I did a terrible job of selling that lie, not least of all because I still had to get that blanket back to the confusingly sexy yet clearly unhinged stranger, lest he think I’d changed my mind on which blankets would be keeping me warm…

14

Kieran

Kieran turned the corner outside of the bar and stopped in the shadows, his whole body tense and his fingers curled into fists. He sucked in deep breaths and tried to clear his head.

He had completely lost control.

Completely.

And without any warning.

His mother’s selkie magic throbbed within him. The ocean, only a mile away, sang to him softly. Sweetly. But, pulsing within that compulsion, he could also feel the power of the tides, the might of the currents.

His parents’ magic came from the same place, the ocean, but it manifested in entirely different forms. He’d only used his mother’s magic once.

Once had been plenty.

For a selkie, the ability to inspire lust and passion was more of a suggestion. A lure. The weak might succumb, but the strong rarely did, unless by choice.

That was, unless the wielder was also a Demigod. Then, the selkie magic was amplified. Boosted. No longer just a lure, it became a command. A drug.

He’d tried using it exactly one time, when he hadn’t understood the difference. His lover at the time had become a robot. Nothing more than a plaything, eager to do his bidding without control of herself or independent thought. She couldn’t have said no if she’d wanted to.

The very idea disgusted him. It had turned a strong woman into mush. Continuing to use the magic would’ve turned him into a monster.

He’d never done so again.

Until now.

He leaned his head back against the wall, fighting the lingering feeling of Alexis’s magic. Trying to cut out the throbbing ache.

What the hell had happened?

Needing movement, he pushed away from the wall and walked to the edge of the darkened parking lot to retrieve his car.

He hadn’t meant to call up the selkie magic. He hadn’t even consciously realized it was happening. One moment he’d been watching the erotic sway of Alexis’s hips, and the next he was lost in a tide of lust and need, his cock so hard he couldn’t think straight. He wanted her with a ferocity he’d never experienced. Wanted to unlock her mind and get all her secrets in between bouts of worshiping her perfect body.

Why was she affecting him like this? Her magic was provocative and enticing, but it wasn’t anything like the sexual compulsion he’d just thrown at her. And even if it had been, he was a Demigod. Her magic shouldn’t affect him like this, especially since the assessment had judged her power level to be fairly weak.

“Bullshit,” he said softly.

He shook his head as he opened his car door, still uncomfortably hard.

There was no way he was wrong in his assessment of her magic’s potency. No way. She’d somehow withstood his boosted version of selkie magic, for fuck’s sake. She’d drunk it in, coasted with it for a moment, and then rejected it with a smile.

He wasn’t wrong. And there was no way someone with her magical potency and ability could’ve simply slipped through the cracks. She was hiding something. She had to be. And he intended to find out what.

15

Alexis

I toweled off my hair as I sauntered into my bedroom to check the time. Three in the afternoon. I needed to get my stuff in the car and go pick out my spot. Tonight, I’d be taking to the streets and selling my wares. Time to prove the moneymaker my magic was not.

Dressed in my best blouse and my only pair of slacks that actually made the journey all the way to my ankles, I grabbed the oversized sack I used as a purse for these ventures and stuffed in a tie-dyed square of fabric, a few dingy crystals, and my tarot deck. The cracked crystal ball without a base weighed down the very bottom.

Rolling my eyes at myself, I slung the strap over my shoulder and grabbed my jacket from its hook.

In the living room, Mordecai was leaning over Daisy, looking at the laptop on her lap. Both kids had scrunched-up expressions.

“What’s up?” I asked, stepping into the kitchen and grabbing my filled water bottle.

“Gandalf is trying to remember algebra,” Daisy said, glancing up from the couch. “He should stick to fire beasts.”

“Do you want help or not?” Mordecai demanded. I smiled at the strength in his voice and the turquoise blanket draped loosely over his shoulders. I suspected he didn’t actually need it; he just wanted the comfort. That was a good sign, and pretty amazing, since his close call had been only a little more than twenty-four hours ago.

Daisy whistled at me. “Look at you. I didn’t know you had it in you. Makeup and everything. Though the blue eyeshadow is…off-putting.” She slapped the cheap Black-Friday-special laptop shut and set it on the coffee table.

Mordecai looked over, and the knot between his eyebrows cleared. He smiled. “I think it looks good. The black eyeliner makes her eyes look really big.”

“That’ll do.” I pushed a loose curl over my shoulder. “I figure I should try to look a little more approachable at these things.”

Mordecai nodded, straightening without any stiffness. That medicine was a miracle. “I think it’ll work.”

A part of me hoped it wouldn’t. That wasn’t the part that realized we needed money, though.

I draped my jacket over my arm. “All right, you guys, keep the door locked and—”

“Wait, wait. I’m almost ready. Just have to grab my…” Daisy’s voice trailed away as she disappeared into her and Mordecai’s bedroom. As she bustled out with a new handbag that I hadn’t seen before, and a cute little hat with a pompom that only she could get away with, Mordecai slipped past me and headed for the front door.

“What’s going on?” I asked, putting my hand out to stop Mordecai. “And where did you get that handbag, Daisy?”

Daisy lifted her arm to look at the handbag. “Oh, Denny gave me this. And hey, his dad still wants me to work for the family business. I mean, I’ll say I can’t for a couple weeks because…you know. But after that…I might just do it. I’m positive Denny has kept his word—”

“Wait, wait…” I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Why is Denny buying you handbags? And I thought you said he didn’t have any money?”

She looked at me with those almond-shaped eyes in her thin, doll-like face. I would kill to swap my ordinary brown peepers for her beautiful blue ones. Then again, she always lamented that I had thick, long eyelashes, and she needed falsies. We always wanted what we didn’t have.

“He helped serve food and clean up at some luncheon his mom threw for a charity. She gave him forty bucks for it. He bought me a purse because he’s into me. Anything else, inspector?”

“Right. Yes.” I shook my head in disbelief as I adjusted the purse strap on my shoulder. “But you just blackmailed him with gay porn so you could rob his dad. Isn’t he horror-struck that you are a bad person?”

She huffed. “Obviously I told him why I did it. He’s totally fine with it. And I’m a serious catch.”

“He’s too dumb to know that she is bad news,” Mordecai said as he leaned against the wall. “He’s thinking with his…eyes, not his head.”

Daisy flicked her hair over her shoulder. “I’m not bad news. I’m just trying to survive. If he wants to buy me things so I’ll stick around, who am I to say no?”

“To the parents of a little rich kid, that’s bad news,” Mordecai responded.

“I have to agree with Mordecai on that one,” I said. “Plus, you recently committed a crime that Denny helped you cover up. He’s an accomplice. It’s probably best for you to steer clear in case he wants to confess his sins.”

“Using people to buy you things is wrong,” Mordecai said patiently.

I paused at the front door. “Right. Yes. That’s what I meant. You shouldn’t hang around him because you obviously don’t respect him, and using people for new handbags is wrong.” I didn’t remind him of how I’d come by my phone. “And also, you don’t want him tattling on you. The second he feels like a scorned lover, he’ll sing like a canary.”

“I should just take over as the guardian,” Mordecai mumbled.

“That’s probably true.” I turned the handle. “Okay—why are you two following me?”

“You’re certainly a helluva lot quicker to notice the obvious,” Daisy said to Mordecai.

“We’re going with you.” Mordecai adjusted his blanket.

I studied their faces to see if they were kidding. They weren’t, which meant they were just dense. “I don’t need a peanut gallery.”

“Um, hello?” Daisy put a hand to her hip. “A large and crazy lunatic is stalking you, or were you too drunk last night to remember telling us about your altercation at the bar?”

“I was not too drunk”—I was a little too drunk, because I only now remembered filling them in—“and it wasn’t an altercation. It was a calm conversation between an arrogant jerk—”

“Who thought he could use his magic to influence you,” Mordecai interrupted.