Page 40 of Just a Little Wicked (Wicked Sisters #2)

Holly

I’m glad you’re coming home. I think Prickles missed you

“ T ell me, Winter, what’s in my future? Have you caught a glimpse of me before, maybe with Connor and Holly?”

“No, actually. I never see you.”

“I’m wounded.”

She brushed his arm with her fingertips.

“No, I mean, I’ve never had visions of you.

Everyone else, yes. It was a complete surprise when you showed up on the lobster boat.

” She went to remove her hand, but he quickly caught it in his and laced their fingers together, pressing the back of her hand to the console.

His touch, like always, calmed her. She couldn’t explain why, but there was no denying that something about his skin on hers drew her into a place of peaceful clarity.

“That’s strange,” he murmured. “Am I the only person whose future you can’t envision?”

“Yes. Well, apart from my own.”

His eyebrow winged upward. “ What? You can’t see your own future?”

She shook her head, half-smiling at his outrage. “Being a Wicked really is a bitch.”

“That’s just unfair.”

“It makes sense, I guess. If I’m given the visions in order to facilitate evil, why bother giving me visions of myself? It’s not like I’m going to hurt myself.”

“So then why am I also absent from your visions?”

She didn’t know the answer to that, but his fingers tightened on hers, and she wondered for a moment if he had a theory he wasn’t sharing with her. She quickly dismissed the thought. He’d been nothing but honest with her so far, and she had no reason to suspect he was holding back now.

Erikson turned the truck into the Wicked Good Apples driveway just after nine PM.

They drove beneath the bare canopy of maple branches that stretched overhead in welcome, and Winter cracked the window and breathed deeply.

It was hovering just above freezing, and the cool wind gave her chills, but she didn’t care: she was finally home.

The moon was almost full and so bright in the star-spangled sky that it flooded the landscape in silver.

Acres upon hilly acres of heirloom trees rolled into sight, bordered in the distance by the cold, creaking trunks of ash and beech interspersed with the shadowy boughs of pines.

The Celeste house stood tall at the end of the driveway, splashes of light falling from the square windowpanes.

It was an old-fashioned colonial built two hundred years prior by their ancestor, Autumn Celeste.

It had creaky floorboards and was so poorly insulated that sometimes Winter swore she could feel the air whipping through its bones on cold February mornings, but it was also stuffed with laughter, books, and a toasty woodstove.

Just behind it sat the old weathered barn, as creaky and unique as the house, where they ran their seasonal apple store and sold pie filling, cookie cutters, and bags of apples to customers in the fall.

“There’s something about this place,” Erikson said as he parked behind the forest-green pickup that belonged to Connor, “that makes me feel like I’m coming home, and I don’t even belong here.”

She smiled at him, just able to make out his features in the light of the porch. “I don’t know about that. Maybe you do belong. Maybe the house picks its own family.”

“I like that idea,” he murmured.

The door opened and Missy flew down the steps toward them.

She was dressed in yoga pants and Ugg boots, and her red hair was whipping around her face as she approached the driver’s side door and ripped it open.

“Come here you beautiful—what the hell, you’re not Winter.

” She peered across a bemused Erikson and said in astonishment, “Wow, Win let you drive? You must’ve cast a spell on her. ”

“It is my truck,” Erikson said.

Missy snorted. “Like that matters.” She slammed the door and met Winter as she hopped down from the cab. She threw her arms around her. “I missed you.”

Although Missy was Winter’s identical twin, they’d never had much in common other than their genes.

In truth, Winter had always been slightly jealous of Missy’s outgoing personality.

It was like Missy had sucked up all the social charm in the womb and left Winter with nothing but the cast-off traits.

Still, Winter loved her sister more than she loved herself, so she hugged her back hard.

“Have you been eating?” Missy demanded. The wind tossed her wild curls over her face and she shivered. She hadn’t bothered with a jacket in her haste to greet Winter.

“Not enough,” Erikson answered for her, opening the truck bed and dragging out their luggage.

“Traitor.”

“Come on, everyone is dying to see you.” Missy took her by the hand and tugged her inside.

Winter caught a flash of Prickles waddling by the bookcase in the living room before she was towed into the kitchen.

Her two aunts, Holly, and Connor were sitting around a table, drinking cups of tea.

Spread across the surface were notebooks, loose papers, tablets, and pens.

Winter was passed through another round of hugs.

She breathed in Holly’s Christmas scent, patted Aunt Rose’s trembling arms, burrowed into Aunt Daisy’s motherly embrace, and then stepped into Connor’s affectionate hug.

Missy pulled out a chair for her and pushed a clay mug into her hands, the top curling with steam.

Erikson entered the kitchen, and Winter watched as Connor’s gray eyes softened.

He stood and hugged his brother, holding him a little bit longer than usual.

Erikson was an inch taller than his brother, but they were both lean, rugged, handsome men.

They’d inherited amazing genes, sure, but they were also television stars and had the benefits and health privileges that came with that sort of money.

Connor held his brother at arm’s length and scanned his face. “You look good.”

Erikson knocked his hand away. “I’ve been gone less than a week.”

Erikson kissed the aunts, hugged her sisters, and then pulled out a chair next to hers, sitting down and yanking his hat off out of respect. Winter passed him her mug of tea.

“Thanks, Elf,” he murmured, wrapping one palm around it while the other dropped under the table to land on her thigh.

It wasn’t until Winter looked up that she realized everyone was watching their interaction.

That was when she remembered the lie they’d never put straight even after they’d come clean about the Shadow Council: the one where they’d claimed to be hooking up to explain their absence.

“We’re not together,” she blurted. “We only said that because we couldn’t tell you about the Shadow Council at the time.”

Erikson blew on the tea. “We’re kind of together.”

“ Erikson. ” Then to the others she repeated, “We’re not.”

“Why not?” Missy asked. “Erikson is a ten out of ten.”

“Thanks, Missy.” He flashed her a smile.

Connor’s striking gray eyes assessed Winter and Erikson’s body language with an eerie perceptiveness that almost made her squirm. Apparently taking pity on them, he changed the topic by asking, “How did the meeting with the Witch go?”

“Atlantes is a giant douche,” Erikson said, “but he’s got one or two redeeming qualities.”

Two seemed like it was pushing it. “He taught me how to shield my timeline,” Winter added. Her sisters’ and aunts’ faces went slack. “He was able to put a magic bubble around me long enough that I wouldn’t beach any more dolphins while I practiced.”

“Whoa, hold up,” Holly said, lifting her palms. “You beached a dolphin? And what do you mean when you say he taught you to shield your timeline?”

Winter explained everything that had happened since they’d last spoken, and when she finished Connor was scribbling so fast that his writing was nearly illegible, and her aunts were gazing at her in wonder.

Missy hopped on the counter and took a swig of her tea, grimaced, and pulled a bottle down from the cabinet.

She poured a healthy shot of liquor into the mug and then tasted it again, nodding in satisfaction.

“The aunts said we have our main talent , but that we can also do other stuff if we have excess power. Are you saying the Witches are the same?”

Winter nodded.

“We should have already known this,” Holly said in frustration. “We shouldn’t have to learn basic information about our powers from road trips and Witches .”

“We’d have known if we had a community and a recorded history,” Aunt Rose pointed out.

Her white hair was plaited down her back, and she wore a fuchsia-pink sweatshirt stained with oils from her herb and potions workshop.

“Everyone Daisy and I spoke with on our New England trip agrees that we’ve let our division as a species go on for too long.

This is vital information, and something all Wickeds should be aware of if they’re not already. ”

It was possible—no, likely —that the Celestes were the least knowledgeable of all Wickeds.

Two hundred years ago Autumn Celeste had killed a man with her powers, and afterward she’d vowed that from that point forward she and her bloodline would live quiet, unassuming lives.

It had done well for them, until it had backfired spectacularly when Missy, Holly, and Winter had been born with all of that bottled power poured into them.

“There is no doubt your travels have concerned the Shadow Council,” Connor said to Aunt Daisy, leaning back and sliding on a pair of black-framed glasses.

Holly gave her future husband a heat-filled look.

“In less than a year your family has become a significant threat. Not only did they become aware of Missy, Winter, and Holly when Holly unleashed her power last spring, but then the two of you began rallying the other Wickeds. It’s their worst nightmare come to fruition.

” He returned his focus to Winter. “We’ve been working on the assumption that the council approached you first to eliminate any forewarning about their next moves, which would indicate they believe you’re powerful enough to see past their shields.

But it would be foolish not to consider other theories.

Can you tell us more about your visions of the past? What are they about?”

“Erikson,” she answered without thinking. The room fell silent, except for the tick of the kitchen clock and the hiss of the teapot on the stove.

Connor lowered his pen. “Your past visions are about Erikson ? As in—” he glanced at the man who’d gone rigid on her right, “—my brother?”

Winter nodded slowly, a feeling of foreboding snaking through her blood as she shared what her pastsight had shown her, along with Erikson’s theory that they had yet to complete some cosmic task together.

With every word she spoke, Connor’s eyes grew sharper.

She mentioned how odd it was that although she could see herself and Erikson in the past, she could never see them in the future.

Connor’s jaw dropped open. “Holy shit, you’re?—"

“Stop,” Erikson ordered, and there was something in his blue eyes that looked a lot like alarm. “You don’t know that.”

“Oh, come on,” Connor scoffed. He gestured with his hand, and the bottom half of a tattoo flexed beneath his shirt sleeve. “You can’t be in that much denial.”

“What are you talking about?” Winter asked, dividing a glare between them. “What am I missing?”

“You can’t see yourself in future visions, and you can’t see Erikson in future visions,” Connor reiterated.

“So?”

“ Enough! ” Erikson barked, standing so quickly that his chair rocked back.

Connor sucked in a breath. “Erikson, you can’t?—”

“I can. Let’s go, Win.”

“No, I want to hear this.” She turned in her seat and stared Connor dead in the eyes. “Why do you think I can’t see Erikson in my visions of the future?”

Connor glanced uneasily between Erikson’s blank face and her determined one.

Slowly he said, “You can’t see your own soul in the future, Winter, because your Wickedness didn’t evolve that way.

And you can’t see his because . . .” He trailed off and turned helplessly to Holly, caught between Winter and Erikson’s warring desires.

“Oh my GOD!” Missy shrieked, leaping off the counter and sloshing spiked tea onto the tile. “You can’t see his future because he has the other half of your soul . He’s your soulmate! This is the most romantic thing I’ve ever heard in my entire life.”

Winter’s cheeks lost their warmth. She could practically feel the blood draining from her face. When she met Erikson’s eyes, they were wary. “You knew, didn’t you?”

“I suspected.”

“You told me we weren’t soulmates.”

“At the time I didn’t know.”

“But at some point you figured it out.”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “I wasn’t trying to hurt you by not telling you, Win. I just didn’t think you were ready to hear it.”

“You don’t get to make those decisions for me, Erikson.” She stood and brushed past him. “And the fact that you did does hurt. Stay away from me.”