Witch Bound

“Not likely. But if I do, you’ll come to them.”

His smile this time was slow—and a little sad. “Not likely.”

“Do you really think the shoes will be okay?”

“For the party?”

She rolled her eyes. “For the wedding.”

“I’m the best tracker in the clan—if I can’t follow you, Rocky, no one can.” But she could hear the amusement in his voice so she didn’t take offense. “Do you like them?”

“What?”

“The shoes.”

“Yes.” While it had seemed like a great idea at the store now that she was heading back to show Audrey, doubt was setting in.

“Then they’re the right ones.”

“Audrey won’t like the color.” A pale pink that reminded her of the blush at the center of the single white rose Christian had sent her yesterday. “Do you think Christian will care? They’re not very traditional.”

Fen considered it for a moment and shrugged. “Well, they’re probably not the ones he would have picked out, but he doesn’t have to wear them.”

“Right,” she said, capping her water bottle and putting it in the holder. She turned the radio up and searched until she found a station she could live with. “I saw you checking out that girl’s ass, by the way.”

He raised his brows. “I don’t check out girls, Rocky.”

“Fine. That very definitely grown woman’s ass.”

He grinned and shot her a look. “Are you sure you weren’t checking her out?”

She shook her head and looked out the window again. Dark came early this time of year and the sun was already setting behind the far hills. They called them hills. Coming from Colorado, that seemed almost sacrilegious. But there was a clean kind of beauty to the area and all of the neatly squared tracts of land soothed the part of her that craved order.

Fen was wrong about her skipping around in conversations. She was just able to carry multiple threads in her head at the same time and switch between them at will. A skill similar to spellcasting, weaving the different strands of power together. It had taken her a while to realize that not everyone thought the same way she did. It drove her mother crazy. Fen didn’t seem fazed by it. She wondered if Christian would be.

Fen took a right turn onto a gravel road. In the side mirror, she watched the dust spin out behind them.

“What are you smiling about?”

She turned to look at him, but his eyes were on the road. One hand on the steering wheel, the sleeve on his T-shirt had ridden up, revealing a nicely defined biceps and the edge of his tattoo—Fenrir breaking his chains. His design. He glanced her way, eyebrows raised. “You’re blushing.”

She touched her cheek. “I am not.”

“What is it?”

“This is the song I lost my virginity to.” She laughed at the expression on his face and then stopped abruptly. “Oh, God. I’m sorry, Fen.”

“No, it’s all right.”

It wasn’t all right. She hadn’t meant to mock him. She grimaced. “If it makes you feel any better, I could probably narrow it down to a single verse.”

“That bad?”

“Uh-huh.”

The silence stretched but not uncomfortably. Some of the tension left his shoulders and his hand eased its death grip on the wheel. The crunch of gravel beneath the wheels nearly drowned out the radio. “Tell me.”

Startled, she stared at his profile, trying to decide if he was serious. Fen looked very serious, but other than that she couldn’t tell what he was thinking. This is a bad idea. But it was also the first time he’d asked her for anything, and this was the kind of thing she’d share with any of her friends. She could be friends with Fen. She wanted to be.

“His name was Brad Dougan.”

“Sounds like an asshole,” Fen said immediately, but the corner of his mouth turned up and she relaxed a little bit.

“I haven’t even started. He went to my high school and we’d been dating for two months, which I know makes me sound easy, but it wasn’t that exactly. It wasn’t even him. I was ready. We waited until there was a surge so my parents would be gone. And that was it.”

He raised an eyebrow. “That was it?”

“Pretty much. We were on my bed. This song was on the radio.”

“Green Day?”

“What’s wrong with Green Day?”

“Nothing. It just seems like an odd choice for a seduction.”

She tilted her head. “What would you choose?”

“Honestly, I’ve never considered it,” he said gently. “Go on.”

She felt a twinge of uncertainty but shrugged it off. “Okay, my bathroom light was on and so was my tank top. He never even made it under my shirt. God, he was nervous. I thought he was going to tear the condom trying to get it on. And then...it was over.”

Fen shook his head. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. I’m not. He did get better eventually.” She laughed. “I can’t believe I’m telling you this.”

The silence stretched and that twinge of uncertainty grew into more of an ache.

“You probably shouldn’t be.”

She met his eyes and it was there again—that sick mix of longing and regret that they weren’t ever going to talk about. “No,” she agreed. “I probably shouldn’t.”

* * *

Fen’s house was a family-sized ranch at the edge of town. The hardwood floors in the entryway looked recently finished, but the furniture appeared to have been there forever. They were likely hand-me-downs. Since clan didn’t tend to move around like the rest of society, a lot of people ended up living in the houses they grew up in. The furniture might actually have been here for quite some time. The couch was brown...plaid with a colorful afghan folded on the nearest cushion. She could almost picture a five-year-old Fen snuggled up on that couch in his Spiderman pj’s watching Barney.

The TV was new and big, mounted over a cabinet that held at least two gaming systems and some stereo equipment. A long, short bookshelf took up most of the other wall behind the recliner. It was clean and spare, but he worked and lived here. It should be better.

“It’s not much,” he echoed her thoughts. He tossed his keys on a table beside the door. “Make yourself at home. There’s beer and pop in the fridge, that way. I’ll order the pizza. Steve delivers if you tip him well enough.”

“Steve?”

“The gas station makes the only pizza in town. It’s decent.” A slight smile accompanied by a shrug. “Edible anyway.”

“Can you order extra? Audrey is going to stop by when she’s finished with the dress.”

While he placed the order, she set her books on the coffee table and wandered over to check out his bookshelf. You could tell a lot about a person by the books they read, she’d always thought. It was always the first place she looked when she was feeling...curious about someone. And she was curious about Fen. He’d become a friend when she needed one and he was Christian’s best man, though that seemed strange to her. They were very different to be so close.

Something about Fen made her think science fiction, but there weren’t any fiction books at all stacked on the shelves. A bunch of textbooks about computer stuff, some nice hardcovers on art history, both photography and paintings. There were sketchbooks on the top shelf along with a sturdy wooden box she suspected held art supplies.

Her fingers twitched to pull one of the sketchbooks off the shelf, but she wouldn’t do that without an