Page 27 of The Baby Hex (Mori’s Mementos #2)

Mori

Teddy and I met with Feral Moonscale at his club.

This early in the day Glitter Bomb was empty.

He told us to help ourselves to drinks because he was running late despite living behind the club.

We stayed away from the alcohol and poured some sodas instead.

Once upon a time, Teddy’s sire Fred Moonscale owned Glitter Bomb and strongarmed the city of Green Bay (now the GGB) into being a safe-enough territory.

Now, it was a thriving city that attracted more newcomers every year.

Feral arrived wearing yoga pants and a t-shirt with his trademark ‘Stay Feral’ scrawled across the front in cursive gold font.

The shirt hung lose around his stomach but did little to hide his pregnant belly.

I almost offered him help up onto a bar stool but thought better of it.

He hopped up on the bar and rolled out a map of the GGB in lieu of hello.

He’d circled all the places where Sharon Claudis had lived, worked, performed magic, or had friends or family. There weren’t many circles in yellow for the latter. Had her loneliness driven her to extremes or had her extremes driven everyone away?

“That’s the age-old question,” my wolf chimed into my thoughts.

“Has she given you any trouble before?” Teddy asked, breaking the silence.

“She’s broken a few laws on how you can market psychic abilities but nothing major enough to set off any red flags.

As far as we could prove, she never lied about her abilities, only omitted facts such as they don’t always work, and she keeps taking that disclaimer off her website.

All seer websites originating from the GGB must have that warning front and center. ”

“Nothing about babynapping?” Teddy cut straight to the point.

“No, that would’ve gotten her in a lot of hot water. Maybe literally,” he said, looking down at his own baby bump.

I bit my lip. Not because the thought of someone being boiled alive messed with my head (it did but only a little) but because Preston was pregnant and he hadn’t told me.

“Drop it,” Teddy sighed, picking up my thoughts over the link I shared with Ni. “That’s a conversation for you and Ni but not here. Not now.”

I opened my mouth to tell him to stay out of my head but he was right. If we were going to keep Preston and his baby safe I had to stay on track and not let my injured sense of brotherhood bog us down.

We left Glitter Bomb with Feral’s map in hand and a plan to head to talk to Venal. Only, Teddy thought it was a good idea to go by himself.

“You can’t expect me not to meet this guy who thinks he’s too good for my brother,” I hissed outside of Glitter Bomb.

“Mori, life isn’t that simple and it’s childish to act like it is! This isn’t about whether or not he wants to worship the ground Preston walks on. If someone isn’t ready for a relationship, not only is it unfair to try to force them into one but they’ll also be a bad partner.”

“But the baby,” I groaned. “You have Zinnia. Could you imagine just never seeing her because you didn’t want a kid?”

“I’m not having this conversation,” he shook his head.

“This isn’t about what I’ve done with my life.

If you show up there with this big chip on your shoulder and riding your high horse this guy isn’t going to talk to us.

He’s not going to tell us anything. It’s bad enough that we’re showing up to talk about his mum.

She’s deranged but she’s still his mum.”

Mums were a sore subject with Teddy who lost his own mother decades ago.

Some wounds lived under our skin forever.

But since he played the dead mum card, I dropped it and let him go alone to talk to the loser.

I wandered around aimlessly for a little while searching the other addresses on my phone.

Nothing looked interesting or out of place.

I figured by now Sharon Claudis knew we were searching for her and wouldn’t just go home.

I still walked by her quaint little house on the corner of Apple Cider Drive and Sparkle Lane.

I closed my eyes and leaned on the tops of her white picket fence.

I breathed out and let my magic travel over the lawn and through her herb garden.

It sank through the cracks of her foundations and around the doors and windows.

It found all the ways inside her home and much to my disappointment, the interior wasn’t the lair of a madwoman.

It was normal. Almost too normal. Everything was a shade of beige or white.

It was tidy without a hint of magical practices anywhere.

“Deeper. Dig deeper,” my wolf chimed into my thoughts and then he was gone.

He was riding the waves and tendrils of my magic inside her house.

He dug deeper in a literal sense. His claws dug into and shredded her magical protections until he fell straight through whatever ward or shield kept anyone from finding the trapdoor down to the basement.

He hit the damp, concrete floor with a soft, floofy thud and the scent of mold and wet filled my head.

He sniffed the air again, pushing himself up onto his big, furry paws.

“Looks like we’re questioning Venal after all,” he said and let out a low growl.

There in the center of the dark basement sat Venal, the son of Sharon Claudis, tied to a chair.

His head lolled forward and his mouth was stuffed with what looked to be the remains of the white cotton t-shirt he wasn’t wearing.

Whatever Sharon used to tie him up must have been magical because there wasn’t many factories making ropes strong enough to hold alpha bears.

My hands trembled for half a second as I ran down a mental checklist of everything that might be strong enough to tie up an alpha bear and keep him in place.

Surgical materials were usually a go to back home but that’s usually because bears could freak the fuck out coming out of surgery.

I didn’t think Sharon Claudis had access to surgical strength materials.

“It’s magic. I can break it. You come here first. Don’t want him to run away. Don’t want him to run away if she can feel it. Need her to think all is okay,” my wolf said inside my thoughts.

He was right. Now wasn’t the time to let Sharon know we knew anything about the innerworkings of her life.

Excitement prickled down the back of my neck.

Was Dern watching me now? Was he seeing me about to go in and rescue this guy?

Though, I could leave him in there and pretend I never found him.

If Sharon was caught before he was discovered by anyone else. Well, that would just be his bad luck.

“Stop it!” my wolf barked into my thoughts. “Stop wasting time and get moving!”

“Sorry that I’m not a spirit who can just slip through cracks,” I rolled my eyes at him as I opened the gate and walked into the yard as if I was just paying my good friend a visit.

If any of the neighbors came out to ask what I was doing, I’d just say that we were family now.

Her son had knocked up my twin after all.

Not to be undone by the obvious, I tried the doorknob first. It didn’t budge but no alarm went off either.

I glanced around Sharon’s tidy porch. There was a glider, four or five potted plants, and a giant ceramic bear sitting with an equally giant jar of ceramic honey between his furry legs.

Yep. The key was in the honey pot. How cliche.

Lucky for Venal that his mother had the creativity of a rock.

I opened the door as if I went inside every day and locked it behind me once I’d passed over the threshold.

I knew from my wolf’s digging around that the trapdoor was underneath the light blue sofa with the striped afghan tossed over the back of it.

It took a few shoves but eventually the damned thing budged enough for me to get underneath the sofa.

My phone vibrated inside my pocket as I climbed down the steps to the basement.

It stopped then vibrated again. Probably Teddy trying to let me know Venal had pulled a runner.

His head jerked up when he heard my footfalls in the basement.

I dug a piece of paper out of my pocket and whispered, “atsilv ko,” to bring it to fiery life.

Venal tried to grunt something out through his t-shirt gag but couldn’t manage to get the full word out.

It sounded an awful lot like my brother’s name.

“No, it’s Mori. The twin you didn’t shag and run off on,” I said.

Venal rolled his eyes.

“You must not have been down here too long yet if you still have the moxie to roll your eyes at me.”

I swept the fiery paper around the basement, double-checking the corners before tugging the wadded-up t-shirt out of his mouth and letting it drop onto the floor. He panted for air and licked the open space outside of his mouth as if trying to air out his tongue.

“This is how this is going to go. I’m going to ask the questions and if I don’t like you’re answers I’m going to put the gag back in and leave you here,” I said, trying to think of what Dern would say. “If you scream, I’ll set the damn place on fire.”

“If this is about Preston and his baby, we both have bigger fish to fry, wolf man,” Venal rolled his eyes again.

I stepped back and took a proper look at him. He was Preston’s type, through and through. He was tall, broad, and had a lot of chest hair. So much in fact that I could barely see his nipples at all. Somewhere under that chest and belly hair must’ve been muscles by the looks of his arms.

“We’ll talk about that eventually,” I said. “You made a kid and that means---”

“Nothing. It means nothing at the end of the day,” Venal sighed.

“We had sex. That’s all it was. It was good sex.

Fun sex. It was a lot of sex but it was still just sex.

If he needs money, I’ll give it to him but I’m not in a spot to be a good role model to a kid.

Your brother seemed fine with the arrangement but warned me you’d not like it.

Only, I thought he was exaggerating about how you’d react. ”

“I’m not the one who tied you up and locked you in the basement. That was your mummy.”

“Exactly but you don’t want to talk about her. You want to ask questions about why I’m not willing to toss everything I worked for up in the air.”

“What do you do for a living?”

“Stuff,” Venal shrugged.

“Are you like a drug guy or a gang man?” I asked and he tossed his head back and laughed. “Don’t laugh at me! I could gag you again!”

“You were a lot scarier before you said drug guy, friend,” Venal laughed.

“I’m an escort. You can look me up on the official registry.

Your brother wasn’t a client. I do have sex outside of work.

Work sex is for the client. Hookups are for me but if you’re finished judging my lifestyle maybe you could untie me and we could figure out where my mother went and what’s her plan. You know she’s after your twin, right?”

“Yes, she is,” a female voice said from outside the door. “Now she has all the bait she needs.”

“Gonna untie me now?” Venal laughed. “Little wolf, we could’ve been out of here if not for all your questions.”

Well, fuck.

“Did you do this on purpose?” I asked.

“No. I’ve been down here since she came home from throwing the bird through the window. I tried to chain her to the water heater, but she got the better of me. She’s an alpha shebear. They’re strong as fuck and regular bitches when they’re so inclined to be.”

“Mori! You should call Preston and tell him it’s time to come home!” Sharon called from the top of the steps.

“Sharon,” I said calmly, heading back up the stairs.

“I’m disappointed in you. You’re so worried about what my brother is doing but you’re not trying to make Venal be the sort of sire he should be.

I’m here to take him back to London with me.

It’s time for him to provide for his baby, don’t you think?

Did you raise him to be a dead beat? That doesn’t look great on you. ”

She was silent for a long second. If only I could’ve seen her face. Maybe I’d have been able to work out what she was thinking. I could’ve tried rushing the door but if Venal told the truth about his mother being an alpha I may have been in over my head.

“I know what you’re trying to do. You’re trying to turn the situation around on me,” she growled. “Preston should’ve already been here. That’s my baby!”

“Ma!” Venal groaned. “That’s not your baby! That baby came from my balls! We’ve been over this!”

“And who grew your balls, young man?!” she growled. “It’s bad enough you’re a dirty whore who---”

I stopped listening and walked back down the steps. Under normal circumstances, I’d have called her a toxic boy mom and moved on with life. Only, now I was locked in her basement with her son who was still tied to the chair.

“This is why I keep getting vasectomies,” Venal mumbled. “They grow back together, though.”

“Let’s get you untied and then we’ll worry about getting out of here. I’m going to trust you, but if you betray me, I won’t hesitate to kill you. This doesn’t mean we’re friends but since you went and used your ‘balls’ on my brother and made a baby I guess we’re family.”

“You just have to unwork the knots in the back. It’s uncuttable but it can be untied. She knows I’m not all that flexible,” Venal groaned. “But look at it this way. As long as she’s here torturing us, Preston is safe.”

“Small mercies,” I rolled my eyes and started working on the knots.

The world spun around me as I squinted at the knots. Was Sharon pumping something into the basement? I tried to say Venal’s name, but the word and the rope slipped from my grasp as my eyes saw black.

“You better hope Teddy’s a helluva lot smarter than your fluffy ass,” Dern’s voice reached my ears.

“If he’s not, you’re in deep, huh? Never go in alone and under no circumstances NEVER go in alone on a double mission.

One thing at a time is the only way to win.

I hope bitching at him was worth risking your life over. ”

“Huh?” I said, trying to blink up at Dern but the light above his head was too bright.