Shadow Kissed (Magic Side: Wolf Bound Book 4)

Savannah

Jaxson’s hand locked around my wrist, but it was his eyes that pinned me in place, burning like golden stars against the night sky.

The signature of his magic vibrated the air, a cascading waterfall of sensation. It woke every nerve in my body, as if I’d been sleepwalking through the last decade of life. The rich forest scent and snowy taste of his magic made me feel like I’d stepped straight from the lake onto the porch of a warm cabin in the silent winter woods of Wisconsin, hundreds of miles from Magic Side and all my problems.

It pulled me toward him, and it took everything I had not to submit. It would’ve been so easy to give in and go with him, to pretend that the Dockside alpha was strong enough to make the coming storm disappear.

But I knew he couldn’t. That was up to me.

“Let me go,” I said, my voice low and about as steady as I could hold it.

For a moment, he held on in silence, and then his grasp softened as he reached up and brushed my hair. “I want to give you the space you need, but we’ve only got six days—”

I stepped away as my mouth turned sour. “Six days until the Dark Wolf God returns? Until he enslaves our people and turns Magic Side into a mound of rubble and ash? Do you think I don’t realize that? I spend every waking minute dreading it.”

“We need to make a plan.”

“I have a plan,” I snapped as a moment of frustration pierced me like a knife. Did he think I hadn’t considered what I was going to do?

I turned my back on him and began trudging up the dune toward the tree where I’d hidden my clothes. Jaxson followed.

“If the Dark God wants me to cut out the souls of the pack for him, then I’d better make sure I can’t, and no one else can, either. I’m meeting Neve tomorrow, and I’m going to hand the Soul Knife over to the Order. They have a magic vault that’s supposedly impregnable. If the blade is locked in there, I won’t be able to use it against anyone.”

Jaxson nodded as he climbed the dune beside me. “That’s a good start.”

His voice was low and approving, reflecting back none of the frustration I’d felt. He was patient, and I needed that right now.

I stopped in my tracks and dug my nails into my palm. He wasn’t going to like the next part. I sure didn’t. “I’m going to ask—if and only if things go really bad—whether they can lock me away in there. To keep the pack safe. Obviously, with what happened with Dragan, Bentham isn’t secure enough, and if the Dark God starts to take cont—”

“No.”

Jaxson spoke so quietly, it was almost inaudible. But the power behind that single word shook me to my bones, like an earthquake erupting inside of me. Every muscle froze, and I couldn’t step forward or protest or even breathe.

His command was absolute. Undeniable. Irresistible.

Jaxson stepped up behind me and whispered in my ear. “I’m your alpha, and I forbid it. Imprisonment is death to a wolf.”

He was so close, I could practically feel his heart beating. Struggling for every ounce of control I could muster, I parted my parched lips and rasped, “I will do what I have to, to protect—’

“No. You’re letting this prophecy control you. Don’t. We don’t yet know what it means.”

Frustration burned my neck, but I surrendered just a little. He was right. I was allowing my fear of the prophecy to control me.

Jaxson circled around and lifted my chin, so I had no choice but to look up into those intense, impossibly golden eyes. “I suspect the Dark Wolf God would like nothing more than for you to lock yourself away. He’s been trying to control you or kill you since you stepped foot in Magic Side. Somehow, you’re a threat to his plans. We just have to find out why.”

The glow in Jaxson’s eyes dimmed, and his power over me faded, but I didn’t move away.

The trace of a warm smile softened his stern expression. “You’re powerful, Savannah, and you’re the one the Dark God is afraid of. But you don’t have to fight him on your own. You’re part of a pack.”

How I wanted to believe him.

I was so tired of the running and the unending fear. Tired of having to be strong and earn every breath I took. I wanted to be able to release just a little of it. To lean on someone else.

We were so close to each other that half a step would do it. We’d be skin to skin, my robe of shadows meaningless between us. I could just melt into him and let the world fade away, even if only for a moment.

Instead, I nodded and stepped back. Maybe one day, we’d have that chance.

I stepped behind the tree where I’d stashed my clothes, plucked my undies from the crumpled pile, and pulled them on beneath a billowing cloak of shadows. “I get it, Jaxson, I really do. I don’t have to do everything on my own—not that I was planning to.”

From the approving way the alpha watched me, I began to get the sense he didn’t have to be able to see me to appreciate the dressing process.

His eyes never wavered. “No more running off. I’m with you, whether you like it or not.”

I pulled my wet hair back. “I guess that means you’re coming to Pere Cheney with me, then?”

Surprise cut across Jaxson’s face. “Pere Cheney? Why? To see the ghost?”

“I swore an oath to bring her a headstone,” I said as I fastened my bra. “I don’t like being beholden to anyone—not you, and certainly not to a half-crazed long-dead witch who swore she’d torture my soul and fill every waking moment of my life with cold and pain if I didn’t follow through with my end of the deal.”

“I shouldn’t have let you speak to her alone,” Jaxson grunted, his voice tinged with frustration and protectiveness.

I shimmied into my shirt, wincing as I pulled it over the damn wound in my shoulder. “The ghost gave us a hint on how to defeat Dragan. I’m hoping that if I follow through with my side of the bargain, she’ll give us a clue on how to defeat the Dark God. Maybe she knows a weakness of his or something.”

Jaxson nodded. “Your plan is good. Getting rid of the knife and meeting the witch. Regardless of whether she helps us, we don’t need to make another enemy at the moment.”

I smiled slightly while I pulled my tight shorts over my ass, a little regretful that the cloud of shadow blocked the view. I mean, he’d seen me naked. We fucked, for heaven’s sake. Why was I wrapped in shadows?

You’re afraid of letting him through that rusty armor of yours, Wolfie murmured in my mind.

What are you calling rusty? I teased back with mock anger.

At least I had my wolf.

My phone buzzed. “I bet that’s Casey, wondering where the hell I am. We need to roll.”

“Casey,” Jaxson said flatly. It wasn’t a question, but rather a statement of all that was wrong with the world.

“He’s got the headstone in his car. I didn’t know anyone else shady or skilled enough to find an unbreakable tombstone at a moment’s notice.”

Jaxson’s jaw clenched. “Fine. But we’re taking my truck. Your Fury won’t make it up the back roads, and Casey’s ride is a piece of shit. I trust it less than I trust him.”

I dismissed the shadows and grabbed my phone to text my cousin. “Where’s your truck parked?”

“On a pull-off on Highway Twelve, near the boundary road. He’ll know it when he sees it.”

I texted Casey. His response was quick: Jaxson? WTF.

“Yeah, my cousin might not be keen on the idea, either.” I pocketed my phone.

“Follow me,” Jaxson said, and took off running through the woods.

I had my Swiftley boots, so it was easy for me to keep up with him without breaking a sweat. My feet pounded into the sand as my soul breathed a sigh of relief. It was good to run together.

I didn’t know why I’d run from him before. Instinct, I supposed. A dread of what was coming tightening around my throat. The fear that I would be the one to hurt him, to hurt the pack.

I couldn’t face that.

Hush, Wolfie said. Stop worrying. Just focus on his buns.

She was incorrigible, but my eyes darted down involuntarily. The sight was enough to drive the dread away for a moment. Feeling a little flush rising, I wondered if I might work up a sweat after all.

When we neared the road, Jaxson slowed and stopped by the bushes where he’d stashed his clothes.

“Give me a few minutes to talk to Casey,” I said, tearing my eyes from the hard angles of his body. “We haven’t cleared the air.”

Jaxson nodded and started dressing. I lingered for just a moment, then made my way to the road through the cluster of oak and hickory as my stomach tightened.

Last time I’d seen or spoken to my cousin was at Aunt Laurel’s. She’d tried to stop me from leaving, and I’d lashed out with my magic. I’d bolted out of the house, leaving Casey cradling her with a look of abject horror on his face.

Since then, he’d learned that I was a werewolf and Jaxson’s mate. And now, I had to tell him I was the werewolf antichrist. Shit.

We’d become so close, yet I’d kept so much from him. And I hadn’t returned any of his calls.

How the hell did I expect him to forgive me?

I stopped dead in my tracks, the guilt of everything weighing on my shoulders like massive iron chains. It had taken all the courage I had just to text him to ask for help with the gravestone. How was I going to face him now?

My leg kicked forward as Wolfie took control, and I yelped in surprise.

Stop that. I’m going! I snapped at my wolf.

Didn’t seem like it.

“Savannah?” Casey’s voice echoed through the trees.

I sighed and trudged out of the forest into a whirling morass of doubt, guilt, and fear.

Jaxson’s big black truck was pulled off to the side of the road, lit up by the headlights of Casey’s RAV4 parked haphazardly behind. My cousin was leaning against the hood with his arms crossed.

I didn’t need werewolf senses to read his mood: pissed.