Page 94 of Spit

I was usually a light sleeper, but being with Sev in my dreams had made it difficult to wake.

It wouldn’t be hard to inject me with something to stop my demon magic—the coven was a collection of magical women, and I was sure they had a whole arsenal of tricks up their sleeves.

Once the witches had gotten me out of the house and across the lawn, I’d been dumped in the forest in the dark while the women watched me, eerily waiting.

I didn’t have to wait long before the guest of honor arrived.

Katalina.

I shouldn’t have been surprised, but I was. I thought that we had put our hostilities behind us. We had shared a moment of friendship.

Katalina Dubois stepped forward; her face was in shadow under the blood-red cloak covering her body and most of her hair. She gave me a look that held no emotion before turning to the crowd of witches in the darkness.

“This woman. Alexis Boudaire is not who she claims to be.” Katalina declared. “She’s a spy for Magicktek. She’s attempting to seduce Legion.”

My brow furrowed, but I couldn’t say a word because of the gag in my mouth.Who the what now?

Ashley, one of the other witches, stepped forward. “What do you want us to do?”

Katalina looked down at me, her smile unnaturally wide, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “Don’t worry. I have a plan.”

I had allowed this to go on long enough.

It was insulting enough that the witches thought that I was weak. I mean, they had kidnapped me from my bed when I was vulnerable.

I was awake now.

One of the first things I learned in my martial arts classes was how to get out of restraints. It was the first thing I taught people I was going to protect.

My wrists were fastened by zip ties in front of me; they hadn’t even bothered to put my hands behind my back—amateurs.

Zip ties were brilliant for restraining people, but they would snap if you managed to get enough force behind them. I lifted my arms when Katalina’s back was turned, and her weird sermon was in full swing. I brought up my knee and brought my wrists down with one sharp movement. The plastic bit into my skin before giving way and snapping in two.

I stood up, reaching up to take out my gag. “You interrupted a really good dream.” I groused.

Katalina whirled around, throwing a spell on instinct. The bright sparks broke in front of me and melted to nothing.

“Good to know that whatever you did to me didn’t actually remove my null magic,” I said as I brushed a leaf from my shoulder. “What do you ladies want to do about that?” I glared at them.

“Get her!” Katalina shouted, rushing forward. Her eyes were manic. “We can’t let her get to Legion!”

Dozens of spells rose and came at me, and if I wasn’t on the receiving end, I would have been impressed by the speed of their casting. Instead, I watched as their spells extinguished as if being doused in water the moment before they reached me.

I ducked and dove, hating that I couldn’t feel my shadow. Hating that the demonic magic that clung to me like a safety net was gone.

When the witches realized their magic wasn’t getting anywhere, I expected them to come at me with a physical fight—but that would have been too easy.

Instead, I heard the snap of a gun and a bolt of pain in the back of my thigh.

Then everything went dark.

I woke up in a car and felt the vehicle screeching to a stop, allowing my unconscious body to roll into the footwell.

The scratchy fabric scored my cheek, and I kept my eyes closed and my mouth slack in hopes that whoever rode in the car would reveal a hint of where we were.

Legion’s limo smelled like green apples, mainly because of the air freshener that Timkin kept on the rearview mirror, but my kidnapper’s car stank of old fast food and feet.

The driver's side door opened and slammed shut a moment later. My wrists and legs were bound. Whatever drug they had pumped into my system was still present, and I wanted to vomit. My head swam, and I didn’t even have the energy to roll over in the small space I had been given.

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