Page 27 of His Whispered Witch (Witches and Shifters: Scott Pack #6)
“Who?” Malcolm asked more urgently.
Asher took a deep breath, wishing that he could have slipped in unnoticed, but this reckoning was always going to come the moment he turned the truck toward home.
“Malcolm, meet Penelope.” He cringed. Was Penn a nickname just for him? “Who sometimes is called Penn?”
She held out a hand, but Malcolm was still on the porch, so soon she was striding across the lawn with one hand outstretched awkwardly. Asher followed her until they reached the porch, where she stood five feet down from Malcolm and finally dropped her hand.
Malcolm hadn’t even gotten up, which felt a little insulting, until Asher remembered how tall he was and appreciated the consideration.
He led her around to the stairs and up before they could finally shake hands. Malcolm was still hunched down on the bench as if he could hide a third of himself somewhere.
“Nice to meet you, Penelope. Penn?”
“Penn is good.”
“There’s a story here,” Malcolm said, his eyes bouncing between the two of them.
“She’s helping me,” Asher said and bit his lip on the bitterness that welled up. It’s not that he didn’t want her help or deeply appreciate her care. She was just so much more to him.
“And you’re helping her,” Malcolm said with a smirk.
Of course, he would know. He would see it and sense it and probably smell it. Hell, Asher’s wolf might be blabbing right now. Normally, the human half could listen in on what the wolves were saying to each other, but Asher lost that privilege a long time ago.
“Sorry,” Malcolm said, “if you weren’t sharing that.”
“No, it’s good,” she squeaked, her arms wrapped around herself.
Malcolm froze. “And what the hell is that?”
“This is Oz,” Penn said. “He’s a bearded dragon.”
“Oh, Moira is gonna love you,” Malcolm muttered.
“Who?”
“Never mind. You’ll meet them all. Probably at first light.”
“Sorry,” Asher repeated.
“Is she another animal witch?” Penn asked.
Malcolm’s gaze sharpened. “Are you?”
“Hell, yeah,” Asher said and then winced. Was that something you just randomly announced? Was it private information? Somebody needed to write an etiquette handbook for when a wolf fell in love with a witch and fled their normal coven and introduced them to their family the month they met.
“I think I love you,” Malcolm said.
Asher’s wolf flared, and Malcolm’s hands flew up. “Not like that, you idiot.” The words were casual, but the push behind them wasn’t casual at all.
“The love of his life is sleeping upstairs,” Asher said to Penn in case she also misinterpreted his words, given that Malcolm was prone to terrible announcements.
“The two loves of my life,” Malcolm said with satisfaction.
“His daughter,” Asher said quickly, then threw up his hands. “Not that there’s anything wrong with two? But not for him. Or me!”
Penn snickered, and another piece of his heart relaxed.
Malcolm’s eyes bounced between them. “So I started the story. How does it end?”
God, if only he knew.
“I’m home to stay,” Asher said and bit his tongue. He hadn’t meant to say it for weeks or months or possibly until after her spell worked, but he was too exhausted for this, and Malcolm’s wolf was a force against his mind. “She is, too.”
Malcolm looked at her.
“Do I put in a petition?” Penn asked, trying for bravado, though her voice shook.
“A petition to stay?” Malcolm said.
“Look,” Penn said. “I’m really not good at diplomacy or politics or lying.
I spend too much time around animals who don’t do any of that shit.
Not that there isn’t animal politics, but it’s the kind where everybody just knows who’s the strongest and the weakest, and if they don’t, they butt heads until they do.
Literally. I fled my first coven when it was taken over, and I fled my second coven when I met him, and I don’t know what we are to each other, and I don’t know if it’s going to be possible for me to stay, but I don’t have anywhere else to go, and I’d like to say that this is just going to be a trial balloon, and we’re all casual, and?—”
“Take a breath, baby,” Asher said, alarmed.
Penn took a huge breath. “But I don’t know if I could do it a third time. I’m just not that kind of person.”
She took his hand, and the warm contact seared him.
“None of this is casual,” Asher said, wanting so much to be sane and strong for her and Malcolm, to be worthy of their love and care, and not be sitting on a time bomb of a wolf.
“Welcome,” Malcolm said as he stood up, and Penn staggered a few steps back.
“Holy shit,” she muttered.
“Sorry,” Malcolm said and tried to shrink into himself.
“I’m still trying to get over the fact that you could just kill me.”
“This is West Virginia. Pretty much anybody could kill anybody. I think we’ve got more guns than people,” Asher muttered.
“I will never harm you,” Malcolm said. Then he winced. “Wow, I mean, things could get horribly awkward, and I will probably accidentally insult you at least twice at the worst possible moment, but I will never, ever hurt you.”
“Mal?” A sleepy voice asked from the door, and Malcolm jolted as if he’d been touched by a live wire in the pastures. Quinn slid the screen door open and strolled onto the porch. She was a petite woman with a shock of blonde hair, dressed in a light blue pajama set that matched Malcolm’s pants.
Asher blinked with wide eyes. She wasn’t showing yet, but he could smell a dramatic change in her scent, and another being was with her. Quinn was pregnant.
“Asher?” Quinn asked as if she couldn’t believe her eyes.
She dashed over to him and wrapped him in her arms, then stepped back and patted the paperclip with a faint smile. “You’re home.”
He nodded once, unable to say a word to the woman who saved his life. She made the charm that kept him human.
“This is Penn,” Malcolm said.
Quinn didn’t hesitate, just looped her arms around Penn’s neck and blubbered.
She stepped back almost immediately. “Sorry. Hormones. Super fun.”
“Nice to meet you,” Penn said.
The lizard scrambled onto her shoulder once it was free of the hug, and Quinn shrieked.
“Sorry, that’s just Oz,” Penn said, petting its back and murmuring.
“She’s an animal witch,” Malcolm said, and Quinn swung to meet his gaze and then back to Penn, whom she wrapped in another huge hug. When it was over, Oz was perched on top of Penn’s head, and both witches were crying.
Asher wasn’t quite sure what to do. He’d expected to force his way into the horse barn for a night until they found out which cabin was empty.
“We need a bed for the night,” he said, and just like that, the awkwardness was back. “Well, forever really.”
“Stay here. This is your home,” Malcolm said immediately.
“I can’t take your home!”
Malcolm rubbed his beard. “I wasn’t planning on moving out.”
“I can’t live in the big house!” Asher said.
“You’ve never lived anywhere else.”
“I’m capable of moving. I literally moved across the country.”
“It’s a huge house!” Malcolm said, as if he were defending it.
And then he glanced at Penn. “Sorry, you probably don’t wanna move in with a strange couple and an 11-year-old and my mom, who’s going to love you probably more than she loves me, and we should not make this decision at 11 o’clock at night. ”
“You want me to live at the big house?” Penn said. She seemed to understand intuitively what the big house represented. It was the alpha dwelling, the heart of the pack. He thought of the purple Gothic monstrosity at the edge of Silver Spring. Maybe she did understand.
Penn shook her head. “That’s insane. You’re right. This is insane.”
“You want to stay here?” Asher asked slowly.
“I can’t believe you’d want us here.”
Quinn burst into tears again, “Welcome home.”
Apparently, they weren’t just moving to the land. They were moving into the big house. This was insanity.
“You said you could help Asher?” Quinn asked tentatively.
“I mean, maybe.”
“How? I could force him to be human, but I hated it. It was the worst day of my life. Though maybe it was worse for you,” she added with a glance at Asher.
“And I have thanked you every day since that you did,” he said quietly.
“I wasn’t going to help the wolf,” Penn said. “I was going to try to kill the snake.”