Page 5 of Mane Squeeze
She turned.
Dominic was staring at her like she’d kicked his dog.
“What thehellwas that?” he growled, voice low and raw.
“That was Thaloryn,” she said, moving stiffly toward the broken runes. “High fae prince. My father’s former court rival. Slightly unhinged.”
“Slightly?!”
She winced. “He’s got a flair for dramatics. And curses, apparently.”
Dominic stepped closer. “Did youmeanto summon him?”
“No! I was trying to get answers—he knows things about the Moonlit Pact. About the shifts in the Whispering Woods.” Her jaw clenched. “He wasn’t supposed tocome through.”
“You always summon volatile fae princes without backup?”
She rounded on him. “I didn’t ask you to walk into the circle! What were you even doing back there?”
“I smelled something off,” he said. “I was checking it out.”
“Well, congratulations,” she snapped. “Now we’re cursed. Together.”
He muttered something under his breath and began pacing. “So, what does this ‘inescapable bond’ even mean?”
“I don’t know yet,” she said, which tasted like ash in her mouth. Shealwaysknew. That was the whole point of being who she was—studious, careful, methodical. But this? This had gone off the rails the moment he’d walked in.
And gods help her, part of her didn’t mind.
She glanced at him. Golden eyes. Thick, tousled hair. Muscles that had no business being that distracting. And even now, even furious and tense, he radiated heat and steadiness like a furnace.
Her heart hated her for noticing.
She rubbed her arms. “We need Hazel.”
“Great. Love a good cryptic prophecy.”
“And Twyla,” she added. “If anyone knows a workaround, it’s her.”
“You’re forgetting one thing,” he said.
“What?”
“We’re still locked in.”
Right. The door. Sealed by Thaloryn’s magic—or maybe her own miscast runes. Either way, they were stuck together. Trapped. With nothing but a failed summoning circle, the afterburn of cursefire, and an overwhelming urge to scream.
Lillith sighed and dropped into a chair. “This is going to be a disaster.”
Dominic sat across from her, arms crossed. “Worse. It’s going to beinteresting.”
3
DOMINIC
The first thing Dominic Kane noticed was the smell of rosemary.
The second was that he was wet.
