I eye the car. “Do you even know how to drive?”
There’s a conspiratorial gleam in his eyes. “I speak your language and wear your modern clothing. I own a car and a home, and I have a bank account full of money. What do you think, Empress?”
“I think you stole this car along with a memory or two on how to drive it.”
“Those who hold the power make the rules,” he reminds me, ever the ruthless warlord.
This is what made Memnon move through the ancient world with such ease. Not only was he smart, strong, and unscrupulous, his ability to glean knowledge from others allowed him to assimilate fast.
I just never appreciated how fast until now.
He opens the car door for me. Inside the vehicle, a shadow moves, its amber-green eyes glinting in the darkness.
“Nero.” I all but fling myself onto my familiar, my body draped over the leather bucket seat so I can reach the panther better. We’ve only been apart for a few hours, but I’d been anxious about my furry dude.
He must’ve been anxious about me too because he nuzzles against me awfully intensely for a panther who prides himself on being aloof.
While I’m snuggling my familiar, Memnon neatly tucks my legs into the car and closes my door.
When the sorcerer opens his own door, he inhales sharply.
“Nero,” he growls.
I pull away from my panther, and only now do I notice what my soul mate already has.
Nero has torn apart the inside of this car. The rear seats are in shreds, the foam interior littering what’s left of them. He’s clawed up the back side of the front seats, the leather hanging in ribbons. Even the center console I’m leaning on has been gouged at.
I don’t know how much my panther understands about the situation between me and Memnon, but this feels like a feline fuck you, and I am here for it.
“You are such a good familiar,” I say softly, stroking Nero down his flank while he rubs his head against me. “I’m sorry for leaving you like I did,” I whisper, referring both to this evening and to another, fateful evening long ago, when my familiar and I were forced to part ways.
Nero continues to rub against me, the big cat in an unusually forgiving mood.
I hear Memnon sigh as his magic floods the interior of the car, thickening in the air until I can’t see much beyond Nero’s fur. When it clears, the car’s interior is unblemished once more.
The sorcerer gets in then, folding his massive body into the driver’s seat. Suddenly the space feels very, very small.
I release Nero, letting him resettle into the back seat while I buckle myself in. The engine roars to life, and Memnon smoothly maneuvers his fancy car out of the lot and onto the street.
I guess the sorcerer really can drive.
Leaning my head against the window, I stare tiredly out at the dark night, watching streetlights and shadowy foliage blur by.
“When are you going to marry me?” I ask softly.
I can’t not ask it. Right before I was arrested, Memnon said we were to wed immediately. It’s been hours since we made that unbreakable oath, and I feel like a fish caught on a hook, waiting to be reeled in to my death.
Memnon reaches over and takes my injured hand in his, turning it so my sliced palm is facing up.
“Not tonight, est amage, when you still bear the marks of our battle.”
I release a shuddering breath.
Not tonight.
That’s a relief.
I glance down at the wound from earlier, when I cut my palm with his blade and said my oaths and lifted the curse. The wound has begun to scab, though the flesh around it is red and angry.
“When then?” I press.
Memnon’s fingers graze the cut, his touch whisper soft. A wisp of his magic curls out, brushing against it. Almost instantly, the flesh pulls together and seals itself up until even the seam of the wound fades away.
“Look at me, Selene.” It’s a command, yet all I hear is a plea. Memnon wants connection, reassurance. This was his grand plan after all. He couldn’t resurrect the past, but he could at least draw forth my memories of it. I suppose, at the heart of all the sorcerer’s vengeance, he simply wanted to feel less lonely.
My gaze reluctantly moves to his. He’s torn his own attention briefly from the road ahead of us.
“It doesn’t matter when we marry, little witch.” He squeezes my freshly healed hand. “Neither magic nor time can keep us apart.” His eyes are luminous. “We are like the stars. Eternal.”
I mean to stay awake. I have every intention of noting the streets that lead to Memnon’s place and then every detail of the house itself. But the winding roads that cut through the mountains north of San Francisco rock me gently, the clock says it’s after three in the morning, and my fatigue is overwhelming me. It might even be that despite my hate for Memnon, something deep in me is supremely comforted at being in the car with him and my familiar.
Whatever the case, I make it maybe three miles before my eyelids start drifting shut and another mile before I close them for good.
I stir twice more—once to the feel of my body being gathered into strong, warm arms and again when I’m placed on a soft mattress and tucked in.
Memnon’s voice echoes inside me as I slip off to sleep.
Be at ease, fierce queen. You don’t have to fight any longer. You are safe with me.
CHAPTER 3
I blink groggily and stretch, basking in the feel of dappled sunlight on my skin and the masculine smell clinging to my sheets.
I reach for the owner of that smell, but my hand lands on nothing but blankets.
My brow creases, and I sit up, stifling a yawn. I have a destabilizing moment where I’m confused, because I’ve never laid eyes on the massive, glass-encased room I’m now in, and I can’t remember how I got here. I remember last night all too well, no thanks to the sorcerer, but my memory does a nosedive after I got in the car with him.
Memnon must’ve carried me in and placed me in this bed. His bed. That makes my spine straighten and my eyes sharpen. I must be in his house, though the man himself is nowhere to be seen.
My gaze greedily takes in the room. The first thing I notice is the space. You have to be a rich bitch to afford something bigger than a tin can here in Northern California.
Memnon is definitely a rich bitch.
The room is massive, and it’s made all the more cavernous by the lack of furniture. There's this bed, a bookcase on the wall to the left, and a side chair next to it. Beyond that, there’s nothing, save for the panoramic windows that take up most of three of the room’s walls. Out the windows directly across from the bed, I can see the rolling coastal hills, and out the ones to my right, I see several evergreen trees that flank the house. Past them, the forest looms dark and lonely. I don’t know how far we are from Henbane Coven, but these woods look similar.
Also along the right wall is a massive en suite bathroom, and to my left is the doorway out.
“Memnon?” I call out.
The building remains silent. A minute later, however, Nero pads into the room, his coat looking particularly sleek as he moves in the soft light. He walks right up to the bed, then hops on.
I reach out and pet him. “Have I told you that you’re the best familiar in the whole wide world?”
He gives me an uncomfortable look, his ears twitching a little. I imagine this is the expression teenagers give their parents. I guess he used up all his sentimentality last night during our reunion.