Dark Witch (The Cousins O'Dwyer Trilogy #1)(81)

“I won’t argue. It’s different for everyone, isn’t it? Love, magick, and how we see and deal. And in each, the choices we make. I’ll only say you’ve had but a short time here, and with him, to think of love and the choices that go with it.”

“I knew the minute I saw him. Maybe that was a kind of vision. I don’t know. But I felt this flutter.” She pressed a hand to her belly. “And this rising.” Slid her hand to her heart. “Attraction, I told myself, because he looked so amazing riding in on Alastar. But it was more. I told myself I couldn’t go there because, well, at first I thought he was with Meara.”

She lifted her eyebrows when Connor let out a laughing snort.

“I don’t know why that’s so funny. They’re gorgeous together. Tall and fit and stunning. And they have this connection—it was clear from the start.”

“Sure like Branna and me, for they’re as close as brother and sister, and never been otherwise. But you thought they were more, so you pushed aside what you felt or might have felt. That’s to your credit. Not all would do the same. I’m wondering if I would myself.”

“Love at first sight’s a fairy tale,” Branna said, firmly.

“I love fairy tales.” With a laugh, Iona propped her elbows on the table, her face on her fists. “I decided it was just attraction, and okay once Meara set me straight. I decided I just wanted to sleep with him, but I’ve never felt what I feel for him. And I know what it is, and I know it started when I saw him riding up on Alastar, both of them so fierce and furious. I fell for both of them right then and there. I’m trying to be patient, which isn’t my nature at all. Alastar figured out he loved me. Now I just have to wait for Boyle to figure it out.”

“You’re confident he will?” Branna asked her.

“You can’t just hope for happy endings. You have to believe in them. Then do the work, take the risks. Slay the dragon—though I really think dragons get a bad rap—kiss the princess, or the frog, defeat the bad witch.”

“Well defeating the bad witch is happy ending enough for me.”

It shouldn’t be, Iona thought, but Connor gave her hand a little squeeze before she said it.

“I’ve things to see to, but later on, after dinner,” Branna continued, “we’ll practice again. Connor can help you with the visions, the healing. The solstice comes closer every day, and there’s still work to be done.”

“You have an idea what to do?”

“You said Boyle hurt him, in a dream, and with only a fist. We can do better than a fist.”

“I’ve got to go back to the school, check on some hatchlings. But I’ll be home within the hour.”

“I’ll walk with you,” Iona told Connor. “I’d like to give Alastar some exercise, even if it’s just around the jumps course.”

“Then I’ll come back by, walk home with you.”

“I can probably get a ride, but if not, I’ll text you.”

“Fine then, go off with both of you, give me some thinking time.” Branna pushed back from the table. “You said Fin was to do a protection charm for Boyle’s bed. Make sure he has before the two of you make use of it again.”

“Okay.”

“The next time you, or any of us, go into a dream, I want it to be a choice, and us doing the pulling in.”





16





IONA CHANGED INTO RIDING BOOTS, AND TOOK TEN SECONDS to put on some lip gloss in case she ran into Boyle. They both had obligations that evening—his paperwork, her spell casting—but she hoped to talk him into a ride after work the next day, maybe a casual dinner out, then a cozy night in, at his place.

Outside, she hooked her arm through Connor’s. The air might have blown cool and damp, but spring rode with it and nudged the blackthorn into bloom.

“Have you ever been in love?” she asked him.

“Sure countless times, and never the way you mean. Though my heart’s been bruised and bumped, never has it been broken.”

“I had the bumps, too, and some bruises. When I was in high school, I actively wished for actual heartache, just to know what it felt like. I always wanted those big feelings, you know? The rush and the fall. What I got was mostly even ground. Settling for someone I knew was settling for me. It makes you feel forever mediocre.”

“And now?”

“Now I feel powerful, purposeful.” She circled her fingers, made tiny lights dance. “Joyful.”

“And all look good on you.”

“Do you want to? Fall in love?”

“Sure one day. She’ll walk into the room, beautiful and brilliant, a sexual goddess with the mind of a scholar and an angel’s temperament. She’ll cook like my aunt Fiona, who can’t be equaled in the kitchen, match me pint for pint at the pub, and like little better than to go hawking with me.”

“You don’t ask much.”

His eyes, green as the moss, twinkled at her. “Why not ask for all, as you never know what life’s going to hand you?”

“Good point,” she said, and made another dance of lights.


*


IN THE STABLES BOYLE BRUSHED DARLING AS MUCH TO soothe himself as to groom her. He’d sent his stable hands home a bit early, as he’d coveted a little time alone. Now, with the sweet mare for company in the quiet stables, he could roll through all the things crowding his mind.