“You don’t have to come,” Vivian said, closing the door of Laurence’s truck.

“No way am I letting you do this without me.” He followed her into the house as Vivian sat her ingredients on the kitchen table.

“I hope this works,” she said, sighing. She’d talked to her mother and sister about what had happened with her summoning and all that had taken place since. Vivian wasn’t sure if her family was more shocked that she’d mated with a shifter or that she’d summoned a demon and banished her ex to hell.

The possibility that she might shift on the next full moon still loomed large in the back of her mind, but first things were first. She had to get Harold back and undo the karma she’d put into motion.

“This isn’t the best time of month for this spell, but it will have to do,” she said, walking through the house to the back sliding door. Outside the waning moon was at half mass. She’d have to make do.

She and Laurence had been in bed all day, making love. She’d only made it in to the shop to get her ingredients just as the moon rose. Things were already starting to slide back into place for her. Her landlord at the shop suddenly changed his mind and said she could stay. The creditors stopped calling. All that in just one day of being mated to Laurence and the intention of undoing the spell. 

After placing logs in her fire pit, she muttered the fire spell that caused the wood to burst into flames. Laurence sat on a patio chair and watched her as she cast her circle and dropped out of her robe. Her nude skyclad form was bathed in pale moonlight and the flickering glow of the fire.

She added the ingredients to the pot, speaking the words of the ancient spell. The ground beneath them began to shake. Her heart pounded hard in her chest as she spoke the last words of the incantation.

The demon rose from the bowels of hell, gripping Harold in its massive hand. She took a step back instinctively, but she remained in her protective circle. The beast turned its gaze on Laurence and Vivian waved her hands in the air, drawing her power from the earth and universe. It would not turn on her mate.

“What seeketh thee?” it hissed.

“Return the man whom I have offered. In return I give you this offering as substitute.” She produced a bowl of lamb’s blood from the butcher shop. The demon grabbed the blood and drank it. He threw the bowl aside. The clay smashed against a stone and shattered into a hundred pieces.

“Have him,” the demon said, wiping its mouth with the back of its hand. It dropped Harold, unconscious on the ground outside.

The demon clawed its way into the soil, disappearing into nothingness, without a trace. Harold lifted his head, looking around. When he spotted Vivian, he sprang to his feet and approached her.

“You bitch. You’ll pay for this!” He went to grab her, but he was knocked back by her protective circle.

Laurence shifted, ripping out of his clothes as his bear sprang loose. He charged and growled at Harold, but Harold blew him back with the flick of a hand. 

“You’ll come back with me, now,” Harold commanded. He began to recite a spell, the words burning in Vivian’s brain. Harold cut a vein with a fingernail that extended and sharpened at will. The blood poured over the earth, adding power to his words.

“I won’t go!” Vivian yelled. “I’ve been mated by a shifter. You have no power over me now!”

“No, Vivian. I own you. Forever.” He continued to recite the spell, the Latin words spilling like thick blood from his lips.

She felt compelled to break out of the circle and go to him, beyond any reasoning. Vivian hated Harold more than anything she’d ever hated in the world, but she couldn’t resist going to him.

“That’s right. Come to me!” Harold commanded.

Laurence charged again, blocking Harold from Vivian. She could feel his love and fierce protectiveness. He would die to save her. She knew at the core of her being as if they had some kind of psychic link. Vivian looked more closely at the link, focusing her love for Laurence into the pulsing energy between them.

Suddenly, she no longer felt compelled to go to Harold. It was as if something had snapped inside her, breaking and falling away. A giddy grin rose on her face like sunshine rising on a new day.

“I won’t go with you, Harold. You are a narcissistic psycho, and I’d rather die a thousand deaths than to help you with your twisted games.”

“Never!” Harold growled as he grabbed for her.

Laurence’s bear blocked him, biting his arm just hard enough to draw blood. Harold screamed as Laurence stood up on two legs above him. Laurence roared with such force the trees behind Harold shook.

“Go from this place and never return. Next time I won’t be so merciful. And believe me, I’ll be justified in whatever I do.”

Harold ran off into the forest, wailing in pain. Laurence turned toward her, shifting as he moved. He ran to her, naked, and she stepped out of her circle to meet him.

“It worked,” she said, burying her head against his hard chest.

“I never doubted it.”

“Really. I was worried there for a minute. He had me. But then… I felt this link between us and when I focused on it, his spell was broken.”

“I felt the same thing,” he said, kissing her head.

She looked up at him and pressed her lips to his warm mouth. “You saved me, again,” she said between kisses. His shaft pressed against her bare stomach, instantly turning her on.

“I think you can save me from this terrible ache I’ve got,” he said, pressing his cock against her. “I need your healing touch.”

Vivian giggled as he lifted her off her feet and carried her inside the house. As he laid over her on the bed, she whispered in his ear, “There’s nothing I’d like better.”