Page 25 of Fixing the Grumpy Pumpkin King
“Ooooooh!”
Locke’s head whipped around. The kids were watching them, grinning. One was making exaggerated kissy noises. They all burst into giggles.
Locke stepped back quickly, his face heating. “We should... uh... we should probably finish decorating the haunted house.”
“Of course.”
“Yeah. So. Let’s... let’s go do that.”
Chapter Seven
LordMabonwokewrappedaround Locke again.
This had stopped being surprising somewhere around day three. What surprised him now was how right it felt. How Locke’s warmth seeped into him like sunlight through autumn leaves, golden and necessary. How that magic, raw and untapped and utterly Locke saturated the air between them, making everything sharper, more vivid, morereal.
He’d been solid for weeks now. Fully present in the mortal realm in a way he hadn’t been in centuries. The colors were almost overwhelming. Locke’s magic did that, turned reality up like someone adjusting the saturation on the world itself. Every morning he woke to golds that actually glowed, reds that burned, oranges that sang.
And every morning, he woke touching Locke.
Not just touching. Holding. Arms locked around his waist, face pressed to the nape of his neck, breathing in that scent that made him ache with want.
He’d had a plan when he first arrived. A simple one: find the town’s celebration, amplify it, seduce half the population into a proper harvest orgy like the old days. Music and magic and bodies intertwined until dawn, everyone drunk on pleasure and autumn wine. He could still do it. One song, the right enchantment woven into the melody, and they’d all be his for the taking.
He didn’t want to.
The realization had hit him at the Briar House, watching Locke successfully summon that chaos ghost and bind it with pure determination. That was when he understood: he didn’t want touch. He wantedLocke’stouch. Locke’s laughter. Locke’s terrible jokes and nervous rambling and the way he looked at Jack like he was something wonderful instead of something forgotten.
Two hundred and fifty-nine years in that empty castle, fading, waiting, watching the world forget him. He wasn’t going back alone. Herefusedto go back alone.
Which meant he needed to court Locke properly.
Which meant he needed to stop failing spectacularly at every attempt.
Jack.
He’d been going by Jack for weeks now, and the mortal name felt strange and intimate in a way his titles never had.
He carefully extracted himself from Locke’s sleeping form. The apartment hummed with his magic, vines climbing walls in burgundy and burnt orange, autumn leaves clustered in perfect corners. He’d made this place his. Now he needed to make Locke his.
Today. It had to be today.
He had a feast to prepare.
Locke woke to the smell of roasting meat and something sweet, like honey mixed with rich savory spices that saturated the entire place.
He blinked at the ceiling of his bedroom, Jack’s vines had crept across it overnight, weaving patterns that looked almost intentional, and tried to place the scent. It was coming from downstairs. Strong enough to fill the entire apartment, rich and savory and making his stomach growl even though he’d eaten one of Jack’s elaborate dinners just last night.
What was Jack doing?
Locke sat up, rubbing sleep from his eyes. Morning light cast dappled shadows across his rumpled sheets. The apartment was warm. Always warm now, like Jack had brought autumn itself indoors and convinced it to stay.
He pulled on sweatpants and padded toward his bedroom door. The smell intensified as he opened it; meat and bread and something fruity, like apples baked with cinnamon. His mouth watered. Whatever Jack was making, it smelled incredible.
Locke made his way down the stairs, one hand trailing along the banister that was now wrapped in vines. The scent grew stronger with each step, almost overwhelming. Not just food. Something else underneath it. Magic, maybe? That crisp autumn-air smell that followed Jack everywhere, mixed with the char from a dying fire.
He reached the bottom of the stairs and stopped dead.
There was a boar on the kitchen table.
