Page 11 of Bewitchingly Hers (Witches of Pleasant Grove #3)

CHAPTER EIGHT

barrett

I couldn’t stop the low rumble in my chest. He was leaned over the counter, reaching out to touch her arm.

Who did that? Touched someone else’s girl like that.

Of course, she wasn’t really mine. Not yet.

Even though every fiber of my being was begging for it. But I couldn’t touch . I needed to remember that. The implications were too high. What was at stake was too large to risk it all.

But then she smiled at him. And my wolf was ready to fight to the death. Like he’d throw down over some invisible gauntlet, over the small witch who had the other half of my soul. She tucked a strand behind her ear, looking visibly annoyed as she typed back and forth with me.

Tell him to chill. It’s none of his business who asks me out.

I scowled again at Eryne’s text message. She said that like it was so easy to control myself around her. I tried to remind myself that she had no idea.

Fate was playing a cruel trick on me that she didn’t recognize what we were to each other. My growl rumbled deep in my chest, and I watched as the skinny guy leave with his coffee cup in hand.

That’s right, my wolf said. Leave our mate alone.

I rolled my eyes internally before returning to the task at hand.

Since my phone had been dead when I’d gotten it, I’d had to charge it before I could call anyone back, and I had eighty seven missed calls.

That didn’t even count all the unread texts.

Fuck. I massaged my forehead, scrolling through the notifications on my phone.

After sending a quick text to my family, assuring them I was fine and had just been backpacking in the wilderness for two weeks without service, I dialed Ezra’s number.

He picked up on the second ring.

“It’s me,” I said without waiting for him to say hello, holding my phone up to my ear as I watched Eryne flitter around the coffee shop.

The entire place was decked out in halloween decor, from little black bats taped to the windows to small tissue paper ghosts hanging from the ceiling. Someone had clearly gone through the trouble of carving pumpkins and hanging lights for the coffee shop as well, giving it a cozy, warm vibe.

What must have been the entire town seemed to have stopped by this morning. I’d lost count of the amount of people that had asked for the famous pumpkin chocolate chip scones, or the sugar cookies that had me licking my lips.

And that didn’t even count the coffee that smelled absolutely divine.

I was only a little distracted taking it all in. It felt like I’d been coming here my whole life, instead of seeing it fully for the first time today.

“Oh, Lockwood.” Ezra’s voice, deep and slightly old-fashioned, came through the phone, bringing me back to the issue at hand. “I wasn’t sure you were even still alive. Two weeks, and you failed check in once.”

“I was sort of… otherwise incapacitated.” I winced, thinking about how I’d been slowly bleeding out before Eryne had found me, and how long I’d been letting her take care of me without a worry for all the people I left behind. “Sorry. I didn’t have my phone back till this morning.”

He made a strangled sound, the one he gave when I knew he was frustrated. “What happened?”

“There’s something out there. Something big. I was tracking it, but?—”

Ezra cursed. “I told you not to go alone. I could have come down.”

“Dammit, I know. I made a rash decision, and I paid the price.”

“What happened?”

I hesitated, but I knew he needed the truth.

“It almost tore me limb from limb. Took a few chunks out of my skin. Luckily, my wolf’s stronger than I am.

Unfortunately, I didn’t get a good look at it.

All I know is that it’s massive, and those teeth…

” I shuddered. And it had somehow knocked out my healing abilities.

“You’re damn lucky to even be alive. What the fuck were you thinking?”

My eyes drifted over to Eryne. “I have no clue. But that’s not all.”

“There’s more?”

I dropped my voice to a low whisper. She was far enough away that she couldn’t hear me, but I didn’t want anyone else in the coffee shop to be listening in, either. “I found my mate.”

Silence. Then, “You what?”

“My mate. She’s here.” I rubbed my jaw, knowing I needed to shave. And maybe get a haircut. Both things were on my itinerary for tomorrow. “She was the one who found me. Nursed me back to health. I couldn’t shift back until this morning.”

He whistled. “What are the odds? You go off on your own and find your pretty little mate, and I’m stuck here, not getting to see any of the action.”

“I didn’t say she was pretty,” I muttered.

“Is she?”

“Well, obviously .” I wasn’t blind. She was gorgeous. Even covered in coffee grounds and exhausted from a long day at work, I thought she was the most beautiful thing I’d ever laid eyes on. “But you’re not allowed to even look at her.”

“Possessive, much?”

I grumbled a few choice words under my breath. “You know how shifters are, Darkmire.”

He chuckled. “Ah. Just as you know how my kind act with our own. I won’t go near your female, Lockwood. You have my word.” I could almost picture him bowing, wearing the three piece suit I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him go without. The man was a walking enigma. A puzzle I wasn’t sure I’d ever solve.

“She’s a witch,” I added, almost an afterthought.

“A witch? Now, that is interesting…” He trailed off. “Why do you think that’s the case?”

I shook my head, even though he couldn’t see me.

“I think I was meant to be here. Something about this place isn’t right.

And I’m going to figure out what that is.

To right the wrongs of our ancestors.” I caught Eryne’s eye, and she gave me a soft smile, curling her finger around one of the short, copper strands of hair.

My lips curled up in a smile of my own looking at her, my beautiful little healer.

“So, you’re staying.”

“For now, yeah.”

“Alright. Where did you say this town was again?”

“Pleasant Grove,” I answered, still looking at my mate. “Massachusetts. About an hour away from Salem.”

Ezra hummed into the phone. “Figures.”

“I’ll call you again when I know more,” I told him.

It seemed like Eryne’s friends were here, two scents I found familiar.

They were there that night, I realized quickly.

Even though I didn’t remember much, I knew they helped her get me into the car.

“Listen, I have to go,” I said, watching them at the counter. “Talk soon.”

Hanging up without another word, I listened to their conversation across the room. I was intrigued by her friends, because I wanted to understand her. Who she was. The things she liked. Everything.

They looked over at me, giggling, and I sat up a little taller in my seat as I pretended to be engrossed in my laptop.

“He’s hot. You should definitely go for it,” her friend said. “Get that wolf-man D, girl.”

Eryne’s cheeks went pink and she looked over at me. I raised an eyebrow, and she looked away, back at her friends, who were still prattling on to her about how she should sleep with me. I was out of my seat before I could think better of it.

“Why are you talking about my sex life like I’m not even here?” Eryne said to her friends, clearly exasperated.

I cleared my throat from behind them, and she turned to look up at me, eyes widening.

That’s right, little mate, I wanted to tell her. I’m right here.

Both of her friends scurried off without introducing themselves, and I shoved my hands in my pockets as I studied her. “So, those are your friends, hm?”

She made a face. “How much of that did you hear?”

I chuckled, leaning in closer, knowing exactly how much I was affecting her. “All of it.”

Eryne swallowed roughly. “All… of it?”

Humming, I twirled the piece of hair that had come free from behind her ear. “Yep. Every. Last. Word.”

“Barrett…” Her voice was barely above a whisper. “We hardly know each other. That would be…” She stumbled on her words. “A bad idea.”

I pulled away. The words stung. Would it? Maybe to her. “You’re right,” I muttered. “It would be a mistake.” But not in the way she thought it would.

“Yeah.” Her voice was all breathy.

Shaking my head, I looked out the door. “I should go.”

“Go where?” She frowned. “I’ll be done in an hour, and then we can?—”

“No.” The word was more of a grunt than anything. “I’ll meet you back at the house.”

Fuck me, I was fucking everything up. What was I even doing?

I grabbed my bag, hoisting it onto my shoulder, before hightailing it out of the coffee shop.

My senses were riding me too hard, and I needed out.

Out of this place, where her smell surrounded me.

Out of reach, where all I wanted to do was pull her against me.

Out of sight, where I could stop thinking about the witch who’d saved my life.

The witch who didn’t know she was my mate. Who had no idea why seeing other men around her was making me go out of my skin. Who had no idea what hearing her talk about sex was doing to me. How badly I needed her. How badly I wanted her.

I’d just met her, and I knew it was irrational.

But it felt like I’d known her my entire life.

Like something had clicked into place that night when she’d found me, broken and bleeding, and my heart was now a little lighter.

But what was it about her that had me in such a trance? That had me truly bewitched?

Shutting my senses down, I focused on inhaling the clean, fresh air. It wasn’t quite the same as home—there, the air smelled of mountains, like pine and spruce trees. Here, it smelled earthier, with more oak trees, elm trees and beech trees dotting the skyline. I didn’t mind it though.

There was something about the feeling of the world under my feet here that settled me.

“ Fuck ,” I groaned. This wasn’t what I was supposed to be doing here.

I was supposed to be figuring out what had happened for the witches to close themselves off, why the fate would give me one as a mate, not trying to figure out how to get her to want me too.

Stripping off my clothes, I left them in a bundle on the back porch, and headed towards the woods.

I needed a run to clear my head. The shift happened almost instantaneously—one second, I was running on two feet, and the next, on four paws.

I turned around to look at Eryne’s cute little house, thankful it bordered the woods.

Letting out a short howl, I dove into the thick underbrush.

After not running for weeks, feeling the air through my fur and the ground under my paws felt freeing. Like back there, everything was muddled. Complicated. Out here, surrounded by forests and nature, there was just me.

Letting my legs take me wherever they wanted to go, I headed towards the mountains at the edge of town. There was something strange about the town wards. About how they’d cracked and fought against my skin as I entered.

If Eryne was right—that this place was supposed to be protected against those who weren’t witches—they weren’t working. They were failing, as if there was something wrong with the magic. It felt bitter, like it tasted wrong. It grated against my senses.

Something sinister was festering here. The better question was why? Why had this community closed themselves off from the rest of the world? And did it have something to do with the creature that attacked me outside the town limits?

My wolf whimpered. He knew something was wrong, too. I ran the perimeter, along the ring where I could feel the witches magic at its highest, until something foul hit my nose. Like the lingering smell of rot and decay. I dug at the barrier, unable to stop until I realized exactly what it was.

Death.

I needed to get back—to tell Eryne what I’d found.

To tell Ezra that there was something bigger going on than I’d expected before. Something that I couldn’t handle alone. Which meant operating as a team.

Wolves were good at that. Hundreds of years ago, we used to live in packs.

We thrived on alpha hierarchies, though those had long since been dismantled.

Now, our towns functioned much like most human towns did, with governments, town councils, and a bunch of red tape that made it immensely hard to do my job.

Luckily, I operated outside of town limits.

Outside the law.

There was a reason my entire family had no idea what I did. To protect them, I had to hide the truth. But how much longer could I hide it from Eryne?

Our mate deserves the truth, my wolf reminded me.

If only it was that simple.

Because everything had just become a lot more complicated.