AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Yeah. Like fucking steel nails on a chalkboard.”
“Hart—” Doc began.
“It wasn’t a normal scream,” Ward suddenly interrupted, his voice sounding raspy and extra-tired.
“You heard it?” Beck asked, her voice worried.
“I did,” Ward confirmed. “The question is whyHartdid.”
“And why didn’t the rest of us?” Beck asked.
I heard Ward sigh. I knew that sigh. That sigh meant some fucking bullshit was going to go down. “What?” I demanded. “The fuck are you thinking, Campion?”
I was scared, and being scared made me irritable.
Ward sighed again. “Hart’s magic is innate,” Ward said softly.
“So is Doc’s,” I pointed out.
“And Mason is a powerful witch who can protect himself from a magical attack,” Ward responded. “While you—”
“Am a fucking helpless magical infant?”
One look at Doc’s apologetic expression told me that yes, indeed, I was a helpless magical infant. Just fucking ducky.
I sighed. “Fucking fine,” I muttered.
“Archie and I stopped him,” Ward said softly. “But he was trying to pull on Hart’s magic.”
“Why?” Beck wanted to know.
“My guess,” came the medium’s answer, “is that Bazan didn’t want to provide any additional information about Vidal or his partner. He couldn’t keep me out by himself, so he tried to steal power where he could.” Ward paused. “Vidal is running for mayor, so clearly he’s important, but I want to know why this merger is so fucking important to Bazan that he had to try to cannibalize Hart.” Another pause. “But I’d prefer to wait until Hart isn’t in the room. In case Bazan gets… frisky again.”
“Frisky,” I repeated dryly. I wasn’t going to complain about not being included. I mean, I wanted to, because I hate being excluded, but I didn’t really want to go through this again, or whatever worse thing the dicksteak ghost came up with for round two.
My head felt like it wasn’t entirely attached to my body. That probably wasn’t good. Neither was the nausea, although that may have had as much to do with the rather sudden spike in anxiety as it did being laid out by a psychic ghost attack on my magic.
But what the fuck did I know? This was the first time someone who wasn’t Ward had tried to use my magic—and Ward always asked permission. Well. He had permission. I’d all but forced it on him a few times, and he was always careful, always hesitant to take too much. But this bouquet of dicksacks had literally tried to rip it out of me.
I’d never appreciated just how much Ward had been protecting me from being, well, knocked out by having my magic forcibly stripped from me.
I wondered how long it would take me to be able to sit up.
Or drive.
Fuck.
Doc got up and left the room, then returned with a plain cinnamon cake donut, which he began breaking apart, offering me a bite-sized piece. My stomach roiled, and I grimaced at him, shaking my head.
“You need sugar, Hart,” Doc said gently.
“I need to not barf on your shoes,” I replied.
Doc exchanged a look with someone I couldn’t see. Moving my head to try to figure out if it was Beck, Archie, or Ward would probably also have made me throw up, so I didn’t bother.
Then Doc pulled out his phone.
“No hospitals,” I told him.
