Page 44 of Enslaved

I’ve driven off Main Street before I remember Briar was saying something. “What makes you think that?”

She sighs. “Oh, just that there’s nothing in the bag.”

I slow down to glare at her. “Of course there is. The white flower. We watched them put it in there.”

“Yes,” she admits, “but Delphine has a minor ability with air, and she could have made it blow out while we weren’t looking, or maybe Dahlia started a fire so hot that it wouldn’t leave any ash behind.”

The longer Briar talks, the more my anger builds, so I wrench the wheel to the right. Once I’ve parked on the side of the road with the engine still running, I hold my hand out for the bag.

She places it in my palm.

I tip it over. When nothing falls out, I come dangerously close to losing control of my wolf. “Those...” I struggle to find the right words. “Bitchyfuckingwitches.”

Briar snort-giggles. “What?”

“We’re going back.” After tossing the bag into her lap, I swing the truck around, already visualizing all the ways I’m going to tear the three witches apart, starting with the tall one with the venomous tongue.

Briar, likely sensing my rising fury, doesn’t say a word.

I park outside the antique shop next door, because if the witches take one look at my face, they’ll run. And there’s no fucking way I’m letting them do that.

“Um, Keane—”

I shove the truck door open. “Get out.”

Briar gets out.

I’ve just rounded the front of the truck, my eyes connecting with the tall witch through the shop window, when a wall of heat smashes into me, blowing me off my feet.

I fly back, hitting the ground hard.What the fuck?My ears ring as I blink to clear my vision. A moment later, a secondary explosion sends something hurtling toward me.

Beside me, Briar groans in pain.

I roll over her, grunting when the thing smacks me on the back of the head.

Briar gazes up at me, her brow furrowed.

“You know,” I grunt as my shifter healing kicks in and my pain melts away, “you could’ve waited until we got the flower before blowing the shop up.”

Her frown deepens. “It wasn’t me.” She pauses. “At least, I don’t think so. I didn’t feel anything.”

“What do you mean, you didn’t—”

“Oh no.” From a few feet away, a woman’s anguished moan draws my attention.

I lift my head and take in a young woman with long dirty blonde hair, wearing a navy belted dress, who stares at the flower shop with her hand covering her mouth.

Behind her, a door stands half-open, but it’s not the only one. People—witches, tourists, and locals—pour out into the street from the Bed & Breakfast and the still-closed shops.

Briar shoves at my chest, and I get to my feet as she scrambles to hers. “Rose?”

The woman jerks her head to face us. Fear bleeds into her eyes at the sight of Briar as she takes a quick step back.

Briar takes another toward her. “It wasn’t me. I didn’t—”

My eyes scan the witches standing in the street. Their attention isn’t on the blown-out remains of the still-smoky flower shop, but on Briar, and it’s clear what they must be thinking. The same thing I did.

I grip Briar’s shoulder and tow her toward the truck, which, thankfully looks like it’s survived with only a few dents. “Time to get out of here.”

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