Always Practice Safe Hex (Stay a Spell, #4)

by Juliette Cross

JJ wasn’t working at the moment, but apparently enjoying the show. Except he wasn’t enjoying Shane’s flirting with his man.

JJ put his hand over Charlie’s eyes at that point, pulling him back to his chest and whispering something in his ear.

“My monster wants to play with you.” His voice had drifted to that deeper, huskier register that made me think of sex. His hands were relaxed at his sides and yet there was a tight rigidity to his stance. He was holding onto control, but barely it seemed.

He tilted his head, gauging my response. I couldn’t come up with a witty or sassy rebuttal, my body humming with sensation and need like never before. Like I wanted to be owned by his darkness. “I’d like to meet your monster,” I finally whispered. “I want all of you to know all of me.”

The words were demeaning, but his voice rang with a worshipfulness I couldn’t describe.

“You want the monster,” he grated, a foreign wildness in his voice. “You’re going to get him.”

chaining me to him.

There was a twisted pleasure humming through my body at doing what he’d commanded me to do,

“You’re so fucking perfect, mate.”

My brain hazed at the strange inflection of his voice and the word mate in his guttural tone.

His voice had gone to that deep, dark timbre, the one where I knew he and his monster were one and the same.

If he’d done this, thinking I’d use our safe word stop and end this, he was out of his mind. I wanted everything his monster would give me.

No one else will dare touch what is mine.”

His eyes were full black, shadows surrounding them, veins of black creeping across his face, down his chest, and up his arms. “You have this beast in your thrall, woman,” he said, sounding very little like Gareth.

What was this madness? I’d never been into kink or pain. If anything, I’d chosen gentle, languorous lovers. But I wanted the pain, craved it…from him. Only him.

“Good, beautiful girl,” he crooned, sounding less and less like Gareth and more like something else that was not of this world.

And I loved it. I fucking loved it. What was happening to me?

mate,”

“Fucking Christ.” I was being lifted gently into strong arms. “I’ve got you, baby.” A soft, sorrowful voice, laced with despair and regret. A press of lips to my forehead. Darkness.

But right now, I was considering options of how I could seriously punish myself for how I’d just treated the precious woman laying beside me in my bed.

Still, I couldn’t be parted from her until I was sure she was okay. I managed to get her to swallow two Advil in her dazed, altered state after I’d fucked her like the monster I was. There was no question I’d caused her pain. I was a goddamn animal. Remorse churned the acid in my stomach.

I cocooned her body under the covers and tucked her body close to mine, combing my fingers gently through her hair, giving her as much tenderness and gentle care as I could even while she was still unconscious. Knowing full well she wouldn’t want or accept my touch when she woke. What the fuck had I been thinking?

You know, the demon whispered from the depths where I’d caged him back behind solid, supernatural walls. Yes, I’d thought to test Lavinia. To show her wh...

I’d let loose the darkest part of me, craving her full submission to the beast beyond reason. The need to invade, conquer, and overcome her drove me tonight. A need ingrained so deep, it came from my Varangian bloodline, I was sure of it.

I’d shown Lavinia what the monster in me truly wanted from her. I couldn’t get past the fact that she’d given me the most soul-shattering pleasure I’d ever experienced. But it was at the expense of her well-being. I tried to regret it. I wanted to regret it, for fuck’s sake. But I was a twisted bastard.

If I could wipe the memory of it away, I knew that I wouldn’t. I’d always cherish the way she made me feel in that moment.

she wasn’t the one bound and chained. I was. I’d worship her for eternity for giving me one heaven...

To be a grimlock like me—who’d known keen loss at an early age, repeated rejection, and brutal abuse at the hands of one who should’ve shown me kindness and compa...

I could only be grateful he hadn’t wanted her blood. Just her body on the most primal level. Still cuddling her close, facing her, I eased the edge of her t-shirt collar aside to examine the bite mark. I hadn’t broken the skin somehow, but nearly. It was already purpling with detailed indentions of my teeth.

I traced a finger over the mark, stomach churning with acid. Not because I hated my mark on her but because I loved it. I couldn’t regret it. And if she stayed with me, I’d want to do it again. A rumble of approval vibrated in my chest. Fucking hell. I hated myself.

“Do you need anything? Advil? A cool bath, maybe.” Though I doubt she’d want to get naked anywhere near me, I couldn’t help but offer. Her brow creased in a question. “What’s wrong?”

I reached up to touch her hair then pulled my hand away, clenching a fist in my lap. She frowned, so I went ahead and told her. Best to rip the Band-Aid off quickly. Get this over with.

The monster’s marks. My marks. “I remember everything. I didn’t forget one second of it.” My pulse sped with sickening speed, the ache in my chest winding tighter. “I should’ve known you’d be gentle like this.” “Huh?” “When you left me.” “Gareth.” She laughed. Actually laughed. Sweetly and with tenderness in her eyes. “What the hell are you talking about? I’m not leaving you.”

“I hurt you.” “No, you didn’t.” Huffing out a sound of disdain, I grabbed both her hands—gently—and flipped them over, stretching her arms toward me. The crisscross of rope-like bruising went all the way up to her biceps. Her palms were pink with rough abrasions from the brick wall. I’d washed them clean and applied lotion several times while she was sleeping. But there was still evidence of what I’d done. She stared down at the bruises, turning her arms to look at them more closely. “They’re kind of cool, aren’t they?”

I choked. “Are you fucking mad?! I hurt you, Lavinia. You should be slapping me, spitting in my face, cursing my name while storming out of my life.” She laughed again, but it died quic...

“But it wasn’t abuse, Gareth. It was just your monster loving me, the only way he knew how.”

“See!” I lurched from the bed, paced away, and turned, staring at her with clenched fists. I’d imagined every possible reaction when she woke and this was none of them.

“You’re the most brilliant, beautiful woman, witch, I’ve ever known.” Her blue eyes shone with tears standing in them. “Then hear me now, Gareth Blackwater. You’ve shown me your worst. And I’m still here.” She lifted a hand to me.

After a few seconds of agonizing over this new reality where she welcomed me into her arms rather than run screaming from my house—from my life—I stepped closer. Tentatively. Incapable of stopping myself, I lay on top of her,