Hex and the Single Witch Read Free

Maybe, if he made himself disappear—damn stupid spell book. Brody remembered he’d left it sitting cheerfully in the garderobe. Damn stupid Valerian for distracting him this morning anyway—always talking, that one. Or eating.
    He cringed again when he heard a voice—her voice, shrill and piercing. His eardrums seeming to burst like overripe melons. “Brody!” she shrieked.
    Nails on a chalkboard.
    He waved meekly, losing the battle to hold in a very long, drawn out, and oh-so put-upon sigh. Clarabelle anchored herself to him. It wasn’t precisely her fault he found her so annoying. Valentine fairies were just like that.
    No, it was Valerian’s fault.
    Brody had started dating Caraway at the end of sophomore year.
    Two years.
    Twenty-four months.
    Ninety- six weeks.
    Seven hundred and thirty days.
    Seventeen THOUSAND, five hundred, and twenty hours.
    That’s how long he’d been chained to a lie.
    Valerian and a summer rain had shattered his dreams, changed what he wanted out of life. That had led to the very public break-up with Caraway and the sudden relationship with Clarabelle.
    He’d spent that summer with Valerian at his ancestral home in Scotland. A chilly, sudden storm while they were swimming in a secret pool in the lost glen. An accidental touch as they’d scrambled to find shelter—the casual brush of flesh against flesh between friends was nothing until the rain made it something more. Slick, heated skin and a moment gravid with all that could be, living and breathing in the space between their mouths.
    A kiss. Only a kiss.
    It had changed Brody forever—Valerian’s yielding lips beneath his, the hard ridge of his cock digging into his thigh.
    The primal need with which Valerian’s hands had fisted in his hair and pushed him down the finely muscled path of his torso to his cock. The absolute bliss with which he’d spilled into Valerian’s greedy mouth and the sweet-salty taste on his lips as Valerian had done the same.
    In the dark, before Caraway’s true power had come to her, her body had been narrow and formless. Close enough that Brody could imagine it was Valerian. But with her power had come her curves, a body all his friends had envied his access to—even Valerian.
    Valerian He’d acted as if the moment had never happened, as if they’d never touched each other, never found that pleasure together. He had a duty to marry, to produce magical children to continue his line. That was his excuse. They all did. The presence of magic was waning in the world and the ban on more than two children per couple had been lifted. Magical families with seven children or more now paid no taxes and their tuition fees to UMM were waived.
    There were trolls and other magic folk who lived as they chose, but they married first. Produced children to do their duty before they could be with those they loved. Yet, that didn’t matter to him. He was tired of living a lie. Brody didn’t want children. He didn’t want a wife.
    Brody had broken up with Caraway because he knew she deserved better than that from him. He hadn’t meant for it to become a public event, but after he’d started down that path, he’d had no choice. She’d accused him of wanting to spend more time with his footballer mates than with her, and she’d been right. Her darts had hit too close for comfort.
    And Clarabelle. Gods, but she was a wreck. So needy.
    Valerian had shoved them together knowing, with her slender build, Brody could fake it with her, and would—if only to get Caraway off his back.
    But now, seeing Caraway with Morningstar, it had done something to him. Twisted up his guts.
    “You were pretty mean to Caraway today.”
    “She’s making a fool of herself with Morningstar.” Brody tried to shrug her off him. “Hey, Clarabelle, it’s really hot. So if you could...”
    She looked like a puppy he’d kicked. “You know, Brody, I don’t understand why you even asked me to be your girl. You don’t even like