Storiebook Charm (A Spellbound Novel 1) Page 15

  She turned as he came up to her and without a word, he took her by the hand, pulled her in until her body pressed against his, and let his hand slide to her lower back, his fingers spreading as he dragged her closer.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded.

  “Dancing.”

  “I don’t want to dance with you, Reid. We’re done.”

  She could say she was done till the cows came home, but her voice cracked, just enough that he knew he’d gotten to her. He held her other hand tight, straight down, pressing their joined palms against her leg.

  He dipped his head and murmured in her ear. “What did you expect me to do after that show you just put on, darlin’?”

  “That wasn’t for you, darlin’.”

  “Wasn’t it?” he asked as the singer belted out the next lines of the song.

  The music surrounded them, cradling them together until not even a breath of air hung between them. He edged his leg between hers, the heat of her against his thigh. He held her tighter, never wanting to let her go. If she resisted, he would let her go, but she didn’t. Instead she bent her legs, ever so slightly, working herself closer. He moved one hand to the side of her face. With the other, he kept her firmly in place.

  “I think it was all for me,” he said, his lips perilously close to hers.

  She’d so effectively tortured him with her dance show. Now it was his turn. He slid his fingers through her loosely knotted hair. He grabbed hold, gently, and tilted her head back, barely able to stop himself from locking his lips to hers, from devouring every inch of her. If he kissed her, there’d be no stopping. There’d be no freaking tomorrow.

  He forced himself into a slow rhythm, bringing her along. They fit together, like interlocking blocks.

  “I-I should check on Harper,” she said, barely managing to swallow the stammer in her voice and choke the words out.

  He rocked against her, shaking his head. “She’s fine.”

  “But…”

  She seemed to forget whatever she was going to say as he dragged his lips across her neck. She melted a little under the heat of his touch. If she responded like this to his lips on such a chaste part of her body, what would happen if she were bare to him? “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

  She nodded, barely. “It’s tonight or never.” She moved her hands to the sides of his face and tried to move his head so their lips would meet.

  “We’ve got all the time in the world,” he said. Granted, he felt as if he were going to burst if he couldn’t have her, but he wasn’t going to make it that easy for either of them. Anticipation was half the fun, and he’d waited for eight years. He was going to have her, yes, but he was going to go slow and make sure they both enjoyed every blessed minute.

  “Kiss me,” she said.

  The words sounded like a desperate plea, but instead of complying, he let her go. “Uh-uh, darlin’.” Not here. They needed privacy.

  Chapter 16

  A shiver wound through Storie when Reid released his hold. Damn him for making her feel this way, but it was her own fault. He was right. She’d danced for him. Only for him. And why the hell not? This was her last night here. For a moment, the world had melted away and it’d been just the two of them, alone. It didn’t matter that he hadn’t been straight with her, that she was leaving, or that there was no future in it for either of them.

  He took her by the hand and pulled her into the tearoom and into the stairwell leading up to her loft. The scent of the astrids floated around them, left over from when she’d had them hanging to dry. He started upstairs, but she yanked on his hand and he jerked to a stop. She scurried up the steps past him, whipping around and putting her hands out to the sides, pressing them against the wall and blocking him.

  “I can’t go upstairs with you, Reid,” she said, looking down at him, wishing she had more time. Eleven o’clock was going to come too quickly.

  “Not even to finish that dance in private?” His hand moved slowly up the back of her thigh, brushing the edge of her dress. A rush of heat crashed through her. If he kept going, he’d reach her bare bottom, the thin strings of her thong mere scraps of lace.

  Her body reacted, independent of her mind. She should push him away. Triple-check that everything was in order, go change her clothes—what did a woman wear to a cross over to a parallel magical world, anyway?—and drive to the lake. Instead, her back arched as his hand skimmed over her behind, feeling the strip of lace cutting over the pulsing center between her legs.

  “N-no, I c-can’t.” She could scarcely get the words out. Reason battled with the blood pulsing through every inch of her.

  Reid didn’t know the clock was ticking and her time in Whiskey Creek was almost up. He kept his distance from her, using only his hand as he circled it back to trace the outside of her leg, his touch feathering around to behind her knee. He skimmed his hands up the sides of her body until he was tracing the neckline of her dress. “Sure you can.”

  “I-I can’t,” she said with a stammer, but she inched closer to him. The flutter had started in her stomach when she’d moved for him on the dance floor. Now she closed the gap between them.

  He pulled at the neckline of her dress down. The heat of his gaze singed her skin. Footsteps in the tearoom brought her back to reality. She broke the connection, a chill winding through her. “We c-can’t do this,” she said, but instead of fixing her dress and leaving him alone on the stairs, she edged farther up, sinking into the shadows.

  “Oh, but we can.” He prowled up the steps after her, catching her and pressing his hands against the walls, his mouth the only contact between them.

  “Reid—” she whispered. She wanted him to devour her. God, why didn’t he touch her? Her head swam. All she wanted was his hands roaming her body, the heat from them warming her, filling her and releasing the aching need she felt for him.

  Below them, out in the garden room, the band made an announcement and the music stopped. The low chattering of conversation grew.

  As if a switch had been flipped, her mind clicked back to the party and clarity seeped back in. She knew the band’s schedule. If they were taking a break, it had to be ten twenty-five. A mass of confusion and desire flooded her, her emotions circling like a tornado low in her abdomen. No matter how much she wanted Reid, it wouldn’t be fair—to either of them. She was leaving. “I-It’s the grand opening,” she said with a stammer, curling her back, breaking the connection between them. “I have to go.”

  His voice dropped into a low growl. “You can’t dance like that for me, can’t do this,” he said with a wave of one hand, “and then leave me, darlin’.”

  But she didn’t have a choice. “I have to,” she whispered, straightening her dress. She looked at him, brushing the side of his face with the backs of her fingers. “I have to take care of something.”

  She hurried back to the party for a last farewell.

  Chapter 17

  Reid leaned against the wall in the stairwell, completely drained. The taste of Storie lingered on his tongue, the scent of her like a cloud of perfume floating around him, commingling with the aroma of the flowers she’d dried and had put everywhere. His frustration mounted, morphing into blistering anger. What—or who—was so important that she’d leave just when they were figuring things out? They needed to finish what they’d started, but there was more. He couldn’t imagine being in Whiskey Creek without her. Hell, he couldn’t imagine being in Austin—or anywhere—without Storie.

  His mother had left him and Jiggs because she was too big for a little square town, but Reid suddenly realized that it didn’t matter where he lived, as long as Storie was by his side.

  Somewhere in the distance, an engine revved, gears grinding as it kicked into gear. Driving off a cliff—that was the right idea.

  He wanted her like he’d never wanted anyone else. She filled his mind with images of Sunday brunch and walks around the square. Long, leisurely afternoons in bed.

  Love.
>
  In Whiskey Creek.

  Jesus, had he lost his mind? His happiness was not in a little square town, isn’t that what his mother had told him? And now he was thinking of chucking all his plans, for what? For a woman who had secrets to spare and left him frustrated and cold?

  He needed air. He needed to get her the hell out of his mind or he’d go crazy. He dug his keys from his pocket and left the stairs. Guess Storie doesn’t have to worry about not fitting in, he thought wryly. The people had come out to see the new bookshop and its eclectic owners. The place would be a huge success.

  He didn’t see her as he plowed through the people, thank God. If he had, he might have gone caveman and dragged her upstairs. And it wouldn’t have been against her will, either. He’d felt her body react to his touch. He knew she wanted him, but there was something else she wanted more. Something she’d left him to do.

  And he had no idea what it was.

  The band had wrapped up and the people were trickling out. He started to leave, changing his mind at the last second. Her apartment. She’d said she’d find someone else to work on it, but he’d be damned if he let her live in that disarray for another second. He turned and headed back into the shadows of the stairwell.

  He took the stairs two at a time, ready to blaze through any repairs he could right this very minute. Practical? No. Necessary for his peace of mind? Yes.

  He burst through the door, stopping in his tracks, staring at the space. “What the…?”

  He’d been expecting the same disarray he’d seen a few days ago, but was greeted by an immaculate room. The boxes were stacked against the back wall. The floors had been refinished.

  “Impossible.” Everything would have had to have been removed, the floors sanded, coats of stain and finish brushed on, and then it would have needed time to dry. He tested the floor. Not even tacky to the touch. “There’s no freaking way.” She couldn’t have done this herself, so how?

  He processed the rest of what he was seeing. The counters had been redone. New fixtures in the kitchenette. A new sink, too.

  What the hell was going on? Something stirred in him and his mind circled around all the inconsistencies he’d noticed. Storie flicking her wrist and suddenly bubbles appeared in the bathtub. Another movement and the broken door slammed shut. The pressure of an invisible hand on his chest.

  And now this. His head pounded. He cupped one hand behind his neck, pacing the room. What the hell was she?

  He stood in front of the wall of boxes. They were stacked nearly to the ceiling. “How’d you do this, Storie?”

  He processed the rest of the room, his gaze finally landing on an envelope in the center of the bed. His gut clenched when he saw Storie’s straight up and down handwriting and Harper’s name penned on the front.

  He knew he should take it to Harper, but he ripped it open instead, unfolding the single sheet of stationery. Reading it sent a knife thrashing through his insides, the sentences burning into his mind.

  One sentence shot out in front of all the others.

  I’m a witch.

  His mind whirled over what that meant. Was she a freaking Wiccan? One of those goddess mothers?

  A freaking witch, whatever that meant, right next door to him.

  He kept reading. His gut clenched when he realized what she was saying. She was leaving for good, meeting her mother at the lake. She’d told him it wouldn’t matter after tonight. Now he understood.

  I’m sorry to break our pact, she wrote, but she needs me. My brother and sister need me.

  “No, I need you,” he ground out. He let loose a string of curses, raked his hand through his hair, and crumpled the note in his fist. He wanted to ignore the part about her being a witch, but as he tried to push the idea out of his mind, he remembered her standing on the tailgate of her daddy’s truck, arms stretched upward. What if she hadn’t been basking in the rain? He tried to accept what he was thinking. Holy shit, what if she’d actually been summoning the thunder and lightning?

  The last line of the message throbbed in his mind. I have a family there, she’d written. It’s where I belong.

  “No, it’s not,” he said. He wanted to throttle her for not seeing what was so obviously in front of her. “Harper is your family. This is where you belong.”

  Right here in Whiskey Creek, with him.

  Family. He’d been running, too, always thinking he belonged somewhere else, that a little square town wasn’t big enough to hold him. But with Storie, the town felt bigger. His life felt bigger. He had Jiggs and The Speakeasy. He had everything he wanted, but no matter where he went, if Storie wasn’t there, it wouldn’t matter.

  Christ. He prayed he wasn’t too late. He shoved the note in his pocket and raced back downstairs, plowing through the stragglers in the front room, hurrying to his truck parked in front of the bar, and heading for the lake.

  Chapter 18

  Storie tore around the corner in her Jeep. A tear rolled down her cheek. She hadn’t been able to find Harper to say good-bye. What would she have said, anyway? I’m leaving my dream to go to some otherworld with my mother, who, by the way, is a witch, and I’ll live happily ever after with my brother and sister who I’ve never met.

  She swiped at another tear. Yeah, that would go over real well. She’d left the letter, but couldn’t imagine Harper reading it. Would she understand? Could she?

  She’d miss Scarlett and Piper. That was the thing that killed her most of all. She loved those girls like they were her own flesh and blood. She hadn’t had a family, so she’d made her own with Harper and her daughters. Suddenly the idea of reuniting with a family she’d never known felt like an anvil around her neck, dragging her down.

  And Reid…

  “No.” She pushed him out of her mind. She couldn’t think about how he’d invaded every cell of her body since the day she’d learned the truth about her mother, or how seeing him again had charged every one of those cells with electricity. She pounded the steering wheel with her hands, stifling the scream in her throat.

  “It doesn’t matter.” He was leaving Whiskey Creek, anyway. One foot out of town, he’d said.

  He’d only tried to seduce her to get into her building, not her pants. He’d manipulated her from the start, convincing Buddy Garland to beg off the job, sauntering in like a damn prince, ready to save the day. If she kept those facts front and center she could forget the rest.

  So what if he rocked the rugged cowboy look like nobody’s business? So what if running her hands through his hair sent shivers dancing over her skin? So what if that half-cocked smile he flashed beckoned her, even when she was alone in her bed just imagining him?

  She drove over the bumpy dirt road, rumbling toward the old fishing shack just up from the shoreline. A sound in the backseat of the Jeep jolted her back to the present. She whipped her head around.

  “Shelton!” The little mutt terrier sat squarely on the seat. She slammed on the brakes, swerving off the dirt road. “What are you doing here?”

  The dog growled, but didn’t budge.

  Storie stared at her. She couldn’t say why, but she had a feeling deep in her gut that she could understand her.

  “You’re on your own, Shelton.” She was just a dog, and not even her dog.

  She pulled back onto the road. Shelton barked, pawing at the driver’s seat, but Storie ignored the dog. The fishing cabin came into view. The same spot at the lake where she’d come when she was twenty years old. The same place she’d first summoned thunder and lightning, to feel her power coursing through her. The same place she’d first seen Reid.

  Shelton barked again.

  “Funny how it all comes full circle, isn’t it, Shelton?” she said.

  Storie checked the rearview mirror as she drew closer to the meeting place, gasping, wrenching the steering wheel. Shelton wasn’t sitting in the backseat. Instead, a young bohemian-looking woman with layered, shaggy hair the color of ochre, bracelets jangling on her wrists, and wide gold-fle
cked eyes held on to the front seats as the Jeep swerved off the road and plowed into the underbrush. Storie slammed on the brakes, threw the Jeep into park, and jumped out.

  “Chill,” the woman said, exiting the car, too.

  “Chill?” Storie gaped. “Chill? Who the hell are you?”

  “No need to repeat yourself.”

  “Who are you?” She recognized her from the café earlier, but she’d never seen her around town. Still, she was familiar. Could be the nose, she realized, straight and perfectly shaped with the slightest curve on either side.

  Just like her own.

  “My name’s Astrid,” the woman said, her voice sharp. “Your sister.”

  Storie was speechless, but the woman kept talking. “First things first.” She cocked her arm at the elbow and aimed a thin, pointed stick at her. It shone in the moonlight, black and decorated with colorful flowers.

  She snapped her wrist, waving the wand in a Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo circle, and then stood back, folding her arms over her chest. “Well, I’m not your fairy godmother, but it’ll do.”

  Storie looked down at herself. Her dress had been replaced by jeans and a white ribbed tank top. Her thong and boots remained, and her sister hadn’t conjured up a bra, but she still felt more comfortable in what she considered her standard daily uniform. “Is this what people wear in your magical world? ’Cause it’s pretty much what I wear all the time.”

  Astrid scoffed. “So I noticed.”

  She stared. “Right. Shelton, the dog.”

  Astrid laughed. “I debated. I actually considered a potbellied pig, but I figured a stray dog was more realistic.”

  Storie nodded, still hung up on the whole shape-shifter thing. “Can you turn yourself into whatever you want?”

  “Used to be able to. Not so much now. Our powers are depleted, but I guess mommy dearest told you all about that, right? Is that how she convinced you to go back with her?”