Page 54 of Forged

“Ritual?” Nick’s mum asked. She turned to him with a demanding look. “You’re engaging in crude rituals now? And you’re involving my grandchildren?”

“Mum, no!” Nick shouted, losing his patience. “It’s just a service, like any other religious service. It’s to honor something higher than us.”

“If this is the sort of thing you expect me to allow you to expose my grandchildren to then you are gravely mistaken, Nicholas,” his mum said, practically quivering with upset. “I’ve let this madness go on long enough. You’ve fallen prey to this viper’s charms.” She threw out an arm toward Bax, which gave Macy the opening she needed to squirm so much Nick’s mum was forced to put her down. “I will not let this continue,” she went right on with her rant as she straightened.

“I’m a grown man, Mum,” Nick told her, trying not to shout as Macy toddled over to him and threw her arms around his leg. “You don’t get a say in who I love or what I do.”

“You’ve been corrupted by this family’s wickedness,” his mum raged on. “I knew there was something wrong with Raina Hawthorne when you first brought her home. I should never have let your relationship with that outrageous woman continue.”

“I beg your pardon?” Rhys demanded, stepping forward to defend his sister.

“Raina was the very best of us,” Robbie also came to her defense.

The rest of the Hawthornes looked mutinous as well.

Nick’s mum barked a laugh. “I can believe that. I can believe it because I have the evidence of how maniacal this entire family is standing right in front of me.” She waved a hand over the collected mass of Hawthornes as though dismissing them all.

“I invited you to join us for this celebration because I thought you might learn something from it,” Nick said, raising his voice. “You’ve done nothing but interfere and criticize since you got here. If you’re going to have an attitude like that, then you can just leave. This is Bax’s day, Bax’s celebration, and all I want to do is make it nice for him.”

“You want to appease your wicked lover you mean,” Nick’s mum seethed, glaring at Nick then at Bax, then back to Nick again. “I consider it my sacred duty to rescue you from this, Nicholas. I will not rest until you see how despicable these people are and until you leave them and come home where you belong.”

“You can’t tell me what to do,” Nick shouted, simultaneously furious and embarrassed, and feeling like an absolute child himself.

It didn’t help that his shouting upset both Macy and Jordan. His babies burst into tears, which had all of the Hawthornes upset as well.

Nick bent to pick up Macy, but his mum tried to race in and get her before him.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he demanded, grabbing Macy first, then taking a step back.

“I’m taking the children,” she said, going after Jordan when she saw she wasn’t going to get Macy. “I’m taking them home with me so they won’t be influenced by this madhouse anymore.”

Rhys was close enough to pick up Jordan and move him out of Nick’s mum’s way, but that tiny victory was immediately overshadowed.

“Enough!” Bax shouted, holding out his hands. “I’ve had just about enough of this. I wanted to find a coven to celebrate my faith with, but this is ridiculous. This isn’t what I want at all, none of it! It’s too much. Can’t I just have thirty seconds of peace to practice my faith and be who I am?”

It might have sounded like his question was directed at everyone, or even just Nick’s mum. Nick felt Bax’s outburst like it hit him square in the chest, though. They locked eyes, and Nick saw the frustration and hopelessness in Bax’s soul. He was losing him. He was losing the best thing to happen to him since his babies were born.

As if to prove that, Bax broke eye contact and turned to go. Nick caught his breath and jerked forward as if he could stop him. He froze, though, when Bax stormed past Raina’s unicorn statue. As he walked past, his foot caught on the rope attached to the front of the cart the others had used to roll the sculpture into the garden. Bax was angry enough that he pulled hard in an attempt to free his foot.

The entire cart lurched. The sculpture teetered. Everyone seemed to gasp or hold their breath. Nally was quick enough to dart out of the way as the unicorn unbalanced entirely and went tumbling, smashing down over the altar table with a sickening crash.

SEVENTEEN

As soon asBax felt the twist and tug in his ankle as he tried to free his foot from the rope he knew he was in trouble. He watched in what felt like slow motion as the wagon holding Nick’s unicorn sculpture, which had been accidentally parked on a broken and unstable part of the garden path, tipped and then spilled, sending the statue tumbling right onto the table.

The sound was horrible, like crumpling aluminum foil and splintering wood magnified by a thousand. The snacks he’d placed on the table scattered, the flowers were crushed, and he was pretty sure the glass goblet he’d intended to use for the Ostara ritual shattered. Bax didn’t care about any of that, though. His eyes went wide and his stomach dropped at the sight of months of Nick’s hard work twisting, bending, and snapping as the unicorn hit the ground.

“Oh God, no!” Nally called out, rushing forward like he could do something to stop the carnage.

It was futile. The damage had already been done. As the proverbial dust and the actual debris settled, a sickening silence fell over the lot of them.

Bax glanced at Nick, dreading what he would see. There were no words for the guilt that sliced through him, like the jagged, broken edges of the ruined statue in front of him.

Nick had gone completely white. He stared at the destroyed altar and his broken unicorn with wide, disbelieving eyes. The only thing that knocked him out of the moment of horror was Macy writhing and crying in his arms.

Nick moved slowly to comfort and settle her. Bax watched him suck in a breath and rub her back before he raised his eyes and met Bax’s.

Instead of the fury and bitterness Bax expected to see there, Nick’s expression was blank. Completely blank. Like he didn’t know what to do or think or feel anymore. It hurt far worse than ordinary anger would have.

---