Page 77 of Bad Witch

My heart thudded in my chest. “How?”

Warrick’s gaze slid to his mate when he answered. “The end of times would already be here.”

Willow drew in a sharp breath, even as she gave my arm a squeeze. “I’ll head to the library at the witches council tomorrow and see what I can find. We need a lead on those weapons. We know a lot more now and what we’re dealing with, and that’s down to you, Temp.”

“I’ll speak with Lucifer,” Warrick said. “He needs to know what’s going on, and he might have some insight. If the stories are true, the Wraiths of Destruction were created by some lesser god. Lucifer might know something that could help. I’ll call the pack together when I get back.”

He turned to his mate then, and pulled her into his arms, kissing her deeply. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

Fender took my hand, leading me away as Warrick and Willow said their goodbyes. We carried on across the clubhouse, through the door, and down to the dens.

“Where are we going?” I asked, my heart racing faster.

My emotions were frayed after everything that had happened tonight, breaking into the Stonebridge cemetery, talking to the priestesses, coming back here and relaying it all to Warrick and Willow. I was overwhelmed and overstimulated. I needed to go home. I needed time alone.

“Tonight was a lot, and I can feel how it’s affecting you,” he said. “I’m taking you to my den, where it’s quiet and you can rest.”

How did he know? How could he feel that? “I need to go home.”

He stopped suddenly, and a moment later, I was enveloped in his strong, muscled arms, my body pressed to his. His mouth went to the top of my head. “Nah, peaches. Being alone is what you’re used to, but that’s not what you need.”

My breath caught in my throat as it tightened. “No, I should⁠—”

“You should sleep, and I’ll make sure nothing disturbs you.”

“I need to be available. Someone might text or call…the clinic,” I choked out, but it wasn’t the clinic I was worried about. It was getting a call or text from someone else in need that had me most concerned.

“Then I’ll wake you. You need this, and you’ve got me to watch over you now. Let me carry things for a while. I’ll carry all your worries. I’ll hold them for you while you rest.”

My eyes started to sting. I was so tired. I’d expended so much of my magic tonight, I wasn’t sure how much longer I could stand.

“Will you rest here for me, baby?”

I bit my lip at the sound of his soft, rumbling voice. What was he doing to me? How did he see inside me so easily? I should say no, I should pull away and go back to my cottage, to Manny and Glinda. I should end this now before it got too complicated, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to let Fender carry everything for me for a while, because I’d been carrying so much for so long all by myself and I wasn’t just exhausted, I was weary to my bones, to my soul.

So instead of doing the right thing, I nodded against his huge, hard chest. “I just want to sleep,” I choked out as my knees buckled.

Fender scooped me off my feet then, lifting me with ease, his limp subtle as he carried me into his quarters and down the short hall to his bedroom. He laid me on the bed, then took off my shoes, and pulled a quilt over me.

Leaning in, he kissed me softly. “Sleep, peaches.”

I grabbed his arm with the last of my strength. “Don’t leave me.”

“Not going anywhere, Temp. I’ll be right here when you wake up.”

Then I passed out.

My eyelids were heavy, and I still felt drowsy when I woke. I’d expended too much magic, and I’d slept like the dead all night to recharge because of it. Allowing myself to get in this state was something I actively tried to avoid. If someone needed me in the middle of the night, I had to be there to answer their cry for help.

Struggling to open my lids, I blindly reached for my phone on the bedside table.

“Relax. You didn’t get any texts or calls,” Fender said.

My eyes snapped open.

Fender was in the bed beside me.

I was in Fender’s bed.