Page 19 of Cimmerian

Mollie met my stare gratefully. “I can. I mean, I think I can. You need to get the demon and Monica both in the same place right?”

“Preferably before Saturday at midnight.” I choked on the words. We only had a few days left.

She was quiet for a moment. “What did Orcus ask for if you couldn’t offer up Monica?”

I peeked at Jasper underneath my lashes, whose face had become a mask of stone. “Me.”

Mollie cursed under her breath. “Okay. This is what we’re going to do. We’re going to summon both of them here at the same time. It’s going to be tricky, timing wise, because we need to make sure they both arrive at the same time. If Monica comes too early, she’ll run. If the Orcus’s lackey is here too early, they’ll take Ava. We only have one shot.”

“Are you sure you can handle this?” Jasper asked, crossing his arms in front of his body.

Mollie met his glare, and I saw a fragment of the old Mollie in her determined eyes. “Yes. Monica is tied to my family’s magic. She’ll have to come if summoned. But I’m going to need some things, and you and Merrick are going to have to get them for me.”

Merrick growled, still in his defensive stance. “No.”

Mollie took a step forward, her back to me, tipping her head up to look at her newfound mate head-on. “Look. If you want to be my mate, you’re going to have to get used to this. Get used tome. I need you and Jasp in your little wolfy forms to run off and find some shit for me. You’re going to do that, and then we can celebrate this fucked-up form of fate that brought us together.”

Despite myself, I laughed out loud, and Merrick scowled. Jasper just nodded. “Whatever it takes. When do we need to leave?”

Mollie fixed her attention back on Jasper. “As soon as possible. It should be easy to get the stuff, but I’d rather not leave this to the last minute. And grab a few of your wolfy friends on the way back. Some extra muscle wouldn’t hurt if things don’t go to plan.”

Jasper grabbed my hand, pulling me into the small kitchen. He forced me to look at him. “Do you trust her?”

I looked back at the small blonde, already ordering Merrick to be safe with equal parts affection and fierceness. “Yeah. I think I do.”

He kissed me briefly. “Then I’m going to go get the things she needs. You will stay here, armed, and on alert at all times.”

I patted behind my back, making sure my blades were still secure in their hiding place. Although, what I could do against a witch I wasn’t sure. I had seen my mother in the forest, and if that was only a part of the power she had taken on… I shuddered to think of the entirety of it.

“Merrick,” Jasper commanded, turning away from me. “You’re with me. Let’s go.” Mollie gave Jasper a quick list of things she required for both summoning spells, and then they were gone, disappearing into the grim light of the late afternoon.

Mollie turned toward me, hands on her hips. “So, I guess it was about time you made the whole living together thing official.”

I shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable around Mollie without the barrier of Merrick or Jasper. “Yeah. As of like, an hour ago.”

“Jesus, Ava,” Mollie muttered, shaking her head. “Who the hell would’ve thought we’d end up here?” She laughed, no humour evident in her voice.

My blood was pumping furiously through my veins, my heart racing. She was so calm. Why was she so calm? I sure as hell wasn’t calm. “How could you lie to me? How could you lie to your best friend’s face for years?”

She pressed her lips together, tears welling behind her baby blue eyes. “I wanted to tell you, Ava. Really, I did. My family, they’ve been witches for a long time. I physically couldn’t tell you myself.”

I frowned. “So how could an entire pack of wolves not know you were a witch? That seems like something they would notice pretty damn quickly.”

Mollie shrugged. “We’ve enchanted ourselves not to smell like witches to other species. It’s a spell that’s gone by the wayside in recent years, but my family still remembers it. Monica insisted we use it on her as well.”

The whole encounter in the forest suddenly made sense, why the guys couldn’t smell her until they were aware of her presence. She had been enchanted. Was Monica using both witch magic and demon magic?Jesus. But one thing still wasn’t adding up.

Chapter Six

“Merrick smelled you. The second we stepped out of the car.”

Mollie’s expression softened for a moment, and her voice grew soft. “The mate bond overpowers anything else. Even enchantments.”

Thatmade sense. Everything else in this crazy, fucked-up world in which I’d found myself confused me, but the idea the bond between soulmates would outweigh even the strongest of magic? Yeah. I got it. A piece of the ice I had so carefully layered my heart in chipped away. The mate bond between Merrick and Mollie was real, and I knew she would never do anything to hurt her mate. And part of that would include keeping me safe. I was safe with Mollie. For now.

Trust was another issue, something to be discussed later, when multiple lives weren’t at stake. I wasn’t sure I would ever be able to rebuild our friendship to what it used to be, but if Mollie’s situation were anything like the wolves’ Alpha command I could kind of understand it. But to help my mother murder innocent wolves? Hopefully she had been a naïve bystander regarding those deaths, but even so I couldn’t imagine Mollie’s mild-mannered parents racing out to summon demons and cast evil spells. Maybe Monica’s influence was greater than I expected.

I shook my head.Allof that could wait until we figured a way out of this. Enemy of my enemy and all that shit, right? I sighed. “So what’s first?”

---