I reach for a knife and keep talking.
“How old were you when you knew you were a kitchen witch?” he asks before I can say anything else.
“I didn’t know I was a witch at all until I met Miss Sophia,” I reply. “Not really, anyway. I had a hunch. All I knew for sure when I was young was that I could read spirits, I saw things, and I had to learn how to build defenses around my mind so I didn’t climb into random people’s psyches. Reading minds is exhausting for one, and the thoughts that people have are disturbing. Not to mention, my father tormented me for over a decade after he died, and I had to escape him.”
Lucien’s blue eyes narrow on me. “How did he taunt you?”
“He stayed in that horrible house with us,” I continue. “He tormented all of us, not just me. He liked to spook us, touch us. He was a horrible man. Mama was just as bad, but she was alive, so we had it coming at us from both sides.”
“When did you leave?” he asks.
“Brielle turned eighteen and filed for custody of us. Mama didn’t fight it, so we went to live with Bri. I was sixteen, and Daphne was fourteen.”
“That’s a long time to live in a house like that,” Lucien replies. His jaw is clenched, and his hand is balled into a fist on the countertop.
“It felt like an eternity,” I murmur and then set the knife aside so I can pace the kitchen as I talk. “Once we moved out, and I could freely talk with others and learn, I started to do some research. My grandmother had given me her grimoire before she died, and I was so diligent at keeping it hidden from Mama and only reading it at night after she’d gone to bed.
“But one night, she found me reading it and took it away. I didn’t get it back until last year. But I’d read enough to know that I gravitated to the recipes. I loved to cook, even then, and it’s a good thing I did because if I hadn’t, my sisters and I would have starved. Mama didn’t care enough about us to feed us much.”
“Lovely woman,” he says with a sigh.
“Actually, after everything that happened last year, I wonder if Horace didn’t put a spell on her. She was certainly possessed by something, but we didn’t know until last year. She’s been at the Psychiatric Pavilion here in New Orleans ever since. She has good days and bad ones, but it’s better than living in that horrible house in the bayou.”
I shake my head, thinking of my mother.
“Anyway, I’d written down many of the recipes from memory and went searching for a coven as soon as I could. That’s when I found Miss Sophia. It was as if it was always meant to be.”
“Because it was,” he replies with a soft smile. “And when I saw you walk into our circle during that Samhain ritual you spoke of earlier, it was as if the final piece of a puzzle snapped into place. I knew you immediately. But it didn’t scare me at all.”
“Lucky,” I murmur. “I’ve been scared literally all of my life, Lucien. It’s exhausting.”
“I hate that for you.”
I don’t know what to say to that, so I reach for the knife and continue slicing the bread. Suddenly, Lucien covers my hand with his.
“Why are you so nervous around me, Millicent?”
I frown, ready to deny the statement, but then I change my mind.
“Because I think you could bring a lot of chaos to my life, Lucien. And I’ve done my best to avoid chaos since I left that miserable house half a lifetime ago.”
He cups my cheek, and the heat that stirs is undeniable.
“I’m not responsible for that chaos,” he says softly as his thumb makes small circles on the apple of my cheek. “And I can bring more than that if you let me.”
I sigh and lean into him. The magnetism between us is off the charts. It’s a longing that I can’t even begin to describe. I want to be near him, to care about him and have him with me. It’s as if I…miss him.
Though as far as I can remember, I’ve never been touched by him.
But this is as familiar as it gets for me. It’s as if I’m hugging my sister, as if I’ve done it hundreds of times.
Except I’ve never felt this kind of pull before, this kind of sexual energy.
Allowing myself to touch him, my hand glides up his side and over his shoulder. He turns me to face him fully and moves me so I’m flush against him, chest to knees.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for this.” The words are almost a growl before he lowers his lips to mine. The kiss is all heat, even from the first touch. His hands plunge into my hair, and I hold on tightly, my hands anchored to his shoulders as he tastes and explores.
When he pulls back, his ice-blue eyes have darkened to a deep indigo, and he breathes hard as he stares down at me.
“Wow,” I whisper and then frown. “Do you smell something burning?”
I blink rapidly, trying to clear the fog of lust from my brain, and see smoke coming out of my oven.
“Shit!”
Lucien and I work together, quickly taking the burnt lasagna from the oven and then out of the house altogether as we turn on fans and open windows.
I swirl the air, trying to get the stench out of the room.
When we’ve cleaned up the mess, we stare at each other for a heartbeat before dissolving into laughter.
“Well, that was a first,” I say, wiping a tear from my eye. “I guess we’re not having lasagna, after all.”
“Sure we are,” he says. “We’ll go out for it.”
“Good idea.”
* * *
“This is going to be so much fun,” Mallory Boudreaux, a friend of mine,
