Not Your Ex's Hexes (Supernatural Singles, #2)
April Asher
To every princess who
really wanted to be the witch …
go for it.
Prologue
Snatch & Grab
Each close encounter chipped away at Rose Maxwell’s luck like a pickax through melted butter. By her rough estimate, she had two more run-ins before her well officially ran dry, and she was not letting that happen.
She swerved through the Potion’s Up crowd, more determined than ever before to ditch the tail that was hot on her witchy behind. But Christina Maxwell—aka her mother—must have downed a Rejuvenation Potion, or at the very least, a Red Bull. Because she was atypically fast on her feet for someone wearing three-inch spiked platform heels for most of the day.
Rose had hoped she’d push pause on her matchmaking nonsense at her sister Vi’s Bonding Announcement Party, but that dream had been dashed with the introduction of Potential Suitor Number One, and then reaffirmed with the not-so-coincidental arrival of Potential Suitor Number Two.
She wasn’t hanging around long enough to find out if there was a third. A relationship—especially one initiated by her mother—was the last thing she needed. During the last matchup, she very nearly ended up Mated and Bonded—for eternity—to a narcissistic tiger shifter who’d made it his mission to hijack her sister’s happily ever after.
She hadn’t dodged the shifter-sized bullet that was Valentin Bisset only to get hit by another.
Heels be damned, Rose hustled across Potion’s, the Supernatural-themed bar that served as her and her sisters’ very own Central Perk, and headed toward the back room. From there, she’d slip away from the party and send an SOS extraction text to Vi or Olive … or at the very least, request a distraction.
She didn’t get that far.
Less than ten feet away, her mother’s head swiveled, and she zeroed in on Rose’s location as if she possessed her shifter husband’s tracking abilities. If Rose didn’t do something quick, it was only a matter of time before that bullet lodged itself in her left ass cheek.
She cursed, mind whirring, and reached for the nearest large object.
Fingers clenched in a soft fabric, she dragged her unsuspecting hostage with her until her back hit the wall, the other person instantly becoming an unwitting barrier against her mother’s line of sight. From everyone’s view, because the stranger loomed over her five-foot-eight-inch frame by at least six inches, and his broad chest, covered in a soft silver-buttoned black dress shirt, more than hid the rest of her.
She almost felt dainty standing flush against this man, and that did not happen often. Or ever. Where Vi and Olive had inherited their grandma’s short stature and curvy physique, Rose had been blessed with her mother’s looming height and her father’s shifter build. It made disappearing into shadows—or dark corners—damn difficult.
Except for now.
“Sorry about the snatch and grab, but you’d be doing me a huge favor if you just stayed here for about fifteen seconds. Twenty would be preferable.” Rose slowly skimmed her gaze up the impressively hard chest, barely refraining from leaning in and basking in the man’s woodsy citrus scent. It was like catnip for the sexually deprived—which she currently happened to be.
Having been the Prima in Training for practically her entire life, Rose had met her fair share of stunning Supernaturals. Most knew it. A rare few didn’t.
This guy, in all his two-day dark blond scruff and glittering gray-eyed glory, was panty-meltingly gorgeous and in the former category, judging by the slowly curling smirk. “If twenty is preferable then thirty or more must be going above and beyond, right? I’ve always been an overachiever.”
Rose swallowed a chuckle.
While most people at the party had dressed up in their finest party clothes, this guy sported faded jeans, the sleeves of his dress shirt rolled up to his elbows to reveal colorfully tattooed forearms corded with muscle.
The voice in her head screamed, Danger, Rose Maxwell. Danger. But her sexually deprived regions cried yummm.
She matched his smirk with one of her own, her body obviously taken over by a pod person. “Then I guess you and I have that in common.”
“Wonder what else we have in common…” His voice dropped to a husky purr. “What do you say we go somewhere and find out?”
Rose melted into a puddle of need.
When was the last time she’d thrown caution into the void? She couldn’t remember. At that very moment, all she could recall was Violet and Olive’s earlier tag-team effort to convince her she needed to “get her witch on.”
In Vi code, that meant let loose.
Have fun.
And what Rose wanted most in that moment was to have fun with the man pressed against all her tingly bits, tingling that, for once, didn’t have anything to do with the Magic swirling just below her eczema-prone skin.
Conjuring a dose of bravery, she met his lusty gaze with one of her own and prayed she looked turned on instead of constipated. “It just so happens that this place has a back room that doesn’t see a lot of traffic.”
Gray Eyes’s lips twitched. “Maybe we should go check it out.”
“Maybe we should.”
Goodbye, Boring and Predictable Rose and hello, Rosie Wanton and Free. Maybe her sucktastic luck had just turned a corner.