Page 54 of Midnight Witch

The dragon bell was quivering on the windowsill.

Mrs. Son-Ha frowned. “Someone just crossed the barrier around the house.”

Vlad rose, demonic energy flaring in his pupils.

The old woman waved a dismissive hand at him. “How about you put away the creepy glowing eyes? It’s unlikely to be an enemy. The barrier wouldn’t have let them through.”

Mae recognized the cores of the pair climbing the steps to the porch. She tensed when she detected a different energy behind them. “Oh.”

“What?” Nikolai said guardedly.

The doorbell rang. Mrs. Son-Ha shuffled out of the kitchen and returned a moment later with Violet and Miles.

Jared entered the room behind them.

Brimstone growled and straightened off the floor. Nikolai stood up and joined Vlad as the incubus stepped protectively in front of Mae. Alicia narrowed her eyes at the Immortal.

Mae had told them what had happened in the basement at the army facility on Staten Island.

Violet and Miles blinked when they registered the battery of hostile stares being aimed at Jared.

“What’s the matter?” Violet asked, confused.

Trixie rubbed her nose uneasily with her paws where she perched on the witch’s shoulder.

Jared’s expression turned awkward as he met Mae’s gaze. He scratched the back of his head. “Hey.”

Mae relaxed. She couldn’t feel the wrongness she’d detected inside him back on Staten Island.

“Looks like you’re back to your normal self,” she told the Immortal.

Nikolai jerked around. “You broke the mirage spell he was under?!”

“What?!” Violet lowered her brows accusingly at Jared. “You were influenced by the spell too?”

“But—how come?” Miles blurted out. “We presumed you wouldn’t be!”

A heavy sigh left Jared. “Look, it’s not as if I could help it, okay?”

“The two of you have spent more time with your friends in Chicago than he has,” Mae told Violet and Miles. “It’s the divine power you’ve absorbed from them that protected you from losing your memories.”

Violet and Miles exchanged a stunned look.

“How did you get rid of the mirage magic affecting Jared?” Violet mumbled.

“Severworked on him.” Mae forestalled the question bubbling on the witch’s lips with a grimace. “But only because he’s an Immortal. It wouldn’t work on anyone else.”

Violet visibly drooped.

“How did you two even meet?” A suspicious frown wrinkled Miles’s brow as he looked from Jared to Mae. “Wait. Did something happen? There was a lot of activity at the Boston coven just before we left the place.”

Mae made a face. “It’s a long story.”

Nikolai and Vlad helped Mrs. Son-Ha prepare dinner while Mae brought Violet and Miles up to speed on what had happened when they’d visited Marblehead Neck and their subsequent arrest.

Jared grew pale the more he listened. “Shit. I turned a gunship on you?!”

“To be fair, you did try to stop it.” Mae watched him closely. “You don’t remember any of it?”

---