Page 27 of Head Witch in Charge (The Sherwood Witches #2)

Erik…

The threat would carry a lot more weight if it weren’t for the fact that the trolls in question are more likely to eat their phones than a pair of witches. Not that I am going to point that out. Frieda and Walter may not eat us, but that doesn’t mean they wouldn’t squash us.

As LeLe and I sit on the platform, Walter dishes us up small—for a troll—plates of biscuits drowned in white gravy minus the sausage with a side of crispy roasted Brussels sprouts.

Then they start telling us stories of all the travelers they’ve stopped—all of whom they threatened to eat and yet none of whom they actually did.

There was the satyr who taught them how to play the electric flute during his five-night stay, the pair of pixies who told jokes for the solid week they were here that had the pair laughing so hard they were crying, and the tatted-up unicorn shifter who played Texas Hold’em until the wee small hours of the morning during the single night he was at their camp.

We are about halfway through the story of the witch who made them newt muffins when LeLe shoots me a knowing look.

You don’t have to have the Graeae sisters’ shared all-seeing eye to understand that despite all their talk, these trolls kidnap for company.

After that, LeLe ends up telling them all about her sister’s rooster familiar Barkley that has it out for her. By the time we’re eating peach crumble, we’re all laughing. All in all, for being witch-napped, it’s a pretty enjoyable experience.

Finally though, Frieda gets up from the log she’s sitting on and does a full-body stretch. “Well, not that hanging out with you isn’t better than watching the bark peel off of a river birch, but it’s time for us to head in.”

“What about the riddle?” LeLe asks.

Frieda grabs a huge glass Mason jar with a sticker on it that says “Riddles” in perfect cursive script and flashes us her toothy grin.

“What, you think we have them all memorized? Do you have any idea how many witches and gnomes and werewolves and other magical creatures pass through this way on a regular basis?”

“Too many, and I hate it,” Walter says, not sounding believable in the least.

“Exactly, and there’s no way we could make up a riddle on the fly for that many folks.” She pulls a piece of paper out of the jar, unfolds it, and then reads aloud. “What disappears completely as soon as you say its name?”

Fuck. What I wouldn’t give to have Sigrid’s brain right now. My little sister loves two things most in life: reading and word puzzles. Me? I do my dad’s dirty work and keep his cruel attention pointed away from my brother and sister. Yeah, not helpful at all in this particular moment.

“That’s it, folks. No clues,” Frieda says. “Now, not that I don’t trust you, but I don’t trust you, so…” She takes out a huge bowie knife, its edges as sharp as her teeth, and cuts through a rope tied to the tree with one bold swipe.

The severed rope zips up the massive trunk of the old-growth tree faster than Bessie when I hit the Nitro boost switch. I barely have time to grab LeLe’s hand and brace myself before the platform flies up into the air before stopping with a jolt once we are up in the highest branches.

“And don’t go getting ideas about making spells,” Frieda hollers from the ground. “We paid extra for the wards to be carved into it. But don’t worry. Walter will pull you down in the morning.”

“Sleep well, but not too close to the edge,” Walter adds. “We lost a leprechaun once that way. Poor little fella rolled off the edge. When we woke up, all that was left of him was a rainbow splat and three gold coins.”

And on that note, Walter and Frieda lumber into their troll-sized fairy house. I glance over at LeLe. Her mouth is pressed so tightly closed it looks like she doesn’t have lips anymore, and her shoulders are shaking as she fights to hold back her laughter.

There’s only one thing I can or should do at this moment. I shoot her a stern look and say, “They’re very frightening trolls.”

She loses it. The laughter escapes. It’s full and joyful and one hundred percent real. Damn, I’ve missed it. She wipes the tears from her eyes as she tries to catch her breath, which just makes me start laughing—and that’s when the actual trouble starts.

The platform starts to rock and then dips on the left side.

LeLe’s giggle changes to a squeal of surprise and an image of a rainbow splat flashes in front of my eyes.

Without the ability to cast a spell because of the runes, neither of us could stop her fall.

She tips backward, gravity tugging at her as one corner of the platform sinks, and I’m not laughing anymore.

There’s no way I’m going to let LeLe end up like that.

I reach out and yank her to my chest and roll us so we’re in the middle of the platform.

While she’s underneath me, I lock my forearms in place on either side of her shoulders and my legs on the outside of hers to block her from rolling as the platform pitches this way and that in slower and slower waves until it finally stops.

Pulse as erratic as a coked-out finance bro witch, I ease my way onto my back next to her.

Neither of us says a thing, but she reaches out, and the backs of her fingers touch mine, and I let go of the breath I was holding.

The muscles knotted in my shoulder unwind, and that hypervigilant part of me that’s always gauging the other person shuts the fuck up.

“Do you think the answer to the riddle is Bloody Mary?” I ask, because that is exactly what someone should say after almost rolling off a platform hanging twenty feet up in the air.

“Nah,” LeLe says. “You have to say her name three times and then she appears.”

We stare up at the five billion stars as the quiet wraps around us.

Well, almost—an enchanted forest is never really quiet.

There are the raccoons and the owls on the hunt, their triumphant calls filling the air.

The sound of twigs snapping under the feet of goblins and dark elves who must be gathering in a clearing come with regularity.

And every once in a while, the galloping of centaurs sends flocks of nightingales rushing out of the trees as they take to the sky.

There are a million other sounds too. LeLe’s steady breath.

The soft sigh she lets out when a falling star goes by.

I’m way too aware of her, and I swear I can still taste her on my lips after that kiss in the meadow.

Every part of me is completely tuned in to her, and a dozen memories of being with her are flashing before me, but one in particular stands out.

She’s naked and sitting in the middle of the hotel bed, eating the chocolate-covered strawberries and drinking the champagne that had come with our breakfast. The sheets are wrapped around her waist. I cannot stop looking at her tits.

They’re fucking perfect. Her pale pink nipples are hard and tempting and I’ve got my hand wrapped around my hard cock just admiring the view.

That’s when she accidentally-on-purpose spills the small amount of champagne she has left in her glass all over her tits and winks at me.

My cock goes from hard to granite and I’m sweeping the plate of strawberries off the bed on the next heartbeat, licking up the sweet droplets as slow and fast as I possibly can.

“Rumpelstiltskin?” LeLe asks, yanking me back to the here and now. “Nope,” she answers her own question as she snuggles closer to me, resting her temple against my shoulder as if it’s the most natural thing to do. “He has a temper tantrum and stomps off, but doesn’t disappear.”

“My uncle Lars disappears whenever the check appears at a restaurant,” I say while my brain runs at light speed trying to memorize this moment so I can remember it for after the power transfer ceremony, when she hates my guts again.

She giggles and gently turns on her side to face me. “You are no help.”

“Incorrect,” I say as I roll to face her, our mouths so fucking close that it would barely take any movement for me to kiss her. “I’m the one that saved us from being a rainbow splat. We are twenty feet up in the air.”

“And you caught me.” Her gaze drifts over me, hot and hungry. “Why? When letting me fall would knock the Sherwoods down a peg or two?”

I should confirm it. Give her the answer she thinks is true. But I can’t. Not when we’re this close. For some probably horrible reason, I can’t lie straight to LeLe’s face like I can to anyone else.

“No, I didn’t do it to put your family in their place.”

She gnaws on her bottom lip as if trying to put puzzle pieces together that just don’t fit. “Was it to make a fool of me?”

I shake my head.

The platform sways as she inches closer, so near I can smell her shampoo and feel the soft kiss of her breath.

“So why did you save me? Letting me go splat would make it easy to just declare yourself my widower and get access to whatever it is that you want from this marriage without having to deal with me.”

It’s probably—no, definitely—what I should have done. It’s what my father would have done. It’s what I would have done if it had been anyone other than LeLe.

What a fucking mess you’ve made for yourself, numb nuts.

I’m halfway to confessing that truth when old habits kick in.

I’d walk in front of a renegade flying carpet that would knock me into next week for my siblings, and I’ve never once told them.

It isn’t possible, not with my dad and his spies seemingly everywhere.

Never admit you care is as close to a personal code as I have.

“I did it because it amused me.” I drop my hand and fall onto my back. “Don’t worry. I’ll probably let you fall next time.”

She gives a little harrumph, but she doesn’t argue.

Why would she? I’m a selfish, unethical bastard, and all of Witchingdom knows it.

“You know what we need to do to solve the riddle?” she asks after a minute.

I keep my gaze on the stars overhead because I’m not sure what will happen if I look over and see that sexy I-have-a-plan face of hers. “I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”

“Forget about it,” she says.

I turn and look at her before I can stop myself. The woman looks smug and way too happy with herself. It’s all I can do not to reach over and kiss her, high likelihood of us both going splat be damned.

Instead, I roll back and lace my fingers together behind my head, as if that can help stop me from reaching out to her. “What do you mean, forget about it?”

“Have you ever lost something and you find it as soon as you stop looking for it?” The platform swings gently as she rolls over and lays her palm on my chest. “It’s the same thing. We just need to forget about it and the answer will come to us.”

I would give her an answer if I could form thoughts.

All I can do at the moment though is feel the tips of her fingers as she traces random shapes over the spot where my heart would be if I had one.

Each soft touch steals a little bit of my breath, all of my concentration, and my determination not to give a shit what happens to her or her family after the power exchange ceremony.

The only way this ends is badly, and yet, I can’t find it in myself to care.

“Are we going to talk about it?” she asks, her voice barely above a whisper.

“The way I just saved you from certain death if you’d rolled off?” I respond, even though I can tell by the uncertainty in her tone that she isn’t talking about that.

Her fingers still and she lets out a tiny sigh. “No.”

All I want in the world right now is for her to start tracing circles and triangles and octagons across my chest again, but I can’t ask for that, so I say, “How we’re going to sweet-talk the recipe for that crumble from Walter?”

“Very funny,” she says with a chuckle. “You know what I mean.”

I do.

I turn my head so I can see her face. Her eyes, one blue and one green, almost glow in the moonlight.

No doubt it’s because her dad’s a shifter.

The little upward tilt of her nose? The same as her mother’s.

There’s a bit of her sisters in the freckles and the crooked nose and the ears that are just a little too big for her head.

And the way she’s looking at me right now as if I’m not the worst person ever? That will change soon enough.

I can’t give her the divorce, not until my dad is powerless and can’t fight for control of the family magic. After that, I’ll do the spell and she’ll be free. She’ll leave after the ceremony. I won’t try to stop her.

Unable to stop myself, I take her hand and roll it over so her wrist is facing up and trace my finger over the glowing handfast mark. “You mean the kiss that doesn’t mean anything.”

“It doesn’t,” she says.

I’ve never heard such a bald-faced lie in my whole life.

“Not at all.” I lift up our clasped hands and kiss the mark, the heat of it making my lips tingle. “Good night, wife.”

She shivers next to me and—for once—doesn’t tell me not to call her that. I may not be the smartest man in the world, but I know when to shut the fuck up so I don’t mess things up. That’s exactly what I do until I drift off still holding LeLe’s hand against my heart like it means something.

I’m still holding her hand the next morning when we’re both woken up by the platform being swung back and forth.

“Time’s up, witches,” Frieda calls up to us. “Time to solve that riddle or become breakfast.”