Page 47 of Hexy Beast

Effie girl, you are losing it. You have got to figure out how to break this proximity charm before you get back to Arcadia and say your I dos—even if they’re only temporary. Darius Aetos is dangerous for your state of mind—and your nose.

Fine. Yes. I’m being a little dramatic, but still, if these aren’t dramatic times, I’m not sure when there ever will be any.

Lying down, I snuggle back into the spot along Darius’s side that seems made for me, making sure to angle my head so the dark hair on his chest isn’t near my nostrils. He wraps an arm around me, his hand coming to rest on my waist. It’s not a small dainty dip—not when you have a rounded stomach and hips like I do—but his palm spans nearly the entire space, fitting perfectly. The steady rise and fall of his chest is almost enough to lull me back to sleep, but my mind is whirling too much for that.

After Artemis’s visit, I’m utterly convinced of two things. One, no matter what Darius believes, that woman is a witch. She may well be a werewolf too—no, I have no idea how such a thing is possible either—but she’s definitely a witch or mystic or some kind of being that has magic. Two, whatever is happening with the Aetos pack, if Nikos takes control, it won’t just be bad for me; all of Witchingdom will suffer, because that man is in it with the Council right up to the whiskers on his chinny-chin-chin.

“I’ll fix it,” Darius says, his eyes still closed.

Propping myself up on one elbow, I look down at him, barely managing not to look way down at him, because I can’t afford to get dick distracted. “Fix what?”

He cracks an eye open and gives me a grin that is all cocky alpha. “All of it.”

I am not going to fall for that. I mean, Fates preserve me, how nice would it be to have someone who would just fix things for me? Really fucking nice. However, that is not how things work in Witchingdom, and Darius and I both know that. Still, it’s kinda comforting to pretend.

“It’s that simple, huh?” I settle back down, resting my head in the pocket of his shoulder. “You’re just Mr. Fix It.”

He lays his hand on my hip and squeezes. “Always.”

“Spoken like a true alpha werewolf,” I scoff.

“Oh, you’ve known a lot of us?”

“A few.” Even though I’m not the Sherwood heir, I still have to attend society functions and political events, some of which include various shifter families. “Although you’re definitely the cutest.”

He lets out a low rumble of an almost-growl that sends the best kind of shiver through me. “ ‘Cute’ isn’t exactly what I’m going for.”

“Would you rather be adorable?” I ask just to really bust his chops. “Or absolutely darling? Or the most precious? Or just a total sweetheart?”

“You better watch it, witch,” he says, his tone gruff, but it’s too late, I see all the way through that.

“Mmmmm, you know I like it when you get all grumpy.”

He dips his head down and buries his face in my hair and gives me exactly what I want, a low snarly sound that seems to vibrate out of his chest. My core clenches in reaction, and I have to bite down on my bottom lip to keep from responding with a pleading moan to follow that sound up with some action. There’s a whole battle of want versus need going on inside me right now. I want to swing my leg over his bare hips, slide down the full length of his hard cock, and ride him until we both come so hard we pass out. However, I need for both of us to get up and get dressed before Nikos has enough time to put his plans into action.

Darius brushes a kiss against my hair. “I can actually feel the thoughts bouncing around your brain right now.”

Lifting my chin, I look up at him. “No, you can’t.”

“That’s where you’re wrong.” He shoots me a smug you-can’t-lie-to-me-witch look. “It’s okay to admit it, even though I’m sure it’s painful for you.”

I don’t bother not rolling my eyes at that. “Has anyone ever told you that your ego is out of control?”

He laughs, a big, full sound that makes me smile all the way down to my toes.

“Do you really think that’s something Aunt Artemis would keep to herself?” he asks.

“Fair point.” The woman isn’t exactly the holding-things-back type (minus the fact that she’s partly a witch—or something). “And speaking of Artemis, after what she said yesterday, do you have a plan for what you’re going to do about Nikos once we get back?” I ask. “What is that guy’s deal anyway?”

Darius lets out a long, tired sigh. “He thought he was going to be in charge when my father died. The pack alpha is the werewolf standing after a battle royale–style brawl. The past several, however, have not been fought fair. Let’s just say my family hasn’t exactly been known for being fans of fair play. I don’t do that shit, though, and Nikos figured that by getting everyone to go after me at once in a coordinated attack, which isn’t exactly following the rules, he’d win. His plan didn’t work, and I became alpha.”

“And he holds a grudge.” I purse my lips together and roll the play-by-play of how all that has happened has ended up with the current situation. It probably started out small, little comments and challenges, but it built. And now he has somehow partnered up—at least Nikos probably thinks it is a partnership, when it is anything but—with the Council to get rid of Darius. “So why don’t you just take him out? The Fates know he’s obviously planned that for you by sending the Council’s welcome wolves yesterday.”

“That’s what would have happened in my father’s time and my grandmother’s before that”—his whole body tenses—“but I’ve seen firsthand what happens to a pack when an alpha lets their wolf run the show.”

His eyes go dark and his jaw tightens. All the warmth in his expression fades into a coldness that hurts to see. I wrap my arm around him and curl my top leg over his as if I can protect him by physically blocking whatever memories are tormenting him.

“When my grandmother was alpha, it was bad. When my dad took over, it was even worse. Most of the pack had to scramble for a share of any score. Backstabbing to get an edge wasn’t just a part of everyday life, it was encouraged. There was a fuck-over-others-before-they-can-fuck-you-over mentality. When I took over, I promised myself that I wasn’t going to be like them,” he says, his tone as cold as the look in his eyes as he stares at a spot of nothing on the cave’s wall. “I wasn’t going to let my wolf take over so that everything was all about getting mine and fuck everyone else. So I shut down that part of me as much as I could. Oh, he still prowls around inside me and lets me know his opinion, but he’s not in charge and won’t ever be. I can’t do that to the pack.”