Page 128 of A Witch-ish Guide to Protectors and Pendulums

“Why do you have to be soyouand ruin something beautiful?”

“That sounds like a you problem. Nothing’s ruined on my end. Well, except that pu?—”

I slapped my hand over his mouth. “If you know what’s good for you, you won’t finish that sentence.”

Removing my hand, he kissed the palm. “I know what’s good for you and you love it when I finish.”

“I think we need to clean up. If I stay in here any longer, the world is gonna burn.”

Connor laughed even harder. “I’m not complaining.”

Oh, lord… I manifested a basin, water, and soap to clean myself up. Yes, it was difficult to do something so common in front of him, but he took pity on me and stepped up next to me to clean himself off rather than keep watching me, and he achieved his goal of settling me.

When we left the room, several sets of eyes found us, crinkling with humor. Okay, so they knew we’d been getting down and dirty in the other room. The fate of the world fell on my shoulders. It was a stressful position to hold. And yeah—it all sounded like excuses to me too. I just had to be okay with people knowing we’d knocked boots at what amounted to a highly inappropriate time. Privacy and leadership didn’t really mesh together.

I wandered over to Simeon and while my brother worked, I asked him, “Do you have a familiar?”

He shook his head slowly. “Had one. Ruby. She died right before Madi and I went underground. We hadn’t… become official yet,” he said, smirking at the memory. “Madi’d been checking something out, so we weren’t together. Ruby threwherself in the path of a demon blade that I’d never seen coming. She sacrificed herself to save me. Stupid thing is, I never knew what she was until she died. I thought she was just a raven that I’d fed and talked to while she ate. Stupid, right?”

“No. I had no idea about Mr. Pooches until a few days ago. But I haven’t seen him in a while and now I’m really worried about him.”

“I’m sure he’ll show up again.”

“He curled up on my lap every night after Jeffery’s death. He took care of me until I could take care of myself.”

“Pooches will show up,” Connor said, startling me. I didn’t realize he’d been listening.

If I’d known he was there, I wouldn’t have mentioned Jeffery. I turned sorry eyes on him. “I was just explaining why Mr. Pooches?—”

“It’s okay.”

My head jerked back. “What?”

“He ever get what we had in there?” Connor pointed back to the room.

Uh… I narrowed my eyes on him not understanding. “Did he ever get sex?”

“No babe. We got deep in there. We hadconnection.”

Oh, right. I got it. Jeffery and I had great sex over the years, no doubt. But no. “No,” I replied honestly. The universe gave me Connor and now it appeared that the jealousy portion of our newly mated bond hopped a bus to some other couple’s relationship. Connor draped his arms around me and I couldn’t help but notice the smug, ‘and that’s how it’s done’ look he shot to my brother.

“Don’t you love it when they’re docile,” Simeon said and without even lifting my head, I let go of Connor’s waist, rearing my arm back to punch Sim in the gut. Hard.

“You know what’s good for you, Baghest, you won’t answer that,” I taunted Connor, but I taunted him sweetly.

“I ever hear that again, Lamia, you’ll beg for a quick death.” At first, I thought Madigan was talking to me and come on—Sim deserved it. But I realized she’d been talking to my brother when she said, “As useful as it is to me, I will rip your dick from your body, cram it down your throat, and laugh while you choke slowly to death on the impressive meat stick.”

Ew. I didn’t need to know that my brother had an ‘impressive meat stick,’ but good for Madigan. You know, girl camaraderie and all that.

Speaking of meat sticks, though, I decided that my brother and his mate should get one more time to bump uglies before the world completely turned on its head. “Sim, how’s it going?”

He pointed to the pot simmering over the fire at the hearth. “I’m just waiting for the brew to reduce enough.”

“There’s a special room in back. I think you and Madigan should check it out while we have a little downtime.” I pointed my thumb behind me.

Simeon raised his eyebrow. “Sister, I like the way you think.” He grabbed Madigan’s hand, leading her to the back of the archives.

“I know why you did that,” Connor said low.

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