Page 57 of A Witchy Spell Ride

“No.”

“Good,” she said, and the word sounded like a promise this time.

I stepped close enough to feel her heat and not close enough to take anything I hadn’t been given. She reached for my wrist. Her thumb rested where I’d rested mine on the other man’s. A mirror held up to a better story.

“He made it personal,” I said.

She tilted her head. “He made us personal,” she corrected. “That’s different.”

“Yeah,” I said, and for the first time that day, the knot in my chest loosened. “It is.”

Chapter Sixteen

Selene

The clubhouse hadn’t changed.

Not really.

Same creaky floorboards. Same faded pool table with initials carved into the corner. Same scent of motor oil, sweat, bourbon, and too much testosterone.

But the moment I moved back in, everything felt… off.

It wasn’t the building.

It was me.

Because now I wasn’t Selene, Reaper’s little sister, the one who burned herbs in the corner and read tarot for club girls during downtime.

Now I was the girl with a shadow.

The one they were all watching.

The one who might bring danger to the front door.

And no one said it.

Not out loud.

But I could feel it.

In the way Bones checked every corner before letting me walk into a room.

In the way Ash offered to sleep on the hallway couch like it was casual.

In the way Vex stopped joking altogether when I passed him in the corridor.

Even Briar wasn’t herself, quieter, more watchful, always near but never still. She vibrated like a neon sign: warm, bright, warning.

Only Ghost stayed steady.

Always nearby.

Always silent.

And somehow the only thing in the world that still felt real. Three days until the Halloween party. The clubhouse was already half-decorated, mostly thanks to Daisy, one of the club girls, who was far too enthusiastic about fake cobwebs and black candles. Somebody had spray-painted a skeleton riding a Harley on the back wall. Briar threatened to put glitter on it.

Ghost muttered something about “armed threats and body paint” and walked off.