Page 46 of Bound to the Wolf
Elise slumped in her seat and leaned against Nico, who was perched on the edge of the chair. Nico sat with his feet flat on the floor and his forearms braced on his thighs, though his hand moved to rest against the back of Elise’s neck the moment she leaned into him. She rested her head on his thigh. “Please don’tremind me. And you shouldn’t hold that against him. It’s a big coven. There’s lots of people from there.”
“Trouble in paradise?” Javi asked.
“There’s no paradise about it,” Nico muttered.
“Let’s just say my parents aren’t happy about this.” Elise flapped her hand against his knee. “Emerson has nothing to do with that. He’s in town to do some work at the university. It’s very normal to stay with a friendly coven. The last time I traveled, that’s what I did.”
“I don’t remember the last time I paid for a hotel room,” Delainey reluctantly added. “It’s pretty convenient, being allied with that many people when we travel.”
“It’s not so much alliances as acquaintances,” she said. “I know a witch who knows a witch. We get on a text together andvoila, accommodations.”
“My worst fear is that Emerson is reporting back to my parents,” Elise admitted. “He’s probably telling them every time I stay over at Nico’s. I don’t care. I’m an adult and they can get over it.”
“How long is he going to be here for?” Hugh asked. He had been a silent shadow against the wall, and Delainey had almost forgotten he was there. He stood with his shoulder blades flat against the plaster beside the front window, arms crossed over his chest, his face half in the light from the floor lamp and half in shadow, the kind of man who could disappear into a room full of people without trying.
Elise played with her bracelet.
Delainey didn’t recognize it at first, then remembered it was the hospitality gift Emerson had given them all. It was a thin braided cord, dark thread woven with something that caught the light in a faintly iridescent way, and a small charm no bigger than a thumbnail dangled from it. Delainey’s was still sitting in her room upstairs. She would have to put it on soon or he mighttake it as a slight, stupid witch politics, but he was their guest, and the formalities had to be seen to.
“A couple of weeks,” Elise said, twisting the bracelet around her wrist in a full rotation. “It shouldn’t be long. Once whatever he’s doing at the university is done, he’ll go home.”
“Okay, but the ex stuff. He and Briana used to date?” Javi pressed.
“I guess it was a couple of years ago. I wasn’t in the coven yet.” Elise shrugged. “We shouldn’t gossip.”
Delainey wanted to gossip so badly it hurt.
But Elise was right. They didn’t gossip with wolves. They didn’t chit-chat. She shouldn’t have felt nearly as comfortable as she did sitting with them, and she should have resented them all hanging out in the coven house like they belonged there.
“It was just regular relationship bullshit,” she conceded. “They weren’t good for each other, but that doesn’t make Emerson a super villain. Just a bad boyfriend. So none of you should date him.”
“But I could fix him,” Javi said in a dramatic voice, and they all burst out laughing.
Then Mark grew serious. “I’d like to take a closer look at Reece. There’s something I can sense in the manacle that your people didn’t.” He rose from the armchair where he’d been sitting and crossed the room in two quiet steps, lowering himself to his knees in front of the couch where Reece sat.
Delainey bristled at the implication that a wolf might be better at magic than her sisters, but Reece’s shoulders visibly relaxed, and he held out his hands to Mark without prompting.
After a moment, Delainey felt a strange warmth around her wrist, not the same as the pain from when she and Reece got too far apart.
It spread slowly through the brass, like someone had laid a heated cloth over the metal, and the manacle’s etchings seemedto glow faintly, not with light exactly, but with a warmth she could see as much as feel, soft, utterly unlike the sharp burn of the binding’s punishment.
It was healing magic, if she didn’t know any better, but it was coming from a wolf. She knew he was a healer, but she had thought that was just the word they used.
Did wolves have magic of their own that they were hiding?
She glanced at the others. The betas from Cole’s pack and Cole himself weren’t acting cagey. They didn’t seem to realize anything fascinating was going on. Elise and Nico had started chatting, so Elise clearly didn’t realize it either.
Wolves could smell witch magic, and she was guessing this didn’t smell anything like it. Otherwise, hackles would have been raised and questions would have been asked.
The warmth slowly seeped out of the bindings. Mark sat back on his heels before standing, shaking out his legs. He’d been crouched in front of them for several minutes.
“There’s nothing physically wrong with Reece. I’m doubly sure of that. Whatever this is, it’s the magic connection.” He looked at Cole. “If it’s all right with you, I’d like to stay here overnight, in case anything goes wrong.”
“This is the witches’ territory,” Cole replied. “It’s their call, but you have my permission.”
Damn right it’s the witches’ territory, Delainey thought, glad that Cole understood and respected that.
She didn’t like the idea of extra wolves under their roof. Elise’s boyfriend was more than enough. At this point she would have gladly kicked all of them out, including Reece, but they were tied together. So what was one more wolf at the party?
