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18

Supernatural Avengers

Harry could now cross being witchnapped off her bucket list, although Nora, sitting in the passenger seat of Marie’s Sugar Tits delivery van, assured them it was for Fates Festival purposes and nothing nefarious.

Her ass disagreed. One more jostle like the one before and she’d either break her tailbone or crack a filling. Blindfolded and without the ability to tell which way the van was about to lurch, she tensed, her muscles already aching.

The van dipped unexpectedly; and with a curse, Harry gripped the closest thing… the thigh next to her.

Jax’s warm hand slid over hers as he leaned closer, filling her senses with his spicy musk. “Have to say that when I envisioned us using blindfolds, it wasn’t in quite this way.”

“Jax! We are not alone despite what the sensory deprivation says!”

He chuckled. “Relax. They all can’t hear me.”

“But enough of us can, thank you very much,” Silas volleyed back. “Listening to your horrid attempts at flirting is excruciating.”

“And he can identify horrid flirting attempts because his are even worse,” Elodie quipped from Harry’s other side.

“You’ve never been on the receiving end of my flirtation, angel eyes, so how would you know?”

“And that’s something I’m thankful for every day of my life.”

Harry groaned. “Do you see what you started?”

“Who? Me?” Jax’s low chuckle shook his shoulders. Their friends continued their back-and-forth, members from both teams joining the trash talk. “I’m suddenly very thankful that Nora stuffed both our teams in the back of this seatless van because if she hadn’t, it would be pretty damn difficult to do this.”

Jax’s large hand slipped around the back of her head and hauled her lips to his. Fingers flexed in the front of his shirt for support, she held on and enjoyed each and every thrust of his tongue, combining it with her own, and let everything around them melt away into the ether.

She lost track of time, only becoming aware of the abrupt silence when she heard a soft pleasured hum—her own—echo throughout the van.

“Those better be I’m gonna kick the other team’s ass moans,” Elodie warned, “because if they’re not, I’ll be the one kicking asses.”

Harry swallowed a chuckle.

“Worth it,” Jax whispered against her mouth, giving her one last hard kiss before pulling away. “Definitely worth it.”

“All right, everyone, less smooching and more paying attention,” Nora interjected. “We’re moments from letting team Big Bads out at their designated drop zone, and soon after, team Fearsome Four. As a reminder, your groups are not to remove your blindfolds or begin your challenge in any way until your beeper alarm sounds. Once it does, your team has until dawn to make it back to the Starlight Gazebo… and I stress, your team . This isn’t a one-for-all scenario. All four team members must be present to consider the challenge complete.”

The van came to an abrupt stop and people shuffled.

“We’ll try not to embarrass you by being too fast,” Jax boasted a second before the brush of his lips feathered along her cheek. “Good luck.”

The door closed and they were on the move again. When they came to another stop, a firm touch guided her from the back of the van.

“Good luck, girls.” Marie cheered them on. “And don’t tell my grandson, but I’ve got my money—literally—on you four. Don’t let an old woman down.”

A door closing and engine revving told them Nora and Marie had left them alone in the middle of nowhere.

“I wonder how long until we—” Grace was cut off by the beep of an alarm. “Never mind.”

They all shed their blindfolds and immediately scanned their surroundings.

“Any ideas?” Harry tried identifying any landmarks, but every tree looked like the one next to it and what she very loosely considered a trail, which the delivery van must have used, disappeared as if it never existed.

Lenny huffed, catching on to the same thing she did. “Looks like Nora thought of everything. We can’t even follow the tire tracks. Anyone have any clue where we are?”

“None. Elodie?” Harry asked.

“On it.” The angel shed her backpack, which held the scant few items each were allowed to bring on the drop, and then whipped off her shirt, revealing her sports bra. In another blink, her wings erupted. Nearly eight feet across and a beautiful array of ivory and silver, they were a breathtaking sight every damn time.

Grace’s mouth gaped. “That is fucking awesome.”

Harry chuckled knowingly. “It never gets old.”

“Give me a sec and I’ll have a bird’s-eye view.” Elodie pushed off the ground and shot through the trees. Her curses trickled down from the thick foliage along with a few errant branches. “Shit. That’s going to leave a mark.”

“Problem up there, El?” Harry glimpsed the angel’s wings through the branches, catching a feather as it floated toward them.

“Almost there.” Twigs and branches snapped and finally Elodie released an annoyed huff. “We’re gonna need that little glowing magical compass because I don’t recognize squat. Like not a damn thing. Where the hell did they drop us? Wyoming?”

They’d been afraid of this. Allowing them to use their gifts seemed all too easy for those who could gain an aerial view and quickly spot landmarks. Elodie fought her way back down, sacrificing a few more feathers while Harry heated up her palms and pulled that little thread of magic from her core.

The familiar misty compass pulsed as she turned right and dimmed as she shifted left. “Looks like we’re heading right.”

With bolstered confidence, Elodie took the lead and set the pace, Harry guiding them into turns as her compass piloted her. Grace hung close to the rear, a contemplative look on her face.

“You doing okay?” Harry sent her a concerned look. She’d been a little quiet since seeing Elodie sprout feathers and take off. “I won’t lie. You being quiet is a little eerie. What’s up?”

“Just thinking.”

“About anything in particular or about everything?”

Grace shrugged. “Why do you think it’s so difficult finding out anything about my father?”

“Both from what Gavin said, and then after meeting Tomlyn, the fae have always held their secrets pretty close to their hearts. I don’t know if that’s for any reason other than it’s what they’ve done for thousands of years.” Harry studied Grace a little more carefully. “Why?”

“So you don’t think it’s because I could be something… dangerous?”

Harry dragged her to a gentle stop for a moment, letting her compass dissipate. “You are not dangerous, Gracie.”

“Except that I kinda am… especially when I get angry and my fire gets all temperamental and—”

“And I got pegged in the head with a stuffed pig and Lenny almost had to make an urgent care visit to get a LEGO removed from her nasal cavity when my magic went all wonky. The last time you had problems with your fire was that first day on the ranch, right?”

“Yeah… I guess. The meditation seems to help a lot, but you haven’t been able to find anything in that fae book and I can’t help wondering if there’s a reason for it.”

“There is a reason,” she said seriously. “Because Nora can only keep it translated for so long and I can only read so fast. There’s a lot of information in there, and I don’t want to miss something important because I’m skim reading.”

“So you don’t think it’s for any other reason?” Grace bit her lower lip.

“Gracie.” Harry cupped her cheeks and pulled the teen’s attention to her. “I’m going to tell you something that Aunt Nora once told me. A wielded gift is no more dangerous than the wielder who possesses it.”

“Meaning?”

“Meaning any gift has both the potential to do good or bad. In which direction it goes relies completely on the gift wielder. Stay true to your heart, and you’ll never need to worry.”

“You sure about that?”

“Without a doubt. You, my sarcastic, snarky Grace Taylor, have a heart so steeped in goodness that you have nothing to fear.”

Tears welled at the corner of the teen’s eyes, and before Harry was prepared for it, Grace’s arms wrapped tightly around her waist, crushing her in a hug that made breathing challenging. Harry savored the moment and returned the hug.

“Thank you, Harry.” Grace’s words sounded muffled. “I know I can be a brat a lot of the time, and I don’t tell you nearly enough, but thank you. For everything… especially for bringing me to Fates Haven.”

Harry sucked down her own surge of emotions. “No thanks needed, kiddo. Although it’s nice hearing that you’re self-aware enough to call yourself a brat sometimes.”

They both chuckled, earning themselves a glare from the angel leading the charge.

“I really hate to break up this touching moment,” Elodie interjected, hands on her ample hips, “but we have a team of egotists to beat. Harry… light ’em back up, please.”

Harry flashed Grace a wink and recalled her magical compass. They got back on track, cursing their drop zone when they trekked up the third steep incline that left even Elodie a little breathless. At the next summit, they stopped for a drink and a quick rest.

Harry took a bite of her power bar when something sucker punched her in the gut. Granola spewed everywhere as she sucked in a breath, doubling over as a secondary wallop of something yanked on her magical core and brought her to her knees.

Grace was at her side in an instant. “Lenny! Elodie! I think Harry’s choking or something! What do we do?”

“Not choking.” She wheezed, waving off El’s Heimlich arms prepped to wrap around her midsection.

“What’s happening?” Lenny guided her onto a rock.

Hand clenched to her chest, Harry fought to slow each breath and tried—and probably failed—to keep the panic off her face. “I don’t know. It’s… tugging.”

Grace hovered at her side, worried. “What’s tugging?”

Lenny’s gaze dropped to Harry’s pulsing hands. “Magic. Look. ”

They all glanced at her hands, now alight with twin pulsing orbs. In her right was the familiar golden compass that directed the way toward Fates Haven and Havenhood Park… and in the other was an entirely different glowing compass.

One Harry most definitely had not conjured.

It didn’t look like anything she’d ever created before with a brassy antique sheen and a brighter, lighter-blue-tinged glow. It pointed in the exact opposite direction of Fates Haven, and unless she was mistaken, toward Witch’s Peak.

Harry shook the hand with the weird compass, but it held on strong, not so much as flickering with the movement. “It won’t go away.”

Ignoring the pulsing magical waves, Grace clutched her hands. “Close your eyes and take a deep breath. Then slowly picture your special quiet space… a place where you feel nothing but peace.”

“You think I can meditate the strange away?” Harry quipped wryly.

“Flinging your hands around doesn’t seem to be doing the trick. What do you have to lose?”

Point made… and not without a severely heavy dose of irony.

Following the teen’s direction, she focused on soothing her frazzled nerves. It was a lot harder than she anticipated, but eventually her heart rate slowed and a warm cocoon of safety wrapped around her. That safety cocoon slowly transformed into a pair of arms.

Jax’s arms.

Jax was her peaceful space. Her safe space. He had been when they’d been teenagers, and there wasn’t a doubt in her mind that it would be the same when they were gray haired and zooming around on motorized scooters.

“It’s working.” Elodie’s soft encouragement urged her to keep going.

“Of course it’s working,” Grace said without a doubt.

Harry took another few breaths before slowly opening her eyes and assessing her magic. Its familiar warmth pulsed like a beacon and was back to where it was supposed to be. Alone. No second strand of mystery magic anywhere in the vicinity.

“That was really fucking weird.” Harry’s voice shook. “It almost felt like another magical source piggybacking on mine, and it was pretty damn insistent that it wanted me to follow it. Its will was almost all-consuming. It had… attitude.”

“How do you feel now? Do you still have the urge to follow it?” Lenny still looked concerned.

Harry mentally slid her mind down her own cord of magic and felt it vibrate. “No. It’s just my magic in there.”

“It’s probably that general wonkiness that has been going around Fates Haven,” Elodie suggested. “Which means maybe we’re closer to town than we previously thought.”

Harry wasn’t sure it was as simple as that, but it did make sense, and she also had the feeling they were closer to the town limits than they’d been earlier. But that remnant sensation of other still had a firm hold on her and wouldn’t let go.

“I’m sure that’s probably it,” she heard herself agree.

They all remained huddled around her.

Grace’s head snapped left and her eyes flickered gold as she listened to something in the distance. “I hear the Big Bads not that far away… and they realize they’re not far away from Fates, too.”

“Then we better start moving our asses.” Harry climbed back to her feet with a groan.

“Are you sure you’re okay?”

Harry flicked her familiar golden compass into existence, much faster than she’d been able to before. “Never been better.”

She regretted those words an hour later when huffing, puffing, missing a shoe, and dripping with sweat and mud of a questionable origin, they stumbled over the town limits. Starlight Gazebo was lit up with an array of white fairy lights and calling like a gorgeous beacon of hope.

People lined Fates Boulevard, all cheering and waving streamers. A roar erupted in the distance—Jax.

“Let’s go!” Harry hobbled as fast as she could, dropping her backpack as Elodie, grabbing Lenny under her arms, went airborne and lifted the screeching seer off the ground.

Harry cursed, shooting a look over her shoulder to see Cougar Jax standing in the middle of the road, Silas, Gavin, and Maddox at his side like the damn supernatural avengers. “We’re not making it.”

“Hell, yes, we are! We haven’t gotten this far to lose now.” Grace stopped in front of her and gave her her back. “Hop on!”

“What?” she scoffed. “Honey, no. I have like a hundred pounds on you.”

“Trust me, I can do it. And we’ll get there before Jax and the others. Just get on.” Grace’s eyes glinted in the moonlight, that gorgeous golden hue peeking through the brown.

Harry barely had her hand on the teen’s shoulders when Grace practically flipped her onto her back with inhuman strength, and then vroom. As if Grace had sprouted wings, she zoomed them past the street-lined crowd and even beat a breathless Elodie and still-screaming Lenny.

Harry and Grace toppled into the gazebo in a gale of laughter with Lenny and Elodie close behind.

“If you ever force my feet to leave the ground, I will pluck all your feathers while you sleep and start calling you Naked Chicken,” Lenny threatened the angel.

The seer’s stern look vanished and they all broke into fits of giggles. They were still laughing as Jax and the rest of the Big Bad team ambled up the steps, Silas looking highly irritated to have come in second place.

Harry glanced up as a large shadow blocked the glowing moon and looked into Jax’s amused expression. He now was on two feet and wore loose gray sweatpants and no shirt. She let her eyes soak in the gorgeousness.

“We won.” She grinned.

“Yes, you did.” Chuckling, he extended a hand and helped her to her feet in one strong tug. Their bodies collided in a warm, muddy squish. “Please tell me that you just tripped and fell into a vat of mud.”

“I did trip… and I’m pretty sure it’s at least seventy-five percent mud.”

“And the other twenty-five percent?”

“I prefer to think of it as victory.”