Night Witch (Weatherstone College, #2)(17)

Stalkcaster: Sorry for the late reply, I was tied up on some business. Did you make it to the city okay?





Fire washed through me as my magic surged against the suppression potion, and I forced myself not to shoot back an immediate reply.

I even debated ignoring him, which lasted all of ten seconds.

Paisley: Yep, made it safe and sound. Dad’s main trial day is tomorrow. I’ll be at the council chambers.





He replied almost instantly:

Stalkcaster: It’s going to be ok. I will make sure your dad is safe, so don’t stress. I can feel you freaking out from here.





Ignoring his statement about making it okay, because there was no possible way he could help, I replied just as quickly.

Paisley: I bet you can, Stalker. Where is “here” anyway?





Another quick reply.

Stalkcaster: Our bed.





My heart stuttered in a weird arrhythmia.

Paisley: You have got to stop saying things like that. You’re confusing me. Speaking of, you didn’t answer my questions the other night, and you promised you would.

Stalkcaster: You needed a break. You needed a night to not deal with the stress of life. The questions and answers aren’t going anywhere. Now go to sleep.





I clutched the phone tighter and let a moment of vulnerability seep out.

Paisley: I find it hard to sleep these days.





He read the message, and for the first time there wasn’t an instant reply. Figuring he was done with the chat, I was about to drop my phone on the green laminate side table, when it buzzed once and then again.

He was calling.

Reflexively, I slid my finger across to answer and whispered, “Hello.”

“I’ll stay with you until you fall asleep,” he said, the rumble of his voice deeper than usual. “Or I can get you and bring you back here.”

Oh Hel.

“I’m with Sara,” I whispered in reply. “I can’t leave.”

I wanted to, though. It was scary how much I wanted to.

Even though Logan’s actions gave me whiplash, this caring side he revealed was impossible to resist.

“Close your eyes, Precious.”

My eyes were closed before I could consider how quickly I obeyed his command.

“Good girl,” he murmured, as if he could fucking see me.

Could he see me? Wouldn’t put it past him.

“Let me tell you about our last day together,” he continued, and despite my sleepiness, I perked up, wanting to hear this story. “We went to the park twice a week. Our moms would take us to hang out so they could gossip. The twins ran off to play together, as they always did. Those two never needed anyone. And Jensen and Trevor were content to wrestle in the mud or throw punches at all the assholes in the park. Which left you and me. You followed me everywhere, and I pretended I hated it, but deep down . . . I thought you were adorable.”

At some point, my breathing grew so shallow I felt lightheaded.

Was I finally going to find out what happened that day in my memories?

“You ran away from me,” I whispered.

Logan’s chuckle vibrated through the phone and deep into my body. “I always did, and you always caught me. Or . . . I let you catch me. But that day, you tripped and fell. You hurt yourself. There were shallow cuts on your hands, and I remember being so angry with myself. I scooped you up in my arms, trying not to freak at your tiny tear-streaked face. Our moms didn’t see us, too caught up in Witch Weekly or whatever they were chatting about, so I took you over to a set of chairs near the back of the park.”

I strained my brain, but all I had was that one memory: the falling.

“I cleaned your hands with water from the tap and my shirt. And you looked up at me with the bluest fucking eyes I’d ever seen, and said, ‘I’m going to marry you one day, Logie.’”

He paused and didn’t speak for so long I thought he’d already gone.

“What happened then?” I pushed gently.

“You pulled a spell from your pocket.” He sounded less intense and more amused now. “You’d stolen it from an old book of your gran’s. That’s why you’d been chasing me—to give me a gift.”

A book of Gran’s . . . ? Which gran?

“We read that spell together, and then I cut my palm to press against the blood already on yours. We were just stupid kids messing around, but fuck . . . it worked, Paisley. Magic bound us, and I felt the bond to you. It was subtle until we bloomed, but there was no denying that day was when you became more than my best friend.”

My head spun, and I lifted my hand as if I could see the blood that had bound us.

“More than best friends, as in . . .”

“Mate,” Logan finished for me. “Mate-to-be anyway. Didn’t you think it was weird that when you bloomed, you started dreaming about me? The moment your power emerged, our bond was triggered. The dreams pushed us together until the first time we had sex, needing to seal the spell we set in motion almost twenty years ago.”

“But . . . I mean . . . you can’t do magic at four and six.” It was impossible, even as I felt the connection simmering between us. It’d been there from the first moment I saw him at Weatherstone, even as we fought against it.