Page 7 of Hexy Beast

After that, there’s a bit of negotiation between the queen and Leona, whose secret husband Erik it turns out has been turned into a tree. What the fuck is all the reaction I can have to that. And not for the first time in my life, I kind of wish I’d gotten more background information before I dove (or in this case drove) headfirst into a situation. Whatever is going on here is complicated and confusing. I’m only following about a third of it, but really, I don’t need to know any more than I’m on Leona’s side and whatever she wants, I’m here to make happen.

Finally, the queen begins to chant in pixyish, her voice going from high-pitched and so nasally it’s almost a squeak to a low bass boom. Then a shower of pixie dust explodes overhead, and the forest floor starts to shake. I’m ready to grab Leona and magic us out of here, but there’s something in the way she’s standing, as if somehow, some way, she’s totally in control, that stops me. Whatever is happening, Leona has a plan.

A deep chasm appears in the ground, the line of broken earth moving like a runaway train straight for a large tree. Leona lets out a bloodcurdling, heartbreaking scream a second before the ground opens up and swallows the tree whole.

I’m summoning my magic to do whatever I can when the last of the pixie dust settles. Sure, I have no idea what just happened, but Leona is gutted, and I don’t care what it takes, that pixie queen is about to have a rough day for making my sister feel like that. All my attention is focused on the tiny little queen as Leona cries out and rushes toward the chasm.

Her pain is so raw and real that I can’t move for a second—and I’m not the only one. All around us, everything has gone still. There’s not a sound in the whole forest until the roar of Darius’s motorcycle booms through the silence as he races away, the top of The Liber Umbrarum spell book sticking out of his saddlebag.

Part of me is ready to chase after him, but I can’t leave my sister like this. She needs me.

It’s pure chaos as Leona rushes down into the pit, finds Erik unharmed and no longer a tree, and thus begins the kind of I’ll-always-love-you kissing sesh that rarely happens outside of the movies. Seriously, it’s a lot, but I kinda get it. True love and all will do that to you. But it quickly becomes apparent that my sister doesn’t need me for whatever is about to happen next between her and Erik. And anyway, I need to go catch up with a thieving werewolf before he gets away with stealing the spell book.

“Hello down below,” I holler at Leona and Erik. “You two good here? Because I need to go chase after that duplicitous jerk Darius before he sells The Liber Umbrarum to the highest bidder.”

“You need help?” Erik and Leona ask in unison as if they aren’t desperate to get naked and orgasmic right about now.

“Believe me,” I tell them with a grin, “I can take care of one little werewolf on my own.”

Chapter Four

Darius…

Wind in my hair, bike back in my possession, prize in my saddlebag: Everything is in order and going exactly according to plan.

Finally.

After all that tedious work tracking the spell book down, taking it had been comically easy, almost as if the Fates were on my side even with the trouble that sexy little chaos witch had created. Now the payday for this thing is going to be huge, and the pack will be able to weather the winter and get back on better financial footing.

“Darius.” Nikos’s voice fills the inside of my helmet as I speed away from the scene of my latest crime. “You get it?”

Which answer he’d prefer is a toss-up.

Yes, if I have the spell book, that means our pack has made the score of scores, and everyone will live like kings through the winter instead of scrounging for scraps.

A no means that I, as the alpha, failed the pack, and Nikos would finally have his opportunity to challenge me out in the open rather than by shit-talking me behind my back.

I’d kick his ass in a fair fight, but Nikos isn’t known for playing fair. The last alpha—my father—was bad, but Nikos would be so much worse. He’d fuck the pack over in a heartbeat if it meant he’d personally benefit.

“Affirmative,” I say into the mic in answer to his question.

“Great,” he says, sounding like I just poured a Coke in his gas tank and ruined his ride’s engine. “We’ll see you at the rendezvous point.”

I grunt an acknowledgment before clicking off my comms.

There’s really no point in keeping them on. Until I get close to our home hidden in the hills, I don’t need to hear my number two’s thoughts. Fuck. I’d rather never hear them at all, but that’s the downside of being the alpha and what Nikos has never understood about the job—you have to listen because it’s not just about what you want. It’s about the pack and keeping everything in order and on schedule to keep the chaos of what happened with previous alphas running the pack into the ground from ever happening again.

I climb the Oros Hills, heading toward our home of Arcadia. It’s just me and the peace and quiet of the open road, and it settles something deep in me. I fucking love these mountains.

That sense of peace lasts for about a quarter of a mile, however, before the air shifts around me. And even though I’m miles and miles from home, the unmistakable warm, rich scent of the honeysuckle flowers that fill the woods around Arcadia hits me like a knockout punch. But what actually lands against me isn’t a fist. It’s a witch. And not just any witch, but the madam of mayhem herself, Effie Sherwood. One second I’m alone on my bike, and the next she’s wrapped around my front, sitting face-to-face with me as if she’s about to give me the best lap dance of my life.

Unfortunately, she’s not about to grind against me in the champagne room. Which, honestly, is too bad, because with a thick, curvy body like hers, I have no doubt she’d rock my world if she decided to give it a try.

My grip tightens on the handlebars, but otherwise I manage to keep an unbothered outward appearance even as she settles against me as if magicking herself onto someone’s lap is a normal, everyday occurrence for her. Going by what she posts on WitchyGram, it probably is. But we both know better about why she’s here. It’s not for fun. She’s here to get the spell book back.

“Miss me, honey?” she asks, curling her full, pale peach lips into a teasing smile.

“No,” I grumble, already planning what my next move should be even as I count the freckles that cover her high cheekbones.