Her Soul to Take (Souls Trilogy #1)(41)

As much as I’d wanted to, I couldn’t kill him, nor could I kill his son Benjamin when Morpheus passed the grimoire and the amulet on to him. I had remained captive, over a century in service to the same family as they grew in power, largely thanks to me.

“His family’s cult,” Rae murmured, her eyes wide in the dark. “You’re talking about the God, right? The monster in the mine?” She shook her head. “That’s a stupid story told to scare children. The only cult members in Abelaum are edgy teenagers who want to hang around in St. Thaddeus and pretend they’re communing with some old god while they trip on acid.” She scoffed. “Come on. I literally research this stuff for fun. I’m not scared by Abelaum’s personal Creepypasta.”

I laughed. “Fine. Don’t believe it. Kent is obsessed with keeping that church from being torn down and the mine shafts from being sealed because he’s just really invested in the town’s history. Victoria and Jeremiah want to be friends with you so badly because they’re just such good, kind people.” I brushed past her, walking on toward her house. I could feel her glare on the back of my head.

“What exactly are you even trying to say?” she snapped, jogging to keep up with me. “If Kent believes there’s a God in the mine, so what? Is he planning to make all of Abelaum drink the Kool-Aid? Is he going to try to recruit me to the cause?”

“Not recruit you,” I said. “Sacrifice you.”

She laughed, but she sounded nervous now. “Right, okay. The Hadleighs are all members of a cult that practices human sacrifice and I’m their next victim. Oh, please.” She would have sounded more determined if her voice wasn’t shaking with cold. “Your ploy for my soul won’t work. I’ll survive without your deal just fine, thank you very much.”

“Says the girl who was just fucked by a demon.”

“You don’t get to hold that over my head.” She tossed back her hair, chin up proudly. “A woman should never be ashamed of wanting sexual pleasure for herself.”

“No, she shouldn’t be.” We had turned onto the dirt road that led toward her cabin. The crickets were unnervingly quiet, setting me on edge. “But a woman should consider her best options when she’s flung herself down a rabbit hole of magic and monsters.”

“I am considering my options,” she said, her voice so drenched in confidence I knew she was faking. “Selling my soul isn’t one of them. You can get your grimoire, leave, and I’ll figure this out alone.”

The cabin was just ahead, the windows warmly lit from within. I wondered if she left lights on because she was forgetful, or because she liked seeing the glow when she came home in the dark. She was silent for a few moments, then said softly, “So, do I need to take a Plan B or something? You know…” She motioned at her skirt. It reminded me that her panties were still lying back there in the graveyard, and I suddenly, desperately wanted to lift her up and consume her again until she screamed.

I resisted.

“Unless you’re a full-blooded witch, you have nothing to fear,” I said. “I could come inside you again and again without consequences.”

Her face reddened, and a little saunter came back into my step as we came up to the cabin’s front porch. I frowned as her motion-activated light flicked on, illuminating a white and orange cat sitting just above the steps.

The crickets were so quiet.

The night was so still.

Something wasn’t right.

“Cheesecake?” The confusion is her voice was evident as she scooped up the cat from the porch. The feline mewled, and rubbed his head against her chin before giving me a slow blink. “What are you doing outside, buddy?”

Alarm had already set in for me, and it took only a few more seconds for her. With the light on, she could now see that her front door was ajar, the curtain billowing softly in the breeze.

“I locked that,” she said softly, clutching the cat to her chest. “I closed it, I know I did.”

I was in front of her before she could blink, putting my body between her and the open door. I peered into the house, sniffing the air, listening. If whoever had broken in was still there, I’d rip them to pieces before they touched her.

She pressed a little closer behind me, peering around me. Her scent was all over this place, mingled with the smell of the forest creatures that had passed through the yard, and the cat in her arms. But there was something else, too: something soft but deeply sweet, rich as caramel.

A witch. A witch had been here.

And there was only one witch I knew of in Abelaum: Everly.

I straightened slowly, the tension going out of me.

“What is it?” Rae said, her voice cracking in alarm. “What happened? Is someone in there?”

“Not anymore,” I said, stepping aside from the door. “A human was here, but they’re gone now.”

“What the hell?” She brushed past me, moving cautiously as she put her cat down on the kitchen table and continued on into the living room beyond. The cat, however, had no interest in staying inside. He bounded back out onto the porch and sat again, staring curiously into the woods with his tail twitching. “Someone went through my things! There’s papers everywhere, they even opened my boxes!”

Worry began to knot inside my chest. Why the hell had the witch been here? What did she want? Everly wasn’t like her father. From what I’d observed, she was as much his captive as I had been. Her mother had been the same: bound to Kent by love and the shared blood in their child. Kent protected Everly with the same possessive obsession one would protect a prized weapon, and without the grimoire, she was his greatest weapon now. The fact that she had come here alone was strange.