Page 22 of Head Witch in Charge (The Sherwood Witches #2)
Leona…
For the past two hundred miles, I’ve been getting smacked in the face by the strands of hair that escape my ponytail and are twisting around in the wind as we drive down the highway. It should have me in a foul mood—but it doesn’t.
I could tell you that’s because of the late-in-the-season blast of warmth making it possible to drive with the top down.
I could tell you it’s because the ice cream was that damn good—when the chocolate-vanilla swirl hits just right, it does change your perspective on things.
I could tell you it’s because being with Erik, I’m that much closer to getting exactly what I want—a divorce.
I could tell you all that, and I’d be lying my ass off and we both know it.
The truth of it is that what has me fighting off the giggles is the man in the driver’s seat chair dancing like he is getting paid for it.
There are dramatic facial expressions as if he’s the main character in a video.
There are exuberant arm motions, made possible by the fact that he magicked Bessie to drive herself.
There is the absolute no-fucks-to-give joy of singing all the lyrics to a song released before either of our parents were born.
I shouldn’t be trying to hold back giggles as I watch him out of the corner of my eye, as if he wouldn’t realize I was paying attention—he does, but we’re both pretending that I’m not looking and he’s not noticing.
This is the Erik I met in Vegas. The one with the goofy-ass sense of humor and a book addiction. The guy who kissed me like he’d been waiting his whole life to do it. The man who made me believe that I wasn’t locked in to a life I had been born into but had never chosen.
And like it was in Vegas, the show he’s putting on is probably just an act so he can pull another con.
He can try all he wants, but I’m not going to fall for it this time, and that’s all there is to that, so what’s the big deal if I sit back and enjoy my soon-to-be ex-husband’s antics while riding in a classic car with the top down and the wind blowing through my hair?
Nothing.
And that’s the story I’m sticking with, so don’t even give me that raised-eyebrow look of oh yeah, sure . I have this. Trust me.
Erik jams on the brakes, making Bessie’s tires squeal, and pulls to a stop in front of a closed iron gate on the side of the road.
Hair ruffled from driving with the top down, he turns to me, an excited grin on his face. “Do you know where we are?”
I look around at the old-growth walnut trees behind the iron fence that seems to go on forever in either direction on one side of the highway and the great expanse of cornfields on the other side. “The middle of nowhere?”
He puts Bessie into reverse and stretches his arm across the back of the seat as he looks behind us at the deserted highway and then hits the gas. “We’re at The Overlook.”
My pulse quickens as I take a closer look at the gold sigil of the hippocamp (a half horse, half fish hybrid) on the gate and pretend I do not notice the brush of his fingertips on my shoulder.
Yeah, the mind is willing, but the flesh is weak.
Even this barely-there touch has electric currents of awareness sizzling through me.
I swear, at that moment I am so tuned in to Erik that I can feel every ridge of his fingerprints as my lungs tighten because I’m too turned on to remember to breathe.
From his fingertips on my shoulder! What the hell is wrong with me?
This man is my kryptonite. I just need to focus on getting through this road trip and then divorcing his fine ass.
Of course, the first thing I need to do is lean forward and break contact.
And I will.
In the next second.
Or maybe the following one.
Definitely the one after that.
Yes, you’re guessing what happens next correctly.
My pathetic self stays right where I am, and it takes everything I have not to let out a shaky breath when Erik strokes his thumb against my skin in a smooth motion that leaves me breathless.
The sizzle of attraction, the anticipation that has my pulse skyrocketing, and the heady lust whipping through me is exactly what I don’t want to be happening.
Mostly. Kinda. Oh my God, just let me get through this road trip without orgasming all over Erik’s fabulous fucking dick, because my duty to my family outweighs any want I may have.
My nipples don’t get the don’t-react message, though, and they tighten into hard buds desperate for his touch.
“You know what I love in life? A win-win. And this is exactly one of those. We get a break from the road to stretch and the Council goons trailing us would never think to look for us here.” Erik turns to me and winks, either completely oblivious to the chaos he’s stirred up in me or way too aware of it. “Ready for an adventure?”
My body screams yes. My mouth—thankfully—stays shut.
He keeps his arm slung across the back seat, his fingers resting against my suddenly overheated skin, and puts the car in drive, pulling right up to the closed iron gate.
He can’t be serious. This is not the kind of adventure I signed up for.
I am only here to return the spell book, divorce the man currently giving me way too many hurry-up-and-get-naked ideas, and then go home to live my predetermined future.
Seeing a hippocamp doesn’t fall into that.
They’re completely mercurial wild creatures who are as likely to bite a chunk out of a swimmer as they are to let anyone climb on their back for a once-in-a-lifetime ride, which is why every witch is warned early on in life not to mess with a hippocamp.
Barter with a troll? Fine.
Make a bet with a fairy? At your own risk.
Get spotted by a hippocamp? Not even on your best day.
My gaze lands on the stark black-and-white warning sign next to the gate, and I latch on to it like a life vest after a water crash landing. “It says no trespassing.”
“Come on, live a little,” he says with a wink.
Then he whispers, “Aperta sesamae,” and the scent of freshly brewed coffee skates along the breeze. The iron gate swings open under the power of magic.
He looks over at me as he draws tiny little circles along my bare shoulder. “It’ll be worth it,” he says, pulling his hand away and shifting the car into drive. “I promise.”
I wish I didn’t care about lying to you, because that would make it easy to say I didn’t still feel the delicious tingle of his touch on my shoulder.
Really, if I could lie with a wink and a grin like some witches in this car, that is exactly what I’d be doing right now.
But I’m not, and so I won’t. Fuck. I swear my life wasn’t complicated at all until that girls’ weekend in Vegas.
I push all that out of my brain (because Vegas equals Erik equals bad decisions and naked blissed-out post-orgasmic bliss) and take in the scenery as Bessie’s tires kick up a cloud of dust behind us while we drive through the orchard.
The walnut trees go back as far as I can see on either side of the road.
The branches of the stately trees are bare, which makes it easier to spot it when the knot in the trunk opens, revealing the eye inside it.
Staring at the unblinking bright green eye, a shiver that’s more of a premonition of danger than the anticipation of dread makes its way up my spine.
In the next heartbeat, my palms are clammy and my gaze is ping-ponging from one tree to another in the seemingly never-ending orchard.
That’s the thing with the trees in Witchingdom—they’re always watching and listening and ready to report back to whoever they’re willing to recognize as the head witch in charge.
Unnerving? Oh yeah, most definitely.
“Erik,” I say, my voice wavering just the slightest bit. “I think we should go back.”
“If they wanted to keep people out, they would have put a protection spell on the gate.”
“And because they didn’t, you think the no trespassing sign is just something to ignore.”
“When you have the chance to see that”—he jerks his chin upward, toward the spot ahead of us where the dirt road seems to disappear into thin air—“most definitely.”
I turn back to face front right in time to see the view change from looking like we are about to drive off the face of the earth to the vast expanse of Lake Avernus.
The lake is a dark blue color that promises deep waters, and it surrounds a large island plopped down in the middle of it.
There’s a trio of walnut trees on the island that have to stand three hundred feet in the air.
They form a kind of triangle around a stone fountain with water shooting from the tipped pitcher of a human running away from a large silver hippocamp.
And as if that wasn’t frighteningly beautiful enough, on the west side of the island is a pair of hippocamps galloping through the water.
The sight makes me forget about the trees’ glares, the warning for trespassers, and the danger that comes with catching a hippocamp’s attention.
All I can do is stare in awe as they change colors depending on how the light from the setting sun hits them, going from blue to purple to pink to silver as they chase each other.
Erik pulls the car to a stop near the edge of the lake and we both sit there, silently watching as the one creature in Witchingdom that everyone is warned about from birth frolics in the water.
It’s not until they dip down under the water that the spell breaks enough for me to realize we’ve been parked for only the fates know how long enjoying the show.
Erik has a look on his face that’s about as far from his usual smirky, I’ve-got-everything-a-witch-could-want expression as possible.
There’s a sadness in his eyes and his jaw is clenched tight enough that he’s going to have to make an appointment with the dentist if he doesn’t ease up.
If I didn’t know any better, I’d think he wasn’t one hundred percent pure jerk.
But I do.
And he is.