“When I was young and full of myself,” he said, rubbing slow circles between my shoulder blades, “I might have ascribed to the notion of fated lovers, especially when Ni’eve chose me to study with her. I had been made to feel special within my family. I was chosen by a druidess at the pinnacle of her teaching years. Many things about being a Magical came easy to me, Calliope. Then I met Jessamyne. I stopped thinking with my head. I stopped listening to my intuition and I let myself be led around by a headstrong young woman with a plan I was never fully privy to. I got caught up in her crazy, and when I finally escaped her hold, I realized I had sacrificed parts of myself in the process.”
“Can you get those parts back?”
“I’m working on it,” he said, his voice and touch equally soft. “I’m working on it. Putting things to right on this island and protecting its portals and the sacred trees would go a long way toward helping me feel like I had earned back my druid blessing.”
“I have a lot of work to do, too, Tanner. We can help each other.”
He kissed the top of my head. The pulse of arousal that often arose when we were close thrummed through Tanner’s body and swirled through mine. “Let’s get back to getting what we came here for,” he said, “and then go home.”
Chapter 9
While Tanner drove the truck, I organized the messy pile of documents we had hurriedly photocopied. “I think what we’re looking for is in here,” I said, rifling through page after page of deeds. “I want to cross-reference this with those directories of Magicals from across Canada.”
If only I could recall where I’d put them. I looked up and through the windshield and chuffed out a sigh, not really seeing the landscape in front of me.
“What’s that all about?” Tanner asked, turning onto Fortune’s Folly Road. He slowed down as he approached House’s hidden driveway.
“This is a lot of work. On top of what I have to do for the Basics of Witchcraft courses. I’m one month in and I feel so behind.” With Sallie to keep an eye on, and the distraction of Christoph’s never-ending building and home-improvement projects, I had been getting increasingly scattered to the point of being inefficient. And it was frustrating.
He parked the truck and cut the engine. “Tell me how I can help.”
I gently tapped at the edges of the papers, trying to get them more or less lined up. “I don’t think there’s anything you can do about my course work. That I have to fumble through on my own.” I shook out an empty cloth bag and guided the papers inside. “Tomorrow’s the equinox. I haven’t joined a coven and I feel like I should at least make the attempt to mark the occasion.”
“We can do a ritual together. It’s every bit as valid as those performed by a full coven.”
“I don’t know what to do,” I admitted. Surely, I could find instructions in one of the course manuals, or online.
“We can do something druid-style. No pressure, no performance anxiety, just you and me, naked on the grass.”
That made me laugh. Some of the tension sloughed off my ever-tightening shoulders. “Hopefully you won’t have to rescue me afterward or wipe off copious amounts of my blood.”
I opened the truck’s door, planted my feet on the gravel drive, and slid the heavy bag of papers toward me.
“But?” Tanner closed his door and walked around the truck to help with the other bag.
“How did you know there was a but in there?” I asked, swatting at his arm.
He held out his hand, palm up, and wiggled his fingers. I took that as an invitation and interlaced mine with his. “I’m getting to know you, Calliope Jo—Calliope du Sang. You have a maternal streak, in the best use of that word. You care for this place and somebody’s messing with it. Cue the beast.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Yeah, that’s me, the beast.”
We headed toward the house, hand in hand, agreeing to table the next phase of the project for the morning. We left the cloth bags on the dining table, checked the windows and locked the doors, and then got ready for bed.
“Any word from Wes?” I asked Tanner. He curled up next to me, all long limbs and warm skin.
“No. The mentors have everyone turn in their cell phones as part of the arrival process. I wouldn’t expect to hear from him—or the kids—until Sunday afternoon at the earliest. Unless there was an emergency.”
I placed one hand on my lower belly and the other on my ribs, feeling guilty I’d barely thought of Harper and Thatcher since they’d whooshed out of sight at the portal. Tanner placed a hand over my eyes and kissed my shoulder. “You’ve had an eventful day. Close your eyes. Try to sleep.”
“I thought having the kids away meant we’d have wild monkey sex.”
Tanner bit me and laughed. “We could, if you’d like.”
I lifted his hand so I could see his face. He looked as tired as I felt. I rolled to my side and nestled into his warmth. “Tomorrow,” I mumbled. “I promise.”
Calliope.
Sweetheart.
Come here.
I woke, eyes wide open and glued to the textured surface of my ceiling. Tanner was giving off enough heat for two people and had flung off the duvet. No wonder I was sweating and dreaming of drowning in feathers. I sat up to readjust the covers.
Calliope.
Sweetheart.
Come here.
Chills marched down my arms and across my back. I crept to the end of the mattress, placed one tentative foot onto the floor, and waited. Tanner slept.
Mama? The tiny voice was coming from either my closet or the bureau.
Calli, come here.
The bureau. The dolls. I pulled Tanner’s T-shirt over my head, opened the bottom drawer of the bureau, and fumbled to get my legs into a pair of sweatpants
