The Ex Hex (Ex Hex #1)(39)

Rhys would be totally fair if he blamed her, but instead, he was trying to make her feel better.

That was also just deeply unfair.

“Mate!” he said brightly into the phone, posture tense even as his voice was all charm and ease. “Heard you’ve run into a sticky wicket.”

Sticky wicket? she mouthed at him, and he rolled his eyes, shrugging as he shifted in his chair.

“No, no, not a problem at all,” Rhys was saying even as he was frantically searching her desk for something.

Vivi handed him a pad and pen, and he gave her a thumbs-up as he leaned down to scribble across the pad.

“I can absolutely get that all sorted for you, not a problem.”

For the next ten minutes, Vivi sat at her desk and watched as Rhys somehow transformed from the louche, carefree charmer she knew into the most competent man on the planet.

Phone calls were made. Notes were written out. More phone calls, and then several emails. At one point, he rolled up his sleeves and sat there across from her, phone pressed to his ear, elbows resting on his widely spread thighs, and Vivi nearly swooned.

When he was finally done with all his calls and emails and texts and who knew what else, Rhys flopped back against the chair, slouching so low that his head rested against the back of it, and Vivi did not take a flying leap from her chair to straddle his lap, which really showed a lot of restraint on her part, she thought.

Still, something must have shown in her face because he looked at her curiously.

“What?”

Shaking her head, Vivi cleared her throat and reached for the least sexy thing she could think of, a copy of her syllabus.

“Nothing.”





Chapter 17




“A ghost,” Gwyn said, looking back over her shoulder at Vivi. They were at Something Wicked, but Gwyn had hung up the closed sign as soon as Vivi walked in, and was now restocking the shelves of leather journals and grimoires.

Nodding, Vivi leaned her elbows on the counter. “A ghost.”

“The Casper kind.”

Vivi shook her head. “Way scarier than that, trust me.”

As briefly as she could, she told Gwyn about what had happened at the library, adding, “But the bigger problem—”

“There’s a bigger problem than a freaking ghost?”

“Mmm-hmm. The college witches are involved now.”

Now it was Gwyn’s turn to roll her eyes. “Those weirdos.”

The witches who worked at Penhaven had always kept themselves apart from Vivi and her family, probably because most of them were transplants, and, Vivi suspected, because they didn’t like the store. Lord knew they’d never set foot in it. They were too serious, too academic about magic for that sort of thing.

Their loss, Vivi thought as she studied a pile of crystals heaped on purple velvet there on the counter. “Anyway, they want us to ‘fix this,’ which, I mean, same.”

Gwyn snorted. “Tell them about the curse. You’ll have a fifty-page paper on curses by next week, but probably no actual solution.”

“Rhys said we were being snobs.”

Gwyn hooted at that. “Oh my god, a Penhallow Witch Boy calling anyone a snob is rich as fuck. And tell him they were rude to my mom first.”

“I tried,” Vivi said, “but I didn’t want to actually get into all of it, you know? The less Rhys and I talk, the better.”

She didn’t add that when they weren’t talking, they were kissing, which was a problem all its own.

Vivi honestly couldn’t believe it had happened at all. Even now, it seemed like a dream, or like something that had happened to someone else. Surely she hadn’t been so completely stupid as to make out with Rhys as . . . what? A dare? A bet?

This is why she’d ended up in this whole situation in the first place. She was normally a completely rational and calm person, and Rhys Penhallow made her totally lose her mind. Which is why they had to break the curse and send him on his way as soon as possible before she did something truly nuts like sleep with him.

Again.

Gwyn finished her arranging and turned around, brushing her hands off on her thighs. “Well,” she started, “Mom is gonna be thrilled—”

She broke off suddenly, staring hard at Vivi.

“What?”

Narrowing her eyes, Gwyn leaned over the counter, getting closer. “Vivienne Jones. What happened with you and Rhys today?”

“Nothing,” Vivi immediately said, but the fact that she could literally feel herself turn pink didn’t exactly back her up.

And Gwyn knew it. Squealing, she clapped her hands. “Did you bang him in your office?”

“What? No!”

“In the library?”

“No,” Vivi said, pushing off the counter and suddenly taking a lot of interest in the display of tarot cards. “There was zero banging.”

Which was true. She and Rhys hadn’t done anything more than kiss. Technically.

But if they hadn’t been interrupted?

Vivi had never been one for sex in public, but she’d forgotten that Rhys could make her feel like that, like she’d die if she didn’t have him right that second. Like her skin was too tight, and his was too far away, like she wanted to crawl inside him.

And that’s why he was dangerous. She’d forgotten herself once with him, and look what had happened.