~

 

“Hey!” Mick growled at the sight of the vampire lurking behind the women.

The beta had an overwhelming sense that the man was just too close for comfort to the nuns for his liking. His wolf rallied within him, and he could feel the prickle of the beast’s fur just beneath his skin.

“Yes?” Clive grinned back. He was enjoying the moment, the anticipation, and what was sure to come next.

“Step away from the nun.” Mick’s deep tone got a whole lot deeper with the sound of a low rumble that underlined his words and warned the vampire that he wasn’t playing around.

“But don’t they look so sweet?” Clive offered back, enjoying the shifter’s discomfort. “Like you could just, oh, I don’t know, eat them up.”

“Hey!” Jeannie shot the vampire a cold hard scowl.

What had gone on before might have been hysterical to her then, but the damn vampire was skirting close to the line with that remark now.

“Maybe not you,” Clive tossed back, wiggling his eyebrows at the woman and enjoying the fact that she snatched her head back on her neck in disgust.

He knows… Vanessa thought.

That damn bloodsucker definitely knows what we are.

The look in Faith’s eyes said the same damn thing, and Vanessa felt the walls closing in. Not to mention the alpha that was heading her way.

Damn it!

Now what?

I don’t think the shifters are going to be too happy to find out that we’re witches dressed as nuns.

Overly prideful, testosterone fuelled men duped by witches.

But, on the bonus side; the vampire hasn’t said anything yet.

Maybe, just maybe, he’s only toying with us like a lion with a mouse, one can only hope.

Unless; he plans to eat us. Because that would be bad.

Although, we might just have the shifters on our side, which would be good.

But, maybe not when they find out we’re not nuns, and that would be bad.

But, we still have our magic.

Bonus round.

“There’s something about you,” Ryan said, snapping Vanessa out of her musings and back to the reality of the moment.

The alpha was still walking towards her, and she was still slowly backing away. She was fast running out of fleeing distance.

“I get that a lot.”

“What?”

“I… don’t know,” Vanessa offered back and took in the slightly confused look on the man’s face as he eyed her like he couldn’t quite make up his mind what to do with her.

Keeping him off balance might just give them the time they needed to escape before the shifters caught on and all hell broke loose. But just how long she could keep up the charade for, and how long would the vampire keep his mouth shut?

She needed something to deflect the man’s attention away from her; she just didn’t know how or what that could be.

“O…K,” Ryan scowled, looking, if possible, slightly more confused.

The alpha had a strange feeling in the pit of his stomach about her, and there was definitely something tapping within the far reaches of his mind that he couldn’t quite put his finger on – like he should know better – or – something – but what that something was could have been anyone’s guess.

It continued to gnaw at him, and so did the fact that the Nun’s feet kept shuffling backward away from him toward the door.

“Let’s go,” Faith announced.

Her voice boomed out into the deafening silence and snapped Vanessa’s attention away from the big man with the dark, sexy eyes and back towards her friends.

If she wasn’t pretending to be a damn nun, then she might have tried flirting with him to throw him off balance, maybe not, considering that he was an alpha shifter. But there was no escaping the fact that he was as sexy as all hell and she didn’t think a night with him would be something that she would regret, or forget, in a hurry.

“How are you a nun?” Ryan grumbled in disbelief.

He couldn’t believe that the woman who was making his pulse race was so off limits to him that it wasn’t even laughable. He felt a certain sense of shame, and a lot of guilt that she wasn’t just making his pulse rise, but other, more personal parts of him were rock hard too.

He wasn’t sure if he needed a cold shower or to headbutt the nearest wall. All he knew was; no matter how hard he berated himself for the attraction that he felt towards her, it still wasn’t going away.

“I walked into a church one day, they tossed the habit at me, and the rest is history,” she offered back with a small shrug of her shoulders, and a wicked grin on her lips.

“Really?” He scowled in disbelief. He was still arguing with that part of his brain that wanted to send his feet towards her, wanted to take her scent, wanted to do so much more.

“Well… no,” she looked over towards Faith, wondering if it was just her that found so much wrong with the situation at hand, and the woman rolled her eyes back in her head at the shifter’s gullibility.

Jeannie might have been covering her mouth with her hand, but she was still spitting out little bursts of laughter, and it was as annoying as it was off-putting.

Ryan pulled his head back on his neck and regarded her with a curious look. She felt a sudden need to check to make sure that she hadn’t just grown a second head on her shoulders, but she decided that would make her as stupid as he was.

“Oh, I’m so going to pee my panties if this continues any longer and we don’t get out of here soon,” Jeannie hissed out to Faith from behind her hand, and the nun elbowed her back in the ribs, making her friend squeak with surprise.

“Are you allowed to use physical violence?” Jason asked, catching the move, and scowling in surprise. He didn’t like that sound that had come from the small redhead.

“I take it you’ve never been taught in school by a nun?” Faith muttered. “Only when truly warranted,” she added in a dry tone.

She couldn’t believe that everyone but the vampire had fallen for it. It was as amusing as it was ridiculous, but she guessed, as shifters, they didn’t spend much time in church or around the clergy.

“Fair enough,” Jason shrugged, but he still felt a little disgruntled.

He’d thought that nuns were as close to saints as you could get. But the nuns in the bar were showing him a different side to religion that he never expected.

“I really need to pee,” Jeannie chuckled.

Clive leaned in over her shoulder and pointed an outstretched finger towards the toilets on the other side of the room.

“Please don’t do that on my floor,” Clive said, and she chuckled harder, sounding as close to a breathless Mutley as she ever wanted to get as she noted the toilet sign on the door. The trouble was that she would have to pass by two shifters to get to it.

“Not here, we’ll be home soon!” Faith hissed at her and grabbed a handful of the woman’s shirt to yank her backward when she dared to put her best foot forward.

“That’s a little harsh, Sister,” Jason said. “When you need to go, you need to go.”

“And we certainly need to go,” Faith hooked a thumb over her shoulder towards the door. “Besides, it’s good for her. It… shows dedication, and a trainee nun needs dedication.”

“This trainee nun needs the toilet because I’m not going to make it to the car,” Jeannie hissed as she tried to cross one leg over the other subtly. Faith sighed.

“Fine, go, but don’t take all fricking night about it!”

“Oooh, the nun said a bad word,” Jason teased, as he watched Jeannie penguin walk towards the toilet.

“I did not,” Faith shot back.

“Did too!”

“Not!”

“Yep!”

“No… I didn’t!” Faith hissed.

For one long moment, she considered hitting him with her magic, and zapping the man like he’d never known before. Then she remembered that she was supposed to be a nun and that they didn’t have magic, and something died within her soul.

Damn, being a nun is hard.

“Did so,” Jason grinned back, refusing to let it drop, even when Faith offered him her best death glare.

Faith twitched with the magic that resided at her fingertips, and she couldn’t resist the urge to give him just a little mosquito sized zap. When the shifter gave a small grunt and jumped in place – tossing his head around as he looked for what had bitten him, she had to look away.

Faith pressed her lips together and gave herself a pat on the back. It might have been a really big mosquito with jackboots on – but, she’d got away with it and she felt a little better in herself. Not much, but enough to blast the man across the bar.

“What are you five?” Mick growled at his brother.

“When the need arises, I am, and she said a bad word for a nun…” Jason lifted a hand and pointed an accusing hand at Faith, and Mick’s eyes followed it. He liked what he saw.

“I will in a minute,” Faith bit out. Feeling the urge to zap him again, but this time with feeling.

“I wouldn’t,” Clive’s teasing sing-song tones came from just behind her, and she pulled herself to her full height and snorted her contempt for him as she tossed a glare at the vampire over her shoulder.

“Can we go?” She snapped at Vanessa, turning back towards her friend but keeping one eye on the Vamp. She’d been busted by the blood-sucker, and she didn’t much like that feeling, but oh how she wanted to zap the shifter again.

“Jeannie,” Vanessa reminded her as nodded back towards the bathroom door and Faith groaned, deflating slightly.

So near and yet so far.

I really don’t know how much longer I can keep up the pretense of being nice.

I’m a witch – I’m not nice. I’m … me.

Unsaintly me.

Bitch witch.

And that damn man makes me want to get my bitch and my witch on and zap him till the cows come home.

“Well, she needs to hurry the hell up!” Faith bit out, flustered by the beta being childish beyond belief, and not dropping the argument like a gentleman would have done.

Arguing with a damn nun is just bad manners.

“Oops!” Jason sniggered, “There’s another one. They just keep popping out of your potty mouth, don’t they?” He said with glee, folding his large arms across his chest and eyeing her with a certain amount of suspicion.

Faith had more than had enough, and she rallied around towards the man. She didn’t much care that she was wearing a nun’s habit, she was more than ready to kick him right in his family jewels and watch him fold like a house of cards and cry like a baby.

“Now listen…” She bit out as she pointed a magic ready finger at the shifter, and narrowed eyes with intent.

“Now – now, Sister,” Clive leaned in and offered teasingly from behind her.

“Oh, you can so keep the hell out of this, vampire!” Faith bit out.

The instant the word was out of her mouth she wanted to snatch it back again.

Ohhh, that’s bad.

That’s so very, very, very bad that I have no words.

You could have heard a pin drop in the bar, there were certainly a few jaws dropping, as all eyes turned towards Faith, and she heard the wind leave Vanessa’s lungs with a wheeze like she was deflating.