Page 10 of Just a Little Wicked (Wicked Sisters #2)

Connor

Do you think there’s video footage of her throwing you overboard?

Erikson

Fuck off.

W inter steered the truck to the side of the road, unbuckled her belt, and lunged for the phone.

Instead of holding her off, Erikson wrapped his arm around her shoulders and tugged her close, trapping her arms.

“It’s not tr—” she shouted, but he’d already hung up on his brother.

“What is wrong with you?” she snapped, pushing herself away from him. Her eyes were flashing, her freckles blending with the flush of fury on her cheeks. Erikson was convinced that if they weren’t in the confines of the cab, she’d tear him to pieces.

“We need a reason for why we’re being all cagey and not coming straight back,” he answered calmly. “Literally any other explanation would raise an alarm.”

“And you and me sleeping together doesn’t?”

“Would it be that unfathomable?”

“Yes! My sisters know I would never sleep with you.”

“Don’t be so sure. Missy’s hinted more than once at there being something between us.”

Her chin jerked back. “What? Why would she do that?”

Erikson shrugged, even though he knew exactly why her far-too observant twin had asked.

Missy was bubbly and uninhibited, and that meant people made the mistake of thinking she was a harmless airhead, when in fact he suspected she was incredibly sharp.

She’d seen the way his eyes lingered on Winter, and how much joy aggravating her brought him.

Erikson was honest enough with himself to admit that there was something about Winter that intrigued him: something that made him want to drive her to the edge and watch all of her tightly controlled composure shatter.

He could even admit that he found her annoyingly attractive.

But attraction was one thing, commitment another thing entirely.

Unlike his brother, Erikson wasn’t looking to settle down and give up everything he’d ever worked for, at least not any time in the foreseeable future.

Besides, he liked his partners sweet and fun and temporary, and Winter was like a chokeberry: bitter, stubborn, and staying.

She clearly didn’t think any better of him, and in fact seemed to find his entire personality off-putting, which meant that despite Missy’s hints that there was potential between them, both he and Winter knew better.

“We can’t say we’re visiting family, because neither of us has family on the coast. We can’t say we’re planning a surprise, because then we’ll actually have to show up with a surprise.

Unless you want Holly cancelling her wedding and hauling ass out here, it was the only thing I could come up with. ”

Winter’s fists were clenched so tightly her knuckles were white. After several moments of heavy breathing, she said through gritted teeth, “Fine, but I’m telling Holly and Missy the truth the minute the wedding is over.”

“Be my guest.”

“Assuming I’m still . . . here.”

The reminder of her uncertain, possibly violent future, sent a burst of rage down his veins. They were down to three days to find Atlantes, who might not even be the solution.

Erikson immediately shut down the thought of failure, shoving the fear deep inside him where it simmered, a coal of rage and anxiety fueling his limbs.

He couldn’t afford to focus on what would happen if they didn’t succeed, so instead he’d annoy Winter and do what he did best: distract both of them from the dread while they found a fucking solution.

Connor was the true strategizer in their duo.

He was the reliable Grimm; the ghosthunter with near-preternatural instincts.

Erikson had always been the reckless brother.

The thoughtless brother. But one thing they both had in common was that when they found a story they wanted, they went after it.

When they had a problem, they stuck by it until it was solved.

They hadn’t given up on themselves when they were kids freaking their parents out with stories of ghosts, and Erikson wasn’t going to give up on Winter now.

The Shadow Council couldn’t have her. She didn’t belong to them.

After one last glare that almost made his ears smoke, Winter threw the truck back into gear.

He used the reprieve from her murderous stare to study her as she drove.

A curl of hair dangled from her mussed ponytail, and the morning sun slanted through the window, catching in her hazel eyes and giving them a feline glow.

She was dressed as practically as possible in jeans, a t- shirt, and a zip-up hoodie.

It was remarkable how she put zero effort into her appearance, and yet everywhere she went she drew eyes to her like a magnet.

The crazy part was she didn’t even notice.

He was familiar enough with women’s morning routines to guess that Winter’s involved taking a shower, putting on the barest amount of mascara, eating a bowl of gravel, and shouting at some neighborhood children.

This was a woman who didn’t give a single shit if other people found her pleasing or likeable.

In fact, she could probably count the number of times she’d ever smiled on two hands.

She was the opposite of fun and easy and flirty.

So why the fuck couldn’t he stop thinking about her?

They spent the next two hours listening to violin music and not exchanging a single word.

Winter stared straight ahead, deep in thought, whereas he couldn’t seem to marshal a single one.

His mind was all over the place, bouncing from what he needed to do when the show came off hiatus, to how his best man duties were supposed to involve whiskey and basketball games—not chasing Witches across the state of Maine with someone who’d probably like to pick her teeth with his bones.

Because they’d had such an early start, they were nearly at Lucas Gillis’ address by the time noon rolled around.

“Let’s drive past his house,” Erikson suggested when they were ten minutes out, “and if he’s at work, we’ll grab a motel for the night.

Once we dump our stuff, we can ask around town and see if anyone recognizes the name Atlantes. ”

Winter nodded, that faraway, thoughtful look still on her face. He wondered if she’d even heard him, or if she was driving on autopilot. He was pretty sure she wasn’t having a vision: when those overtook her, she stiffened and went entirely vacant, becoming nothing but a vessel for the future.

Erikson and Connor had spent their entire lives trying to prove the paranormal existed so that kids like them didn’t end up ostracized and lonely.

They’d been able to see ghosts from a young age, and their parents’ marriage hadn’t been able to withstand the strain.

They’d ended up in and out of hospitals for evaluations so often that their educations had been pieced together by books and Google.

More than a decade ago, they’d been angry teenagers without degrees, so they’d started a ghost-hunting Youtube channel.

To their utter surprise, it had blown up.

So much so, that a major TV network had signed them, and they’d been starring in Grimm Reality ever since.

They’d become famous and wealthy beyond anything Erikson had ever dreamed of, and still he’d felt unfulfilled. Yes, Grimm Reality had introduced doubt and made people consider that perhaps the paranormal really could exist, but they’d still never been able to prove it.

Then last spring, Connor had heard about a haunted apple farm in Maine where the strangest things happened: the ground stayed wet during droughts and dry during heavy rain; vegetative diseases didn’t reach the place; and the apple cider was unnaturally delicious.

When Erikson and Connor had finally discovered that Holly and her family were Wickeds, it was a like a missing piece of Erikson’s soul had finally fallen into place.

The knowledge should have shot Grimm Reality to the top of the charts, but it had never happened, because Connor and Erikson had known that if they exposed the Wickeds, the women would be hunted.

They’d be blamed every time a hurricane came through, or harassed over diseases.

Humanity would seek to destroy them, just as they had their ancestors hundreds of years before.

So it had turned out that although the brothers were finally able to prove the paranormal existed, they’d chosen not to.

The first time Erikson had seen Winter fall into a trance, he’d been floored at how real it all was, just like the first time he’d watched Holly call a storm, and Missy use a disease to decay a curse.

He’d known his whole life that there had to be more out there, especially since ghosts existed, but the proof had been earth-shattering.

Honestly, he still wasn’t over it.

When Winter had had her vision of Atlantes by the ocean he’d been in awe, but there’d been a new, niggling emotion behind the amazement.

He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but it had felt a little like concern.

She clearly struggled with her curse, forced time and again to accept horrific visions of the future.

There was something so deeply unfair about it that it made him feel itchy with anger.

How Winter looked right now was different than how she looked when she had visions though; it was more like she was so deeply distracted that even his voice couldn’t pull her from whatever problem she was mulling over.

When they reached the small coastal town of Lubec, Erikson drank in the view with appreciation.

The town proper was directly on the coast, the gray ocean within a stone’s throw of half the buildings.

The streets were quaint and lined with old brick buildings, house apartments, a brewery, and multiple pizzerias.

Across a slice of ocean, he spotted the white-and-red-capped Mulholland Point Lighthouse standing against a backdrop of firs and a cotton sky.