Page 29 of Hooked on a Witch
“It’s too deep after the recent rain.”
“Maybe it is, maybe it’s not. Depth can be varied.”
She liked his closeness and the heat of his breath on her cheek. She glanced up, far too aware of him. Put her in heels and she’d reach his chin. His essence seeped deep into her lungs. He smelled of danger and…something mesmerizing. Her heart, already pounding, went into a bongo rhythm. Wrong time. Definitely the wrong place for attraction to kick in.
Do not stare at him.
The slashes of his eyebrows drew low. “We have to get out of here. We’ll have to run for it. Better cover for us in the darker forest.”
She blinked a few times to break her fixation. He hadn’t unwound his arm from her waist. The gentleness of his touch was at odds with the threat in his stance. Something hot and dangerous glimmered in his blue gaze, which cried out to her.
“Pray to whatever you believe in that they don’t send the snakes.”
“Snakes? I hate snakes.” She shivered.
He grabbed her hand and dragged her into a sprint. Bark exploded around them. Must be suppressed gunfire since she hadn’t heard the expected crack of a gunshot. A glance up saw six small knives lodged deep into the tree bark. Not bullets.
Merck shifted positions, pushing her in front of him. A few paces later he stepped on her heel, catching the back of her sandal. She stumbled. He slammed into her back. Her side whacked against the rough bark of a tree.
“Sorry,” he grumbled, catching her before she nose-planted into a new tree.
Yelling echoed from behind them in a foreign language she didn’t understand.
She refused to stop. She fixed her shoe, grabbed his hand, and pulled hard.
Something burned into her back and side. She stumbled again and hit the ground, her face landing on wet leaves and pine needles. He fell to his knees next to her, clutching his side.
“The snakes are here,” he announced.
Her neck hair stood on end as the air around them cooled. She scanned the terrain for movement, snagging on something in the shadows near a tree. A serpent the size and look of an adult cottonmouth slithered their way. Her nightmare—chased by a cottonmouth. It’d happened when she’d been about ten or eleven. They were vindictive snakes that didn’t run from people, at least not in this area.
“Don’t let them strike you.” He jumped up and kicked the closest slithering serpent against a tree. Its thick body fell, unmoving. Dead? Or stunned?
She froze when the mother of all snakes reared up in front of her face poised to strike. The creature was anaconda gigantic. The opaque fangs oozed clear fluid. Time went into slo-mo. She could hear it breathing and see the coiled base tense.
In a whirl, Merck tossed his knife at the snake. It fell, decapitated.
Her back screamed as if she’d been bitten. She twisted to find two knives lodged deep into her skin. Her heart rate soared as she tugged and seesawed them out, which hurt. Wow, it hurt.
Merck darted around the perimeter of the small clearing in which they’d fallen. She couldn’t see what he was doing, but suddenly he pivoted and tucked a small vial into his shirt pocket. “That should keep at least the snakes away for a while.”
“What was that?”
“Special potion.” He squinted toward the house and scowled. “Shit.”
He retrieved his knife and dove for another snake, cutting its head, and landed on his side a few feet from her.
“They’re resistant to the deter potion. Damn it.” The pain hazing his gaze indicated probable knife hits, maybe a snake and who knows what else. Him dying wasn’t an option. He had to be the person who’d help her, the one her mother referred with her dying breath.
She curled her small hand around his. “Please don’t die. I think I need your help. I think that’s why I’m here.”
“I am helping you. I’ll distract them. Go wherever you go when you Pleiades witches disappear.” He wiped debris off her face.
“How do you know that I can…”Jump dimensions?she added silently.She should leave. She could pop away to her alternate dimension and, even though she hadn’t tried it since she got her magical powers, she was guaranteed to arrive somewhere not surrounded by demonic snakes and whatever else was coming for them. Her chest jerked at the thought of leaving without Merck.
His eyelids drifted closed for a moment.
She shook him. “Don’t you dare pass out or die on me. You have to help me or the world will end.”
