My life is so weird.
While I retrieve my water bottle to actually drink some of it, my phone begins to vibrate against the wooden slats of the bench.
“Wonder what my aunt wants?” I muse, answering the phone.
“Callie,” she barks into the phone, not waiting for me to say hello. “Are you still at the party?”
“Yeah?” I reply, trying to figure out if there was a curfew I missed.
“Good, I need you to stay there. Do not come home. Do you understand me?” Mildred insists, and there’s a loud crash of something wooden exploding.
“Why? What’s happening?” I cry, clutching the phone tight against my ear.
Connor straightens into full protector mode at the sound of terror in my voice, eyes narrowed and head tilted to the side to catch every detail.
“Demons. The creatures that attacked our home are de…” she’s immediately cut off with the sound of something hard cracking against her skull.
“Aunt Mildred!” I shriek, listening to the phone clatter to the ground.
No. No. No. Please don’t take her from me. Haven't I suffered enough? Please don’t take away the only person who loves me.
“Not so powerful when you’re unconscious, are you, bitch?” sneers a female voice from somewhere in the room.
There’s an exasperated sigh, followed by the sound of someone picking up the phone.
“Are you the niece?” a man asks, annoyance coloring his cultured voice.
My necklace goes from cold to burning hot. Wind instantly whips through the trees, knocking over everything not nailed down, decorations and people alike, and a booming sound of thunder rumbles in the distance.
“What you do to her, I will do to you twice over,” I growl with menace.
“I’ll take that as a yes,” he replies flippantly. “I have no interest in you, little witch, or your aunt. Send over that insufferable Morningstar bastard and his special vampire friend, and no more harm will come to your aunt.” His voice drops to slow and cruel as he warns, “No one else. I see someone that isn’t those two, I kill the bitch and turn her insides into a fucking Jackson Pollock painting. Got it?”
“Fuck you!” I scream, scrambling from Connor’s hold. He rises with me, one arm wrapped around my waist to keep me from running off.
“And do be timely about it. We get hungry when we’re kept waiting,” he warns before hanging up the phone.
With his lightning reflexes, Connor is able to stop me before I throw my phone, too furious and scared to think straight.
“The hell is going on?” Felix yelps, poofing in near the end of the bench and almost in our outstretched hands. “I don’t know if there’s such a thing as the Force, but if there is, I just felt a disturbance in it.”
His eyes turn to saucers as he witnesses the carnage that the magic my necklace couldn’t contain has already wrought. “Pretty girl? Don’t think Nolan would appreciate you destroying his house on his birthday. Want to talk about it?”
“Get the others,” Connor orders Felix, an animalistic growl heavy in his voice.
“What happened?” Felix exclaims, his eyes bouncing back from me and Connor.
“Demons have my aunt,” I cry, and lightning shoots from the sky into the forest at the back of the property, setting the trees ablaze.
Chapter 18
Donovan
In the distance, smoke billows from the spreading fire and there’s the faint wail of emergency sirens. Most of the party-goers are still huddled inside the Campbell’s home, unknowingly safe, because, for once, the coven is doing something useful. Working against Callie’s magical winds that are trying to spread the fire through the whole damn state, they’re attempting to contain it until the humans can officially put it out.
Everyone distracted, the six of us slipped away and are footing it to the parking lot at the base of the hill.
“Remind me again why we’re not taking one of my cars?” Nolan complains, marching beside me.
