Page 32 of Waltzing With Witches

I grin as I settle myself down into the ancient wooden chair in front of my desk. “Vampires run hot, Morgan. I burn through liquor faster than it can affect me. Worst I can do is get a little tipsy.”

She rolls her eyes. “Must be nice. That would have saved me quite a few hangovers in my younger years.”

It’s my turn to roll my eyes. “Twenty-eight is quite young.”

Steely eyes flash at me. “Not that young, Keeper.”

I smile. “Regarding your earlier questions. Vampires don’t get made, we’re born like most other monsters. I was born before the haven system existed, in the tiny town which is now Hearth HQ. I stopped counting birthdays several hundred years ago.” I run a hand through my hair. “Shit, I’m pretty old, come to think of it, even in human years. Was there another question?

She gives me a look. “Siblings?”

“None. I imagine Evenia had me and decided not to try her hand at parenting ever again.” I glance at my watch, examining a series of quiet alerts that come through.

She sighs. “We really suck at communicating, you know that?

Of course I know that. It’s been purposeful on my part.

I look back at her. “We do.”

She steeples her fingers in front of her chest. “Have you ever thought that maybe we should change that?”

I look away. “Truth or dare, twenty questions, whatever game you want to play—it’s a bad idea, Morgan.”

Why am I still here? Why did I even follow her? I spin the logic path around in my mind and can’t find any reason except that I want to be. She’s a gravitational force, and I am helpless when she’s this close.

“Why?” She pulls her feet off the desk and leans forward, planting both elbows on the burled surface. “You have been an absolute dick since I moved here, yet you called me here. Why?”

Grim satisfaction fills my chest. I did my job, then, keeping her at bay. Because gods know that’s not what I want.

“Let’s table this topic,” I say. “Ask me something else. I don’t want to start with the heavy stuff.”

She sighs and sits back, opening her hand. I pass her the bourbon bottle, watching with delight as she brings it to her soft-looking lips and sucks at the opening. My cock hardens, lengthening and pressing against my thigh. A gnawing pain takes up residence in my chest.

Morgan sets the bottle down, wiping a stray drop of bourbon from her lips. I grip the arms of my chair to resist leaping across the desk to suck it off her myself.

“What would you have been if you weren’t a Keeper?”

I let go of the chair arms and cross one leg over the other. “Architect. I studied for it in another haven and then lived in the human world for a while. A long while,” I murmur, thinking back on the decades I lived outside of the haven system.

“Tell me everything,” Morgan breathes.

I smile softly. “Seattle is home to a vampire-and-witch hybrid coven. It’s been there since Seattle was founded in the mid-1800s. It’s a unique city; there are actually a lot of monsters there who prefer not to live within the haven system.”

Morgan looks at me with rapt attention, gray eyes wide and lips parted.

“There’s not much to tell,” I admit. “I lived in the human world for a while, studying, working, living with the coven there.”

“Why’d you come back to Ever?”

I reach for my turtleneck, pulling at the thick fabric. The room suddenly feels heated, my cheeks flushed. I can see no way around sharing the rest of this story with her, no way around breaking her heart. I wonder if I subconsciously knew it would come to this that day I broke down and called her to Ever?

I uncross and recross my legs, clearing my throat. “I, uh—”

I expect Morgan to encourage me to continue, but she remains silent and focused.

Here goes. “Three human years ago, I was at an Anberlin concert in Seattle with some friends. It was New Year’s Eve.”

Morgan hisses in a breath, but now that I’m sharing this whole awful story, I want it out. It’s like a wound I can’t stop picking at, festering and festering away. I just need to lance it and deal with the consequences, dire as they may be.

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