Page 3 of Wildfire Witch

“You’re right. It was a huge mistake,”I said.

That didn’t explain why Seth immediately thought I’d committed arson. But if he truly had a pinch of fae blood, he could save my ass. “My manager and at least one customer saw. They’re out there right now, waiting for medical attention.” I answered him honestly.

“Point them out to me in a moment.” Seth was busy unscrewing a pot half full of ointment. “This is the good stuff, blessed by a green witch and everything.”

I let him take my hand and slather it in a generous coating. The magic within the cloudy paste went to work, cooling the blistered skin, and I let out a small sigh of relief. He wrapped my wound in a bandage.

With him bent over me, I suddenly felt a little self-conscious. “Thanks. It’s not every day I meet another witch.” Most hung out in various supernatural cities across the states, but my instincts, influenced by past lives, screamed for me to stay away from those locations. “I’m Nix.”

“Nix?” he repeated, surprised.

Well, that was a weird response. Usually if someone had a question about my name, they were asking if my parents were mythology buffs. But Seth seemed like he was expecting me to say something else.

Someone opened one of the truck’s rear doors. Standing there was a firefighter who’d stripped off his helmet and loosened his protective mask to wear it like a heavy necklace. The humming in my chest began again, and I pressed my fingertips over my heart to get it to stop.

“At last,” he said in a delighted tone. There were tears shining in his eyes as he took me in. “My Verity.”

Who the fu…

My eyes widened and flames crackled in my ears. I barely heard Seth say, “She’s panicking. Good going, Cer.”

Verity. I recognized it. That was my name, many lives ago. Maybe the original one, whispered over me back when I’d had a family to love and no phoenix trapped within me.

Just like that, this stranger had taken a missing piece of my lives and slotted it back into place. It was a gift, a bit of my identity back. “Who are you?” I asked with hushed awe.

The joyous expression he wore dimmed, brow pinching with confusion. He climbed into the truck with us, further crowding the small space. When we were shut in together, his features blurred like a heat mirage. I gaped. Seth’s little trick with the sparkles didn’t hold a flame to the glamor of the full-blooded fae who revealed himself.

And he was…gorgeous. Handsome in a way a human man could hardly compare to, flawlessly masculine to the point that he was nearly pretty. His skin tone was icy, with full, pale lips set in an angular face. Lengthy, pointed ears emerged from a head full of blue-tinged silver curls.

Though his irises gleamed like polished nickels, there was darkness there, hidden depths I could’ve gotten lost in, if it weren’t for his answer to the question I’d promptly forgotten upon his surprise transformation. “I am Ceridor Farrick of the Wind Court.” His voice was reminiscent of a breeze, refreshing to my fire-stung ears. “And your husband, Verity. You don’t remember me?”

NIX

In all my lives,I doubted I’d been dumb stricken quite as thoroughly as the moments after Ceridor’s surprise statement. Myhusband? And the way he was looking at me…his silvery eyes soft with affection. I could believe he knew me, and had lingering feelings for the past version of me he’d married.

When my mind caught up, my gaze darted to Seth, who seemed entirely unsurprised by what was going on. He might’ve been excited, actually, but his expression shifted to a touch of jealousy with a tightened jaw and a flash of his perfect teeth.

What the hell? Where were the hidden cameras and why weren’t they shouting that this was just a prank?

I decided to laugh it off and see if this fae man could produce any more evidence that he knew me. After all, he could be a member of the Fire Brotherhood and engaging in a new tactic to get me to let my guard down, so he could kidnap me and earn the bounty on my head. In that case, Seth was definitely his partner in crime.

With a forced chuckle I barely strangled out of my lungs, I said, “I think you have me mistaken for someone else. My name is Nix. If I had a husband?—”

“Nix,” Ceridor interrupted. “Short for phoenix, I presume?”

He could still be a fire bro. All of them know about my phoenix.

“How is Aodhnait doing?” he asked, sounding like he cared.

She hummed loudly in approval. The sound filled the truck’s enclosed space and provided the only answer she could give on her own.“Ours,”she stated. What had gotten into her?

“Pretty great,” I answered dryly. I eyed the exit, blocked by their bulk, and that made me feel vulnerable. “Well gents, this has been…interesting, but I smell like spilled coffee and burned electronics, so if you’ll excuse me. A cold shower is calling my name.”

“No, don’t run away from him,”Aodhnait practically whined.

Arching a blue and white brow, Ceridor said, “I shall accompany you to your home.”

“I’ll clean up here,” Seth volunteered. They exchanged a glance and the fae nodded his approval.

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