Page 10 of Unhinged Magic (Cutters Cove Witches #2)

I walked over to the bed, even when I knew it was a bad idea. Sitting beside her anyway, I left a space between us. I lowered my voice, trying to pull myself together. “Talk to me. I don’t understand why you did that. Help me understand.”

She shook her head, pleading with me. “You won’t believe me.”

“Why would I not believe you, Skip? When in all the years I’ve known you have I ever questioned you?”

She stared at me for a long time.

There was so much more to this; I knew it. I needed to hear it all.

“I’m sorry,” she said finally, the words leaving her on a sigh. “It all happened so suddenly, right before...” She didn’t finish her sentence, but she didn’t need to. I knew exactly what she meant.

The memory of me admitting my feelings to her caused a familiar ache in my heart. But the words that had come from her next broke me. I still remembered the crack in her voice as she had said them.

'I’m sorry, I can’t do this.'

All this time I thought she had left because of my confession. Maybe I had been wrong.

Skye’s chest heaved as tears rolled down her cheeks. I fought the urge to push them away.

Sitting completely still, I let her continue.

“I left because I was sent to a boarding school, one that was not the usual kind.” She picked up a nearby cushion, tugging it to her chest and wrapping her arms around it. “It was for people who couldn’t handle their magic,” she added, avoiding eye contact.

I didn’t follow.

“But Ty was helping you with your fire element. I thought you were doing okay?”

When her gaze found mine again, I realized there was more to this than I knew. Her twisted irises mirrored both guilt and... shame?

“The spirits. I couldn’t handle them at first.” She readjusted herself, hugging the cushion tighter.

“The evenings were the worst. They would fight to speak with me. Mom and Dad found me screaming in my bedroom every night. They tried to help, but you know how rare it is to see spirits.” She let out a long sigh, her shoulders releasing tension with every word.

I stared at her, trying to keep an open mind. I’d never met anyone who could see spirits before. It was rare indeed.

She continued, adjusting her legs again. “I had no choice and no prior warning. I couldn’t say goodbye, and Mom and Dad swore Tyler to secrecy. The only other person who knew was Scar, but it was months before I even got to speak with her. I wasn’t in a good place. Not for a long time . ”

I sat numbly, taking everything in. All this time she had been fighting demons of her own.

She continued, words suddenly free-flowing from her. “I’m sorry I hurt you. That I couldn’t come home for his funeral.”

My fathers.

His death had come unexpectedly, and the days following were the hardest of my life. I’d desperately wanted her to be there for his funeral. Had felt her absence like a wound.

Skye kept speaking, finally looking at me.

“I wasn’t me .” She lifted the pillow off her lap, setting it aside.

“It took me years to control these voices in my head. It’s not something I can just turn off.

I had to live with it, learn boundaries, and figure out how to develop relationships with these voices.

I spent months at a time in bed, exhausted.

The mental toll on me was huge. I didn’t want to speak to anyone, didn’t want anyone to see me that way. ”

Tears slid down her cheeks now, her crystal depths blurry with emotion.

Seeing her like this tore me apart. “I wish I could have been there to help,” I said, suddenly feeling guilty for my rudeness over the past days.

She shook her head. “I had a lovely mentor, a woman who guided me through it. It really helped having someone who knew what I was going through.”

Fuck.

“Skip, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know.”

She shrugged. “Don’t be sorry. I’m okay now.”

All this time...

I was pissed Ty hadn’t told me but understood his reasons.

“You were gone a long time. Years, ” I said.

She pulled her hair off one shoulder, draping it over the other. “When they let me out, I moved to the city. I wasn’t ready to face everything back home.”

Her family. Me.

But here she was, giving me answers. It felt so good to have them.

I adjusted myself on the bed to face her. “Thank you for sharing this with me,” I said, meaning every word.

She nodded, and we connected right then, in some otherworldly way I couldn’t explain.

I saw her, and she saw me. Two lost friends reunited, both wounded but healing.

Only she didn’t know the extent of my wounds. I wasn’t sure I could ever speak them aloud.

“This is nice,” I murmured, not wanting to break the moment. Fearful the wrong words would not mend this . Although we never touched, I felt the familiar comfort like a warm hug. It had the same effect.

Deciding to leave while I was ahead, I stood from the bed, shoving my hands into the pockets of my hoodie.

“I’m going to go, but I’m not sorry I climbed your balcony. It was worth it.”

A slow smile tugged at her lips. Lips I now needed to fight for. Because things still weren’t as they should be. But I would fight for this, for us .

Maybe the reason she was denying the mate bond had something to do with all of this. I needed to give her time. She was worth every second.

Skye rose from the bed, joining me as I walked to the sliding door. I turned to face her. “Be careful,” she said, motioning to the balcony.

I nodded. “Always.” Then I hauled my ass over the edge.

***

Determination could make a man do things he wouldn’t normally do. Today it led me to Coffee Cove where Skye worked, though how often, I wasn’t sure.

I pulled my dirt bike into the curb, kicking out the stand. Running my hand through my hair, I pushed up the sleeves of my shirt to my elbows before shoving my hands into my jeans pockets. I rarely got nervous, but somehow Skye had crashed that theory. My gut churned knowing I was about to see her.

Was she okay? Were we okay?

I hadn’t pushed any further last night, happy to leave things where we did. But that would not stop me. I had to find out why she was so against our bond.

I pushed open the heavy door, letting it shut behind me, smiling because I knew how deceiving this place could be. Outside, the cozy little cafe looked quiet, but inside, every table was full.

I spied Skye, scurrying to a table in the far corner, four drinks balanced on one tray. She wore workout tights and a black top with the cafe’s logo on the front, her hair pulled into a high ponytail.

I watched as she hurried over to another table, clearing it of dirty dishes, balancing them on her now-stacked tray again.

As she headed back to the counter, a woman with a slick, black top knot lifted her ghastly thin pointer finger in the air, demanding her attention.

Skye stopped, a polite smile plastered on her face, but the way her shoulders tensed suggested otherwise.

At the counter stood a line of people waiting to place orders. I looked for another server but couldn’t find one. At that moment, Skye caught my eye, desperation turning her stare into a frantic mess.

I frowned, angling sideways to see behind the counter and into the kitchen. A guy stood over a stove, flipping pancakes with one hand and garnishing plates with the other.

This place was packed. Was it just the two of them?

I strode behind the counter up to the till. It looked the same as the one at the tattoo parlor I owned. Next to it on a pad of paper were scrawls of drink orders, a few at the top crossed out.

“Hey, what can I get you?” I asked the next person waiting in line, quickly taking their order and jotting down their coffees on the pad beside me.

Skye hurried behind me, giving me a look that I read as 'thank you' as I took another order.

The distinct crash of plates on a bench sounded from the kitchen before she appeared beside me again, parking herself in front of the coffee machine.

I cleared the line in front of us, turning to her. “Short staffed?”

Skye grabbed three mugs, setting them beside her. “Yeah, Jess called in sick and Lola’s out of town.”

She set to work making the next order, filling the mugs with coffee.

“You seem to know what you’re doing,” I said, watching her closely. She moved so fluently, like she had done this before, her fingers running over the motions like a well-oiled machine.

“You’re a trained barista?”

Concentration etched in her forehead, her vision fixed on the task at hand.

“I wouldn’t say trained. More like thrown in the deep end back in the city.”

I nodded as a tradesman approached the counter.

“Hey again,” said Skye, greeting him with a smile from behind the coffee machine. “Another americano to go?”

He smiled wide, lines indenting his cheeks as he spoke to her. The ease of their interaction made my fist tighten at my side. “You know it,” he replied.

I took his payment, and he made his way to a nearby leaner.

“Who was that? Haven’t seen him around,” I commented, keeping the conversation light.

Skye darted a look at me. “Americano to go.”

I quirked a brow in question.

She nodded toward the table closest to us. “That’s mocha, espresso with cream, and the lady with the blue vest and matching blue earrings is cappuccino with chocolate and one sweetener.”

I stared at the table of women, watching one pour a dash of cream into her drink as the lady who loved blue popped a sweetener in hers. I couldn’t help but be impressed.

“You know them by their coffee orders.”

I hadn’t thought of it before. I guess this wasn’t exactly a place you introduced yourself by name, but most people would order the same thing every time. “Except you missed one thing,” I added.

Skye’s frown combined equal parts confusion and curiosity. “And what’s that?”

I moved closer to her as if revealing a big secret. “You forgot her shoes,” I whispered, for effect.

Her lips turned up at the corners as she peered around the edge of the coffee machine again. A suitably impressed nod. “So it seems. I hope I’m that cool when I get old.”