Page 35 of Season of the Witch (Toil and Trouble #3)

“Potions research. I admit, it’s an area that fascinates me.”

No doubt why he’d also brought Griffith here, she realized, as he leaned an arm on the counter to face her. His smile was easy and wide. “Tell me more about it.”

Her heart leaped. Shit. Fuck. She wasn’t prepared.

“Uh…o-okay,” she stammered, trying to organize her thoughts into business lines. A red spark tickled her palm, magic reacting to her emotions, and she closed her hand around it. She swore she felt each individual sweat bead form at her hairline.

She could so easily ruin this. It was her thing.

Keep it casual , Henry’s voice whispered. Talk to him one-on-one.

A steadying breath helped. She stumbled at first, picking her way through giving too many facts and not enough, finding a rhythm.

Damon brought out the coffees two minutes in and complained ten minutes later when they went cold, but neither moved for half an hour.

* * *

“I’m not saying you’re not trying.” His dad’s voice droned through the cell phone pressed tightly to Henry’s ear.

“But the house party breaks up end of next week and what have we got to show for it? You haven’t had any one-on-one discussions with him about bottom lines, stocks and shares, projections… ”

“Siddeley doesn’t do business like that,” Henry reiterated, wrapping his free arm around his middle as he stared at the fountain. He’d come out front to return his dad’s call, figuring the gushing water would give him some privacy. It said everything that his mom used the compact, his dad the cell.

He didn’t linger on that as he added, “Tia said the other night went well. He actually listened to her about how we plan to run the business, where we want to go.”

“Exactly. Tia said.”

Henry felt his forehead furrow. “Yeah. So?”

A sigh. “Henry, where’s your competitive spirit? You’ve never been one to lie down and surrender.”

“That’s not what I’m doing.” He didn’t know what his dad was smoking, but whatever it was, they shouldn’t offer it for sale. “We’re meant to be a team? As in, I do my bit, she does hers and we all go home happy.”

“You and Tia are both in line for inheriting the company. I know you don’t remember much about the merger, working together, but you want CEO. You want it more than anything.”

Henry doubted that. With each day that passed in a haze of twinkle lights, more memories of his past with Tia slipped in.

Claws sinking into his neck and a howl of laughter from above at their first meeting.

The taste of her lip gloss when he’d first caught her mouth with his.

Sweat dampening his hair after a solid hour of carnival games to victoriously hand her a purple cat.

Staring at her at a party as she spoke to another warlock, overwhelmed by possession. Need.

Arguing with her again and again, the same frustration, the same results, the way they’d collided, sex the only way they could win with each other.

A few pieces of the jigsaw remained lost, the breakup, the years after, but he knew enough.

He’d adored Tia with every beat of his heart.

He couldn’t give a shit what’d happened between them since then.

There was no fucking way he was about to cheat her out of her win, and he couldn’t believe things had tipped so sideways he ever would’ve.

An unpleasant taste coated his throat. “We’re a team,” he repeated. “I’m not screwing her over for a job.”

“You don’t understand now, but trust me. You’ll want justice.”

“You don’t know me.”

“I know you better than most.”

“Do you?” Henry wondered. For weeks, all he and his dad had been able to talk about was work.

For years, maybe. They’d never been close and no new memories had contradicted that.

It was work. Responsibility. Duty. And what did he have to show for that decade of dedication?

“If you knew me, you’d know I’d never hurt Tia. Memories or not.”

His dad let out a noisy breath. “That woman has always screwed things up for you. A stain on your life.”

Henry’s hackles rose. “Careful,” he warned softly.

“I’m not trying to be cruel. It’s… This could be a chance to prove yourself, what you’ve been working so hard for. Everything you’ve ever wanted.”

Tia’s eyes laughed up at him in his mind. “You don’t know what I want.”

“I’m your father.”

“And when was the last time you acted like one instead of my boss?”

The other end of the line went silent.

Henry dragged a hand down his face, frustrated with himself and his dad.

“It’s not just about the investment,” Richard said after a beat. “Henry—Tia isn’t good for you.”

He snorted. “So, this is parental concern?”

“I’m not going to pretend I don’t want you to secure Siddeley,” his dad said tightly. “But I also… Well, I don’t want you hurt by her. Again.” The words were gruff, if blunt. Henry almost believed he meant them.

They ended the call not long after.

He kicked at a pebble lying on the snow, driving it deeper. Stupid, that was what it was. People changed, no matter what his dad thought. She’d given him a second chance, even with their past.

The past she wouldn’t talk about. She didn’t answer his questions unless pushed and she never entertained the future. Stirrings of unease lit his magic and he breathed through the simmer of fire, directing the heat into the snow beneath him.

He took the unsettled feeling to their bedroom. Steam and vanilla hung heavy in the air from her bath, but she was—sadly—out of the tub, wrapped in a long-sleeved red dress that clung to every curve and flattered her brown skin. She was carefully blow-drying her hair when he walked in.

She smiled in greeting, absent affection that twisted something in his chest.

He echoed it with his own, bending to kiss her shoulder, easing the material out of the way. She hummed as he pressed two more kisses up her neck.

“Hi,” he murmured into her skin, inhaling her scent. Trying to settle.

“Hi yourself.” She angled her head in silent invitation and he complied, taking her mouth in a drugging kiss. She nipped his lip and drew back. “How was the call?”

He shrugged, moving to the mirror, staring at his own reflection. He watched his face as he said, “Same old, same old.”

He saw her sneer as she finished her hair and set the tool aside. “He’s got to be happy we’re making some progress. Or is the stick in his butt blocking that emotion?”

“He…said a few things.”

“About me?” she guessed. She dropped onto the bed, hair a sleek curtain as she tilted her neck. “Let me guess. He doesn’t want me talking to Siddeley. He wants you to.”

He shouldn’t be surprised she’d guessed. “Wants me to win it all by myself.”

“Ass.”

Henry kept his eyes on her in the mirror. “We win as a team or lose as a team, right?”

“I don’t lose, but sure.”

“You wouldn’t claim the win for yourself?”

She pressed her lips together. “I thought about it at the beginning, but I’d be a dick if I did that. It’s my fault we’re in this mess.”

His smile was genuine as he turned and propped his hips against the dresser. “Such a way with words, Celestia.”

“I know, right?”

Humor danced in his chest. On impulse, he said, “Tell me a memory.”

Even though he’d gotten their past before the breakup back, it wasn’t enough.

He wanted to know it all from her side. Her view.

How it led to them separating. If she opened up, talked about it, maybe this time things could be different.

It was why he continued to keep the truth to himself. For them. For a chance.

He knew better than to push, but with his dad’s words pulsing like a warning, Henry couldn’t help it. “Come on. Give me one of your memories.”

“Why?”

“I want to know you. Us.”

It was obvious the second the shutters came down. Disappointment crushed him as she patted the bed next to her with a sinful smile. “Then come here. I got clean just so you could get me dirty.”

He ignored the way his cock leaped. It would be so easy to give in, go to her. “Why do you do that?”

“Do what?”

“You change the subject any time I want to talk.”

She glared, sitting up. “Because I don’t .”

“And I do.”

“Well, that sounds like a you problem.”

“It’s an us problem,” he countered, frustration tipping into bubbling annoyance. It was a repeat of his memories, one of them always pulling away. Using sex as a band-aid. This time had to be different.

He dragged his hands through his hair, pushing back the rising tide of magic that surged with his irritation. “Why did we break up? Is that why you’re so stubborn about keeping distance between us?”

“Distance?” she scoffed, looking at him like he’d lost the battle with a mind hex. “I don’t even know what you mean. We’re having sex.”

“According to you, we’re fucking. Fucking,” he repeated harshly, pleased when she shot daggers at him from her eyes. “Like two strangers. I don’t want that. Talk to me.”

“About what?”

“Anything. Everything. Besides what position to do you in.”

She stood, throwing her hands up. “You’re being ridiculous. I’m leaving.”

“What a surprise. Tia runs away,” he mocked as she strode around the bed to pass him. The sentence knocked something inside his mind, an impression of familiarity that almost shivered something loose.

She swiveled and stalked up to him, brandishing a finger. “It’s not me who runs around here.”

“Oh, no?” He caught hold of her finger, straining to unlock why. The veil over those memories held and he made a sound of frustration. “Then tell me why.”

She breathed harshly through her nose. Every hot thought rolled through those hazel eyes, sank into the angry flush that burned her cheeks. For one second, maybe two, he thought she would. That she’d cross the line she’d drawn between them.

Then she scoffed again, tugged her finger out of his grip and stormed out of the room.