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She hesitated, then finally repeated, “Why?”
He wondered if her caution around him was his demonic heritage or damage from her past. Instead of pressing that matter, he kept things light to keep her talking. “Is it a crime to want to get to know you?”
“But I mean…” she stopped walking, loo
ked down the street ahead of her, then looked over his shoulder before she leaned in toward him, “if I tell you things, are you going to tell the whole town? How do I know I can trust you?”
“You can’t.”
She jerked away as if he burned her and glared. He hurried to correct her immediate response of thinking the worst of him. “What I mean to say is, from what I’ve learned of you thus far, you have no reason to trust me.” At her long look, he added, “How about this, if I break my promise to you, I’ll let you cut off a finger.”
She snorted. “Yeah, right.”
A couple of pixies strode by them giggling and nodding a hello, which he returned before he turned back to Bryanna. “A demon always stands by his offer.” He held up his index finger and wiggled it. “You can have this one if I spread a bad word about you.”
He offered his hand to seal his agreement, but she tilted her head and regarded him. After a short pause, she chuckled and shook his hand. “Say a word and I’ll use your finger as a stir stick for my tea.”
“Agreed,” he replied on a firm nod. “Now tell me.”
“Well, I grew up normally, like most witches do, but things changed on my eighteenth birthday. My parents called it growing up. In actuality, they were saying goodbye.” She sighed and walked down the sidewalk again. “When most witches get a present on their birthday, my father handed me a check. He told me that the amount was enough to fulfill his obligation to me as a parent. I haven’t seen or heard from them since.”
Zeke was damn sure he wasn’t going to like where this story was headed, but he couldn’t hold back. “Why would you parents say goodbye to you?”
She pointed to herself, lifting her eyebrows. “Flawed, remember?” Then she stared out in front of her and heaved another sigh. “I never knew they were embarrassed of my magic until that day.”
Zeke’s fists tightened at his sides. Bryanna wasn’t flawed by any stretch of the imagination and he’d like to introduce his fist to anyone who said otherwise, but he doubted she’d believe him if he told her that.
He remained silent as she went on, “Just like every witch, the Shreveport coven gave me a job. Since my element is earth, I should’ve joined the Earth Witches and assisted in earthly duties.”
“Earthly duties?”
She nodded. “Normal magic stuff, creating new earth spells and such, but as you’ve seen, my magic doesn’t quite come out right.”
“All perception.”
She gave him a sweet smile. “Wanting clothes and conjuring a skin cream is all perception?” At his firm nod, she chuckled before her smile faded. “Anyways, the coven gave me an office job.” Waving over herself, she scrunched her nose. “For obvious reasons, they thought my magic would only harm someone and I agreed with them. My magic is too unpredictable and pointless. Besides, I didn’t mind the job.”
Zeke clenched his jaw to refrain from spitting out a few curses. What kind of witches treated one of their own so poorly and hadn’t found a way to make her magic useful? No wonder Bryanna felt so withdrawn.
He restrained his wrath. “You did well with what you were given—that doesn’t sound all that bad to me.”
“That part wasn’t.” She shrugged, glancing both ways before they crossed a street. “Through my years of working there, I had a few boyfriends, and at the time, I thought they liked me. Later I found out they only wanted to, you know…”
He waited for her to continue, but when she didn’t, he urged her on. “No, I’m afraid I don’t know what you mean.”
“Get with the freak.”
Trapped in her troubled eyes, anger rushed through his veins as hot as lava. He would enjoy finding every one of the men who used her for their pleasures as if she were nothing more than a play toy. While he loved women and the time he spent in their beds, he had never mistreated such beautiful creatures. “Go on.”
She hesitated a moment, gazing at the house on her right, then finally said to him, “But all that changed when Layton came into my life. He had told me it didn’t matter to him what I was or how I did things. And he made me feel,” sadness tinged her voice, “special.”
Special.
That word didn’t do her justice—he simply saw perfection. Her beauty and kind heart were clearly things she couldn’t see within herself. “So what changed with Layton?”
Raw pain seeped into her expression. “A month ago, I was at the coven working and I heard a few of the witches laughing at me. One of them was making a joke that Layton was only with me for my money. Of course, I didn’t believe it. I thought they were conniving bitches.”
She hesitated, shutting her eyes on a long exhale before opening them again. “What they said stuck with me. After a while, I started to notice things and see his lies. He would tell me things and I would listen like a lovesick puppy dog and never questioned him.”
