Familiar (3 page)

“I’m still going to Stan and you can’t stop me,” Owen
said after a moment. His voice had grown stronger. He wasn’t
backing down. “He’ll listen to me. The bracelet is only to buy
enough time to explain things to him. He won’t refuse. The thing’s
worth a lot of money and I know he likes money. He’ll see that it’s
what Mom would have wanted.”

“Stan’s my father, not yours. All you are is an
unwanted little bastard. Now why don’t you go back to your pretty
little witch girlfriend, consider yourself lucky that somebody
wants to be around you, and stay the hell out of my life and out of
my pack?”

Again, there was that sharp twist of pain from Owen.
His brother’s words hurt him deeply and made him feel completely
and utterly alone. I kept walking, but I realized I was now crying.
I wiped the tears off my cheeks.

I stopped eavesdropping, cutting it off as if
mentally hanging up a phone. I walked and walked before I looked
over my shoulder. Owen was nowhere to be seen.

I didn’t stop till I got to school. I didn’t see Owen
again, although for the rest of the day it was as if I could still
feel his grief—the grief of a boy I barely knew but felt a deep
magical bond with whether I liked it or not.

My heart ached for him.

“Morning.”

I pried my eyes open the next day to be greeted with
a total déjà vu. There was a tawny-striped cat looking at me. A
larger, older version of the kitten from yesterday.

“You,” I said.

“In the fur.”

“Where did you go yesterday? I thought you were going
to catch up to me but you never did.”

“Sorry. Had a couple things I needed to take care of
after talking to my brother.”

“That’s vague.”

“It is, isn’t it?”

“I got more clothes for you.” I nodded over at a
stack of folded clothes on a chair that I’d grabbed from my
brother’s closet.

“Cool. Thanks. Your mom already left. She said she
was letting you sleep in since it’s Saturday. She talks to herself
a lot?”

“All the time. It’s bizarre.” Although, not as
bizarre as having a conversation with a cat. Luckily, Mom had
barely been around yesterday after school so I didn’t have to
explain what had happened to my familiar that had seemingly
vanished into thin air.

He was back. I wasn’t sure how I felt about that.

“I’m going to change and, uh, get changed,”
Owen said.
“Consider yourself warned.”

I quickly turned over and sat up so my back was to
him. Through our connection, I could actually sense when he shifted
form back to human. Then I heard the soft sound of rustling
material as he grabbed something to wear off the pile and got
dressed.

“So we’re all alone,” he said after a moment. “No
mommy to barge in on us and find out the little secret you’ve been
hiding from her.”

I stood up and finally turned around. He stood on the
other side of my small peach-colored bedroom wearing a new pair of
jeans. He hadn’t put on a shirt yet. His skin was tanned as if he’d
just come back from vacation in the sunny south. He pulled a white
T-shirt on over his head, covering up everything I was gawking
at.

My gaze snapped up to his face. “Your brother is a
jerk.”

He looked at me with confusion before his dark blue
eyes narrowed. “You were listening? What is that, some kind of a
witch trick?”

“A simple one, actually, which is the only reason why
I could do it since I suck at magic. If it’s your pack, you should
be allowed to go back without having to jump through hoops.”

“I don’t do hoops.”

“It’s just an expression.”

“Like ‘none of your beeswax’ was just an
expression?”

“Sort of.” I looked at him sharply and realized he
was now smiling. “What’s so funny?”

“You are. Why the hell do you care about me?”

I frowned. “It’s probably because of the bonding
spell.”

“So you’re admitting that you care about me?”

I just looked at him, afraid to answer that. What was
I admitting? I didn’t want to admit anything, but the truth was
kind of obvious. I did care about Owen. I cared about what happened
to him and I felt his pain when he’d been rejected by his
brother.

And it wasn’t just because he was inarguably
gorgeous. I just...liked him.

I blamed the bonding spell entirely. I never fell for
a guy after only knowing him only a day.

Well, hardly ever.

“I guess I just don’t want you to get hurt,” I said
honestly.

He drew closer and brushed my long hair back over my
shoulder. I suddenly felt very aware that I was wearing a pair of
pajamas that had tiny smiley faces all over them. I felt like a
little girl even though I was only a month away from my seventeenth
birthday.

But I
wasn’t
a little girl. Despite the
PJs.

“Thank you,” he said simply. “And I’m sorry I had to
kiss you like that yesterday. I needed Jeremy to believe you were
my girlfriend. I don’t think he’d understand if I told him I was
actually your familiar. I don’t even understand that.”

“It’s okay, I didn’t mind.”

He raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t?”

My cheeks warmed. “Let’s just forget it happened,
okay?”

“Not so sure I can.”

“Why not?”

“Because I want to kiss you again.”

He drew me closer to him. His hands were on my
shoulders and my hands were pressed against his firm chest so that
I could feel his rapid heart beat. His warm breath glanced against
my cheek as he lowered his mouth to mine.

The phone rang. I jerked away from Owen, pulled out
of whatever spell I’d just sank into and grabbed for the phone on
my nightstand.

“What? I mean, hello?”

“You. Me. Shopping. Noon. Yes or no?”

My best friend Sandy often spoke in bullet
points.

I glanced at the clock. It was a little after nine. I
flicked a glance at Owen and realized I wished Sandy hadn’t called
to interrupt our potential second kiss.

Dangerous kitty-cat.

I quickly calculated what had to be done. Owen wanted
his bracelet. Then he wanted to deliver it to Stan, his
step-father, as payment for letting him back into the pack even
though his brother was still a major obstacle there. I assumed that
whatever Stan said was gospel for the pack. If he agreed that Owen
was back in, then all was well with the world.

Then we needed to have our bonding spell removed. I
had no idea what I was going to say to Mrs. Timmons to explain what
had happened, but I’d cross that bridge when I came to it.

“Noon sounds doable.”

“I need new socks,” Sandy said. “Are you up for the
challenge?”

I turned away from Owen. The sight of him was very
distracting. “Socks. Exciting stuff.”

“They disappear. And I can’t even blame magic for
it.”

“Socks are obviously the source of all evil.”

“We’ll have lunch in the food court first. Then sock
hunting. Mike’s joining us. Is that okay?”

“Totally okay with me.”

Mike was Sandy’s new boyfriend. A senior. She’d
introduced us the other day. Nice guy. Now he was automatically
part of our little group of misfits through his association with my
best friend.

Sandy was also a witch-in-training with two
overbearing, magic-using parents. It was nice to have something in
common that we could complain to each other about. Didn’t mean we
couldn’t have fun, too.

I wondered what she’s think of my current situation
with Owen. She probably wouldn’t believe that he was technically my
witch’s familiar at the moment. Nothing this interesting usually
happened to me. And Owen—well, he was very interesting.

After ending the call, I looked at Owen. He waited
patiently over by the door.

“I need a minute to get ready,” I said. “Alone.”

“No problem.”

“Um, Owen? Do you want some breakfast or
something?”

A smile stretched across his face, making him better
looking, if that was even possible. “Breakfast sounds really good.
Almost as good as ‘or something.’”

He slipped out of the room and closed the door before
he could see just how red I was able to turn.

* * * * *

Two bowls of cornflakes later—I never claimed to be a
great chef—we were out of the house and on the same route we were
taking yesterday morning.

“Look, Brenda,” Owen said after a couple of minutes.
He stopped walking and turned to me. “I know this has been a real
nightmare. I appreciate your help.”

“My help? I stole your bracelet.”

A smile played at his lips. “I didn’t exactly come by
it honestly myself, although if it helps, I stole it from a
horrible rich woman who killed a litter of kittens by drowning them
when her Persian got knocked up.”

I shuddered at the horrible thought. “It represents a
lot more than a few expensive diamonds to you, doesn’t it?”

“It does.”

“I know I shouldn’t have listened in yesterday, but I
did. And I’m worried that what you’re doing is going to end up
getting you in trouble.”

There. I said it. It was none of my business, but I
said it anyway.

“Because of my brother?” he asked stiffly.

“Yes.”

His jaw set. “Let me worry about Jeremy, okay?”

I wracked my brain for a good answer to his difficult
situation. “What if you don’t go back to your pack? What if you
find a new home and a new, uh, pack? Just start fresh somewhere
else?”

His expression shadowed. “Because it’s not that easy.
You don’t understand. That bracelet that you’ve got stashed
somewhere is my only answer.”

“I totally disagree.”

“You don’t know my situation. Overhearing one
conversation isn’t enough to make you an expert on me.”

I faltered. “Maybe not.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Just like my knowing that
you’re afraid to embrace your magical potential is only part of who
you are.”

I felt a sharp and sudden stab of anger at the
accusation. “I’m not afraid.”

“Could have fooled me.”

“Just because I’m not interested in doing something
doesn’t mean that I’m afraid.”

Owen shrugged. “If you say so.”

I crossed my arms and studied him for a moment.
“You’re trying to change the subject.”

“From what
you
were talking about, you mean.
All I want is the bracelet. There’s nothing else in this town I’m
interested in.” He crossed his arms. “And that kiss yesterday?
Don’t read too much into it. It was more to fool my brother than
anything else.”

I’d be more hurt by his words if I didn’t remember
what he’d said to me only forty minutes ago.

“I want to kiss you again.”

Maybe he was lying. Maybe he thought I was easy and
just wanted a distraction to take his mind off his troubles.

The smiley-faced PJs were rather fetching, now that I
thought about it.

I mean, what did I think this was between us?
Something real? Something that had the potential to be something
more?

I was such an idiot. All I was to Owen was a flashing
arrow pointing him to where his shiny diamond bracelet was—his
one-way ticket back into a shifter pack that he was too stupid to
see didn’t even want him around.

And I
wasn’t
scared about learning magic. I
wasn’t afraid that I’d be a big fat failure and disappoint my mom
when she realized I was nowhere close to being as talented as she
was.

Of course not.

I bit my bottom lip.

Well, maybe I was a bit scared. But that wasn’t a
very helpful realization at this exact moment.

“Let’s go,” Owen said as he started to walk again.
“All I want is the bracelet and then I promise I’ll be out of your
life once and for all.”

I glared at him. “Fine with me.”

We continued on until we reached an alleyway, just
west of the main street. I stopped walking.

“Is this where you put it?” Owen asked without a lot
of enthusiasm.

I turned to face him. “About your bracelet—”

But then my words were cut off by the sight of what
loomed behind him.

The werewolves.

More this time. There were three men and two others
in large, scary wolf form. None of them looked very friendly even
though it was a bright and shiny Saturday morning.

And this was a very deserted part of town. Just my
luck.

Owen’s shoulders tensed and he turned slowly to see
what had turned my face ghost-white.

There was nowhere for us to run. My back was up
against the end of the bricked-in alley and the werewolves were
blocking the only escape route.

“Morning,” one of them said. He was roughly the size
of a small tank and had a bald head and a scruff of beard. “Let’s
just make this really nice and easy, Owen. How does that sound? No
more messing around this time. My patience has worn very thin with
you.”

Owen’s biceps flexed. “Don’t do this.”

“Are you going to turn into a tiger again? I wouldn’t
suggest it. I brought reinforcements this time.” The thug nodded at
the wolves. “And I also brought this and I’m not afraid to use
it.”

My gaze went to the black metal of the gun he held as
it caught the sunlight.

I truly wished that I’d taken the few magic classes
I’d attended more seriously. I wouldn’t have been able to do that
much—however, I might have been able to mentally influence this
bully to leave us alone. Or I might have been able to throw up a
glamour to fool or confuse them so we could escape. As it was, I
couldn’t do anything but stand there and look like a
victim-in-waiting.

Or could I? I searched my memory for what I’d
learned. What I’d paid only partial attention to since I was too
busy fighting what my mother wanted me to do.

Think, Brenda, think.

Mom always seemed convinced I was able to do more
magic than I thought I could. She always believed in me, but I was
the one who didn’t believe in myself.