Half Past the Witching Hour (Paranormal Personnel Saga #3) (15 page)

‘I want you and I love you.’

‘Too little, too late, Nathaniel,’ I said, looking away. ‘We are over, so go. I can’t pretend that we have something that’s not there.’

It was hard, even harder than before, but I turned into ice, knowing that we couldn’t continue to act like nothing had happened. He smiled and pulled away. He was gone within a minute and I was a wreck. Complete mess.

I slid back on the ground and kept asking myself—
what have I done?

The room was in chaos; pieces of glass lay on the floor. My clothes, food, makeup and Quentin’s clothes were everywhere. It took me half an hour to breathe properly again. I reached for my phone and started scrolling, searching for Kate’s number, but I didn’t dial. I threw my phone across the room, feeling like someone just slapped me. Kate would condemn me for what I’d done. I didn’t think I could bear seeing the disappointed expression on her face when I told her that I slept with my ex. I had to keep this away, dig a hole in my brain and forget that this had ever happened.

I got up and waved my hands, cleaning the mess, and for some reason my spells were working. I couldn’t quite believe it when I was moving things with my energy. I fixed the broken mirror and shattered bulbs, pretending that everything was like when we arrived. The room was clear, but I was tainted, smothered with guilt.

Blissful, hot and explosive, the best I ever had.

A few hours after, I went downstairs and had a late breakfast. Quentin didn’t come back until later that evening. He apologised until I couldn’t listen to him anymore. My mind was clouded with thoughts about Nathaniel. I barely understood his story about the accident and his partner.

Lies after lies were making me feel repulsive about what I’d done. In my head I’d crossed the line and I had no idea how I was going to deal with the next couple of days. I had no choice but to pretend that I had food poisoning. Sleeping with Quentin in the same bed where I just made love to Nathaniel felt wrong in every respect. We both agreed that it would be better if he took me home.

Quentin had a pure soul. He didn’t deserve being deceived.

I was going to tell him, but I didn’t want to ruin his whole weekend, so I decided to wait for the right moment.

We packed our bags and checked out of the hotel by eight o’clock. It took us less than two hours to get back to London. Quentin was talking all the way back, trying to entertain me, but I was absent, dwelling on what happened between me and Nathaniel only a few hours ago.

‘Let me drop you home and I’ll get something from the pharmacy for your stomach,’ he suggested, when we were reaching my street.

‘My mum is on her way. She called me when you were checking out,’ I lied, feeling like crap. People like me were going straight to hell.

‘All right, as long as you’re in good hands. I promise that I’ll make it up to you.’

‘I had a really great time, seriously. I’m the one that should be sorry for being such a wimp.’

‘You’re wonderful, Julia. Come on get some rest. I call you tomorrow.’

We kissed and he drove off, leaving me alone outside my apartment. I dragged myself inside and for a really long time I didn’t move from the sofa, just stared at the wall. I couldn’t be with Quentin after I slept with my ex. I had to break up with him or tell him the truth.

I went to bed a few hours later unable to push away the images from the hotel room in Brighton. Nathaniel’s and my sweaty bodies together, gasping and panting as I came, releasing my excess magic through an orgasmic ecstasy. The warmth settled back in my stomach and my heart began beating faster. Since our first meeting Nathaniel had pushed me to the edge, but after our steamy reunion I was exhausted, so I fell asleep pretty quickly, diving straight back into another nightmare.

I was standing in the centre of a blazing fire with Mum, who screamed, trembling with fear. The fire spread through the room, cutting off the way out. There was no air, just lethal smoke, pain, and approaching death. Struggling for breath, coughing, I slid down on the floor.

I woke up drenched with sweat, breathing hard and searching for the flames. It took me a long moment to realise that it was just a dream and I was safe. Yet again, it was the same dream that I kept experiencing over and over. Fire and my mother’s screams echoing in my head.

It was the middle of the night and after I calmed down I took a sleeping potion my grandmother had given me. I didn’t wake up until Sunday afternoon. I rubbed my eyes, hearing my phone vibrating. Frowning, I looked at the screen, seeing the picture of Claudia. She had left me a few voicemail messages yesterday, but I was so preoccupied with cheating on my boyfriend that I didn’t even return her phone call.

I remembered that she did mention a party that my grandmother was planning, and as it turned out, this lavish family gathering was taking place today. Claudia offered to pick me up when I finally answered the phone.

‘Grandma ordered me to bring you. I’m going to be in trouble if you don’t show up,’ my cousin warned me. Claudia always sounded so excited about things like that, whereas I hated family dinners.

‘Fine, whatever, tell her that I’ll be there.’

‘Great. Can’t wait to see you!’

After I hung up, I was ready to slash my wrists. Until this morning I thought that my steamy sex with Nathaniel and dreams about my mother’s death were the worst thing that happened to me since the blackouts, but now I had to attend a dinner party with every member of my family. I even considered calling up Kelsie to rescue me, which meant that I had to come up with more lies, so I ditched that idea.

Claudia picked me up an hour later. We hadn’t seen each other since last year and I was eager to know if she was doing better since I freed her from the hands of Caleb McGregor.

My cousin was a pure elf. All the elves had baby blonde hair and blue eyes. We’d never been that close, but I liked her more than other members of my family. My grandmother rarely organised these sorts of things, due to the fact that my mother was a human and she couldn’t talk about magic in front of her. My father’s two sisters married paranormals, so the whole family was in quite a shock when Dad got involved with a human. He’d always been so responsible about everything he did, especially after he joined the police force.

‘It’s been ages, how you been?’ Claudia asked, once I got into her car. She looked good in her purple top and skinny jeans.

‘Fine. So tell me, why is Grandma organising this dinner? Something is going on, isn’t it?’ I asked straight away, as she drove off away from my street.

Claudia smiled and tucked her short hair behind her ear.

‘I think she misses all of us, but she specifically told me to bring you,’ Claudia said, laughing. ‘You really pissed her off when you got involved with that vampire.’

I pursed my lips together and shrugged. ‘It’s was none of her business. Besides, I don’t get all the drama. It’s over; we are over.’

Liar, liar, pants on fire.

Geez, I was a liar, but I swore that fast, intense, and most amazing sex with Nathaniel wasn’t going to happen again. And I wasn’t going to share this news with my little cousin.

‘I wish I could be so brave and date some paranormal other than an elf.’

‘You can. No one says that we aren’t allowed to date anyone else. I’m seeing someone else now, a giant,’ I stated, feeling like an idiot. Now I was lying to myself. Soon I was going to be single.

Claudia nearly crashed the car when she heard me.

‘What? A giant, oh my god, Grandma is going to flip,’ she hissed, laughing.

I rolled my eyes. ‘I told you, I don’t care what she thinks, but I respect her views. It’s not like I was planning to go out with Quentin. We met and one thing turned into another.’

‘But he is
giant
!’

‘Chill out, he is just another paranormal.’

For the rest of the journey my cousin was telling me what would have happened if she’d gone out with a vampire or a troll. I knew that my grandmother had her odd rules, but she had to stay away from my love life. Claudia was brought up purely by a magical family. She didn’t have to be careful when talking about magic in her own home. She was playing with fairy dust by the age of three, whereas I was satisfied with dolls.

Most elves married other elves or fairies. Rarely did an elf get involved with different breeds. My grandmother was highly respectable in her community and she hated anything out of the ordinary that could affect her reputation, and this was exactly what I was doing, obviously not intentionally.

The drive to Canterbury wasn’t long, but Sunday traffic seemed busier than normal. I recognised my Dad’s car in the driveway, so my parents were already here. My mother probably thought that I was enjoying myself in Brighton with Quentin. Just before Nathaniel and I broke up Dad started warming up toward him, but now I had a new boyfriend and Dad wasn’t too keen on the fact that I’d chosen a giant. He wanted to live life without conflicts and my new relationship would cause a lot of drama in the family.

‘So who is going to be there?’

‘Everyone,’ Claudia announced, looking excited. My stomach made a short contraction, but I was certain that no one would dare to ask questions in front of my mother. My family might have been obsessed with magic, but they weren’t stupid. Dad had his own code. Besides, I could’t even think about Mum’s reaction if she’d ever found out that all the magic in this world was real.

Claudia parked her brand new car outside and used her glittering charm on me, so I looked less miserable. At least I didn’t have to worry about my excess magic. I found a silver lining in sex with Nathaniel. I was calm and in control.

When I stepped into the living room my mind spun, because I realised that Claudia was right. My whole family was there and everyone noticed me straight away. Aunt Dorothy raised her left eyebrow studying my appearance. Claudia’s dad died when she was younger and her mother never remarried. Next to her there was my Aunt Michelle, with Paulina and Paula, twin sisters, who were waving and smiling at me. Aunt Michelle was married to Brandon, who worked as an accountant.

‘There you are, girls. I was worried that something held you two away,’ my grandmother sang, hugging us tightly. I had drunk more potion that I should have before I came here. Grandma could sense that my magic was off, so I couldn’t be here for any longer that was necessary . She was in a good mood, so that was a positive sign. I had to remember not to piss her off before we all sat down to dinner, so I could sneak out early. Mum was talking to Grandpa Fred. Dad looked tense standing by the entrance to the kitchen.

‘Hey, Grandma, is everything all right?’ I asked. She gave me a sharp look straightening my elegant shirt.

‘Of course. I just thought that it would be nice to have everyone over,’ she muttered, passing me a cocktail glass with suspicious looking liquid.

‘That’s nice,’ I answered, walking quickly away to join Dad.

‘Hey, hun, you okay? I see your trip to Brighton didn’t go as planned?’ he asked.

‘Quentin had some problems, so we had to shorten the trip,’ I explained. Dad didn’t ask any more questions and changed the subject to his beloved rugby. Mum grabbed me a few seconds later asking me a million questions about my trip away. She looked flushed and her eyes were shimmering. I suspected that Grandma charmed her drink, so she would have been more receptive for spells later on.

The dinner was going to be served in half an hour, so I spent some time catching up with the rest of the family, avoiding Grandma. We hadn’t spoken since she tricked me into going back to the past, when she showed me how Nathaniel’s brother-in-law killed my grand-grand cousin Gloria, because he couldn’t resist her scent. She had tried to get in touch with me several times, but I always wiggled myself out of talking to her.

Grandma knew what was going on with my life. She knew that I parted ways with Nathaniel. She probably thought that it was her doing. My two aunts Dorothy and Michelle congratulated me when I went to the kitchen to help myself to wine. They mentioned that they were ready to set me up with a perfect elf and my future looked bleak if I’d have stayed with that ‘filthy vampire’ any longer.

‘Come on, spill the beans, how was it?’ Paula and Paulina asked when they cornered me away from everyone in the bathroom upstairs. I looked at them, wondering if I was missing something.

‘How was what?’

‘Being with a vampire and, you know, the sex?’ Paula asked with dreamy eyes.

When one member of the most respectable family in Canterbury had a scandalous relationship with a non-elf paranormal, all of a sudden everyone wanted to know all the juicy details.”

The image of Nathaniel holding my legs brushed through my mind and I felt a tingle of power between my tights.

Blissful, hot and explosive; the best I ever had.

’My lips are sealed,’ I said, smiling. ‘Besides you are both engaged, so I don’t know why are you’re suddenly so interested in vampires.’

Paulina pinched her eyebrows, shaking her head like she’d forgotten that she was getting married. Paula looked annoyed that I didn’t want to talk about my encounter with a vampire. They were the same age as I and we used to hang together often when I was younger. Paulina worked as a clerical assistant in some privately run business that specialised in the export of magical artifacts. Paula was doing her PhD in the Neurophysiology of Trolls. My grandmother adored them.

Paulina continued to question me. ‘Yeah, but you were the first and we’re dying to know if they’re as different from us as they say?’

‘Nathaniel was half vampire, so he was just like a normal human being except that he had fangs,’ I said almost whispering. The twins exchanged startled looks and swallowed.

‘I kissed a wizard once when I was eighteen. The kiss was nothing special, but I was so excited tasting a forbidden breed,’ Paulina muttered, sighing loudly.

I didn’t understand them. The twins obviously weren’t happy with their own choices, otherwise they wouldn’t ask me about my shameful relationship that everyone was condemning. Telling them about Nathaniel brought those steamy memories back, and I was glad when Mum called us for dinner. Claudia loved gossiping and she was probably going to tell them later that I was going out with a giant. It wouldn’t be long before the whole family found out, but I didn’t care. I had more important problems to worry about than what my family thought about my complicated love life.

Grandpa Fred charmed the table so everyone had a space. I was planning to sit as far as I could from my grandmother, but it seemed she read my mind, because she asked me to sit beside her.

Mum was chatting away with Aunt Michelle about her work in a local surgery. Dad didn’t look particularly relaxed and I wanted to ask him what was wrong.

My grandparents were loaded, so they could afford to hire help for an occasion like this. A tiny hag started serving food around us swiftly.

‘I don’t understand why you would be upset over this silly time travel trip,’ said Grandma suddenly after everyone was busy eating the starter. ‘I wanted you to see what would happen if you continued to go against you own values. Besides I was right. You left that vampire, so you understood that he wasn’t for you.’

I was boiling inside, ready to snap. That was why I’d been avoiding her all this time, because I couldn’t bare talking about him. Now it had changed. I’d slept with him despite everything I ever believed in.