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“So we swear,” we said together, and our voices crackled with the charged words. The spell whirled around us and tingled into my skin. I felt the hold of it clamp around my mind for a fleeting second before the sensation faded away.
Gabriel shuddered beside me. Then his fingers moved as if on autopilot to cancel the email he’d been poised to send and then to trash the files.
Frankford held out his hands. “I think we’ll just take that.”
“And release her consorts,” Helen Frankford said to the enforcers.
The ones who’d been restraining Ky and Damon stepped back. Damon glowered at them and rubbed his arms. Ky made a strained noise as Gabriel handed over his computer.
“Well, I hadn’t gotten it that customized yet,” he said as if consoling himself.
“Back in the car,” I said to the guys, and motioned to the figures gathered around the gate. “Why don’t you clear the way?”
Frankford looked up from the computer and smiled thinly. At a gesture from his wife, the group of enforcers parted.
“There,” he said, in a tone that didn’t sound victorious or defeated. “Go on home, Rose Hallowell. And the Spark willing, our paths will never cross again.”
I returned his smile as I opened the front passenger door. “Nothing would make me happier.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Rose
It’d been less than two weeks since I’d last set foot inside the manor, but somehow stepping into the wide foyer of my family home with the crystal chandeliers overhead and the curving wooden staircase ahead of me, breathing in the smells of old wood and recent polish, I felt as if I’d arrived somewhere unfamiliar. Maybe because this was the first time I’d been able to walk through those doors with my consorts at my side.
“It’s probably not a good idea for us tostayhere, right?” Kyler said, looking around. “All the time, I mean.”
“If we want to avoid a whole lot of talk from people in town, it’s probably better if we mostly use Seth’s house,” I said. “But I want you to feel like this is your home too. It’s the weekend. Hardly any staff are around. After everything we’ve been through, I think I deserve one night with you here.”
Jin took in the place with a grin. “I can agree to that.”
I made a shooing gesture. “For now, poke around. Get comfortable. There are half a dozen guest rooms if you want to pick one we can make yours. Nothing’s off limits. Before anything else,Iam going to take a shower.” It’d been too long since my last one, and my skin still felt gritty from that scramble down the cliff face.
Upstairs, I hesitated in the hall. Technically the master bedroom that had once been my dad’s and Celestine’s was now my domain. The thought of stepping in there to the ghosts of their presences made me shiver.
I eased open the door and peeked inside. My stance relaxed. Before we’d left, I’d asked one of the cleaning staff to change the bedding. The sheets and duvet were crisply laid out, nothing about them suggesting anyone else had ever slept here. Celestine had swept her belongings off the dresser before she’d left under my compulsion. The bedroom window had been left open, a light breeze stirring the gauzy curtains. The room smelled like the summer flowers blooming outside, fresh and sweet.
If I was going to take over as lady of the house, I had to start somewhere.
I grabbed my bath supplies from the common bathroom and carried them to the master bedroom’s en-suite. I was just checking that the towels were fresh too when the floor creaked by the doorway.
“Hey,” Damon said, poking his head in. “How’d you like some company?”
I raised an eyebrow at him, and he grinned in response.
“I could use a shower too, you know,” he added.
“Oh, and I’m sure that’s the only reason you’re looking for an invitation.”
“Well, no.” He sauntered over to me and looped his arms around my waist. His breath tickled my ear as he spoke. “I believe we started something in the bus a couple nights ago that we still haven’t finished.”
His touch was enough to send desire spiking up from my belly. “You make a good point. But I do still want to shower.”
“Oh, I was counting on that.”
He slid his hands to the hem of my shirt and tugged it over my head. His gaze darkened with hunger as he took in the swell of my breasts within my bra. Reaching to unclasp it, he leaned in for a kiss at the same time. I soaked in the heat of his mouth, need tingling through me, and ran my hands down his chest. With a yank, I removed his shirt in turn.
My fingers settled on the bulge beneath the fly of his jeans. I pressed against it teasingly, and Damon growled. He stripped my jeans and panties off me and nudged me up against the glass wall of the shower stall.
