The Ex Hex (The Ex Hex, #1)

by Erin Sterling

Never mix vodka and witchcraft.

May I kiss you? and she’d said, Now? and he’d smiled that slow smile and said, Now is preferable, but I’m open to whatever your schedule allows, and how was any woman supposed to resist that?

“You broke my heart, Rhys Penhallow,” she said. “And we curse you. You and your whole stupid, hot line.”

“Never mix vodka and witchcraft.”

Besides, it was kind of fun being the black sheep. When he fucked up, that was taken as a given, and when he managed not to fuck up, everyone was pleasantly surprised.

For a moment, he considered dropping it, letting his father see him pathetic and bedraggled, but no, that kind of thing would only work on a father who had a heart, and Rhys was fairly certain Simon Penhallow had been born without one of those.

But every once in a while, she came to mind. Her pretty smile. Her hazel eyes. The way she’d tug at the ends of her honey-blond hair when she was nervous.

“Girl, do not disappoint the woman who makes my favorite bath salts,”

“No offense, Vivi, but I love your aunt more than I love you.”

Any hope he’d had that whatever he’d felt for her nine years ago had been a mad mix of summer and magic and hormones was immediately squashed as he looked into those hazel eyes, took in her flushed cheeks and her parted lips.

For a long moment, they stared at each other, Rhys still on the ground, Vivienne standing above him, and he remembered they’d been in a similar position the last time he’d seen her, right after she’d leapt out of his bed when he’d told her that he had to go back to Wales to get out of his betrothal.

“You almost ran your ex-boyfriend over with a car, and then left him lying in the literal dirt on the side of the road. It is such a big deal, you absolute queen.”

Needless to say, her body definitely remembered how much it had liked his, which was deeply unfair and, quite frankly, treasonous of it.

He is the worst, he is the worst, he is the actual, literal worst.

“Which means that we were right—there’s a lot more bad shit to come.”

And of course she’d lied to him when she said she couldn’t remember his kiss. She’d remembered everything when it came to him. Every kiss, every touch.

“Stay with me here. You’re an adult woman going through a stressful time in her life, and now your hot-as-hell ex is back in town and wants to kiss your face off. I say smoke ’em if you got ’em, babe.”

Her curse had done that. A curse she was no closer to being able to break.

Rhys had not known Vivienne all that long in the grand scheme of things, but he recognized the look on her face now. This was a closed subject, and pushing her on it wasn’t going to get him anywhere.

“Cursed Penhallow,” Piper added, her form becoming even wispier. “Cursed for what was taken.”

“It was never yours, asshole,” the ghost hissed. “You took it.”

“What was wrong must be righted, what was taken must be relinquished,”

Vivi and Rhys were getting really good at Not Talking About Things, which, she thought, was how it needed to stay.

“I’m sure being terrorized by a ghost wasn’t high up on your list of things to do tonight.”

Sometimes she thought what she’d really fallen in love with that summer was the version of herself she was when she was with him.

If she could tell herself this was just about sex, just about getting off, it would be easier to watch him walk away this time.

Or at least she hoped it would be.

It’s different this time, she told herself even as she kissed his neck, his jaw, his mouth, anywhere she could reach. It has to be.

Even though it had just been hours ago, last night—well, early this morning—it almost felt like something out of a dream. A really fantastic, really dirty dream.

“We’ve made a lot of mistakes,” he agreed. “But I don’t think this is one of them.”

And he knew that when he left this time, it would be the same. They could talk about “getting it out of their systems” all they wanted—this wasn’t the kind of thing one got over.

You did it before, you’ll figure it out again.

And he would always break her heart. He wouldn’t mean to, he definitely wouldn’t want to, but he would.

“I love good sex and distractions more than just about anything. But I also can recognize when something is the real deal. And this is, isn’t it?”

Assuming I’m still around after, I will.

“May I kiss you?” Rhys’s heart jerked almost painfully against his ribs. “Now?” “I’m open to whatever your schedule allows.”

“I love you. So very, very much. And I know that I’m flippant sometimes, or make a joke rather than say the truth, but I want you to know that you’re everything to me, Vivienne. Everything.”

“You’ve had my heart from the moment I saw you on that bloody hillside, and I hate that I wasted nine years without you, but I’m not wasting a single second more. If you need to be here, then I need to be here. Simple as that.”

“No, I mean . . . it doesn’t have to be either-or. You here or me in Wales. We can do both. We can have both. And it’s going to be messy and hard sometimes, but it will be worth it. Because I love you, too. You’ve had my heart just as long, and I trust you with it.”