Page 5 of Agony of Our Regret (Sorcerer’s Society #11)

FIVE

Entering the second trimester was supposed to bring relief. Lies.

Maybe I was paying for finding out late, and my body was making me pay the full toll. Maybe I was coming up with explanations to keep from losing my mind.

“I never want to throw up again,” I whined quite pathetically with my head over the toilet bowl while Gavin held my hair back.

“I’m so sorry, baby.” He rubbed my shoulders. “It should gradually get better.”

It should, but I had my doubts.

“It hasn’t been this bad in a while.” I rested back against the sink.

“Maybe you ate something your stomach didn’t agree with.”

I hadn’t. It was six in the morning. I woke up to puke. “I only had a PB and J last night.”

“Right.” He continued his massage.

At least it was Saturday, and I wasn’t this sick at work. Luca didn’t have to witness this. He was on a special assignment that took him out of the city to an undisclosed location.

The Council didn’t give us many details, as much for our protection as for him and his team. I just hoped it would move us closer to ending the AS.

He should be back by Monday, but that was up in the air.

Maybe that’s what this was about. It wasn’t food poisoning or morning sickness. My body was freaking out because he was gone.

He promised me he wouldn’t be in any danger, but I knew better. His ability was his hearing. If our leaders added him to the team, they wanted his ability to hear from a distance for covert surveillance. But he still had to be close to the target, usually within the same building or even closer in noisy spaces.

Luca wouldn’t take unnecessary risks. He was smart and well-trained. I might be new to working for the Society, but he’d been at it for years.

I trusted him. I had to trust his team would have his back.

“Have you heard from him?” I didn’t need to specify who before Gavin shook his head.

“No, but he told us he likely wouldn’t be able to call or text.”

“That makes no sense. Why would they be somewhere he didn’t have service? If he’s a safe distance away, he should be able to text.”

“We don’t know the specifics.” Gavin stood and held a washcloth under the water before ringing it out and handing it to me.

I covered my face, gently pressing on my swollen eyes.

“He needs to focus.”

I let out a pathetic groan. “Fine.”

I left the towel on my face and listened while he moved around the bathroom. The shower started, and clothes hit the ground.

“Do you feel up to showering, or do you want to go lie down?”

I lifted the towel enough to peek at him. He was naked and had one hand stretched out to help me stand. I tossed it away and licked my lips. “I want to shower, but I think I’ll need help.”

A grin stretched his lips. “I can do that.”

He pulled me to my feet, and I yanked off my shirt while he tugged down the boxers I borrowed from one of them.

“Come here.” He stepped behind me before his hands landed on my hips to guide me into the walk-in shower.

The warm water washed over me, and I closed my eyes as I opened my mouth and quickly swished it away before spitting it out. Not very sexy, but neither was barf breath.

The rough touch of the loofah scraped gently over my skin as the scent of my body wash rose on the shower steam. Gavin gently rubbed down my arms and back before stepping closer behind me and pressing one palm over my stomach while the other lathered my breasts.

I groaned, all thoughts of nausea replaced by want.

As I eased my eyes open, he hummed against my ear. I slipped my hand behind me, finding his erection and slipping my fingers around him.

“This wasn’t what I planned.” His voice was tight as I stroked him.

“No?” I teased the tip before slipping back down to his base.

His hands froze, one squeezing my boob while the other dug into my hips.

How I could go from feeling like I was dying to starving for him made no sense, but I didn’t fight it. My body knew what it needed better than I did these days.

I leaned forward, resting my other hand on the tiled wall while I lined him up with my entrance.

“Ave,” he groaned again and pushed his hips forward, sliding into me, and filling me until I cried out.

“Oh, god,” I panted and slipped my hand down, cupping his balls once before catching myself on the wall as he thrust into me.

“You feel so fucking good.” He bent over and kissed the back of my neck, never losing his tempo.

I wanted to touch him, to make him feel as good as he made me, but all I could do was hold myself up as he reached that perfect spot, making me scream.

His fingers dug into my hips, pulling my ass back to slam into me again.

It was hard and fast and the perfect distraction. He always knew exactly what I needed and took care of each and every little—

“Fuck!” I cried, as I climaxed and shattered around him.

“Avalon,” he moaned as he came, filling me as his hips jerked.

I dropped my head against the warm tile and sighed.

Once we could both stand, we cleaned each other and stepped out to dry off. Then his phone rang from our room.

“Shit.” He hurried out, nearly slipping. I watched in the mirror as he frowned and answered the phone. “Mom? What’s wrong?”

I rubbed the towel over my skin and watched his face pale.

“When?” His eyes flashed to me. “Okay. Yeah.”

I bent over and wrapped the towel around my hair before stepping out and crossing the room to go to him. “What’swrong?”

He tried to smile, but it fell flat. “Call Luca.”

“He can’t––“

“Just try.” He turned his head, and Tessa was talking quickly.

I grabbed my robe from the hook near the door and pulled it on as I hurried to the other side of the room to get my phone from the nightstand. I hit Luca’s contact. The call went to voicemail, so I left a message.

Gavin was still on the phone and lifted his finger to make a circle motion and mouthed. “Again.”

I hit the call button again.

No answer.

Three more times.

On the fourth, he finally picked up. “Ave? Love? What’s wrong?”

“I’m not sure.” I crossed to Gavin. “He picked up.”

“Talk to my mom.”

We traded phones, and he leaned against the door frame. “Luca?”

I held up his phone to my ear, watching him. “Tessa? What’s going on?”

“Hi, sweetie,” I’d never heard her so stressed. “There’s been some movement from the AS. We just got tipped off that they released a list.”

“Of what?”

“Our members.”

“What?” I snapped my eyes to Gavin. He was pinching the bridge of his nose.

“We think we’ve caught all the major media outlets, but there’s a chance we missed something.”

“What does this mean?”

I knew but needed to hear someone else confirm.

“They’re trying to expose us.”

“But not their members?”

“Theirs, too. They want to reveal people in powerful positions and what they really are.”

“Powerful positions? Like Bruce?”

“He was included, but more so the people involved with the humans.”

Finally, I understood. “That shouldn’t include us.”

“It shouldn’t, but I saw a copy of the list. They added anyone they knew.”

“Shit.” I hadn’t meant to say that aloud, but she agreed.

“That’s all of us.”

“Because of Juliet.” I didn’t bother using that traitorous bitch’s real name. She infiltrated my life as my dad’s assistant, luring us to move to Arlington Park in hopes of my getting close to the guys.

“Yes.”

I blew out a tired breath. “What do we do?”

“We’re telling our members to return to their homes if they are on missions.”

That’s why I needed to call Luca.

“And we’re encouraging individuals and families far from councils to gather.”

“What do you mean?”

“CeeCee and Steph should either return here, Columbus, or find somewhere closer to Orlando, so they're near the local council there.”

My heart jumped to my throat. “What about Noah, Sky, and Vince?”

“They were all listed. They need to either find their closest Council or return immediately.”

“Have their parents told them?”

“I’m not sure. I called Gavin as soon as I heard. Their parents have been notified, so they should reach out to them.”

Shit. Shit. Shit.

Not only did they need to come home for their safety, something I’d panic about until they arrived, but I couldn’t hide my pregnancy symptoms with them around. I couldn’t dodge Sky’s questions when he was standing in front of me.

“Okay.”

“I’ll call back with an update as soon as I have it. Right now, you guys should stay home. Don’t go outside if you can avoid it, and do not go anywhere alone.”

“Okay,” I repeated numbly.

“We’ll be fine, Avalon. This is the break we’ve been waiting for. We can take action now that they have.”

She meant to comfort me, but as always, I just wondered what came next.

Gavin and I received messages from Noah, Skyler, and Vince’s parents. They reached the guys overseas and asked them to come to Chicago immediately.

Luca was on his way home too.

“What do you want to do?” Gavin sat a plate of cheese and crackers between us on the couch.

I stared at the black screen of the TV.

They were coming back.

Maybe.

That wasn’t confirmed.

Yet.

Just because their parents asked didn’t mean they would listen, and getting home would take time. Noah and Sky would have to arrange flights home and get back to a major airport. Vince would have to figure out his work situation.

This was a precaution, but much like shipping us off to a supernatural academy, the Society didn’t know how long the alert would last. Would this become our new normal? Hunkering down and waiting for the AS to strike?

No.

The threat disrupted too many people, plus the daily functions of the Society.

Upending the teenagers’ lives was one thing, but impacting every member was another.

“I’m not sure,” I finally answered.

“If they want to stay with us, it might be better to go back to your house. It’s not much bigger, but it has more space than this.”

Three bedrooms versus four. Either way, we’d have to share. Both felt too confined.

How had I gone from desperately wanting them back to dreading the reality of them being here?

Oh, because I was hiding an enormous secret.

He squeezed my hand once. “No matter what, Luca and I will support you.”

“How can we explain not letting them stay with us?” I finally voiced my concern. “After flying to them, asking them to come back, then they get here, and I’m like, ‘Oh never mind. Go home.’”

Gavin shifted, lifting his knee so he could face me. “If they had come back with you, or even within a few days, it would have made sense to have them stay with you. Now, I think they need to earn that privilege.”

I pursed my lips and considered. That made sense.

“They need to prove themselves?”

He nodded. “That and they need to figure out what their intentions are. If this is just a vacation and they plan to go back as soon as the Society gave the all clear, then they don’t stay with us.”

My chest tightened at that possibility, but it was entirely possible. Coming back didn’t mean they’d be here permanently. They still weren’t choosing me—us. The sooner I accepted that, the better.

“Okay, yeah. I don’t want them to stay with us if it's temporary.”

He released my hand, put a slice of cheese on a cracker, and handed it to me. I ate it and tugged a blanket over my lap.

“Have you heard when Luca should be back?”

“He said tomorrow around noon.”

I’d feel much better when he was home. None of us knew the ramifications of the AS’s release yet, and we had too much work ahead to mitigate the fallout. Best case, we caught all the news outlets and stopped things in time. Worse case, the AS planned for that and had something else up their sleeves. I hated being a pessimist, but that seemed more likely. If they were serious enough to expose our members, they wouldn’t be thwarted so easily.

But maybe my outlook was unique, given what they’d already put us through.

The other members didn’t understand how much their lives could change or how real the threat was.The complaints about feuding neighbors and who should host the next holiday brunch presented to the council seemed silly in comparison.

“What do you want to happen?” Gavin asked after handing me another cracker. He watched me eat in his not-so-subtle way of making sure I ate enough without having to hound me. I was grateful this snack, turned meal for me, seemed to have a truce with my stomach. It was one of the few things that didn’t make me queasy.

What did I want?

The delusional part of me wanted us all to live happily ever after and believed this was the first step toward making that happen. The realist screamed at that Pollyanna to shut up and protect her heart from another inevitable break.

Even letting myself think about the six of us working things out was dangerous.

“I want to see them.” I couldn’t imagine them being so close and avoiding them.

“How and when?”

I side-eyed him. “Are you planning something?”

“No.” He grabbed two bottles of water from the table and handed me one. “But you control this situation. If you don’t want to see them for a few days, I’ll make sure you don’t. If you want to meet somewhere neutral, I’ll plan it. If you want to be in public to decrease the odds of emotions getting out of control, I’ll make a dinner reservation. Factors out of our control had dictated so much of our lives. I want to make sure this isn’t one of those situations. I want you to be comfortable when or if it happens.”

And that was why I loved him with my whole heart and soul.

I leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Thank you.”

He smiled, and a blush crept up his neck. After all these years and with all we’d been through, he was still bashful around me. He was adorable.

“We don’t even know if they’re coming back, but if they are, I’d rather not have them show up unannounced at our front door.”

He nodded. “That won’t happen since they don’t know where we live.”

“And your parents won’t tell them?” It wasn’t like I wanted to keep it a secret forever, but the thought of them appearing without warning was stressful.

“I’ll make sure they don’t,” he assured me.

“Okay, I’d like to meet them somewhere neutral, but familiar.” I took another sip of water.

“One of our houses?”

That seemed like the best option. We used to meet at a park near our homes, but meeting inside would be more comfortable inside.

“Either yours or Luca’s would probably be best.”

He lifted a brow. “You’d be okay going to mine?”

I’d avoided that since moving back here and had only been once since we left for Drexel. As much as I loved his parents and home, looking across the street to the new house built after mine burned down was too harsh a reminder of my dark past. Even though nothing about the design was anything like when I lived there, just looking at the lot was hard.

“Whatever’s easier.” I tried to brush it off, but he didn’t let me.

“Let’s do Luca’s. Seeing everyone will be enough for one day, we don’t need to add on.”

I nodded. A reunion should be happy, but this one felt more like an oncoming disaster.