Bewitching The Alpha (Hex My Heart, #3) (2 page)

United, his human mind forged with his wolf. Why the hell did she have to come back?

Why now? And why did he want her more than his next breath?

“I
f they didn’t want the law broken then they should have stripped my magick when they had the chance. Not my fault the old geezers are slow in the head.”
They
referred to the archaic cave-dwelling High Council Elders who ruled over all witches and warlocks. Or, card-carrying dickdouches if Ember was feeling particularly generous with her fury. Lucky for them tonight she didn’t care what they thought of her, her past or what they wanted to hang over her head as blackmail this time. They could kiss her witch-gone-rogue ass!

Ember pressed her shoulder closer to her ear when her cell phone began to slip from its perch with all the winding bends and dips in the road.

“I can hear you’re in full snark mode tonight.”

She smiled and tightened her fingers around the wheel of her Jeep to take another curve.

“Can’t seem to help myself lately.”

“Ember darlin’, you know this ain’t gonna work, sweetie. Breakin’ the law again won’t change the past.” Harmony’s soft Southern twang added an effortless layer of exasperation to her tone. How the hell her coven sister did that, Ember would never know, but the woman was good, she’d give her that.

The truth of the matter, she no longer had a family to worry about and that was a damn blessing in disguise. If they didn’t have her back, why should she stick her neck out for them?

“The past can suck it. I’m so over it.”

“Maybe...” a deep sigh crackled through the earpiece before her sister continued gently. “I don’t know. Maybe it is time to move on, Ember? Have you considered that?”

Only half a million and a half times since breakfast. “Tried it, I really did,” she drew in a breath and on a long sigh of her own, asked a question she hardly had the guts to put out there. “Do you think he’ll forgive me? Or understand at least? Hell, maybe he’ll just shoot me and call it a day.” Threads of energy tightened in her belly and water rimmed her eyes to cast a blurry mirage over the road in front of her.

Hades to blazes. She never cried. Or lost her cool. Not anymore. Not a single tear had trailed down her cheek in sixteen months. So why the waterworks now? She sniffed and passed a hand over her face. No way in hell she’d break that record tonight.

“Sweetie, you know him better than that. If he’s gonna shoot you with somethin’, it’ll be with the only loaded piece of hardware the good goddess gave him.”

Her brows arched and she smiled. She had nothing. What did you say to something like that anyway? Yes, please? “The man won’t look at me, doubt he’s thinking of doing the wild thang with me anytime soon. But really, give it to me straight and tell me I’m crazy. That I need to turn around because the only way I see me getting
the wild thang
back on the table is doing exactly what got me in trouble in the first place—a helluva lot of magick and even more groveling right now, and I don’t care what fire storm of hell comes about because of it.” Besides, she’d made her mind up about five miles back.

“I just did, crazy witch, but it seems your heart has your attention, darlin’, not me.” A small understanding laugh colored her sister’s tone. “Just be careful, won’tcha? I don’t think you’ve forgotten what happened last time you pushed the Council like this.”

She splayed a hand over her midriff. No, she remembered all too vividly.

Nothing could erase the judging look from her family upon finding out she was pregnant and married by shifter law. But the real soul-crushing moment had been their nasty disloyalty when they’d found out
who
the father of their grandchild was. Watching them turn their backs on her as she stepped over the threshold of her home for the last time was something she’d never forget. Not in a million years.

Shunned and betrayed were two very distinctive emotions no one could bury, she only hoped Julian understood she never meant to hurt him.

As members of the Royal High Council, she never once thought her own flesh and blood would have picked the all-mighty dickwads and their fat bank accounts over their own daughter. One phone call and five minutes proved her dead wrong.

Almost two years and the pain still sliced at her chest, and the burn hurt like a fresh wound.

Ember’s fingers tightened around her cell. In the same breath her father had used to shun her, blackmail had spilled out with a vehemence that shocked her younger self into silence and self-loathing. Until that night, when the news of her mating and pregnancy to the second-in-command of Sweet Briar Hollow’s shifter pack spread within the Royal Council, her father had always treated her with respect. Never disgust or shame.

Her brows pinched together and she focused her attention out over the hood of her Jeep. The ultimatum he delivered cut her deeper than any blade could ever slice. Young and naïve made a desperate combination that landed her on the firm side of plain stupid.

Ember ran her free hand through her short hair, then slammed it back over the leather padded wheel.

Turning her back on Julian, the man she’d fallen for with a single caress of his ethereal whiskey-colored eyes, haunted her day and night. But his eyes weren’t the same anymore, nor was the man. And it was all because of her.

“I really screwed up, Harmony. I don’t think there will be a way out of this. I’ve been back for months and I get more attention from the town drunk than from Julian.” Would a little flirting hurt? No. He couldn’t even do that.

If that wasn’t bad enough, a week after she was forced out of the only home she ever knew, loss struck again. All medical advice she sought labeled it a stress-related miscarriage. In a blink, what she thought had been a beautiful thing turned ugly under the archaic beliefs of others. The one thing that had made the betrayal and heartache worthwhile, stripped from her. They could have taken her powers, and she would have gladly given them if that were the only cost.

Her sister stayed silent on the other end, her soft breathing a comfort in a way and in total contrast to the heavy memories that pressed down over Ember.

Grief. It left a nasty, sour taste in her mouth that twined through her body and twisted around her heart like an invisible barrier she may never break free from. But she had to try.

With a heavy foot, Ember took the last turn on the road that lead to his cabin, and then gunned it as the road straightened over the final crest before dipping back into the Hollow. With the phone pressed between her cheek and shoulder, she down shifted, her tires slinging miniature pea gravel-packed snow bombs as she hit the dirt road drive that led into the woods and away from anyone that could interrupt her plans.

With little ceremony, Ember switched her Jeep into four-wheel drive before continuing up the steep incline.

“So what’s your plan? Tell me in all your crazy... horny... dazed scramblin’ you have a plan.” That was her sister. Why hold back a punch when you could lay it all out in plain, Southern-lilted English?

“Winging it all the way. Mostly. Best plan to follow when all the magick hits the fan, no?” Or, was about to. No telling how this was going to turn out. With what she was about to do, the less anyone knew the better. Less ass covering she had to do, too, if it came down to it.

Truth spells were a bitch with claws and if the Elders of the High Council found out what she was about to do, her sister could be punished.

That part sucked.

Nah. Plausible deniability was the name of the game.

Several dips and potholes made the Jeep jerk and swerve. She gunned it and turned the wheel until she rode the higher middle and side road where it was smoother.

A shiver flushed along her spine. Perhaps the cold weather of the latest Nor’easter that had hit their small Maine town for one last hurrah before winter bowed out for the year? No, that wasn’t it. There was something different about the air. She’d felt it earlier back at the Matchstick when it happened. First their gazes had connected from across the span of the bar. Normally they rocked at ignoring each other. Then again, she couldn’t ignore how he’d reached for her and brushed the tips of his fingers through her hair when he thought she hadn’t noticed.

A palpable thrum pulsed through the crisscrossing lay lines with a steady rhythm. Her magick acknowledged the ancient powers and siphoned a little off the top.

A faint groan broke through the earpiece followed by a slight, “Tsk tsk. Seems a lot of mischievous deeds are playing out tonight.”

Deflect attention.

“You can sense Ambrosia? Is she all right?” Ember had swung by the Matchstick earlier hoping to catch Ambrosia before she’d left on a personal mission that involved two very determined alpha shifters and an elixir that she shouldn’t have brewed for her coven sister. She knew from experience breaking a bond never worked out well for any involved. Hindsight and all that load of crap.

“She will be if her alphas hurry.”

Ember’s shoulders relaxed and her mind cleared of the worry she felt for her sister since helping her with the elixir. The alphas in question held Ambrosia on a pedestal. No way would either man let harm come to their witch.

Ember needed to lift the veil she’d lived under for way too long, and helping Ambrosia tonight did the trick.

It didn’t click for her, though, until the second Julian had stroked his hand through her hair tonight. With the slightest of touches, thousands of electrical strands of power combed through her body. Dormant for over a year from the control of her best and strongest spells, the powerful gut-punch nearly took her to the floor.

Denial was never a good thing and she swallowed her fair share. Seeing Julian with the six-pack of women he blew through a week was great for starters. Every time she turned around the man had another blonde bombshell on his elbow. Hades to blazes, if she had to suffer through another doe-eyed looker, she might skip the plan she just told Harmony she didn’t have and go straight to death by magick, with a swift plead of insanity in front of the High Council. With her past, she could probably get away with it too.

“Earth to Ember. Did you space out or did ya inhale too much lavender crystal today?”

Ember gave a slight shrug and rounded the last bend on the mile and a half long driveway, skidded to stop then slammed the Jeep into park.

“A little of both and if your little ‘tsk tsk’ included me, you know I work better on the fly. If I recall you didn’t object to my
on the fly
sleeping spell you and Honor used over the entire school staff so you could play hooky for a Pink concert.” Ember slogged through the muck and edged around a crater of a pothole left from an uprooted tree toppled by snow from the looks of it, before making it to the edge of Julian’s porch. With her box of mischief tucked snugly under her arm, she scanned the darkened cabin and surrounding woods for signs of the man in question.

“GASSSP... you didn’t go there, bringing that up. It was years ago.” A sweet husky laugh cut up her sister’s words. At the oddest times her sister could make her smile. Any man lucky enough to land a girl like Harmony would have heaven in his hands. She knew how to ease a sister’s mind without even trying and never stopped being a friend.

Ember pushed a little more. “Or how my
on the fly
helped fill a special order that started with a hot love potion and ended with you and a sexy jock in the back seat.”

“Oh! Burn! You play dirty. You better never tell a soul!”

She smiled at her sister’s faux embarrassment. Ember tucked the phone to her shoulder and stood on her tiptoes to run her hand along the eve of the door. Roughened wood scraped along her fingertips.

Bingo.
Julian, you never change
.

“You play just as dirty. HA! Probably more. That Southern charm of yours is like honey to a bee. It draws men and when you have them tied up and under your spell, the real devilish creature comes out to play. You’re a wicked temptress well hidden behind your perfect red lipstick.” Ember slid the key into the lock and turned. “Listen, I love ya, babe, but I’m here and gotta go now.”

Harmony softly hummed in agreement. “All kiddin’ set aside, hun, be kind to him. He’s still hurting and his heart doesn’t know how to move on without his mate. Give him time.”

He sure didn’t show it. Back at the Matchstick blonde bombshell number
whodafuckknew
had her eyes trained on him from across the room, intent written all over her too perfect body.

“Sure. Any parting words of wisdom?”

“You betcha. Go light on the dragon’s blood for your truth spell. That shit takes forever to wear off, if it doesn’t knock him out first.”

Sometimes Harmony’s psychic abilities gave her the chills. She couldn’t exactly read the future, but once things were ‘set in the fabric of the Universe’ as Harmony put it, things became clearer and easier to read. Not absolute, because human will was a fickle beast but according to Harmony, if she concentrated on the thread of a soul long enough she could read their immediate future. “And Ember, I can tell you’ve made up your mind. The plan you have... be careful. You mess with the will of someone else and that could get ugly, darlin’. Fast.”

She knew the consequences, but what other choice did she have?  Watch as her mate moved on. Without her? Not likely. Seeing him with anyone that wasn’t her drained her magick and the bond they shared caused a whole other ache.

Time for drastic measures. And time to reclaim her man. She flicked her fingers over the various herbs and potions she held.

Knots tightened in her belly and she swallowed the bile that always washed the back of her throat when the memory of all she’d lost to betrayal roared back to life.

“And you know I’m not talking about just the Council members stripping your powers here.”

She understood. Karma was the least of her worries, though.

If she didn’t take this final risk, she might as well hand over her healing crystals and caldron now, because nothing else in the world would matter after tonight if her balls-to-the-wall plan went south.