Maximum Witch: That Old Black Magic, Book 3 (9 page)

He stepped on the front stoop, ducking to avoid banging his head on the hanging fern basket. His cop instincts were gratified to notice the heavy-duty deadbolt securing the door. “Good girl.” He depressed the doorbell and listened to its echoing chime inside the quiet apartment. There was no pitter-patter of approaching feet, or any other evidence that Willa was home. He wasn’t exactly surprised, but it would have made things a hell of a lot easier. And less confrontational, since it now looked like he’d have to track her down at her workplace. Sure, he could wait for her here, but he half-suspected she would take off the minute she spotted him. Sneaky though it might be, she wouldn’t have that luxury if he cornered her in her office.

He unclipped his cell phone from its holster and dialed directory assistance. A female operator came on, and he asked for the address for the Savannah division of the National Alliance of Witches. The operator’s bored monotone as she recited the location made Max’s lips twitch. Definitely not the reaction he’d expected. Then again, maybe the woman was used to people calling about witches. Probably it was the fourth most popular inquiry—right behind the Justice League, the Power Rangers, and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

Shaking his head, he returned to the Jeep and punched the new coordinates into the GPS. The prospect of seeing Willa again filled him with equal amounts excitement and trepidation.

Up until this moment, he hadn’t really considered the possibility that she wouldn’t want to see him eventually, after her embarrassment died down. Considering the way she ran off, odds were good that she was experiencing some measure of regret about sleeping with him. The realization left him with a bad feeling in his gut. Even so, he still had to do this. Had to make sure she was okay, both physically and mentally, and somehow, someway, convince her that what happened between them wasn’t a mistake.

Or remain a one-time deal.

Chapter Eight

“Willa, have you listened to a single word I’ve said?”

Domino Blanchard’s familiar nasally whine hammered through Willa’s thoughts and jerked her blank stare from the blinking cursor on her monitor. She gaped at Domino. “Er…what?”

“I
said
I’m leaving for my yoga class and I’ve set my calls to transfer to my cell phone.”

It was on the tip of Willa’s tongue to ask why, since she’d be there to field any of Domino’s messages, but then she remembered the head matron from the San Francisco offices was due to call. There were at least four other guild leaders in attendance today and available to speak with the woman, but no doubt Domino—in her infinitely controlling and paranoid wisdom—had decided it would be far better to huff and puff her way through a conversation with the head matron while doing the downward-dog pose.

“Do you think you’ll have the rest of the notes from this morning typed and ready before you leave tonight?”

Probably not. “Yes.”

Domino nodded before swinging her purse over her shoulder and trotting through the entry. Exactly three minutes later, Marabella Blanchard slunk through the front door. Willa narrowed her eyes at her best friend. “Were you hiding in the bushes again waiting for your mom to leave?”

A pink stain crawled along Marabella’s fair skin. “How much of a pathetic loser will it make me look like if I say yes?” Sighing, she plunked her fanny on the edge of Willa’s desk. “Sorry, I know you’re sick of hearing me bitch and moan about my problems with my mother. So I promise I’ll keep my lips zipped about her at dinner tonight.”

“Dinner? Tonight?”

“Don’t tell me you forgot.” Marabella frowned. “You know, you’ve been doing a lot of that lately. Forgetting, I mean. Is everything okay?”

No. I’m going crazy and forcing gorgeous strangers to let me play naked cowgirl with their penises.
“Yeah. Absolutely hunky-dory.”

“Maybe I should talk to my mom. Tell her not to overload you with so much work.”

“That would require you leaving the bushes.”

A stubborn look crossed Marabella’s face. “I mean it. My problems aside, I’d do anything for you. If that means taking my mom on, so be it.”

“That’s very sweet of you, but unnecessary. I-I’m fine.”

Marabella’s expression turned accusing. “You just stuttered.”

She tried for flippancy. “Excuse me, didn’t realize it’s illegal.”

“There’s something you’re not telling me.”

Willa fidgeted with the space bar on her keypad. “You’re imagining things.”

“Spill it.”

She took one look at the stubborn slant of Marabella’s ash-blonde eyebrows—so similar to Domino’s, in many ways—and knew the only option was coming clean. After a quick scan to make sure no one else was within earshot, she scooted closer to Marabella and swallowed, trying to work the shameful admission past her throat. “I attacked a guy.”

Marabella’s mouth dropped. Shaking off her obvious shock, she stared at Willa. “You mean you got into a fight or something? But…but you’re so…tiny. Why would you do that? Unless…” Her eyes widened before taking on a fiery rage. “Did the bastard try to hurt you? Who is he? He’s going to pay—”

“Not that kind of attack,” Willa assured.

Marabella gnawed her bottom lip, her nose twitching. “I don’t understand.”

Damn, this was more difficult and embarrassing than she thought it would be. “I—I jumped him. You know…” When Marabella only continued looking at her with that innocently expectant expression, Willa moaned and hissed the damning word between her teeth. “
Sex
. I attacked him with sex.”

Marabella’s eyes grew larger than dinner plates. It would have been funny, if it weren’t all so damn awful fessing up to her shameful behavior. “Would you please stop looking at me like that? I already feel bad enough about what happened.”

Marabella dutifully lowered her gaze and cleared her throat. “Wow, that’s so…not like you.”

“Tell me about it.” That was the problem. For the past week or so, she hadn’t been acting like herself in any way. The prospect of what she might do next was damn scary.

“Well, what happened?” The unabashed curiosity sparkling in Marabella’s eyes made it clear she wouldn’t be happy with anything less than a blow-by-blow of the dirty details.

“There isn’t much to tell.”

“You are such a liar.” Marabella stacked her arms over her chest, her left foot giving an impatient tap. “I can tell from the way you’re blushing that it must have been amazing and hot and something I should be insanely jealous over, except I’m so happy for you, I’ll keep my sulking to a minimum.”

“Um, did you not hear the part where I said I
attacked
Max? Trust me, it wasn’t one of my finer moments.”

“Max who? Do I know him?”

Leave it to Marabella to tune out the unsavory parts. “No, I don’t think so. You guys don’t exactly run around in the same circles.” Unless Marabella had developed a habit of taking a daily dip in the Atlantic.

“Tell me about him.” A conspiratorial smile hugging her mouth, Marabella wiggled closer. “How did you two meet?”

Now there was an interesting story. She hadn’t filled Marabella in on the strange episodes she’d been experiencing lately. It wasn’t that she wanted to be secretive or anything, but she also didn’t want Marabella to worry, since her friend had enough on her plate with the little feud going on with Domino. Best to just leave out the section about being bitten by a leviathan and almost drowning. “Max is a…cop. It was purely coincidence we ran in to each other last night.” At least that wasn’t a total fabrication.

“Wait a minute. You attacked a
cop
? With
sex
? Ooh, this is getting good. Did you use his handcuffs on him?”

“Uh, I think you’re missing the point.”

“Come on, don’t hold out on me. I need details, Willa.
Details
.”

She opened her mouth, fully intending to come up with a reasonable story that would both satisfy Marabella and not completely mortify her, but snapped her lips shut with a hard snap of her teeth when the topic of their conversation strode through the doorway, looking huge, gorgeous and thoroughly pissed.

Max. What the hell was he doing—?

Oh shit. She’d told him where she worked.
Brilliant, Willa
. So much for moving to Outer Mongolia. His gaze slammed into hers and they stared at each other for what seemed an eternity. The rustling of Marabella’s trousers announced that she’d turned to see what had captured Willa’s consuming focus. A second later Willa detected Marabella’s hard swallow. Not surprising. Max had that kind of affect on a person.

He strode toward her desk, his gait purposeful and predatory. “We need to talk. Now.”

“This isn’t a good time. I’m working.” She glanced toward the corner of her desk where Marabella’s butt was still parked. She sent her friend a silent transmission, hoping Marabella would back her up.

“You must be Max.” Her grin wide and dazzling, Marabella hopped down and extended her hand.

Willa bit back a groan.
Traitor
. She watched in bemusement as Max and Marabella exchanged introductions. Under different circumstances, she would have felt incredibly rude not to have been the one to initiate them, but at the moment she was too busy trying not to hyperventilate herself into a full-scale panic attack. She could barely look Max in the eye. Oh goddess. What he must think of her.

It got eerily quiet and the fine hairs on the nape of her neck let her know Max was staring at her again. Probably Marabella too.

“Willa, you have to look at me sometime.” Max’s husky baritone managed to be both stern and sexy.

Damn him.

Reluctantly, she tore her attention from her computer monitor and became lost in the azure depths of his irises.

“Why did you run out on me, sweetheart?”

Once again Willa became aware of Marabella’s heated interest. She squirmed in her seat. “Could we please not discuss this here?”

“All right, then come to dinner with me.”

“I can’t. I promised Marabella—”

“We’ll do it another time,” Marabella interjected, her smile crafty as she glanced at Max. “She’s all yours.”

Willa garbled an irritated noise that made Marabella’s smile widen. Her angelic features suitably devilish, Marabella chirped a cheery, “Have fun!” before whispering, “Call me later” in Willa’s ear.

Something landed in Willa’s lap, and she looked down to see that Marabella had kindly handed her purse over. “I can’t leave
now
. Domino is expecting those transcribed notes in the morning.”

“Oh phooey. My mom can wait. Now skedaddle.”

Willa gifted her friend with a proper glare. “This bossy side of you is very unattractive.”

Laughing, Marabella tugged Willa from her seat and shoved her toward Max. His big hands settled around her upper arms, and it took every ounce of control Willa possessed not to plaster her body against him while she tested exactly how long she could kiss him without coming up for air. Smothering a silent groan, she extricated herself from his grip and headed for the exit.

Outside, he followed her to her car and waited expectantly by the passenger door. He returned her frown with a shrug. “You don’t mind, do you? We’ll go somewhere in the city, and then you can drop me off back here on your way home.”

She wasn’t too keen on that plan, since it’d mean being trapped within close proximity of Max and having to breathe in all that testosterone he exuded while trying to battle the urge to rip his clothes off and lick every inch of him. “Fine,” she gritted out between her teeth.

Ducking inside the Taurus, she watched Max fold his considerably larger frame into the passenger seat. She situated herself behind the wheel and buzzed down the window, both to allow the stale heat to escape and hopefully some of the aforementioned testosterone marauders. It was no use, Max’s addictive blend of musk and ocean flirted with her nostrils, instantly making her panties wet.

Max buckled his seat belt and draped his arm across the back of his seat. She tried not to notice the fine dusting of hairs sprinkling his forearm, or the way his shirt stretched taut along his torso, accentuating his sculpted pecs and ridged abdomen. Against her will, her scrutiny drifted to his lap and the distinct bulge beneath his fly.

Max’s free hand grazed along his thigh before settling in place very near the source of her fascination. “Where do you feel like going?”

How about where your hand is, only a little higher and a little more to the left?
Giving her inner slut a stern warning to knock it off, Willa bit the inside of her cheek and considered the possible options. Her usual Savannah hangout was Champions, but there was a ninety percent chance of running into people she knew there. People who would want to know who Max was and would undoubtedly drill her with a million questions later on. “I hear there’s a new deli that opened up over by Lafayette Square.”

“Sounds good. I could go for a nice, thick juicy sandwich right about now.”

Nice and thick. Oh jeez. The bastard was killing her. Tightening her fists around the steering wheel, she drove as fast as she could toward Lafayette Square without actually breaking any speeding laws. The interior of the vehicle remained uncomfortably quiet for a long stretch. Just as she was about to reach for the knob on the radio to alleviate the strained atmosphere, Max cleared his throat.

“Don’t you think we should talk about what happened?”

“I’d rather we pretend that it didn’t.”

Max fell into a broody silence for a moment. “Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought you enjoyed it.”

She could feel her cheeks burning from the inside out. “You would have to bring that up.”

His gaze slashed in her direction. “Willa, it’s all I can damn well think about. Every time I look at you, I picture your face and the sounds you made while you were coming all over my cock. I’ve been rock hard for the past six hours.” As if to verify his statement, he shifted in the seat, his hand adjusting the position of his zipper.

She ripped her focus away from the tempting sight and stared out the windshield. Okay, so he wasn’t exactly put out that she’d pounced on top of his hot bod and had her wicked way with him. It lessened her guilt somewhat, but it didn’t solve the core crisis of her problem. There was something driving her to do things that were out of her control. It was as if another entity held the reins to her body and was having a jolly good time at her expense. She didn’t like it. Not one damn bit. And for whatever reason, the entity that’d weaseled inside her head had set its sights on Max. She couldn’t allow it. Couldn’t let it manipulate her or Max any more than it already had. “I don’t want you to get the wrong impression. I—I did enjoy what happened. A lot. But I don’t think it’s a good idea if we see each other again after today.”