Chapter 11

MISTY

Fitness training on Monday evening was murder. I couldn’t concentrate, and when I smelled Lloyd, I fell off the damn wall, winding myself.

I expected Trainer Marcus to give me hell, but everyone was looking toward the pack house, and then I heard Beta Anthony’s angry voice.

“You’re supposed to train him, not kill him.”

I squeezed between Dawn and Perry and froze. Josh looked like he’d been hit by a train. His face was covered in blood, and tears rolled down his cheeks. My dad was right—Lloyd had taken exception. My heart sang for a moment—only a moment—

“Hmm, he’s a slow learner and couldn’t dodge quickly enough,” Lloyd countered.

“You piece of shit. I call this abuse!” Beta Anthony shouted.

“I call it training. He will heal.”

Lloyd angled his head and linked me. ~“I have a meeting tonight. Punishment will be an hour later.”~

I didn’t respond. I had no intention of going, but then an idea popped into my head.

“Glad that asshole’s been taken down a notch,” Perry said under his breath.

I hadn’t told Dawn or Perry what happened at lunch yesterday, and when they asked how I was being punished, I told them he made me run around the training grounds.

~“You see,”~ Cammy said. ~“He will protect us.”~

~“Only because he wants something, I don’t know what, but I’m going to find out.”~

~“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Misty.”~

~“I think it’s a brilliant idea.”~

Trainer Marcus dismissed us, and I hurried home. My mom had fallen asleep on the couch, which was perfect. I showered and dressed in cut-off jeans and a T-shirt.

“I’m off, Mom,” I shouted from the hallway and left.

My thoughts never wandered far from Lloyd, and I was a little nervous, but I had to do some investigation to find out more about him. I wished he would tell me why he was so obsessed with witches. Had he had an encounter with them?

I was sure the grimoire was real, but no amount of paging through it yielded any information. The pages stayed blank.

When he’d pressed it into my hands, and I saw the pentagram, a shiver of trepidation had shot through me. How many times had I traced the pentagram on the boulder and felt at one with the world?

Not even Chelsea knew, nor had I told her about my recurring nightmare, which seemed to be absent since I’d come here.

The cottage came into view, and I sped up. The door wasn’t locked, and I quickly let myself in. Time to search. The closet was tiny, and everything was folded, jeans and T-shirts—huh, no underwear—

I huffed in frustration when I found myself picturing his privates, and Cammy laughed in my head.

~“Shut up,”~ I rebuked.

I spun on my heel, but there weren’t many places to hide things. The bedside table didn’t have a drawer and only had his car keys on it. I moved to the table and went through the books.

All of them were about witches and curses, some so old that I couldn’t read them. It looked like words were misspelled until I realized that the letter S looked like the letter F.

I picked up a page that had four words written on it and stared at his bold, cursive penmanship, every stroke even and decisive.

~“Allegiance?”~

~“How and with what?”~

~“You could take a page out of his book,”~ Cammy giggled.

~“Very funny.”~

My handwriting was more of a scrawl; sometimes, even I couldn’t read it. But what did he mean? Allegiance to whom? It made no sense, and I stood contemplating.

Where was his phone? It wasn’t on the table, but he might have it on him. Then my gaze fell on the car keys. Maybe he’d hidden something in there…

Grabbing the keys, I rushed out the door and pushed the button to unlock the car. It bleeped, and I cringed as the noise echoed.

Yanking the door open, I slid inside and automatically closed the door, and the dome light went off. Damn, I needed light to search through the car. I felt around for the switch, but the light didn’t come on.

I was still fiddling when a knock on the window startled me—Lloyd. Shit.

He tried to open the door, but it was locked. “Are you stealing my car?” he growled.

“Na-uh, I just wanted to see what it looks like inside, that’s all,” I lied.

“Open the door.”

“Sure,” I said and tried to, but it must have locked automatically when I got in. The remote was still in my hand, so I pushed the unlock button, but it didn’t beep like it had when I unlocked it.

Crap.

“Um, it won’t unlock,” I said sheepishly, but I already knew I’d broken it.

~“Sorry, Misty,”~ Cammy muttered.

~“It’s not your fault.”~

Lloyd looked at me in consternation. “Try it again.”

I lifted the remote so he could see that I was pushing the damn button. “See,” I said snippily, annoyed that I’d been caught. His meeting couldn’t have lasted very long.

He narrowed his eyes. “Your witch powers.”

“I don’t have any goddamn powers. Maybe the battery needs replacing?”

He shook his head and put his hands on his hips, and my gaze slid over him discerningly. He cut a very fine figure, and I eyed the bulge in his pants. He wasn’t hard, but it was still noticeable.

A little pulse started beating between my legs, and I hoped he couldn’t smell my arousal.

“So now, shall I leave you in there?”

My face fell. I hadn’t thought of that. “Don’t you have a spare key?”

He shook his head.

Fuck.

“Try the start button,” he suggested.

I pushed it multiple times, but the car didn’t start. “Not working.”

Lloyd was still standing with his hands half buried in his pockets, facing away from me, as though he were thinking, or maybe he was angry. Perhaps he had no clue about cars.

I tried the door again, putting my weight into it, but it didn’t budge. How the fuck was I going to get out of there. Break a window?

~“I think we fried the engine,”~ Cammy whispered.

~“You may be right. I’ll have to break the window to get out, and I think Lloyd is angry that I broke his car. Well, here goes.”~

Bunching my fist, I punched the window as hard as I could and yelped as pain rocketed through my hand and wrist. I cradled it close to my body and squinted at Lloyd, who was shaking his head at me derisively.

~“On it,”~ Cammy said and started healing my hand.

He grabbed the door handle and pulled, biceps bulging, and it came off in his hand. I couldn’t help the laughter that bubbled up when I saw him inspect the door handle in astonishment.

“Did you think you could pull the door off,” I laughed. He threw me a look that only made me laugh harder.

“Face away from me,” he snapped.

I turned my face, and the window exploded, showering me with glass. “You could have warned me…”

He reached in and grabbed my wrists, and I hissed in pain. “Careful, I think I hurt it.”

And then he did rip the door off, and my mouth fell open. Before I could get out, he gripped my waist, hauled me out of the car, spun me so I had my back to him, and carried me into the cottage before setting me down.

“What were you hoping to find?” he snapped.

“Information on you. If what you say is true and I smell like a witch, then the question begs how you know what they smell like because, according to the history books, they have been extinct for hundreds of years…”

He stared at me for long moments, a stony expression on his face. “It doesn’t matter anymore. Go home, Misty.”