I went home, avoiding the witches still chattering in the kitchen and promptly passed out in my bed. I technically didn’t have to stay at my mother’s house anymore since the Council had unfrozen my assets. But I was way too worn out to find a new place to stay in the middle of the night.

I woke up with my hair plastered to my head, feeling hung over and a faint sense of longing in my chest. I rubbed my forehead, remembering being with Raven last night. My pussy throbbed and I pressed my eyes shut, trying to block it out.

What the hell had I done? Sleeping with Raven had been a stupid, impulsive mistake. But he’d been right about one thing, I couldn’t resist him. I wondered if he felt the same way and maybe that was why he was so angry. The bond was messing with us both.

I stood from my bed, resolving to break the spell once and for all, freeing the two of us. All of a sudden, a wave of emotion smashed into me and I slid down the wall of my bedroom, breaking out in sobbing tears.

I cried my eyes out like a five-year-old girl who’d lost her best friend. My whole body shook with sorrow and loss. The door swung open. I expected to see Mother through my tear-streaked vision, but instead I found Twyla standing in the doorway in shock.

She closed the door and swooped down to me, putting her arm around my shoulders. She pulled me to her and held me, rocking me as I cried. What the fuck was wrong with me? Was this the spell? It had to be.

“It’s okay,” Twyla whispered.

“I’m so confused, Twyla,” I whimpered.

“It’s okay to be confused.”

“It’s Raven. We cast a bonding spell on each other when we were in college. It was stupid. But we loved each other so much back then.”

“You never broke it,” she said.

“No. We never did.”

“And it’s as strong as ever.”

“Yes. I want to break it now.”

“Is that why you’re sitting on the floor weeping your guts out?” she asked, stroking my hair.

“It must be the spell.”

“Is it?”

“I has to be. I don’t lose control of my emotions like this,” I said, sniffling as I stood. Twyla rose beside me like some kind of ephemeral ghost. Her faraway eyes where shrouded behind a vale of black lace. She stared into the distance out the window.

“The darkness is here,” she whispered.

“Edana from the Council told me they suspected as much last night.”

Twyla gasped and moved away from me as if she was afraid and trying to escape. “No,” she moaned.

“What? Twyla what’s wrong?”

“I can’t. I have to get out of here. Nowhere to go. He’s everywhere. Olivia!”

“Twyla. Stop. You aren’t making sense.” I grabbed for her arm, but she yanked it away before she went screaming out of the room.

Mother walked up behind her and gave me a disgusted look. “What did you do to her?” she asked me.

“I didn’t do anything to her,” I said, offended.

“Why is she screaming then?” Mother threw a dishtowel over her shoulder and cocked her hip out.

“She had a vision.”

“A vision involving you,” she said.

“I’m taking care of it, okay Mother? Can you just give me a little bit of a break here? I’m doing everything I can.”

“Make sure you do, Olivia,” I heard her say as I trudged down the hall. “And take a shower. You look like hell.”

Oh my God! I growled. She was right though. I felt like death warmed over. After fighting the wendigo, digging a hole, burying the creature, puking, and then having hot sweaty sex with Raven, I’d been through it all last night.

I need a shower big time. I went into the upstairs bathroom and turned on the shower, looking at my reflection as the steam rose in the mirror. What was I doing here around these people? Someone like me could only bring them pain. I’d proved that over and over again.

Then I thought about what I’d done with Raven the night before. We’d totally done it without protection. Great. Just great. I might be a witch, but I didn’t have birth control spells written on my body or anything. I had to see Iona. I knew she could give me something to make sure I didn’t have any accidents.

After a long, hot shower, I wrapped myself in a towel and went back to my room to check the things in my trunk. I found several fresh uniforms. Weapons, cash, runes, scrolls, spelled totems. All regulation stuff used in the job.

I put on a fresh uniform and loaded up on weapons and runes. Most supernatural weapons were spelled to keep humans from seeing them. It had been that way for hundreds of years. I could walk down the street with a sword at my waist and a dozen totems around my neck and no one would see them.

With my gear in place, I went downstairs. Smelling coffee, I wandered into the kitchen. It was empty, as if by some kind of magic. Thank God. I poured a cup of coffee and drank it quickly. I didn’t want to talk to anyone this morning.

Family togetherness and I were not getting along. I needed a break from these people. Maybe a decade or two would do it.

I strode out of the kitchen down the hall toward the front door and walked straight into Twyla. Her wide eyes looked right through me. Her tiny body trembled as if she were being blown by a terrible wind.

“What?” I asked. I didn’t have time for this.

“I’m afraid, Olivia. I see darkness descending.”

“Don’t worry, Twyla. I have my powers back and Benedictus. I’ve got this.” I walked past her out the front door. “I’ll be fine.”

If everyone would stop freaking out and getting in my way, maybe I could deal with the threat. I grumbled to myself as I got in the car. First Raven, now Twyla. It was “make Olivia feel guilty” day, or week. Heck, lifetime.

I groaned as I turned the key in the ignition. Before I went out to the vamp club, I needed to pay Iona a visit and deal with my stupidity the night before.

Pulling up in front of the apothecary, I rehearsed what I was going to say. I didn’t want anyone to know about this, but I was going to have to tell her. I had to tell her something. I couldn’t exactly say it was for a “friend.”

Striding into the shop, I was struck by the bittersweet smell of herbs, oils, and soaps. Amber jars lined the shelves on the wall behind where Iona stood helping a customer. She glanced up to say hello and gave me a wide smile of recognition.

“Olivia. Hi. I’ll be right with you.”

She finished ringing the customer up. After she walked out of the shop, Iona ambled over to me. “What brings you to the shop today?” She leaned down on the counter, resting her chin on her palm.

“I need some help with something. An herb. For when you… you make a mistake. Like. In bed.”

Iona stood up and giggled at me, then turned to pull a jar from the wall. “A mistake in bed. I hope it didn’t hurt. How does someone your age make a mistake in bed anyway?”

“Please, Iona. I just need the herb.”

“Who was it?” she asked, a gleam in her eye. Great. She was going to make me pay with my blood. I sighed. “Anyone I know? Does he have black hair…and feathers?”

“Iona.”

“It was Raven, wasn’t it?”

“Of course it was Raven. Like I’ve had time for a random hookup since I’ve been here. Jesus.”

Iona frowned, her features softening. She looked concerned. “Are you guys getting back together?” She scooped the herb into a tea ball and closed it. She muttered a spell as she waved her hand over the ball of herbs.

“No. But we’re still bonded. That’s all it is.”

“I’ll make this tea for you now.” Iona pulled a hot kettle from the single electric burner she had on the back counter and poured hot water into a cup. “That needs to steep for fifteen minutes. Why are you two still bonded?” she asked as she walked back over to me with the teacup covered by a saucer.

“Because I left in a hurry five years ago. We never broke it.”

“You left him without a word. You broke his heart, Olivia. The whole coven is concerned about him since you’re back.”

“Why are you telling me this?”

Iona put her hand over mine and gripped it, looking me in the eye, her face serious. “You need to know, Olivia. Raven was despondent when you left. He tried everything to find you. He thought you were dead. When he found out you’d just left without a word and had gone to join the Executioners without him, he went through a really bad period. First he got really destructive. Then it turned inward. We were worried he might hurt himself.”

“Raven would never…” Iona gripped my hand harder, cutting me off.

“Raven is a strong capable man now. But the boy you left…he was just a boy. A twenty-three-year-old boy who’d lost the love of his life. If you hurt that man again, the entire coven will punish you.”

I pulled my hand away, narrowing my eyebrows in disdain. How dare she threaten me like that? This was between me and Raven. No one else.

She lifted the saucer off the cup and removed the tea ball. “Drink up.”