Magic Hunter (The Rover series Book 4) Read online

  He swallowed, his breathing coming faster. “From this moment you are mine.”

  I matched him inhale for inhale. “From this moment you are mine.”

  “From now until forever we are mates,” he whispered, his lips so close to mine I could feel his breath in each word.

  “From now until forever we are mates.”

  When he closed his eyes, I followed suit even though I didn’t want to lose the beautiful sight of him. I was surrounded by him. His wet mouth on mine, the silky strands of his hair falling around my face. Magic surged between us, and I didn’t know if it was his or mine. I simply tried to match it, grasping my power in whatever way I could and thrusting it between us, offering it up to him to take and do whatever he would with it.

  He hissed against my lips, but it was too late. The power doubled over between us, rolling and writhing and then resettling. Once it lay around us like a down blanket, I popped my eyes open to look at him.

  “Is it over?”

  He arched his hips into me, surprising me enough to gasp as my body lit up from the inside. It wasn’t just the pleasure of him being inside me physically. It was as if his magic, his mind, every part of him surged through me, loved me, pleasured me.

  I wrapped my fingers into his hair and dragged his mouth to mine for a kiss. Anything to curb the edge of this feeling. Any moment I might shatter and there was no safety net to catch me.

  “I’ll catch you,” he whispered, and then he took my mouth hard.

  His teeth grazed mine as he threaded our tongues together. He let out a growl, drew our mouths apart so he could brace his weight off my chest, and swiveled his hips up.

  The sensations felt amazing, so much better than before. Like I felt my own pleasure, and his, and something else that mixed the two between us. It wasn’t just sex; it was a joining of our hearts, our souls.

  I slid my fingers down to his chest, loving the silken feel of his skin under my hands. “Don’t stop.”

  He set a furious pace, as if he were seconds away from his own end despite the few moments we’d been entitled.

  I wrapped my legs around his hips, digging my heels into his ass as he slid in and out of me. Each pass elicited another wave of desire.

  I matched him, raising my hips to meet his, and then we broke. The world around us turned crystalline and fragile as we shattered together. I held onto him, using him as a shield in the storm. When uncertainty flared bright inside my chest, he smothered it with his own, taking my mouth, riding out my orgasm, and every doubt that threatened to drag me under in the wake of it.

  Once we stopped moving, the kiss ended, our ragged panting the only sounds in the room. I stared up into his eyes. Then reached out with my senses, tracking my magic from my own body to his and back again. I felt the familiar pull of him too, inside me, but found new magic. Bright shining liquid stuff like a pool of mercury in my gut I could sift through my fingers.

  I realized two things at once. First, Fin had a depth of power I couldn’t even begin to understand. He’d been deliberately keeping it tamped down. Not to hide it but to limit the effects he had on people. He could turn them into walking zombies without a second thought. It hit me all over again how he could have used me for his own ends and cast me away.

  Next, our magic complemented each other. His was liquid and smooth, honed and ready for battle at a moment’s notice. Mine was silken black smoke thick and hard to grasp yet strong all the same.

  I popped my eyes open to find him staring down at me.

  “How do you feel?” he asked.

  It took me a moment to clear my throat and find words. “I’m not entirely sure. I understand and know what we just did, and yet, when I reach for the magic it feels almost unwieldy. I’m not sure what to do with mine around yours.”

  “You don’t separate them. From the moment we said the words our magic became one.”

  He’d deliberately taken my mage magic into himself when he’d accepted me. I cupped his cheeks and stared into his beautiful eyes. He’d taken the darkness into his light and he still looked at me like I was the most precious thing in the world to him.

  “Thank you,” I said. And I meant it. For the gift he’d given me, and the way he’d loved me in so many ways I hadn’t noticed since we met.

  He opened his mouth to respond, and my phone let out a sharp ding beside the bed.

  I’d set the text tone when I added his number to my phone, so I didn’t need to look at the contact name.

  Helix was ready for us.

  Chapter Sixteen

  FIN DIDN’T EVEN ASK who texted. It was like the second I realized who was on the other end of the line, he did too. But I couldn’t think about that fact too much or I’d get bogged down in the whole mind sharing aspect and likely do something stupid.

  Fin eased out of me, left the room, and returned with a warm wet towel to clean me up. The look in his eyes as he did so made me shiver. It was proprietary. As if he couldn’t wait to come back and finish what he’d started.

  We dressed and then I checked the message. No doubt Helix had some shady place for us to go, another hoop to jump through as if we were trained circus animals there for his amusement. Strangely, a lot of our interactions made me feel that way. But under it all I could tell he genuinely felt protective over Melinda so I couldn’t completely hate the man.

  His text was simple: go to the house.

  I assumed he meant the townhouse where I’d first met Melinda. We loaded ourselves up with easy to carry weapons, jackets to conceal what we could, and headed out.

  I kept waiting for things to get awkward, for something to feel off between Fin and I since the bond sealing. But every movement he made, every word he uttered, even him opening my door for me felt perfectly natural. As if the sealed bond meant something inside me had finally clicked into place and this is where we were meant to be all along.

  “Stop worrying,” he told me, climbing into the driver’s seat.

  We crossed town as dusk fell. I hadn’t even realized how much of the day we’d lost.

  I checked the magic inside me, feeling Fin’s magic rise under my call the same way. At least I could see his magic had returned; there didn’t seem to be any lasting effects from Melinda’s battery drain on him.

  Helix held the door open as we parked in front of the house. The same sort of bubble slid over our skin as we crossed the sidewalk to bound up the stairs. This time, the barrier let Fin enter instead of shoving him away.

  On the other side, he looked back at it and I knew he marveled at the construction. It wasn’t like reading each other’s thoughts but feeling the same thing he felt. Reading emotions on an ultra-detailed level.

  “It sucks in the power of those who try to enter and uses it to keep them out,” he whispered to me.

  “Cool,” I said, deadpan, but gave him a smile.

  I’d attached myself for life to an uber nerd, which should have been glaringly obvious by the size of his library back at his mansion.

  I shoved the thoughts of our previous headquarters away. It wouldn’t do well to think about the Captain right now when we needed all our focus. Fin grabbed my hand and squeezed, thanking me for remembering his friend, for appreciating him in the end.

  We entered the house and Helix closed and locked the door behind us. I gaped at the sheer number of locks down the door frame.

  Helix shrugged. “I believe you should use the tools that require the least amount of effort first. Then move up from there. If any of these locks buy us more time, then it was worth it.”

  I couldn’t help by smile at him. “You don’t have to justify your choices to me. I understand how much you want to keep your friend safe.”

  With a nod, he marched around us in his stupidly expensive suit and led us into the drawing room.

  Melinda sat in an armchair, a black Kimono wrapping her slight form in glistening silk. The flickering light from the fireplace caught the folds of her robe, reminding me of the mercury of
Fin’s magic in my grasp.

  We took seats on the couch opposite her, and Helix stood vigil at the back of her chair like he had before. I noticed more now how he was attuned to her every twitch. It only made me more curious about their relationship.

  Fin nudged my arm clearly saying ‘none of your business.’ I gave him a sheepish grin and focused on Melinda. While still incredibly beautiful, she had dark circles under her eyes tonight.

  “You called us here.” I said, gently. “What did you need? Are you finished?”

  She waved at Helix who crossed to the bar and handed Fin and I each a whiskey on ice.

  Melinda raised her glass. “To your bonding. I see you’ve sealed it.”

  We weren’t going to go into how creepy it was that she noticed it, or maybe...the answer filtered into my head.

  Fae could see the entwining of our magic around us, like a brand easily identifiable. It would fade as we settled into it but for now it shone bright and strong a symbol of our new union.

  Still creeped me out though, especially given the intimacy of the ceremony and what we shared in those precious moments together.

  “Thank you,” Fin said, for both of us, as my mind wandered.

  I needed to get used to this thing between us. The knowledge that slipped into my head distracted me.

  I let her sip her toast and then took a polite drink myself before placing the glass on a coaster on the coffee table. If we had to do magic, or fight anytime soon, I wanted to be at full capacity.

  She sighed and finished her drink. Helix took the empty glass away and returned to place his hands on the back of her chair again like a castle gargoyle on duty.

  “Tell me what you know about metal magic.” Melinda said.

  I glanced at Fin who gave me a tiny nod to go ahead. “Well, I know that some metalsmiths can imbue metal with magic, hold it and keep it there to be used later, or by someone in particular.”

  She nodded.

  “Also, some metal is better suited for magic than others. The ones which go well with magic are more expensive and harder to get a hold of. There is a balance between hard metals and soft metals. Soft metals are better for magic, but they are also easier to scratch, bend, and break so to make things like weapons, there has to be a certain amount of magical binder.”

  “You know more than I thought,” she said, sounding impressed.

  To be fair, I’d been doing a lot of research lately on magical metalsmithing.

  “Most of us, metal workers that is, start with jewelry,” she said, “watches and little things to begin as we get to know what form our magic will take. It’s rare to find a metal worker who can do everything required to complete a project. Often it takes several workers with varied gifts to finish one item. Many of my kind work in teams to produce their artifacts.”

  I nodded. “Let me guess. You aren’t one of those.”

  Her jaw tightened as she glanced away. “No, I’m not. Sometimes I wonder what my life would have been like if I had been. Safer, probably. As you can guess, my abilities are highly sought after. Most of those with whole abilities die young trying to flee others who wish to capture them, or under the strain of their own power as they try to do too much with too little source magic.”

  Fin’s knowledge hit me again.

  The source magic being the well of someone’s power. Most fae only had so much of it, and what Melinda did, required more than she had access to herself.

  “I understand better now why you need magical amplification from Fin. So, what now? Were you able to negate the knife?”

  She shook her head, and my heart sank like a rock tossed off the edge of a cliff.

  “Don’t misunderstand me,” she said. “I have only tried the bare minimum to get a feel of what would be required. I need to explain some things about it first.”

  Fin squeezed my hand, no doubt seeing the turmoil swinging like a pendulum inside my gut.

  “Okay, shoot.”

  “As you know, or may have figured out, the Black Mage held me captive for some time. He used my power to bolster him in any way he could figure out, and left me used up and drained on a daily basis. I had nothing left to tap into, until the next day of course...” She trailed off, her eyes going hazy as she stared into the fire.

  Helix closed his hand around her shoulder.

  She continued. “He held me for a long time. Years.”

  Fin’s anguish rose up from inside me, threatening to claw its way out of my body. I gripped his hand tighter in my own, using it to give whatever he needed to fight the rollercoaster of emotions.

  Even though I was perfectly aware of his inner battle, his face remained polite, composed as he listened to Melinda speak. It made me wonder how many of those fights with himself he had where I’d made things worse by throwing his pain back in his face.

  I didn’t let the guilt take hold, focusing on Melinda’s next words.

  “The weapon you’re trying to fight is one I made myself.”

  It was like the needle scratch on a turntable. Even the fire seemed to go silent around us.

  Well, shit.

  Part of me wanted to hate her for what she’d done, what she’d made for him. But it was impossible to do so when I stared into the naked pain written on her face. She never had a choice. Esteban would have forced her to make the knife, and threatened to kill her if she didn’t.

  “If anything, maybe that helps, since you know what was done to create it?”

  She shook her head, tears pooling on her long dark lashes. “I should have died instead of giving him such a weapon. And a few people did die, in the making of it. I feel their souls sometimes, around me, blaming me for being a coward and choosing to live.”

  I nodded. “In that situation, sometimes it’s not a choice. Our minds are meant to keep us alive. If our will to live is strong it can overpower reason, love, anything to ensure your heart keeps beating. Don’t blame yourself. I’ve faced him several times and know what he’s capable of. It wasn’t your fault, none of it.”

  She sniffed and wiped her eyes with her fingers. “Thank you for saying that, but decades of guilt can’t be negated by a few kind words.”

  I let her have that. even if Fin’s acute desire to help his sister beat at me with every breath. Him being here, witnessing the aftermath of Esteban’s capture of her, was eating at him from the inside out. He wanted to make it right more than anything in the world. His sense of justice was almost as strong as my stubbornness.

  She continued, her voice steadier. “What you need to know is that when I made the blade, I tied it to me magically, so I’d always be able to eventually cut off its power. I don’t have enough magic organically to do it alone, which is why I needed your magic.”

  She nodded at Fin.

  I glanced between her and Fin. “I take it there is a big fat but coming any second.”

  A short laugh burst out of her. “You’re correct, Zoey. There is a but. In order to unbind the magic around the knife, I need to tap into it using all the magic I have, and all the magic I was given for the task. This will put me below my source, drifting on magic alone. To be able to return safely I need an anchor.”

  Fin clenched his hand around mine and I risked a look at him. Even though his face remained perfectly unreadable, everything inside him roiled in fear, confusion, anger, dread. So much so that I had to mentally try to contain it like throwing a mental fire blanket over the dark mass of his emotions.

  He flinched and then met my eyes. I nodded and he did the same, telling me he was better now.

  I focused on Melinda again. “So you need an anchor? What does that mean for us?”

  The knowledge, courtesy of Fin, hit me a split second later.

  She needed family to anchor her. No one else could be the blood tie she needed to keep herself from floating off into her own magic.

  By the look on everyone’s faces, being an anchor had its own dangers. Before, I might have thrown Fin into the middle of the room
and said to get to work. Now, I couldn’t do that. There was nothing on Earth that would compel me to risk his safety if it weren’t absolutely necessary.

  “Explain the process,” I said, hearing the sharp edge to my tone I didn’t mean to include.

  She shifted on her chair, crossing and uncrossing her legs. “We’ll cut our hands, creating an anchor of our blood between us. Then once the magic of that settles, I’ll be able to use the magic Fin gave me and my own to delve into the connection I forged with the blade and sever the magical signature.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  Helix spoke up. “It’s like ripping the stuffing out of a teddy bear. The magic making the weapon will be gone. It’ll still be a knife, deadly in its own way, but it won’t have the power it did. In fact, with it being a softer metal, it will be easily destroyed.”

  “I take it by the doom and gloom layered over your voices that this is a dangerous undertaking for both you and for your anchor.”

  She nodded. “If I go too far, I can drag him into the depths of my magic too, leaving us both empty shells. The Black Mage could have done something to protect the weapon in the years since I’ve made it that might rebound on us. One misstep and I could easily kill us both.”

  Fuck.

  I glanced at Fin, but he’d already made up his mind to help her, if only to pay back the debt he felt he owed her for not protected her all these years. His guilt and anger were a bottomless pit. I didn’t dare go near it, but I clasped his hand tighter in mine, layering the other on top of them.

  A surge of warmth and love hit my chest. I had to drag my attention back to Melinda who stared off into the fire again.

  “Is that it?” I asked. “Anything else we should know?”

  She shook her head.

  Fin leaned forward, hand still tucked between mine. “I’ll do it.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  HELIX HELD HIS HAND out to bring Melinda to her feet. She allowed him to lead her from the room and gestured for us to follow. With Fin’s hand still in mine, I went first, Fin trailing behind me until we came to the staircase leading down into the basement.