Total pages in book: 202
Estimated words: 193561 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 968(@200wpm)___ 774(@250wpm)___ 645(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 193561 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 968(@200wpm)___ 774(@250wpm)___ 645(@300wpm)
“I don’t need to meditate, cuz. I need to get that fuckin’ spelled poison out of her!”
“And we’ll do that, but Greyson, your eyes are glowing and the amount of magic you’re pulling, you could affect Carrie’s and other patients’ medical machines.”
She takes my hands into hers and squeezes them.
I demand, “Why don’t I know what this is and how to fix it if I can pull coven magic?”
Bailey startles and jumps from a dead sleep to standing on her feet. “Greyson?” She looks alarmed and her eyes bounce between me and our mom.
“Deep breaths, Greyson, okay?” Erica says in a soothing voice, and I see bright red and neon blue sparks flying off our joined hands. My energy and hers, I guess. Am I pulling hers?
“Breathe. We’ve got this. We’ll work together to heal Carrie. Okay? We’ve got this, Grey. You don’t know what Dani knows. You’d need to know more about ingredients before you’d identify what you’re smelling. Let’s focus together on pulling the poison out of her. Intention, Grey. Okay? Just pull it out.”
She starts slow-breathing while continuing to hold my hands. As soon as my breathing synchs up Erica’s, a phone starts buzzing and Bailey is saying, “Linc’s calling.” She’s putting her phone to her ear and saying his name. Immediately she’s looking at me with fear on her face.
And I feel it, too. Something isn’t right.
Stacy?
Stacy! I reach for our connection in my mind. We’re too far apart; I don’t know what’s going on, but I do know by my connection to Linc and Jase probably because they’re together and one is on the phone connected with my sister beside me that something is wrong.
Erica’s soothing voice speaks some more and I don’t know what she’s saying as I’m zoning in on the phone in Bailey’s hand, on Linc’s voice which I can hear from here and the fast words he speaks that I’m making out come through my mind sounding tinny as I go numb and his words nearly take my feet out from under me.
Stacy is gone. Something about a sewage problem taking everyone’s focus and someone moved Jared’s trailer up front and it, along with Boyd’s pickup truck which it was attached to because Jared was at that massage parlor with me. It’s around an hour since anyone saw her. Someone told Linc Stacy was asleep on Cat’s bed, but he realized it’s not her scent, it’s someone who was sick and brought in from their trailer. The Airstream and Boyd’s truck are gone and Linc says her scent trail stops there.
Gone?
My wife is…
Gone.
A roar of rage flies from my mouth.
Hands are on me. Riley has my shoulders. He’s behind me.
Noise rushes into my head and new shapes are in the space. My father. Rye’s father. Mase’s dad. I hear Riley speaking but make out nothing over the adrenalin pounding through my veins.
Bailey holds that phone. Erica has my hands. They’re either circling me slowly or I’ve got vertigo. My mom. The woman who raised me in the hospital bed is hooked up to machines because someone fucking targeted her. And she needs to be better. She needs to wake up. Wake up and be okay so I can go find my fucking mate. Heat intensifies not only in my eyes, in my entire head.
Pull.
Pull.
Smoky shadows ooze from the walls and float directly over her. The shadows are still, but the room has begun turning slowly, around and around with everything turning except Erica who still has my hands. Red and blue sparks fly, hitting the shadows and sparking loudly, like crackling electricity.
“Pull,” Erica urges.
And now the sparks are purple. Mine and Erica’s magic working in tandem.
I pull in a deep breath and suck the shadows straight out of the air into my lungs.
Mom is suddenly sitting straight up, eyes open, gasping for air, and I’m immediately releasing my cousin’s hands, turning to the bathroom door in the corner of the room, rushing for the sink and vomiting whatever I’ve pulled from those shadows, straight into the drain.
My guts are convulsing painfully.
It's rancid. Rotting. It’s hatred. Pure, covetous hatred.
Covetous? Why do I know that?
I taste the meaning behind the poison. I know what spell was used. If I were more experienced, I’d know exactly how to cast it. Someone poisoned her, someone who wants what she has.
My ears are ringing. Erica’s hands are on my back as steam from the hot, running water rises. I spit into the sink and whatever it is bubbles back up in the drain like black sludge before a slurping noise pulls it back down.
“Grey,” Rye puts his hand on my shoulder. “We’ll help. We’ll help, brother.”
Erica mutters something, holding her hands over the sink, flexing her fingers.
Wind, seemingly from nowhere, blows her hair back.
And I hear my father loud, clear, but baffled. “Baby? Why the fuck do you smell like that?”