Page 3 of Just a Little Wicked (Wicked Sisters #2)

Missy

Okay, okay, you dragged it out of me. Or like, you totally would if you weren’t ignoring us all. The real reason I haven’t been on a date in weeks is because I’m still hung up on Gregory. When do you think I’ll get over him?

T he captain appeared visibly confused when they reached the dock down a man, but Winter gave him a little what-can-you-do shrug, and as she brushed past, she leaned forward and told him where to drop his traps that day.

The moment her boots hit the dock, she sprinted toward the small bed and breakfast where she’d rented a room for the week. She shucked off her rubber boots and stuffed everything she owned into her backpack, grabbed her violin case, and slapped the key on the check-out counter as she exited.

Winter scanned the street but didn’t spot Erikson, so she jogged to her old rusted truck, tossed her belongings into the passenger seat, and turned over the ignition. The engine roared to life, and minutes later Winter was once again cruising down Route 1.

She pushed down the guilt threatening to surface for having thrown Erikson overboard.

Thinking music might help drown out her conscience, she fiddled with the knob to the radio, since the truck was too old to even have a CD player, much less Bluetooth.

The ocean was frigid, and if Erikson wasn’t so huge, and if she hadn’t waited until they were so close to the dock, she probably wouldn’t have done it, but he’d left her with no other choice.

She couldn’t go back home. It was the first place the Shadow Council would look for her, and she had to avoid them at all costs.

She hoped her message had been clear, and that he’d give up and report to her sisters that she was safe and as much a pain in the ass as always.

Winter drove for an hour before she started looking for bed and breakfasts that might be open in November. Many of them closed after the rush of tourists during the summer season, and it took her another half hour to find an open one. She tried to avoid hotels since most required identification.

The Victorian inn in the small town of Iceland Bay was stuffed with kitschy nautical decor, but the shower was hot and the owner wasn’t nosey.

Winter washed off the sting of salt air and pulled on a cable-knit sweater, jeans, and a pair of worn work boots.

With a swipe of mascara, she was ready to explore the tiny town and learn if any of the restaurants were hiring, since lobstering was off the table now, thanks to Erikson.

She was a hard worker, and she wasn’t above washing dishes for a wage.

It would probably pan out better than trying to waitress—she didn’t have the gift of gab or the bubbly personality that her twin sister, Missy, did.

She was traversing the path from the inn to the center of town, when she impulsively veered toward the rocky shoreline instead, drawn to the ocean’s gray, thrashing waves.

At the water’s edge, she sat on a rock and curled her arms around her knees.

The wind whipped her damp hair into a frenzy, while the sky overhead turned darker by the moment.

She missed her sisters. She missed her family.

Winter shivered, a frisson of awareness sliding over her skin moments before she heard the crunch of a foot on the pebbles behind her.

“That better not be you, Erik—” She paused mid-word as a strange sense of familiarity slithered over her. She vaulted to her feet and spun to find three strangers standing directly behind her on the otherwise deserted shoreline.

They were women, two with white skin and one with brown.

They wore leggings, skirts, and stylish ankle boots, and at a quick glance, one might think they were a group of friends on their way to the bar for the evening.

Their hair was loose, ranging from straight to curly, and they wore easy smiles. But their eyes . . .

Darkness coated Winter’s tongue in a sensation she didn’t recognize.

She was used to being in the presence of strong Wickeds—she and her sisters were some of the most powerful Wickeds to have been born in centuries—but to her recollection, she had never come across another Wicked outside of her family, and it was extremely apparent to her now that the three women standing in front of her were Wickeds.

There was a sense deep inside Winter, a recognition that she’d never felt before.

She wondered if she’d be able to sense any of their kind, or if there was something special about these particular women.

Wickeds were the counterparts to Witches.

While Witches wielded good magic and pretty charms, Wickeds were cursed with more sinister powers meant to balance them out.

Some Wickeds could control the weather to create hurricanes and bring droughts to crops, like Holly.

Others could create disease, like Missy.

Some could fly, such as her mother. Her Aunt Rose made potions, and her Aunt Daisy had a death touch.

Winter had visions, as spotty and uncontrollable as they were.

The Celestes suppressed their powers, or twisted and subverted them to mitigate harm, but aside from her own family, Winter knew very little about other Wickeds.

After the witch trials, Wickeds had allowed themselves to scatter into the shadows and be forgotten, leaving them without shared knowledge or community.

Their only remaining governing body was the Shadow Council, which was murderous and power hungry.

It seemed the monsters from her vision had finally found her.

Fuck.

Winter flexed her hands into fists. “You’re here to offer me a job.”

One of the women, her skin pale against a garishly red infinity scarf, smiled, and it was such a cold, feral thing, that Winter’s first instinct was to run. She held her ground. “Impressive, Winter Celeste. Wicked Seers are not supposed to be able to see us.”

Yes, it would be much harder for the Shadow Council to get away with murder if others could see them coming, wouldn’t it?

Winter said nothing.

“She’s as powerful as we thought,” the woman with brown skin purred. She pushed back a curl, and a gold ring with an opal center flashed on her finger. “I can sense it simmering beneath her skin. All that raw Wickedness bursting to be freed.”

Winter had hoped to evade them, to avoid this exact scenario where the Shadow Council “offered” her the chance to join their reign of terror. But now that it had happened, there was only one thing left to do, one last-ditch option to keep her family safe.

“You already know what we’re . . . offering ,” the woman with the opal ring continued, because they all knew it wasn’t a choice. “You’re the most powerful seer born in centuries, and we want you to take your rightful place on the council.”

Aunt Rose and Aunt Daisy had kept Winter and her sisters hidden for as long as they could, Aunt Rose concocting potions that dimmed the girls’ powers to manageable levels.

But four years ago, the sisters’ powers had outstripped even Aunt Rose’s capabilities.

Then, last spring, Holly had unleashed enough power to alert even the most unaware Shadow Council member to their existence.

This confrontation had always been inevitable, and yet Winter still found herself unprepared.

“The council doesn’t already have a seer?” she hedged, peering closer at the woman who had yet to speak. She was dark-haired and had dark eyes that burned with hatred.

“Melanie,” Opal Ring said, nodding to the very woman Winter was studying, “but her power pales in comparison to yours.”

Melanie’s obvious hatred increased.

None of the women had advanced toward her, but Winter was painfully aware that as non-threatening as they appeared, the Shadow Council hadn’t strayed far from its assassin roots. Her own mother had been one of their victims.

“Why do you need me?”

Her question was ignored. “You should be honored we’re here. Very few ever meet the Shadow Council and walk away. Even fewer receive an invitation to join it.”

“When you join us, you’ll be able to use your powers in a way you never have before, all while doing a great service for our kind,” Opal Ring added.

When she joined, not if .

Winter swallowed down the bitter taste of their falsehoods. “I appreciate the consideration, but I’m happy with my life as it is.”

The other seer spoke for the first time. “She can’t be that strong of a seer if she thought she could outrun us.”

“Good point,” Winter immediately agreed. “You must have the wrong person.”

Except visions were never certain. Circumstances could still change them, and Winter had hoped that by avoiding this moment, she could do just that.

Her Wicked visions came to her with the purpose of helping her thwart good things from happening, or helping her enhance destruction and mayhem.

They were often violent and soul-chilling, so she fought them off.

Suppressed them. She did her best to force her Wickedness into a deep, locked place in the center of her soul, but despite her best efforts, some still slipped free.

The vision that had taken hold of her before she’d left Wicked Good Apples had entrapped her in a nightmare for hours.

It had felt strange and unnatural, sticky in her mind instead of silky like they usually did.

She’d never before experienced something so detailed, or something that had felt so wrong .

It had been through Holly’s eyes. Her older sister had been slumped against the wall in the Celeste’s two-hundred-year-old house, staring at Missy’s lifeless body on the floor, a wide slash across her throat.

Blood had painted the walls everywhere Holly had looked.

Connor had been draped over a table, a puddle of sticky blood pooling beneath his cheek, and her aunts had been deathly still on the couch.

A Wicked she didn’t recognize had hovered over Holly, who was gasping for air through punctured lungs.

Furniture was scattered and broken as if a hurricane had come through—and it probably had, since Holly’s power was weather.

The Wicked leaning over her sister had golden-blond hair, and her white blouse was soaked in blood.

Her eyes had been entirely black. She’d lifted her hand as she crouched before Holly, her nails long and painted Barbie pink, and hissed, “Winter should have joined the Shadow Council when she had the chance.” Then she’d flicked her hand to the side, and a dark red gash had opened in Holly’s throat.

Winter hadn’t been there, but she’d witnessed the future all the same, and she’d known she would do anything to change it.

At the reminder of what had sent her running, Winter’s fear and panic compressed into a smoking coal of fury deep inside her chest. If she had Holly’s powers, she’d start a hurricane and sweep these horrid creatures into the ocean.

If she were forced to join the Shadow Council, she would become complicit in terrorizing other Wickeds. There was no way she could say yes to the Shadow Council, but she knew what would happen if she said no.

This was why she’d run, why she’d tried so hard to avoid being found. If they couldn’t find her and offer the job, then they couldn’t use her to hurt others. They couldn’t hurt her family.

But she’d failed.

Red Scarf smirked. “We have the right person.”

“Time,” Winter blurted. An extension was her only hope now. “I need time.”

The other two women hissed, but Red Scarf gave her a considering look. “Even with advance knowledge of our arrival, you’re unprepared?”

“My sister is getting married Saturday, and I’m one of the maids of honor. It’s only four days.”

Red Scarf considered, her eyes calculating as the wind pressed her skirt against her legs. “All right.”

Her companions gaped at her.

“We’ve waited this long for someone with her power; we can wait a bit longer,” she told her colleagues. Then to Winter, she said, “Do you see how accommodating we can be? However, you should know our leniency has limits. Don’t ask for another extension, or there will be consequences.”

Opal Ring held out her hands and the other two grasped them. A moment later, all three women disappeared.

Winter stared at the vacant space in shock.

Had they . . . teleported? She hadn’t even known that was a possible power.

Without the centralized government of the Witches, the Wickeds had fallen by the wayside with very little knowledge of who they were—the Celeste family more than most thanks to the choice of their great-great-grandmother to live a small life.

Winter truly felt like she was operating in the dark when it came to her own species.

She stepped forward, pushing at the air with her hands in case they had only turned invisible, but they were gone.

She returned to the rock, the cold seeping through her jeans, and dropped her chin into her palm.

If Winter were the sort of woman inclined to cry, she would burst into tears.

How was she going to save her family from a ruthless assassin squad that could teleport to wherever they needed to go?

If they wanted her because she was powerful, she had no doubt they had collected other equally powerful women with various talents—including ones Winter had never even heard of.

Her choices were impossible: become a murderer, or allow her family to be murdered.

Winter stared at the white-capped waves for a long, long time.