A Curse in Darkness by Sherilee Gray

Chapter 16

Willow

Warrick grippedthe steering wheel of the Morris in those huge hands, the big silver rings he sometimes wore catching the moonlight every now and then.

No one drove this truck but me. But I’d been shaking so hard by the time we reached it, Warrick had steered me to the passenger side without a word and lifted me into the seat.

Ren was gone.

We searched for hours, wandering through the forest. Nothing. Not a single sign of him. Warrick couldn’t track him or Edric. Their scents weren’t the same, anymore. They seemed to change and morph when they were possessed, making it impossible.

My sweet fox was out there somewhere right now, and that spirit could be making him do terrible, terrible things, things he’d never recover from. I bit back the sob trying to crawl up my throat. I should have sent him back as soon as I saw him. No, I should have taken him back out and driven him home myself.

Oh goddess, what would I tell his parents? Sally and Calum were like family to me, and I’d promised them I’d look after their son when I became a Keeper.

I gripped the door handle and tried to draw breath.

“Dove.”

“It’s my fault.” I stared out the window and fought back my scream of helplessness. My throat felt raw. “I told him to stay in the salt circle, but his instinct to protect me…” I swallowed convulsively, acid trying to crawl up my throat. “He saw I was in pain and…I should have seen it coming, I should have…”

“A man makes his own decisions. The fox chose to follow you out there, and he chose to ignore your orders to stay put.”

Warrick didn’t understand. How could he? He didn’t love, he didn’t know what it was to really care about another being. He understood loyalty, but that wasn’t the same. He didn’t even have a soul; how could he ever understand? “It’s happening again,” I said, unable to keep the words inside me. I felt untethered, spinning out of control, the kind of fear I’d only ever experienced once in my life, and it gripped me so tight, it was all there was.

“What’s happening again,” he said, voice sharp.

“When Azel hurt me, when he cut me…”

Warrick jolted at that monster’s name, his big body jerking like he’d been struck by lightning. “Dove,” he said.

I ignored him and carried on, I had to get this out. I don’t know why, but I had to purge the horror, the fear. “I remember lying there, his breath brushing my cheek as he leaned over me and carved WITCH into my back. He laughed, but he was so angry, so incredibly angry. I’d never heard a sound like that before. I broke…when he threatened my family. I was in so much pain and he was in my head, breaking me from the inside out, stripping back layer after layer, crushing my spirit, my will to live, to fight.…so much, that I gave up my friends. I’ve never felt like that before…” My hands shook in my lap. “He took me to the knights’ compound and I dropped the ward protecting them. I’ve never felt weaker or hated myself more.” I curled my fingers into fists. “I should have let him kill me before doing that… I should have…”

Warrick growled, loud and harsh, the sound ripping through the cab. “No,” he barked. “You did what you had to do.”

“I failed, Warrick. I failed all of them, and it’s happening again. I’m failing.” I sucked in a ragged breath. “Ren is gone. What if I don’t…what if I lose him forever?”

His fingers curled tighter around the Morris’s steering wheel, but he said nothing, because Warrick didn’t lie and he couldn’t promise that Ren would be okay, that he’d come home.

Finally, we reached the crossroads, and he indicated the turn that would take me back to my family. My stomach churned. “I don’t want to go home.”

Still, he said nothing, just turned in the opposite direction and headed toward the hounds’ clubhouse, and I let him. I was being a coward, but I couldn’t face my family after what I’d done, not yet.

Ren’s parents, though, I needed to tell them now. Before I completely sunk into my pain and was utterly useless. I forced myself to hit Sally’s number. Warrick remained quiet beside me as I tried to explain to Ren’s mom what happened. She cried, and I made more promises I wasn’t sure I could keep.

Warrick pulled up outside the clubhouse, and I followed him in.

He strode through the main room, down the stairs and into his room, shutting the door behind us. I stared at him, and tears stung my eyes, but if I cried, I wouldn’t stop, because I’d lost Ren, because we were going to lose everything, and I didn’t know how to stop it.

“Dove,” he said so low it rolled through me like a tremor.

I didn’t want to think. I didn’t want to think about Ren out there somewhere, or that I might never get him back, even if he did survive this. I couldn’t. I’d break if I did.

I locked eyes with Warrick. “Fuck me,” I whispered.

His expression didn’t change, but his eyes darkened before he shook his head.

I strode toward him. “You want to, you’ve said it enough times.” I pressed my hands to his chest and tried to shove him toward the bed. He didn’t budge. “What? Now you’re acting all chivalrous? You either want to fuck me or you don’t.”

I was behaving like a crazy person—well, I fucking felt crazy. Out of control, and so desperate to get out of my own head space, so full of horrors and fear, that I pushed on, moving closer, pressing my body against his huge, hard one.

“You don’t want this,” he said.

I reached down and cupped his hard dick through his jeans. “You told me the next time I touched your cock, you’d fuck me.” I lifted a brow. “Don’t chicken out on me now, alpha.”

“You don’t want this,” he repeated.

I squeezed him hard, wringing a groan from him. “Don’t tell me what I want.”

“Fine.” He grabbed me, lifted me, and tossed me on his bed, then he came down on top of me, pinning me with his large body. He looked at my mouth and licked his lips.

“Well, what are you waiting for? All those females you fuck, they want more, right? Show me what I’ve been missing.”

He cupped my jaw, his gold eyes locking with mine. “Your emotions are all over the place, I can feel them.” His expression darkened. “The shit you said on the way here…” He growled under his breath. “You’re in pain, dove, and you’ll hate yourself, and me, if we do this.”

“Why do you care how I feel?” I fired at him. “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. You don’t even understand emotions.”

“I didn’t say that.”

No, he hadn’t, I’d made an assumption. But I didn’t care, I wanted an escape, and he could give me one.

“I want you,” he said. “You fucking know I do, but not like this.”

I tried to shove at his chest, but again, he didn’t budge. “Then let me up.”

He shook his head.

“Warrick, let me the hell up.”

“Not letting you up until you’ve calmed down. You still want me to fuck you in the morning, I’ll let you bounce on my dick all you want.”

“You really are a giant assho…”

He pressed a thick finger to my lips. “Quiet.”

I stared up at him, my fury shooting higher, so much so, heat fired through my veins, igniting my skin. I fought, shoving and kicking.

He held me in place easily.

I shook my head, dislodging his finger. “Get the fuck off me.”

“No, but keep throwing the attitude. I like it, makes my dick even harder.”

I hissed up at him like a demented wild cat. “I’ve changed my damn mind, you can keep your dick to yourself.”

“Liar. You want my dick so bad right now, I can smell it.” He scented the air. “Can damn near taste it.”

I screamed in outrage and tried to shove him off again.

Again, he didn’t budge. Instead, he grabbed my hands and pinned them over my head by the wrists. “Best you keep still, shut the fuck up, and go to sleep, or I might forget how emotional you are and fuck you, anyway.”

If I could, I would have punched him. A broken hand would be worth it. “Fine,” I bit out.

“Fine what?”

I stared up at him, looking into his eyes, and the way he watched me back…was that concern? No, of course not. Now I was imagining things. “I’ll sleep, but I’m covered in mud.”

“So.”

“So, can I at least take a shower?” Let me up so I can kick you in the nuts and get the hell out of here.

“No.”

“No?”

He shrugged his wide shoulders. “I don’t give a shit about mud.”

“Well, I do.”

He shrugged again, brought my hands down, rolled away, and pushed me to my side, then he rolled back in behind me. A muscled arm banded around me, keeping me pinned against him. I felt him kick off his boots.

There was no way I could get off this bed unless he let me, and suddenly I didn’t care. I was exhausted right down to my bones. With the last of my energy, I kicked off my own boots, because it was obvious he wasn’t letting me go anywhere tonight, even if I had the energy to leave.

The light went off.

“How did you do that?” I asked.

“You’re not the only one with powers, dove.”

I figured he had them, I’d just had no idea to what extent. “What else can you do?”

I felt him shrug. “A lot of things. Not as much as you.”

The look in my fox’s eyes, eyes that had no longer been his own, filled my head. “Where do you think Ren is right now?”

He was silent for several moments. “Don’t do that.”

I blinked into the darkness. “Do what?”

“Come up with stories in your head. We’ll worry about that shit when we find him. Then we’ll deal with the aftermath, whatever that is.”

I swallowed, and the sound was audible in the dark room. “What if…he’s like Maddox and runs away? Or what if what that spirit forces him to do is too much for him and he goes feral?”

“A shifter goes feral, we put them down.”

The words were blunt, harsh, but his tone had gentled. I squeezed my eyes closed and kept them that way. I knew this, I knew what happened to shifters that lost control of their inner animal. Ren was strong, though. I had to believe that, or I’d lose it.

Warrick’s warmth, his strength, soaked through me as if it were trying to fill the gaping hole inside me, leaving no room for the pain.

And somehow, in his arms, the anxiety and turmoil was just a little bit more bearable.

* * *

I was laying in long grass, eyes closed, the sun beating down. So warm.

Crickets chirped, while birds perched on headstones and sang their morning song.

The cemetery had always been a place of peace for me. Some would find that weird, macabre, but I didn’t care. When I lay here, it was as if I were being embraced by the women, the amazing witches, that had come before me. I always felt recharged, energized after I spent time here.

A dark cloud drifted over the sun, taking the warmth with it.

The birds and crickets quieted.

Thunder rolled across the sky.

I sat up, looking around, shivering as an icy chill lifted goose bumps on my skin.

“One by one,” a voice called, traveling to me on the breeze.

“Hello? Who’s there?”

A dark figure stepped out from the trees lining the cemetery. I didn’t know them, they shouldn’t be here, they shouldn’t be able to enter our most sacred place.

“One by one,” the dark figure said again.

I scrambled to my feet. “Who are you? What do you want?”

The figure slowly walked closer. They were small, draped in a dark cloak so large that was all I could see of them. A red fox trotted up and sat at their side.

“Ren?”

But Ren didn’t move. He looked at me with eyes that weren’t his own, eyes that didn’t know me.

A shadow hovered behind him, growing larger. “Come here,” I called, “come to me.” Ren turned and walked back into the woods, and that strange shadow drifted deeper into the cemetery. “No, please, Ren. Come back.”

“One,” the dark figure said and lifted a hand. “By one,” they finished and lifted their other hand. The billowy sleeve of their cloak slid back as they lifted them higher, and tangled in the skinny fingers of their right hand was a tumble of chestnut hair, the left was wrapped in pale gold waves.

I stumbled back, screaming, falling to my knees.

Iris and Rose stared back with dead eyes, their decapitated heads clutched in the stranger’s hands. The cloaked figure laughed and kicked something.

Another head, this one rolled to a stop beside me. Beautiful black hair, thick and wavy, covered the face, and I brushed it back with a shaking hand.

Magnolia.

I screamed again.

“Wake up,” a voice said, echoing all around me.

The dark figure dropped the heads and walked toward me, a long, bloodied knife in their hand. “One by one,” they repeated. The strange shadow followed.

“Wake up, dove,” the voice said again, against my ear this time.

I jolted and gasped, my eyes shooting open.

“Dove?” Warrick said, voice so low I felt it.

My face was wet, and I was shivering.

“Your skin’s like fucking ice,” he said.

My throat hurt and a sob escaped before I could stop it.

Warrick wrapped his arms around me, rubbing those hot, rough-skinned hands over my skin, and I couldn’t bring myself to push him away. I needed it. I needed to be held so badly.

The cold slowly washed away, my body drawing warmth from Warrick, letting it soak through me.

“I’m okay,” I said, because the last thing I wanted to be in front of this male was weak or vulnerable.

“You were screaming, Willow, crying. You are not fucking okay. Why are you so cold? Why can’t I get you warm?” His voice was gruff, and yes, definitely filled with concern.

“It was just a…a bad dream, that’s all. And I’m starting to warm now.” But it wasn’t just a dream, was it? I squeezed my eyes closed. It felt too real. Ren turning from me…the contorted looks on my sisters’ faces. They were dead. Oh goddess, they’d all been dead. They filled my mind again, and I snapped my eyes open.

Warrick didn’t question me, but I got the feeling he wasn’t buying my bullshit. I was too shaken to try to convince him otherwise, though, the lies wouldn’t come.

We lay there in silence for a while, and as I slowly calmed, as the dream drifted away along with the ice under my skin and in my veins, I became more and more aware of the male surrounding me.

The way he’d held me, so…tenderly. He’d wrapped me securely in his strong arms, offering me support, and it felt more than just physical. One arm was across my middle, the other banded across my chest. One of his thighs was between mine, his front pressed to my back, his groin against my butt, and his bearded chin was on my shoulder.

It should feel restricting.

It didn’t.

He was warming me.

Comforting me as if he thought he could make it better if he could just get close enough.

And I liked it…way too much.

“You must think I’m pathetic.” I swallowed several times. “Weak.”

He made a rumbling sound. “Seen you hack off a demon’s head, dove. Several times.”

“You’ve also seen me cry,” I added.

“Also seen your dress torn, covered in my blood, crouched in front of me ready to take on an entire forest of creatures to protect me.”

There was a smile in his voice. “You’re never going to let me forget that, are you?”

The hand on my chest slid up, and he pressed a finger to my lips like he had the night before. His mouth came to my ear. “Enough,” he said roughly.

I didn’t try to pull away this time, no. A shiver slid through me at the dominant tone of his voice.

“No one has ever put themselves between me and danger, dove. Not ever. I’m alpha, that’s my job. But you did that.” His lips moved against my ear, and he breathed deep. “So no, not fucking weak, sure as fuck not pathetic.”

“Warrick…”

“You’re the strongest female I know, Willow.”

His finger traced my lower lip, and before I could stop it, my tongue darted out to taste his salty skin, needing it, craving it.

He stilled, his sharp indrawn breath loud in the quiet room.

I turned in his arms, and he let me, not stopping me this time. Not when I rested my forehead on his wide tattooed chest, or when I pressed my lips to his incredibly hot skin and kissed him there. Then a second time.

His blunt fingers thrust into my hair, and he tilted my head back, looking down at me with question clear in his eyes.

I stared back, needing him so badly at that moment there was no way he could miss it.

And I knew for sure that he hadn’t when his nostrils flared, and on a rough sound, he leaned in and kissed me the way only Warrick could. Fiercely.

His mouth covered mine, hungry and demanding, his tongue delving deep, claiming, wild, leaving me breathless. One of his hands dropped to my ass and he squeezed, making me squirm. I couldn’t hold in my whimper, my thighs clenching as the ache inside me intensified.

He kissed along my jaw, down my throat, a low, rumbling growl rolling from him almost constantly now. “You need me to get you off, don’t you, dove?”

“Yes.”

“You think you’re ready to be fucked, but you’re not. It doesn’t matter what I said, what I wanted in the woods, I was wrong. So I’m gonna use my fingers this first time,” he said.

I wanted to protest. I wanted him inside me already. We’d been dancing this dance for so long. Too long. I opened my mouth to beg for it, but he kissed me again in that all-consuming way, filled with hunger and dominance and need.

The hand on my ass slid around my hip, and with a sharp tug, he tore the front of my pants open. I gasped into his mouth as he dragged my destroyed pants and underwear down my thighs.

I kicked them aside and spread my legs for him as his hand slid back up, grasping, massaging my skin, making me squirm. I was so impossibly wet and achy, so empty, I was close to tears from how much I needed him.

Near mad with lust, I reached for the front of his jeans, but he grabbed my wrists and pinned them over my head with one hand. Then the other was sliding between my legs, pressing against my slick flesh, making me arch and groan into his touch.

“Fuck…this hot little pussy,” Warrick gritted out. “It knows who it belongs to, doesn’t it, dove?”

I nodded before I could think better of it. I’d say anything, do anything, for him to make me come at that moment, but deep down, I knew he was right. My body had never responded to anyone the way it did him. And that was one of the reasons I’d tried to ignore this fire between us.

We had a connection I couldn’t explain. And as much as I’d tried to deny it, he wasn’t the only one who felt it.

It did scare the hell out of me, though.

He slid his middle finger over my needy flesh, and all thought scattered as he grazed my clit, but he didn’t linger, he dipped down lower and dragged his finger through my wetness before coming back up and giving me what I needed, circling my clit.

“Look at me,” he said.

I forced my eyes open, staring up at him heavy lidded. I bit my lip and rolled my hips desperately, all control shot to pieces.

His glowing golden eyes bore into mine as he dipped back down and pushed a thick finger inside me. I arched deeper and cried out, so close to the edge, to coming just from that alone.

A tremor washed through me.

He slid his finger out and back in with a grunt. “Yeah, we’re gonna have to work you up to fucking, dove. This tight little body isn’t ready for my cock, not yet.”

His thumb brushed my clit again, and I shook all over. What was he doing to me? How was this possible with just his finger?

He dragged it out and pushed back in, adding a second, and I cried out when he went deeper. I was writhing beneath him, straining against the hold he had on my wrists above my head, where he pressed them into the mattress.

He dragged his lips along my throat, my jaw, while the fingers between my legs thrust faster, deeper. I spread my thighs wider, wanting more, rocking against his hand, so wet now, the sound of those thick fingers fucking me filled the room. My skin was hot and sweaty, my breathing coming in pants, mixing with Warrick’s own harsh breaths.

“Come for me, dove,” he grated against my ear. “Let go.”

The rasp of his voice lifted goose bumps all over my skin as I worked myself down on his thrusting fingers, the feeling inside me building, until it flew through me, filling me, breaking me into a million pieces.

My mouth dropped open in a silent cry, and Warrick covered my lips with his, kissing me, swallowing my desperate sounds as I spasmed and clutched at his fingers.

He didn’t stop until I collapsed back against the mattress, desperate for breath.

Oh shit.

He pressed more kisses to my neck, my jaw.

His fingers were still deep inside me, and I squeezed my thighs around his thick wrist, not even ashamed that I was silently asking him to stay where he was—inside me.

Because I wanted more.

I needed it.