Chapter 2

When I stepped into the living room, all four of the girls were seated on the couch, and all four of them watched me with varying levels of wariness—expect for the one who’d done something witchy to me outside. She watched me with rapt interest.

Sophie waved at an empty chair that looked as uncomfortable as it was ugly. “Please, sit,” she said with a kind smile.

Steps slow and purposeful, I lowered myself into the chair, which I was positive had, at one time, been used as some sort of medieval torture. I ran my palms along the arm rests. “Your hospitality is as gracious as ever, Sophie.”

Her eye twitched with barely contained contempt. Score one for me. Sophie turned to the girl on her right. “Piper, please fetch our guest a drink.”

So, the girl messing with me was Piper. Good to know.

“Why do I have to wait on the vampire?” Piper honest to God whined.

And dammit, something stirred inside me at the sound of her voice. “You don’t.” I refused to meet her gaze and be caught up in her spell again. “I don’t want any of your witches’ brew.”

One of the other girls huffed, the one I’d been ready to kill. “You have the manners of a heathen.”

My brows rose. “Excuse me?”

“Sabella,” Sophie scolded.

“What?” Sabella lifted her head and looked down her nose at me. “He’s rude and unappreciative, and he nearly killed me. Not that he could have, but he was going to try. And not once has he apologized.”

I snorted. “There’s no trying involved. I would’ve succeeded.”

“If you say so.” Sabella waved me away like she was utterly bored, then stared at her fingernails.

“You should apologize.” Piper’s melodic voice wiggled its way into my chest and squeezed my heart. “It’s the polite thing to do.”

I remained silent, careful not to allow myself to so much as glance at Piper. I had no idea what game she was playing, but if she didn’t knock it off, she’d find out exactly who she was messing with.

“It’s okay, Jaxon. When you’re done being cranky, you can apologize to Sabella.” Piper crossed her legs and folded her hands on her knee.

The sound of my name on Piper’s lips had everything inside of me tightening and twisting. My fingers curled around the ends of the arm rests so tightly my knuckles blanched, and I half expected to hear the bones crack. She thought I was cranky? She had no idea how cranky I could be.

Turning slightly to face Sabella, I settled my steely gaze on her. “I’m sorry I didn’t kill you.” I smirked. “I mean, I’m sorry I tried to kill you.”

Sophie sighed and shook her head. Sabella rolled her eyes, and Piper giggled. And just like that, the twisting and tightening returned with a vengeance. What the hell was she doing to me? I risked a glance at her, and the way her eyes lit up with pure mischief had me smiling despite my foul mood.

“What coven did you say you were from?” I asked.

“We didn’t,” Sophie said.

“Do us all a favor and shut your stupid vampire mouth.” Sabella pinned me with what could only be described as a death glare.

I narrowed my eyes. I’d never met a witch who wasn’t willing to name their coven. What was going on here?

Peyton sat on the far end of the couch, staring off. She hadn’t said a word to anyone about anything. Piper, though, kept her gaze steadily on me, and I squirmed in my seat. Actually friggin’ squirmed. I hated it here. I glanced at the front door. Where the hell was Abby? I stood to go check on her.

“Leaving so soon?” Sabella asked, brow raised. A smug smile curled her lips.

“And deny you the pleasure of being in my presence?” I infused as much snark and disinterest into my voice as I could muster.

“We certainly wouldn’t want that, would we?” Piper’s entire expression offered one hell of a challenge, and if I wasn’t already so unsettled by her, I’d answer whatever unspoken challenge she’d just thrown down in front of me. Because there was no mistaking that she’d intended that for me and me alone.

Instead, I headed out the front door. Abby and Isach were still in the same spot they’d been when I left them. “Hey, if you two are done kissing and making up, it’s time to get in here. These witches are already on my last nerve.”

“See? Lack of manners.” Sabella’s haughty tone frayed my final nerve.

Piper tsked. “That’s no way to talk about your hostesses.”

I cursed, spun on my heel, marched back into the living room, and plopped down in the torture device they called a chair. I was not going to let these witches get the best of me. All four of them now stared at me, and I had a new appreciation for how people in a freak show must feel. Tension swirled through the room.

A second later, Abby and Isach walked into the room. About damn time. Maybe now we could get the hell out of here.

“Everything alright?” I asked.

Abby nodded, her gaze not straying too far from the girls.

Isach approached from the doorway. He rested his hand on Abby’s lower back. “Sit with me.” He nodded toward a loveseat.

I did a double take. Where had that come from? It wasn’t there a second ago. I narrowed my eyes at the witches. The only one who bothered to acknowledge me was Piper, because of course she did, with a lift of her eyebrow and a barely noticed shrug.

Abby sat next to Isach on the end of the loveseat that was closest to me. “Start at the beginning,” she said, her voice firm. “From the moment the war started with your coven. What happened?”

Isach took a deep breath, his body sagging when he exhaled. “All of this started long before then.”

My instincts kicked into high gear, and I gave Isach my full attention.

“The day Chloe and I went to talk to Ivy about doing the spell that would let Chloe get pregnant, Ivy said I needed to swear a blood oath to her, that I needed to align myself with her coven once the magical balance was restored and my coven was dealt with.”

“I remember,” Abby said.

“I took her deal, and I swore the blood oath,” Isach said.

“I know all of that,” she said, confused. “We talked about it quite a bit. We—”

Isach held up his hand. “Please, let me finish.”

She nodded for him to continue.

He shifted so he could look at me now, and I nodded for him to keep talking. “What you and everyone else don’t know is that I had never intended to fully align myself with Ivy. I was going to swear the blood oath, fight my coven, and stay with Ivy just long enough for Abby and me to get married and start a family.” He gave Abby a sad smile before returning his attention to me. “Then, I was going to permanently hide my magic so no one could ever get to it, and Abby and I were going to become vampires.”

I leaned forward in the chair, arms propped on my knees. “Would’ve served her right. Despite everything, I still don’t trust that woman. But how did you go from all of that to this?” I straightened and waved my arms around to indicate Isach’s current situation.

“The day I made the blood oath with Ivy, I gave her a small boost of power so she could make the potion for Chloe and Trent. But she took more from me than she should have.”

“She siphoned from you?” I asked, my tone incredulous.

Isach nodded. “I didn’t say anything to her because I didn’t want to cause trouble when our alliance with her was already so tenuous. At the time, we needed her help, so I kept my mouth shut, but I was on alert.”

My blood boiled. How many times had I told Chloe and Trent and everyone else that Ivy couldn’t be trusted? They hadn’t wanted to listen, and now here we were. When we got home, I was going to kill Ivy myself, and I didn’t care if I pissed off Chloe. She’d get over it eventually.

“When Trent was kidnapped, we worked together to do location spells to find him, and she drew on my magic again.” Isach clasped his hands in front of him and hung his head. “I realized she was up to something, so I went to talk to her. Alone.”

The longer Isach kept talking, the hotter my rage burned. I’d known Ivy was power hungry, but how far had she gone? How much farther would she be willing to go?

“I asked her a lot of questions about how things would work once I joined her coven, what would be expected of me, what role I’d play. She was very vague, which didn’t help my suspicions, but I had no way of knowing what she was up to. Until I was getting ready to leave.”

“Did she do something to you?” Abby asked.

“No. Heaven Leigh approached me, said the entire thing was a trap, that as soon as I formally joined the Rose Coven, Ivy was planning to drain my magic from me. Then, she was going to kill me.”

Abby gasped. My lip curled with hatred at the mention of Heaven Leigh, and I growled low in my throat. She was the witch who’d helped kidnap Chloe, and then eventually starved me. She was on my hit list, too, right after I dealt with Ivy.

“Why would Heaven Leigh tell you any of that?” I asked. “Why would she betray Ivy when they were all getting exactly what they’ve always wanted?”

“For starters, Heaven Leigh feels guilty about her part in kidnapping Chloe and then starving you. I guess she thought by telling me what was going on, she could make amends.” Isach shrugged. “She’s terrified of Ivy. She said Ivy was leading the coven in the wrong direction, that she was so eager for more power that she ruled with threats and fear instead of with love and sisterhood.”

She felt guilty? Yeah, right.

“So, what? Heaven Leigh wanted to overthrow Ivy?” Abby glanced between Isach and me.

“No. She doesn’t want to lead, but she doesn’t want Ivy to be the leader anymore, either. She was hoping I could help her. Defeating the Zoya made Ivy the leader of the most powerful coven, but add my magic to that?” He shook his head. “She would’ve been unstoppable.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Fresh anger sparked in my chest. “We could’ve done something to stop her so you wouldn’t have had to fake your own death.”

“Someone told Ivy I was planning to betray her, and she threatened to kill everyone I loved, starting with Abby. Then Chloe and the girls.” His expression was a mixture of anger and sadness.

If I had any reservations about killing Ivy, they were gone now. Nothing and no one would ever be allowed to harm Chloe or those girls. I’d die before I let that happen.

“But if you were dead, you couldn’t betray her, and she wouldn’t have any reason to kill anyone,” Abby said.

“Exactly,” Isach said.

“What about your magic?” I shifted in the chair. Again. My ass was going to have blisters when this was over. My gaze darted to the four witches who were being entirely too quiet for my comfort.

“Yeah, and who did we bury?” Abby asked.

Isach smiled with smug satisfaction. “He was a member of my coven. When I gave Chloe my magic, I gave him a very small boost, too, knowing as soon as Ivy found out I was dead, she’d make a grab for it. Then I did a spell to make him look like me, and I took off right before Chloe blasted everyone.”

I whistled. “You pulled a Dante.” Despite how angry I was with him for this little stunt, I had to hand it to him—the entire thing was rather brilliant.

“Huh?” Abby said.

“When Dante was holding Trent prisoner, he was using Zoya magic to make women look like Chloe, and then he’d torture and kill them in front of Trent. Isach did the same thing, making someone else look like him,” I explained.

“So, you don’t have your magic anymore?” Abby asked.

“No. I hid it somewhere safe, though.”

“Which is why you’re shacking up with them.” I nodded at the witches. “They’re protecting you.”

“Yes.” Isach smiled at the four of them, and they returned the gesture. “They’ve kept me hidden and have prevented anyone from using location spells to find me.”

Witch boy was smart. He’d covered his bases.

“You did all of this to protect us.” Abby wiped her palm on her shorts. She stood abruptly. “Ivy knows I came here to try to resurrect you. She was pissed, but Chloe and Trent….” She jerked around to stare at me. “If she knows about…”

Shit. My stomach knotted. Losing my composure would only make things worse. I kept my expression neutral. “We haven’t told Chloe and Trent anything yet, remember?” I said calmly. “For all they know, we failed to bring Isach back. For now, he’s still dead to everyone.”

Isach stood and reached for Abby’s hand. “Abby and I need some time alone to discuss a few things.”

I suppressed a groan.

Sophie nodded with understanding.

“The vampire can stay with us until you finish.” Piper gave me a sly grin, and I scowled in response.

“Have a little mercy on me, huh?” I met Abby’s gaze. “Don’t leave me down here to suffer too long.”

She followed Isach out of the living room. I was once again alone with the witches. I expelled a heavy breath. I was tempted to listen in on what Abby and Isach were saying upstairs, but I wouldn’t violate her privacy like that.

The silence stretched for an uncomfortably long time. I looked everywhere but at Piper, or any of her sisters. How long had they lived in this house? There was a noticeable lack of any real décor, no pictures or personal touches. That was odd.

“He’s probably thinking of ways to kill all of us in one fell swoop.” Piper’s whispered words blew across me like a gentle breeze.

I fought back a smile. This girl was tenacious, wasn’t she? I couldn’t shake the feeling she wanted to get a rise out of me. I shifted in the chair and stretched my legs out in front of me.

“Actually, only three of you,” I said, intentionally inflecting my tone with boredom. “The quiet one on the end there is the only one who hasn’t annoyed me.” I jutted my chin in Peyton’s direction.

“Give her time.” Piper grinned. “She’s worse than the three of us put together.”

I highly doubted that. Before I got the chance to say anything else, Abby came rushing down the stairs. Her face was red and splotchy, her hair was a frizzy mess, and her eyes were still wet with tears. Isach was nowhere to be found.

I jumped to my feet. “Are you alright?”

She shook her head. “We need to leave.”

“Isach?”

“He’s not coming. Please just take me back to the hotel.”

“Okay.” I couldn’t get out of this house fast enough. Without hesitation, I escorted Abby outside and into the car.

But as soon as I was on the road, my chest seized, my breath became sharp and ragged, and my stomach revolted. The urge—the need—to turn this car around and go back to that house, to Piper, consumed me unlike anything else I’d ever felt before.

That’s when the truth hit me. Piper hadn’t been using magic on me. She hadn’t been messing with my mind or emotions. What had happened was far worse.

I’d found her. My soulmate.