Mathilda, SuperWitch (45 page)

“
I can’t, er… tell you.” (Goddess, did I wish I could lie. Okay, I take it back, this
was
hard.)

His arms tightened.

“Matty…” (Aidan, all warning)

“Aidan, you’re just going to have to trust me.” (Me)

Ha. Trust! That was a joke.

No response.

“Please?” (Me again, trying to be girlie cute, tipping my head to the side and everything)

He stared at me.

I stared back.

Boy, did I need to win this staring contest.

Okay, so I couldn’t win the staring contest.

So I kissed him instead.

It took a bit.

He fought it.

But I worked hard, giving it my all.

Then with a groan he gave in, backing me into the lounge, twisting at the last minute and seating himself, taking me with him, not breaking the kiss and lounging back in one smooth move with me on top.

Finally, after my body melted into his due to his superior tongue action, his fingers in my hair fisted gently and tugged even more gently and he asked, “Do you know what you’re doing?”

I gave my stock answer, “I never know what I’m doing.”

He twisted me so he was (mostly) on top of me.

I don’t know what it is and if other girls feel this way but there is something very nice about the weight of a man on you, especially a man who smelled like wood, vanilla and musk with a hint of citrus (Lalique Le Lion, mm…).

“Matty,” he called, his voice lower than normal, a virtual rumble that travelled along my body like a physical thing, “now is not the time to be playing around.”

“Aidan,” I said in all seriousness as I put my hand on his cheek, “really, you’re just going to have to trust me.”

He
might not think I was doing the right thing.

But I was.

He dipped his head so his face was close to mine and he whispered, “Something isn’t right with you.”

I rubbed my nose against his.

Then I teased, “You think? I mean, less than a year ago, I was a girl with the simple dream of one day owning a $3,500 Hermes Birkin Bag. Now, look at me, look at this place,” I flicked out a hand to encompass my Magic Room, “look at my life. We’re on the cusp of war, Aidan, and I’m Che Guevara.”

Finally he grinned. “Che was just the face of the revolution. It was Fidel who was the heart. The reason you see so much of Che is because he was photogenic.”

Ack!

“I know but I don’t want to be Fidel. He’s hairy, cigar-chomping and icky,” I informed him.

Aidan touched his lips to mine then pulled back and stated, “Believe me, you don’t want to be Che. Che came to a nasty end in a Bolivian jungle.”

Yikes!

I didn’t need to be reminded of that.

Aidan went on, “And Fidel lived to subjugate millions.”

That sounded better.

Kinda.

I still didn’t want to be Fidel.

I decided to change the subject. “Are you going to cut me some slack?”

He kissed me again, I melted again. His kiss grew deeper, I melted more. Things carried on, got a bit out-of-control and I must admit, we kinda slid, head first, into second base.

Then he disengaged, rearranged my clothes, kissed my nose and said (clearly convinced by my reaction which I must admit was a little wanton, can’t keep my head on straight when making out with man I adore even if he is probably about to throw me to the wolves), “I’ll cut you some slack. But you should remember three things.”

I didn’t want to remember three things.

Still, I said, “Yeah?”

“One, I’m watching you.”

Ack.

“Two, Wilding’s watching you.”

Yikes.

“And three, we’ll do anything to save you, even if it’s from yourself.”

Great.

* * * * *

Scary, sad and miserable run-in with potential-father-of-children/life sacrifice/shifty, boy-I-can-pick-‘em, “Boyfriend” Number Two:

* * * * *

Last night, Aidan redeemed his Curzon voucher.

We went to the movies and he didn’t eat the icky, sweet popcorn but instead we shared a bag of Galaxy chocolate Minstrels which I chased with a Diet Coke (of course).

He dropped me at The Gables, backed me against the front door and laid a really good one on me.

Mm.

I was wandering dreamily up the steps to the Tower Room, a long night of browsing through some black magic books (I’d looked everywhere else…) when I felt the chill run up my spine and I looked behind me.

It was Ash, stalking me up the stairs.

Holy crap.

I’d forgotten I was caught in their war.

And I’d forgotten Ash’s promise.

Clearly he’d seen Aidan drop me off after our date and the episode at the door.

Ack!

I didn’t say anything, just backed away slowly going up the stairs backward with one arm out to ward him off.

My shoulders slammed into the heavy wooden door at the top.

“Ash…” I whispered and there he was.

He didn’t utter a word, hardly made a sound. I don’t even know how he got there but, within moments, I was lifted up, pressed against the door by his hard torso, both of my legs straddling his hips, one of his hands on my ass, his other hand up my shirt, the cup of my bra pushed aside, his fingers at my breast doing things to my nipple that caused my hoo-hah to
woo hoo!
and his mouth, there is no other word for it,
devouring
mine.

I had one hand in his hair, the other yanking the shirt out of his jeans and I have to admit I was moaning and whimpering (just a bit).

(Okay, a lot.)

Holy Sexual Prowess Batman!

Everything flew out of my head.

Agatha Darling herself could have opened the door behind us and I would have said, “Just a sec,” shut it again and carried on with Ash.

All I could focus on was him, his mouth, his body, his hips (oh me), his fingers (oh my) and how it all felt.

Then I said it, (or moaned it, against his lips, no less), “Please, Ash,” all hungry, wanting, semi-begging, my nails digging into the sleek skin of his back under his shirt.

He growled into my mouth.

I felt that in my hoo-hah too.

I dropped my head, nibbled his neck then kissed him there, worried that I’d hurt him then I licked him…

Oh, you get the picture!

I’m a slut.

I admit it.

At that point, I didn’t care.

Who knows how I would have humiliated myself if it had gone on one second longer.

But then his fingers stopped, righted my bra and his hand slid down and around my waist. I lifted my head and he just held me, his forehead against mine, his breathing heavy.

“This can’t go on much longer,” he growled in a tone that scared the bejeezus out of me.

He was right, it couldn’t.

“This happens again, you’re mine,” he declared.

Holy crap.

My stomach plummeted.

In a good way
and
in a bad way.

Yikes!

He lowered me to the ground but I held on to his biceps. I wasn’t recovered yet.

“Ash,” I whispered.

He made another rumbly growl and kissed me again, laid a big, huge, deep one on me, just when I thought it was over.

“Quiet,” he muttered when he was done, resting his chin on top of my head and there we stood for the longest time.

Then finally he let me go and backed down a step, hooked his fist in my waistband and pulled me forward until I was eye-to-eye with him.

“I don’t know what you’re up to but I don’t like it,” he decreed (again growling).

Great.

He was getting all threatening again and there I was, standing there panting.

He kept growling (and being threatening). “If you carry on and I figure out what you’re doing and it’s the mess I think it is then I’m putting a stop to it and taking matters into my own hands.”

“Why are you always threatening me?” I asked, losing my sexy, making out with Ash vibe. “It isn’t necessary to threaten me. I think I’ve made it clear I’m quite capable of taking care of myself,” I reminded him.

“These aren’t threats, Mathilda; I’m saying it like it is. You have a couple of days to wrap up whatever it is your cooking up or I intervene, got me?”

I felt, at the look on his face and tone of his voice, that even though he was a big, arrogant, domineering, traitorous bastard, the best thing to do was give up on the bravado and agree.

So I nodded.

He gave me that clotted cream look again.

Man, I hated it when he did that.

Just as much as I loved it.

“And you best not let Seymour redeem any more of your vouchers or I’m ending this détente. Is that clear?”

Ack!

Détente?

This
was détente?

I was screwed when it came down to war.

As in, literally.

Er, hmm.

And, mm.

I shook myself.

“Crystal.” I nodded again so he’d understand that I definitely understood and wasn’t actually thinking what I was thinking or what I couldn’t quit thinking.

Yikes!

“Fuck,” he swore, obviously the mind-meld letting him know where my thoughts had wandered and he wrapped his hand around my neck and pulled my head toward him for another shorter but no-less-hotter kiss.

Then he was gone.

I needed to get cracking or I was in some serious trouble.

Or, should I say, more serious trouble.

Ack!

Concentrate:

End the mind-meld.

Get Althea’s magic back.

And then home.

Or I “suffer” the consequences.

Ack!

6 October

Found it!

Of course, it was in the black magic books.

“
Appropriating Magic”

Icky, dark, horrible magic that was, in practice, actually slicing the magic away from the soul of a witch.

Not nice.

You would not believe some of the bits that went into the ceremony.

I mean, exactly how would one go about gathering “excrement of yale”?

I mean, what the fuck is a “yale”?

Here goes:

Origins: from the Burning Times.

Covens would perform a ceremony to shroud an accused witch’s powers in hopes of saving her from the trials that she faced which, most of the time, led to death anyway. The trials were nonsense, the witch hunters wouldn’t have known what they were looking for if it bit them on the ass.

Which it could do if some magic leaked out of a witch under torture.

Once known as “black”, but now referred to with the politically correct, “dark” witches took the shrouding ceremony a bit further. After lots of not-so-nice experimentation, they’d hit on the formula.

By the way, this dark ceremony was borne from witches besotted by men who wished to be warlocks. The witches turned to the darkness in order to hold these men and empower them. Together, they’d trap a witch, usually a young, frail or old one and strip her magic to convey it onto the new warlock.

This magic was eventually absorbed back into nature as men couldn’t hold magic very long.

The same ceremony, with a few more icky components that included the blood drawn from live animals and more excrement and some bits of organs and the like, could be used to strip an oracle of her sight.

It was unheard of for a coven to carve the magic from one of their members.

So, Agatha Darling’s vile act was unprecedented.

There, I found it.

Now, I had to counteract it.

10 October

It was all planned.

I think I knew what I was doing.

Althea had to take us to Agatha’s alter and we would have to perform the antidote ceremony there.

Ack!

I was scared shitless.

It took a powerful coven to pull Althea’s power and sight away. We were having a hard time gathering all the ingredients and implements. How we were going to muster the power, I had no earthly clue.

Thank the goddess that Lucy had begun Wicca instruction under Fay. The Honeycutt Coven hadn’t taken on the training of a pure adult Tenderfoot since Fay’s mother talked Mavis’s mother into taking her in over 150 years ago (both were now retired in Spain).