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None of that shit was true, except for the weight lifting, and I didn't know what he put in his shakes except for the fact hedidn'tput steroids in them. He claimed his body was a work of art and the man barely even took a Tylenol.
"No," I answered, as I set the wood and sandpaper down on my worn worktable. "I'm pretty sure I would have mentioned it if I were expecting company. You know, like I always do. Like wealldo."
I rolled my eyes. Scout did not enjoy the company of others, and people showing up unannounced was his idea of a freaking nightmare. Hell, people showing up at all even when he knew they were coming made the man want to break out in hives.
Scout glared at me, and his puckered up face looked like he'd sucked on a lemon and didn't much care for the taste of it.
"This is bullshit," he muttered angrily, and the door slammed shut behind him.
"Shit."
I scrambled off the bench and raced up the stairs. He'd scare the piss out of whoever came knocking on our front door. And we lived so far out of the way that we didn't get random little people trying to sell candy for a school fundraiser or Girl Scout cookies. People usually had a purpose behind knocking on our door.
I ran up the stairs two at a time and pushed the door open roughly.
The door to the basement opened up inside the large, cavernous garage. The basement didn't run along the entire house, but only underneath the garage.
We'd built our house a couple years back, and it wasn't exactly what I'd call conventional by any means. The garage really wasn't a garage at all, but more of a pole barn. Our house was made up of three pole barns connected. The one in the middle was where our kitchen, living room, laundry room, den, dining room, office, and all of that good stuff was. The garage was on the right side and the other pole bar on the left side was where all of the bedrooms were and another living room and a bar.
As a teenager and even in my early twenties, I would never have expected to find myself in a place like this. A nice place that my coven had built from the ground up. We weren't wealthy, at all, and I believed my own family to have been cursed by outside forces. Read: The Council. But we'd worked really hard, scrounged every cent we could, and we made this happen. The property had been in Gunner's family for years and he was more than happy to donate it to the cause. Forty-five miles of wilderness and only our home on the land. No neighbors, and there was a small lake with a stream on the property. The stream cut through the backyard and made the view beautiful.
Scout's father had been a normal man without magic, but his mother had been one of the rare females who'd had magic. She'd gotten pregnant when she was seventeen and her boyfriend had been twenty-five. He'd worked for his father's construction company, and when he found out she was pregnant he asked her to marry him. That particular story did not come with a happy ending for Scout's father, because no matter if she'd loved the man or not, he was not a witch and his mother had always dreamed of having a coven of her own one day. She'd gotten her own coven when Scout was three years old, but that didn't mean she'd tossed his father aside. She'd allowed the man to continue a relationship with his son, to be a father to him, but it had come at a great cost to her, because she'd had to hide her entire life from the man. But she'd done it, and because of that Scout had grown up in her coven with all of her men, but also being able to spend every other week with his father until he became a teen and his magic came in. Then he'd had to learn how to control it before his mother felt he could go back to spending time with his dad. The result? Scout grew up learning the ropes of his father's construction company, and when the man had an unfortunate heart attack that had taken his life, the company had passed from father to son like it had when his grandfather had passed.
Scout had drawn up the plans for the house, and he and his crew had built it from the ground up, with our help of course. Though, I was sure he would tell you that we were more of a hindrance than a help, but whatever.
Most of the furniture in the house had come from me and had either been made by me or one of my ancestors. The dining room table, the beds in each and every room, the nightstands, the dressers, the television stands. My family had been making furniture for generations, and once we'd made a fortune off of it, but those days had long since past. I was working my ass off to make a name for myself and my pieces, and I was slowly getting it back where it should be. It would take years of hard work for me to get there though. I had no problem putting in the work.
I strode through the garage toward the door that would take me out front.
I opened the door and stuck my head out. The black SUV Scout had mentioned was a Suburban that had parked in front of the front door to the middle building.
Scout stood with his back to the front door, facing the Suburban. His feet were spread apart in a fighting stance and his arms were loose and down at his sides. He looked ready to choke the life out of whoever came out of that SUV.
I shook my head as I started toward him. He really wasn't an asshole, I promised. He just didn't like other people, outsiders from our small group and the people he'd grown up around. Normally, this didn't bother me because it was just Scout and how he was. I was a take you as you come kind of guy, and I didn't go out of my way to try and change people. I either accepted you as you were or I stayed the fuck away from you.
But, right now,Iwanted to choke the life out ofScout.
The front passenger door opened at the same time as the driver’s side door. All I noticed, however, was the female who'd stepped down and out of that passenger seat. The last time I'd seen her she'd been covered from head to toe in blood and looking absolutely dead inside.
I had wanted to reach out to her to make sure she was alright, but the Council had forbidden people from contacting her. They said she needed time to come to terms with her new role in life.
Personally, I thought they were full of shit, but I hadn't reached out to her. Only because short of showing up on her front doorstep, I didn't know how to get in contact with her.
And here she was, showing up on my front doorstep.
"Holy fuck," Scout muttered under his breath, sounding slightly awed and horrified all at the same time.
Yeah, she had that effect on me as well.
"Close your mouth," I muttered, without looking away from the incredibly powerful witch standing in front of me. "You're drooling."
That might not have been the truth, but at this point he deserved me giving him shit for being a rude son of a bitch.
"Hey, Ar—" My words choked off when the back door opened and another female stepped down and out of the Suburban.
"Holy fuck," Scout repeated on another whisper, this one full of shock and awe. The horror from before when it had just been Ariel had vanished entirely from his voice.
And, like the first time, I couldn't blame him in the slightest. Though, this time I didn't give him shit for it.
