Page 19 of Bad Witch

“You hunt treasure as a hobby?”

She laughed, the sound so surprising, so genuine that I rocked back. She smiled all the time, but I’d never heard her laugh. It was the sweetest sound I’d ever heard.

“No,” she said, her laugh dying down. “I do like to search for old things, and I like deciphering puzzles. I’m quite good at it.”

“Yeah?”

She nodded.

“You really think you can help me find these weapons?” I asked, already sold on the idea, anything to spend more time with her.

She licked her lips, and I nearly groaned. They were glossy and pink today. She rocked forward and said, “I mean, I can’t guarantee anything, but I’d like to try.”

“What was the last thing you found?” I asked, because I wanted to keep her talking. I liked seeing her like this, excited about something.

Her lashes fluttered, and she looked away from me. “Oh…um, some ingredients, mostly ancient flowers I needed for a potion.”

“And they were still good after all that time? The seeds?”

“Yes. It’s a plant thought to be extinct. Dried, it turns woody and preserves very well. It took me a while, but I found where it’d been hidden, secret stores of it buried centuries ago. The seeds were there as well, and I can use those to cultivate my own.”

“What kind of plant? What’s it used for?” I needed to keep her talking. Something had changed; the excitement washed from her eyes, and she’d closed down a little.

“Oh, nothing important,” she said, not meeting my gaze.

Nothing important? That was obviously a lie. A thought-to-be-extinct plant and secret stores? She obviously didn’t want to talk about it, though, so as much as I wanted to keep questioning her, I resisted. “Sounds like you know what you’re doing, Temp. I could definitely use your help.”

“Really?”

The excitement returned. She was practically bouncing now, and as soft and curvy as she was, that was not helping me get control over my dick. “Finding this stuff’s important. If you think you can help, then absolutely.”

“Excellent,” she said. “When should we start?”

“How about after the movie? We come back here, have some pie and look through these books. War’s organized a gathering up in the clubhouse later, but I have time before that.” I tried to act casual, but getting her back in my den later felt really fucking important.

She nodded, still beaming. “I’d like that.”

Not as much as me. I opened the door, and we headed back out. I wanted to take her hand again but thought I should probably play it cool. If I walked into the common room holding Temp’s hand, everyone would look. I didn’t give a fuck about that—in fact, I wanted everyone to know she was mine—but I got the feeling Tempest would prefer not to have a whole lot of attention on her.

We’d kept up with movie nights even with how uncertain everything was at the moment. It was a break from the constant training for a war that couldn’t be stopped. It gave us a few hours to pretend the city, our city, wasn’t being ravaged by a mystery sickness and that the humans and our friends and family in the Silver Claw pack weren’t suffering and in pain. I shoved those thoughts down. I didn’t want to bring all that with me tonight. Not when I had Tempest at my side.

When we walked into the common room, the lights had already been dimmed and everyone had found seats. There was a couch free in the back, and I directed her in the darkness. “Over here.”

Relic was up front with a bin of candy, tossing out what people were calling for.

“You want candy?” I asked her when she took her seat. “What do you like?”

“I’ve never really had much candy. I mean…my uh, grandma would make cakes and stuff but nothing that we hadn’t made ourselves.”

She really had lived isolated. “Yo, Relic, Red Vines and M&M’s.” He tossed them to me and I put them on her lap. “Time to remedy that.”

She nodded, blinking up at me, then looked back down. “What’s your favorite?”

I grabbed the M&M’s, opened the pack, and held it out.

She took one, placed it in her mouth and chewed. Her eyes went wide. “Oh yum, that’s delicious.”

I wanted to feed her all the candy just to keep her looking at me like that.