I listen as my coven sisters chat about how hard premed magic is and nod when appropriate, but I’m distracted by my own unease. This feels like a reenactment of Little Red Riding Hood, only the whole story is flipped on its head, and the wolves aren’t going to eat us—whatever is lurking out in these woods will.
In my mind’s eye, I see that murdered witch again, with her gaping chest cavity and missing organs—
“I saw Kane.”
I nearly jump at the sound of Sybil’s voice in my ear.
“Maiden, Mother, and Crone, Sybil,” I say, clutching my heart. “You scared me.”
“Ease up, Bowers,” she says, pressing a red cup into my hand. “I’m not going to bite. Kane, on the other hand…”
“Will you stop?” I whisper frantically.
“Never,” she whispers back.
As I speak to Sybil, I catch the eye of one of the witches across the way, her features almost painfully symmetrical.
I’m about 75 percent sure that’s Kasey, the shady spell-circle witch. She responded to my earlier text with the time and place of the spell circle.
Now she gives me a little wave, and I wave back at her, my stomach twisting on itself.
Really need to get a respectable job. I don’t have the nerves for shady side gigs.
Olga comes over to us, her hair a frizzy tangle of curls and her eyes wild.
“No Book of Last Words?” Sybil says, looking the witch over. “I thought you never parted with it.”
“Ledger,” Olga clarifies. “It’s the Ledger of Last words.” She holds up her drink. “And I didn’t want to spill beer on it. But I’ve added to it since we last spoke…”
I force myself to tune out the rest of what she has to say. Normally, I’m as curious as the next person about death and last words and all that jazz, but tonight it’s not sitting well. Not when I’m already on edge.
So I sip my drink and let my eyes wander over the cabin while my coven sisters chat.
The house is two stories tall, and from where I stand in the living room, I can see the doors that line the second story. Most of them are already closed, and it doesn’t take any supernatural sense of mine to know just what is going on behind them.
Without meaning to, my eyes land on a group of lycanthropes across the room, near a roaring fireplace. The magic shimmering off them is translucent and textured, rather than colorful and misty. At the center of them is the one and only Kane Halloway.
My stomach flips at the sight of him chatting with one of his friends, and all those old feelings of excitement and infatuation bubble up. Back at Peel Academy, I pined for this guy. And for all that time, he looked right through me.
Kane turns away from one of his friends, and before I can look away, those lupine blue eyes of his catch mine.
Look away, I command myself.
But I can’t seem to.
Kane holds my gaze, and the longer I stare, the more I swear I see his wolf peeking out from those irises. Heat rises to my cheeks as the two of us stay locked like that. I don’t know much about lycanthropes, but I’m pretty sure staring is a dominance display. And I’m pretty sure challenging a wolf like this is a bad idea.
Across the room, Kane’s nostrils flare just the slightest.
Then he smiles.
“Oh my goddess,” Sybil says, catching sight of the exchange. “Go over and talk to him like you’ve wanted to for the past several years,” Sybil says.
Finally, reluctantly, I force my gaze away from Kane to give my friend a pointed look.
“He can hear you,” I say, my voice low. Even in their human form, lycanthropes have preternatural hearing.
“Then I hope he knows you’d happily fuck him too,” Sybil says louder.
Hell’s bells.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Kane grin with the confidence of a man who definitely just heard that bit of conversation.
“Why would you do that to me?” I whisper furiously at her.
“Because I love you and you’ve waited too long for good things to happen to you.” Sybil gives me a quick squeeze, then pushes me out of the circle of witches.
I stumble away, flashing her a betrayed look.
“What are you—？” But Sybil has already turned back to Olga, who is only too happy to resume her conversation about last words.
I take a few steps away, chewing on my lower lip, my heart racing. I glance down at my beer. I’m going to need at least three more drinks before my confidence is anywhere near high enough to approach my longtime crush.
“Hey.” That deep, masculine voice nearly makes me drop my red cup.