~
“Oh, phooey!” Sarah rushed over to the oven and yanked it open.
She’d been able to smell the burning bread from down the hallway, and yet, she still hadn’t managed to detach herself from one of the elder witches that was at the inn to find a mate and was excited to the point of distraction at the prospect – her damn distraction from saving the bread.
She pulled on the oven mitts and grabbed the large tray with the three black top loaves from inside and placed them on the countertop. She backheeled the door closed and waved her gloved hands in the air to try to chase away the acrid smoke.
“I could have helped with that — if only I’d been allowed inside my own inn,” Chloe said and drew Sarah’s attention towards the open window. The vampire was perched with her feet up and her back against the frame.
“Not now, Chloe,” Sarah huffed.
Her newbie vampire aunt was at it again, pressing to come inside the house, and yet, Sarah was still unsure if the woman was ready. After all, she had a house full of tasty witches that she didn’t want to serve up for breakfast, dinner, and tea to a hungry, uncontrollable vampire.
“Yes, now, Chloe,” the vampire scowled back at her relative. “If I’d known you had been this unfeeling, uncaring, mean little witch then I never would have left the inn to you.”
“You know the rules. Get a handle on your bloodlust for witches, and then we’ll talk.”
“I have.”
“No, you haven’t.”
“Prove it!”
“I don’t need to prove it. I can see it when your eyes fall on the nearest jugular vein,” Sarah placed her gloved hands on her hips, tipped her head to the left, and challenged the woman with just a look.
“I pity your children!” Chloe hissed.
That comment took Sarah completely by surprise. She lifted up an oven-gloved hand and pulled on her magic. She swiped one of the burning hot bread tins from the side through the air towards Chloe’s head.
On pure instinct; Chloe caught the tin in her hands, and the burning hot metal made her shriek in pain. It took a moment for her brain to catch up, and then she tossed the tin away from her.
“Nice catch,” Sarah said as she placed her hand back on her hip. She might have felt guilty had her aunt not being able to heal so quickly.
“You did that on purpose!” Chloe’s jet black eyes were locked and loaded on her niece.
“No, that was just a bonus,” Sarah offered back.
“If you were on this side of the threshold I would rip your head off and hand it back to you before your dead body hit the floor,” Chloe bit out with all the vengeance inside of her.
“Proved it!” Sarah said with a triumphant smile.
Chloe eyed her for a long moment. At first, she had no idea what her niece was talking about, and then it slowly sank in.
“That’s not fair!” Chloe bit out. “And you did it on purpose!”
“Nope, double bonus,” Sarah said with a small shrug of her shoulders.
“You’re a scheming little witch if ever I…”
“Looked in the mirror and saw one?” Sarah challenged her with just a look, and Chloe chewed on an imaginary wasp.
“It’s getting to the point where I really don’t like you,” Chloe said in a huff as she folded her arms and looked anywhere but at Sarah.
“It’s way beyond the point where I really don’t care.”
“So, family means nothing to you?” Chloe offered her a piercing look.
“If that makes you feel better.”
“You deliberately burned the skin off my hands,” Chloe said. Now the vampire was playing for the sympathy vote.
“Did not.”
“Did to.”
“I don’t feel guilty,” Sarah shrugged again.
“Shocker!” Chloe bit back. “Heartless woman.”
“It’s a family trait,” Sarah offered back with a small smirk on her lips.
“Witch!”
“I’d say it takes one to know one, but…” Sarah lifted her gloved hands and thrust them towards Chloe and with a little magical shove to back it up, the vampire shrieked as she was knocked from the windowsill and disappeared from view with a hearty thud against the wooden planks of the wraparound porch.
“I hate you!” Chloe grumbled.
“Then my work here is done.” Sarah grinned.
She turned and started for the door, suddenly remembering that she still had the oven mitts on her hands, she shucked them off and tossed them back over her shoulder onto the countertop.
Knocking her vampire aunt onto her backside had more than made up for the burnt bread.
~
~
~
Quinn’s chin went down towards his chest as a growl vibrated against the door to his mate’s room. His eyes were jet black, and he hadn’t felt such a rush of anger in years, but then getting electrocuted by a damn door handle could do that to a man.
Two urges clashed within him; firstly, he wanted to kill his mate. Secondly, he wanted to woo his mate. What a contradiction in terms.
It was little wonder that his beast didn’t know if it was coming or going. Hell, he wasn’t sure if he was having a senior moment or not.
Two worlds, two needs, two desires clashed within him. It would come down to which was greater.
Quinn might have been getting on in years, and sometimes it felt like it. But that didn’t stop him from lifting one booted foot and kicking the door open as the locks gave way under the force of the blow.
“Don’t hurt yourself,” Valerie said quietly from where she sat in the chair at the window.
Quinn had expected the woman at least show signs of surprise at his entrance. But there she was, sitting like the Ice Queen on her throne, receiving an expected guest.
Quinn’s wolf grumbled a warning growl within him.
Mine…
Quinn thought the beast was welcome to her. It was just a shame that man and wolf came as a package deal. Right then and there, he would gladly walk away — but he couldn’t.
He’d waited too long for a mate. His mate. Wickedly wicked witch or not that was what she was.
“I’m not worried about hurting me,” Quinn growled.
“Is that a threat?” Valerie asked as she raised her left eyebrow at him.
Quinn grumbled and growled, but he didn’t immediately answer her question. He needed a moment to think it over.
A long moment.
And still, a moment more.
Valerie waited patiently for him to reply. It was amusing to watch the emotions play across the man’s face as he tossed and turned thoughts within his mind.