, so careful. He took everything slowly, waiting for my approval, either through my eyes or from my reaction. Never in my wildest dreams would I have thought my first time could’ve been so perfect.He kissed me, his tongue tangling with mine. I lay back, and he came with me off to my side as he continued to kiss me, deeper and more passionate
I woke up late the next morning, in my own bed--alone. I was wearing the same thing I’d had on when I’d gone to bed the night before, and for a moment, I thought maybe it had all been a lovely dream. Maybe I hadn’t gotten up in the middle of the night and gone outside with Sam.But my body told me otherwise. It wasn’t pain, exactly. More like a deep
I stared at Raven for a long time, not quite sure I’d heard her correctly. Well, that’s not quite true. I knew I’d heard her. What I didn’t know was whether or not I’d understood her. “The Parker pack was here, in our forest, last night, because of you?” I asked her, once I regained the ability to speak.Raven nodded. “Yeah.
There’s a comfy chair right next to the fireplace in the main living area of Brookstone. It has become my favorite place to sit. I can sit there for hours and do absolutely nothing but stare out the window at the beautiful forest and sparkling lake. It’s amazing to me to think how far I’ve come in just a year and a few months. I don’t just sit around and do nothing, though. I haven’t had to use my magic to fight off any other mages or shifters since we destroyed Grimly Grouse and his evil minions, but I do use my magic sometimes for other things, like producing presents for my friends or making mythical creatures to entertain us. Brookstone is as beautiful on the inside as it is on the outside. Part of that is the fact that we modernized it and redecorated a lot of the rooms. We wanted all of the modern conveniences we were used to, but we didn’t ruin the amb
My plan had been pretty simple. I’d bust into Brookstone, make the other mages and any shifters that were there think that the house was on fire, and I’d run them out to where my pack mates were waiting to take them down.I had no idea one of my pack members had her own idea of what should happen then. I guess I should have. It isn’t as if she hasn’t shocked me enough times in the past for me to expect Fionna to do something… unexpected.The mages in Grimley’s pack came streaming out of the house. Most of them went out the front door because I’d started the alleged fire in the kitchen, which was in the back of the house, on the east side. Fionna, being the tricky mage that she is, had opened a portal right on the other side of the front door so that every single one of the mages who ran out that exit sprinted right int
I didn’t bother to get a ride back to Brookstone the next day. It was clear that no one wanted to drive out there anyway, and it wasn’t as if it was a necessity. We had other ways of getting there, after all.I volunteered to change my wolves into birds so they could fly with us, but all of them passed on that. They said they weren’t used to flying and were afraid they’d fall out of the sky or something. Like I’d let that happen. I’d rolled my eyes, but since most of the area around where we’d stayed the night before was woodsy and rural, we decided it would be okay for them to walk out into the woods and shift there. The rest of us would fly over.My wolves weren’t going to be entering the property until after I knew the situation in the house. Once I knew whether we were on the defensive or the offensive, I woul
It was difficult to get rooms with enough beds for all of us, but my wolves decided they could always shift into their wolf forms and sleep on the floor, and since most of them didn’t sleep much anyway, we went with that. I was definitely going to be sleeping that night, though. I was so tired, I could barely keep my eyes open to discuss the plan for the next day. Fighting mages is hard work--apparently.“So what is our plan for tomorrow?” Kaylee asked. We were gathered in the room she and I were sharing, all of us sitting on the beds, the floor, and the small sitting area. “I take it we’re going right back there since you wanted to stay so close, Harlow.”“Yeah, we need to go right back over there and take care of things once and for all,” I said. “We just need a plan that will get rid of Grimly Grouse as s
With the ground shaking beneath our feet, the mages lifted themselves up into the air. I pulled up my wolves, too, but that didn’t help save my house. The thought of Grimly Grouse destroying my family home was enough to make me want to set his hair on fire.The ground was cracking beneath us now, some of them were at least a foot across. The idea of one of my people dropping inside of one of them was enough to make me want to fly everyone out of there and back to our rental right away.“Kaylee,” I shouted, wanting to try to fix the problem beneath us and keep my wolves out of danger. “Can you take over for me?”“You mean… float them?” she asked. “All of them?”“We can all help,” Liam said from the o
Looking around at my mages, I tried to determine who I needed to help and who was okay on their own. Liam was taking on a large male mage with a nose ring and the appearance of horns coming out of his bald head. I assumed those were placed there by magic, and he didn’t really have horns growing out of his head, but it was difficult to know for sure. “Give it up, Harlow!” I heard Grimly shout from far behind the line of advance. “I have more reserves. You cannot win.” It was difficult for me to keep my eye on this brute that was about to knock Liam out and respond to the maniac in the back. I decided to ignore Grouse and concentrate on Liam’s predicament. I was fairly far away from the fight, and there were other engagements going on between me and Liam, but I couldn’t let that stop me. The devil guy with the horn
The mages from Brookstone were slowly walking toward us, their long cloaks in a rainbow of colors not even moving from the wind they made, their steps were so even and slow. I stared at them for a long moment, trying to determine what the best thing to do was. A quick estimate told me that there were probably about thirty of them, which meant my team was outnumbered about five to one as mages went. The wolves would be able to help a little, but not much. They were mostly there to fight off any wolves that came our way, and Grimly Grouse had stopped using those, pulling out the big guns instead.We really only had two choices. We could stand there and fight and probably get annihilated because we were outnumbered so badly, or we could run away, regroup, and figure out when and how we should come back. I was really starting to lean toward Plan B, but when I looked at the faces of my packmates, I could tell t
I took advantage of the fearful flicker I’d seen in Grimley Grouse’s eyes and hit him with a bolt of power before he had much time to expect it. He got his hands up, but it wasn’t enough to completely deflect it. I ended up hitting him hard enough to knock him backward almost to the edge of the stream. The other mages around him took a few seconds to stare in shock before they remembered they had powers and could possibly do something to help him.They weren’t going to be able to help him, though. My mages were all ready, so before any of the red cloaked mages could hit me with their powers, mine had their hands up, shooting rays of light to counteract the ones directed at me. I watched the magic around me bend and shift, redirecting back the way it was coming. A few of the red mages were knocked off balance, but none of them went flying the way that Grouse did, probably because mos
I heard the first sounds of battle coming from my left, to the southwest of the house, but I couldn’t tell who it was that was caught up first by the wolves coming from Brookstone. I thought that Raven and Tony had been the furthest to the south, but I wasn’t certain. I decided I should fly over there and have a look. Of course, by the time I got over there, there was a good chance the rest of my wolves would be under attack as well since we’d seen the wolves shooting through the forest at an incredible rate spread out in a line. As I landed, I heard the sounds of battle echoing across the forest as Grimly Grouse’s wolves collided with mine. This wasn’t going to be pretty. I changed back into my mage form as soon as my feet touched the ground and immediately fired a