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A YEAR LATER
Celeste
I looked down at the white stick and smiled as my stomach flipped over.
Two pink lines. Clear and visible.
I was pregnant.
Again.
“Oh.”
We’d celebrated Destiny’s first birthday only yesterday, and I’d been feeling a little queasy all day.
I’d had my suspicions, of course, but I’d wanted to wait until after the party to do an official test.
Unlike that day, all those months ago when I found out I was pregnant the first time, this day would be cause for celebration, not despair.
What a difference a year and a half made.
I slid the cap back on the test stick and placed it into my back pocket. The men were out, but they’d be home for lunch soon.
“How you going, baby girl? You ready to get changed?”
Destiny was sitting in her highchair, having inhaled a banana, a sandwich and some berries.
She ate more than I did.
I glanced at the clock and counted. I had about ten minutes before my triad arrived home.
“Let’s go, beautiful girl.”
I picked up my daughter and carried her to the nursery, cleaning the crumbs and berry smudges off her angelic face.
I squealed a little as I opened the new t-shirt and changed her into the outfit that I’d ordered online. It had arrived last week and was a perfect fit for my daughter.
I stood her up and she teetered a little.
Her t-shirt read, “I’m going to be a big sister.”
“Perfect.”
Destiny toddled over to the corner of her room and began to play.
What a year it had been!
Tayte had spent months recovering from his injuries and surgeries. The wolf genes helped his healing tremendously, but it still took a long time before everything was well again.
Both with him, and with us.
But every day we’d worked on rebuilding the trust again.
Every day I loved them all that little bit more.
So much so, that now, if I heard them tell anyone I wasn’t their fated mate, or they’d get rid of me to save the pack, I’d laugh in their face.
My men lived and breathed our family.
They loved me and my daughter, and since the moment I put Destiny on Tayte’s chest, I hadn’t looked back.
Not at that night I thought they wanted to get rid of me. Not to my horrible childhood or the months before I met Tayte.
My life was blessed.
I was Cinderella in my fairy tale, and I had three Prince Charmings to love, and who loved me back. Every single day.
“Celeste!”
My heart leapt as they entered the house—loudly—as they always did.
“Daddy!” Destiny called out as she stumbled, trying to run past me. She got a few more steps into the living room before she fell to the floor and cried as she always did.
Tayte laughed as he scooped her up and showered her with kisses.
“How’s my perfect girl? Have you been good for Mommy?”
Sam came for me first, which was nice, and gave me a swift kiss. “Are you okay? You looked a little pale this morning.”
I nodded. “I’m great. How was work?”
“Busy.”
Dane came in and shut the door, grabbing for Destiny and whirling her around.
“Something smells good. What’s for lunch?” he asked.
None of them had noticed Destiny’s top yet and my stomach was in knots, waiting for them to discover the surprise.
Of course, I assumed they’d be happy about the new pregnancy. After all, they put in daily efforts to make sure I was constantly filled with their desire for me.
But it didn’t stop the anxiety that rattled through me.
“Um... lamb curry. I wanted to try a new recipe.”
“Great. I’m starving.”
The men all piled into the kitchen and I started serving them, putting lots of rice in every bowl as I knew how many calories they burned through in a day.
“Hey, Celeste?” There was a strange note in Dane’s voice.
“Yeah?” I asked as I put each bowl down in front of my men.
Dane was looking at me with a huge smile on his face. “What does this mean?”
He pointed to Destiny’s top, where she stood on his thigh and clung to his neck.
He turned her around and showed the other two men, who went silent.
My heart leapt in my chest and I swallowed quickly, my hand trembling as I pulled out the stick from my back pocket.
“Well... I’m pregnant.”
The three men looked at one another for a single second, then jumped to their feet, whooping loudly.
“That’s brilliant!”
Sam grabbed me and kissed me, then Tayte picked me up and twirled me around.
“How are you feeling?”
I put my hand out to steady myself. “A little woozy, but happy. Are you three happy, too?”
Dane kissed me soundly, still holding Destiny, then wrapped his arm around my shoulders.
“We couldn’t be happier. More babies for our family, and a baby brother or sister for our perfect girl.”
He nuzzled his nose against Destiny’s face, who cackled and wriggled to get down.
Dane put her on the ground and she toddled off to her room.
My triad surrounded me, holding me in that long, intense way they had, that always made me feel loved.
“I love you. All of you,” I said. “Thank you for my new life.”
Tayte swung me into his arms and carried me up the stairs.
“Lunch can wait. I think we need to celebrate now.”
Dane stayed with Destiny and Sam followed us into our main bedroom.
They’d swap after a while, and if I passed out from exhaustion, one of them would call into work and tell them they were taking the afternoon off.
My life truly was perfect.
I had my men, my child and a village of people who loved and supported us.
It seriously couldn’t get any better than this.
THE END
I hope you’ve loved reading about the Woodland Wolf packs! Reverse Harem and wolf shifters make the perfect pairing!
Which is why I wrote- Halloween Witches. Another wolf shifter reverse harem series.
If you’ve enjoyed this series, you will love Alpha Magic.
You can download and read it: HERE
Or read on for a sneak peek into book 1.
Prologue
Halloween night. One year ago.
Ruby
Our mothers said that three of us were Fated, blessed. What she meant was, I would be stuck with these two pain-in-the-ass best friends until my dying day.
“So, are we going to do this, or not?” I asked my friends, staring at each of them in turn. “Because there’s no going back after this.”
My heart was pounding like a runaway train and if we didn’t cast the spell now, I was afraid we’d never have the guts to do it.
The wind moved through the trees around us, rustling the leaves and signaling a Fall storm was on its way. We were gathered outside beneath the full moon and dark, starless sky, on a large piece of property in the middle of nowhere.
No one could see us, and as long as we never said a word, nobody would ever know about our little adventure on this night.
This Halloween night. Our joint twenty-first birthday.
Tiffany, the blonde bombshell of our little group, nodded fiercely. I could see the determination in her bright blue eyes. She wanted this as much I did.
I turned to Bella, who had her teeth buried firmly in her lower lip.
I rolled my eyes. “Come on, Bella. You know we can’t do this without you.”
And I meant that literally. Bella was a powerful witch and without her magic, I wasn’t sure Tiff and I could pull off a spell of this magnitude.
She frowned and I could see the hesitation in the set of her shoulders, in her dark brown gaze.
I narrowed my eyes at the girl who’d been practically a sister to me since the day we’d been born. “Come on, Bella. Please.”
We’d been talking about this spell for years, planning every part of the complex incantation. Waiting until the night we were old enough... powerful enough... gutsy enough, to pull it off.
Suddenly Bella’s gaze hardened, and relief poured through me. I knew that look. She was on my side now.
“Okay, Ruby. I’m in. Let’s do this.”
I grabbed my two best friends’ hands and they grabbed each other, forming a perfect triangle of strength.
We were three witches born on the same day, the most powerful day of the year for our kind. All Hallows’ Eve.
Our mothers were best friends, united in the abandonment by the fathers of their children. They’d made sure we grew up together, strong, bonded, and most of all, loyal to one another.
We clasped hands and glanced down at the book between us, a spell book I’d found ten years ago, hidden in my mother’s things. A powerful spell book that had belonged to my late grandmother.
We began to chant in an ancient language that no one used anymore.
I closed my eyes, having memorized the spell years ago. I spoke my part and my friends spoke theirs. Each section was a call to the magic that rippled in our veins. To Fate. And most of all, to the unconditional love that we all desired and craved.
Over and over we chanted our words, the magic in our blood, in our ancestry, simmering and bursting at the seams.
I could feel the heat in my body building until sweat rolled down my face. I didn’t stop, and neither did Bella or Tiffany. The power of our combined words swirled around us like a hurricane, and I clung to the spell, focusing everything I had on this night. This one moment, where we would make sure that we’d never end up like our mothers, abandoned and alone.
My eyes opened. The ancient book floated in the air between us. Bella was watching the book with trepidation and Tiff grinned when she caught my eye.
We began to speak louder, the words in our hearts building naturally as the spell came to a crescendo. I stared at our joined hands as white light built between our clenched fingers.
There was a sudden surge of power, and the urge to finish the spell gripped me. I nodded at my honorary sisters and together we spoke the last of our parts. There was no going back now.
As we uttered those last few words, the white magic we’d conjured shot into the air above our heads, exploding into a spectacular spray of fireworks highlighted against the dark night sky.
The impact of the explosion blew us back and apart, each of us landing with a thump on the grass.
I groaned as I rolled onto my side to take pressure off the bruised parts of my backside but I didn’t look away from the sky as the magic exploded, then seemed to disappear.
A small amount of disappointment hit me. I’d expected more than some white fireworks, then dissipation. Though what I’d thought would happen, I didn’t know.
As we sat on the ground surrounded by nature and trees and the gorgeous country house off in the distance, peace stole over me.
“Is that it?” I asked, and as though in answer, the spell book that had been hovering in the air between us, landed in the dirt. The front cover closed, all signs of magic, gone.
Tiffany stood first, brushing the dirt from her tight pants and groaning as though annoyed by the mess.
Bella and I got to our feet too, the excitement and build-up to this day beginning to leach the strength out of me.
It was over. It was done. Now, all we had to do was wait for the spell to come to fruition. For the men—our men—to come to us.
And patience, although I’d been told was a virtue, was not one of my strengths.
“So... back to the house for a celebratory drink?” I suggested, forcing some excitement into my tone.
We’d brought some alcohol with us. Why wouldn’t we, when we could finally legally drink in the human world?
“Sounds like a plan,” Tiffany said with a flick of her long hair, and together we turned and trekked back to the house that Bella’s family owned.
I glanced down at my hands, expecting something to have changed. But as I glanced at each of my friends, it seemed that nothing was different for any of us. Not physically, anyway.
I wondered if our loves, wherever they were, had been hit with our magic. Could they feel it, even now? Were they searching for us?
Once inside the little house in the woods, we flicked on the lights and used our magic to mix up cocktails the color of the sunset—red, yellow, and a splash of purple.
“Perfect.” I picked up my glass that had been resting on the counter.
Tiffany and Bella plucked up their drinks as well, raising their glasses to clink with mine.
“Happy birthday,” I said, and they chorused back to me.
Sharing a birthday with my two best friends had been trying at times, especially growing up. I’d never had my own party, or a single day when I could feel simply special just for being me.
But now, I loved it.
We all took a sip of our first legal drink and grimaced at the amount of liquor I’d poured in.
“Wow, that’s strong,” Tiff said, blinking rapidly.
I nodded, swallowing hard as the vodka and gin mix slid down my throat.
Bella gulped awkwardly, shuddering before she set the drink back down on the counter. She waved her hand over the table in front of us and conjured up a whole feast of savory and sweet snacks. Chips, chocolate cake, cookies, and crackers with cheese littered the surface in front of us.
She was the best at making food. Actually, she was the best of everything when it came to magic. But luckily for us, as the most introverted of our trio, she never threw it in our faces.
“Oh, perfect. Thanks, Belle.”
I grabbed some chips and stuffed them in my mouth. I hadn’t eaten dinner with all the nerves surrounding tonight.
Bella sighed and I glanced up at her, raising my eyebrows in question. It was obvious she wanted to ask me something.
“What’s up Bell-Bell?”
“Do you think it worked?” she asked, speaking aloud the question we all wanted answered.
I shrugged, forcing myself to appear nonchalant, though I was anything but. This spell would hopefully change the course of all our lives for the better.
I gave her the only answer I could. “I don’t know. I hope so.”
“So do I!” Tiffany said, her tone exasperated. “We’ve only been planning this forever.”
I conjured up some stools and we all sat down around our little birthday feast.
We chatted and ate, drank and laughed, celebrating our whole lives ahead of us.
Through the night I hoped that our magic was working its way to the men for whom we were destined, because the spell we had woven together tonight was a spell that called out to destiny. For our one, true love.
All three of our mothers had been abandoned before we were even born. We’d grown up around sorrow and loneliness. Heartache.
None of us wanted that for ourselves or any future children we might have.
So tonight, we’d sent out a call for the men who would love us for all eternity. Our perfect matches. Men who would stand by us. Love us. Never leave us.
We wanted them quickly of course, but they would answer the call when they were good and ready. Or at least, that was what I assumed.
Whether that be tomorrow, next month, or next year, I would wait. And I knew Bella and Tiffany would, too.
Because only Fate could be trusted with such an important a decision as the person we were meant to spend the rest of our lives with.
Born to three single mothers, not a father between us, we had trust issues aplenty. I, for one, wasn’t going to just date anyone.
And I certainly wasn’t going to fall in love with the first guy who happened to look my way. I’d rather be alone forever than live with the pain my mother wore like a heavy coat.
So hopefully, Fate and our own magic would not let us down, because we’d risked everything tonight to make our futures happen.
Chapter 1
One year later.
Ruby
My day job at the local florist certainly wasn’t glamorous, but it passed the time all the same.
“Have a nice day,” I said to the human woman who’d bought a bunch of roses for her sick mother. I waved her out the door. What I really should have done was tuck in a spell for her mother’s flu, but we weren’t allowed to do magic around the humans in town.
I let out a huge sigh and looked around the large shop filled with buckets of brightly colored flowers and potted plants. What was I doing here again?
Making yourself useful until you work out what you want to do with your life, my mother’s voice sounded in my head.
The witches in my family were healers, fortune tellers, teachers. But unlike all those women who had come before me, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life at this point.
I’d graduated high school with good grades, gone to community college, then... nothing.
I was adrift, and that wasn’t my personality generally. I wasn’t a flake. But unlike so many of the witching community who were addicted to the coven lifestyle, I just... wasn’t.
I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to hang around this town forever. Travel sounded more interesting to me, seeing the world. If only I could convince Bella and Tiffany to come.
“Ruby, I’m just heading to the bank. Do you want me to grab anything for your lunch?” Andrea, my boss, smiled at me as she picked up her handbag from behind the counter and headed to the front door.
“No. I’m all good today. Thanks, Andrea.” I waved at her as she left.
Such a lovely woman, especially for a human.
When my mother had realized I couldn’t make up my mind on what I wanted to do with my life, she’d forced me to get a job with a non-magical person. To learn, to expand my horizons. To be “of use to the community”.
Which, at the time, I’d thought was a horrible idea. But as it turned out, there were a lot of nice humans here.
The school I’d attended had been mostly for witches, and I’d kept my head down at college and mostly associated with those I knew. Again, mostly witches.
Now, it was kind of nice to be able to weave between the different communities, not that the humans knew what I was, of course.
I turned back to the flowers I’d been arranging when my last customer had come in. A phone order had come through for a large bunch of lilies and violets. Simple, but lovely.
I was so tempted to use my magic to make them bright, bigger, more beautiful. But there were severe consequences for revealing magic to the non-magicals.
So, instead, I practiced my hand skills. I arranged them in a nice bunch, wrapping paper and plastic around the stems, then tying it off with an orange ribbon to contrast the vivid purple color of the violets.
The bell above the door tinkled as a new customer pushed it open.
“With you in a moment,” I called over my shoulder toward the front door, and a tingle of awareness shot up my spine.
I shivered, not with cold but with impending change. My breath caught in my throat as I twisted around to see who had set off such a drastic shift in the world around me.
A huge man stood in the shop, staring at me with quiet intensity.
His rugged beauty struck me like a slap to the face. Soulful, dark blue eyes. Brown hair falling to his shoulders. Features so stunning it made me want to crawl over the counter and jump into his arms.
The only thing that stopped me from doing exactly that was the fact that the person standing before me staring at me like he’d never seen a woman before, wasn’t just a man. I took a deep breath through my nose and shivered at the gruff, animalistic notes.
He was so much more than just a shifter. He was a wolf. Not just any wolf, an Alpha.
I’d come across one once by accident when I was a child in the forest. The scent of an Alpha was like barely leashed power, earthy sweat and strong animal. I’d never forgotten how I’d felt that day, and now I was standing before another one. This time, in human form.
I placed my hands on the counter in front of me, digging my nails into the wood so that I didn’t squeal or scream or any of those immensely embarrassing female reactions that finding your one true love was bound to bring out in even the calmest of women.
I cleared my throat with a cough and forced myself to look up at him. “Can I help you?”
He had the brightest, sharpest blue eyes. The darkest hair. And if he wasn’t six feet six, I’d bite my own bum.
“You’re a witch,” he said, no inflection in his voice indicating it was a question.
“Shh...” I said, hushing him. “You’re lucky my boss has gone to the bank.”
He frowned. “She doesn’t know?”
“We don’t tell humans what we are. You know that.” I crossed my arms over my chest and raised an eyebrow at him. “Do you go around shouting to the humans that you’re an Alpha wolf shifter?”
His eyes went wide, and he stared at me with his mouth open. He looked as if I’d hit him over the head with a frying pan.
“What’s wrong? Cat got your tongue?” I asked, grinning at him for long moments.
Damn, he’s beautiful. So beautiful.
Though that was probably the wrong word for his appearance. His jaw was darkened with the beginnings of a new beard and the muscles bulging under the gray hoodie he wore hinted at an incredibly lethal body.
Hot... he was damn HOT.
“What are you?” he asked, almost as an accusation.
“What do you mean, what am I?” I repeated and frowned at him. He knew I was a witch. What more did he want? “I’m Ruby. Why? What’s wrong?”
“How did you know that about me?” he asked. “I’m not the Alpha... not yet, anyway.”
“But it’s in your blood, isn’t it?” I asked, second-guessing myself now. I couldn’t be wrong about that, could I? The other Alpha I’d met was in wolf form.
He took a few steps forward, his intense blue gaze staying focused on me. “Yes, it is. So, answer my question. How’d you know that?”
My breath caught in my throat the closer he moved, the scent of him so familiar, like a long-forgotten memory. But how was that possible? I’d never met him before. I was sure of it.
“I...” I swallowed and dropped my arms, grabbing for the counter again as my knees threatened to buckle beneath me. “I met an Alpha wolf when I was child. He smelled the same as you.”
The Alpha crept closer until he stood right in front of the counter I was leaning on for support.
I had to tilt my head up to look into his eyes, and when I did, a noise came out of my mouth that I couldn’t decipher.
A moan? A prayer? A curse?
What is this?
I gripped the counter as my trembling legs finally gave way. This was going to hurt if I didn’t save myself.
I muttered a spell word and conjured a chair beneath me. I fell into it, feeling as intoxicated as I assumed drunk felt.
Witches had a great resistance to alcohol, like most paranormals, so I’d never felt what being tipsy was like, let alone been fully intoxicated. But I had to assume it felt like this strange, hot, tingly feeling that pulsed through my veins, making me weak, weepy, and strangely aroused.
Damn, that’s what this is! Arousal. Heat pulsated from my core, radiating through my belly and down my legs.
I forced myself to look up at him, and he was staring at me as though he were waiting for something. “Um...” My brain had gone all stupid and blank. “Did you ask me another question?”
He shook his head and growled a little, swallowing and coughing as though he suddenly couldn’t speak.
What was going on?
The bell tinkled again over the front door and Andrea strolled back in.
I jumped to my feet and made my chair disappear before she saw it.
“Welcome back,” I greeted her, putting on my cheeriest smile and happiest voice, though inside my head, my world was spinning.
This guy... this wolf shifter... he had to be my soul mate. The one I’d called for on Halloween last year. Didn’t he? Nothing else made sense.
He was so much hotter, bigger... older than I’d imagined.
But I’d never expected a wolf shifter. Damn. How was my mom gonna take this news?
Andrea placed her black handbag on the counter and frowned at the Alpha wolf in front of me. “Can I help you?”
I was surprised by her non-welcoming response, especially for one of the friendliest women I’d ever met. Didn’t she feel his strength, his power? How wasn’t she affected by his beauty?
Then something my mother had once told me swam up into my subconscious. Humans don’t like shifters. Wolves, especially. They could feel the danger in them, which to us, was an aphrodisiac. However, for a human, it only smelled like trouble.
And boy, am I in trouble...
The guy nodded at Andrea and pushed a piece of paper across the desk at us.
I glanced down at it. An order of lilies and violets.
“Oh, these are for you, sir!” I squawked in my nervousness to diffuse the situation. I didn’t want Andrea to be angry at him. He wasn’t doing anything wrong.
I twisted around, grabbed the flowers I’d just been arranging, and turned back to him in a hurry. I leaned over the counter and offered them to the huge man I was pretty certain was meant to be mine.
“Thank you,” he managed to say, though he sounded garbled and his teeth were unusually pointed as he forced the words out.
Almost... wolf-like. His teeth hadn’t looked like that when he’d come into the shop.
He pulled out a credit card from his wallet and I glanced down at the name before sliding it through the sensor on the side of the register monitor. I couldn’t help myself.
Jackson Davis.
Oh, I liked the sound of that. But where did he live? Where was he from? Was he just passing through town or did he belong to a pack in the area?
I have to find out!
I processed his payment and handed back the plastic.
He plucked the card from my hand with his fingertips, careful not to touch me as he took it. A flush of disappointment washed over me. I ached to touch him, to see if I could feel something tangible and physical between us.
I was early in my training as a witch, but all my teachers said I had a natural affinity for scrying. Future predictions. And my instincts were always on target.
And every instinct, every vibe, every ounce of my witchy genes, was telling me that Jackson and I would be seeing a lot more of each other in the future.
“Thank you,” he mumbled again as he backed away, though he barely opened his mouth to speak this time.
I cocked my head at him and watched as he began to retreat. What was with the talking thing? Or more precisely, the lack of talking thing?
Was he fighting the urge to shift? Did he feel the attraction between us that radiated like the sun? I wanted to know so badly what was going on inside his head.
“Oh, ah...” I tried to call out to him as he left, but he practically ran for the door, the bells clanging as he threw himself outside.
I stared at him through the window as he hopped into his truck and squealed out of his parking spot in front of the shop before I even had time to walk around the counter.
Andrea shook her head and tsked loudly as she opened the cash register and began unloading the change she’d gotten from the bank. “He sounded like such a nice man on the phone. I’m sorry you had to wait on him while I was out. I’m sure he scared you.”
“Scared me?” I repeated, moving away from Andrea to arrange some nearby roses. Idle hands... devil’s work, and all that.
“Oh, yes,” Andrea said, shuddering. “Didn’t he bother you? The size of him... the feel of him. Ugh.” She shuddered again.
I clenched my jaw. Why didn’t she understand that there was nothing wrong with him but instead, something wrong with her?
But I swallowed down my anger. It was for the good of the humans that they were afraid of the shifters. It was natural. And I shouldn’t be offended.
Even though my face was flushed with heat, and rage bubbled inside me.
It’s a good thing. It’s a good thing. Don’t get mad.
I faced the roses I was toying with so she couldn’t see my red face and forced myself to continue with normal conversation. “Who were the flowers for? His wife? Did he say?”
There hadn’t been a card ordered so I was left hoping someone hadn’t snagged him before I could.
“His grandmother, I think,” Andrea said as she went into the back to check stock and I was left staring out the window.
Was this the man I was meant to love? The one that our Halloween spell had called upon? Everything in me said yes.
But none of us three, not Tiffany, not Bella, not me, had even had a single date since that fateful night exactly twelve months ago.
But from the feel of Jackson Davis and the prickling of the hairs at the nape of my neck, I was pretty sure I’d just met my one. My only. My soulmate.
And he was a wolf shifter.
Damn. I hope the coven doesn’t mind!
Download and Read: HERE