“I love you too, Lorcan,” I whispered.

  And that was the last thing I heard before fangs pierced my throat and the magic swallowed me whole.

  ***

  “So, about the blood bond,” Lorcan started as we both lay side by side in postcoital bliss.

  “Right,” I said and inhaled deeply. Before I could mention Janeth’s name, Lorcan continued.

  “I don’t know what’s happened, dearest, but I’m fairly certain…” He stopped talking and paused, as if trying to find the right words. I leaned up on my elbow and looked down at him. “I believe it’s gone,” he finished.

  “Gone?” I repeated, frowning at him as I shook my head. “But how is that possible?”

  “I don’t know, but what I can say is that horrible feeling I always had when the two of us were together… that feeling like I would need to swallow every last drop of your blood… it’s gone and has been for at least the last five or six days.”

  The last five or six days… about as long as it had been since Janeth attempted to turn me. I felt my eyes widen of their own accord. “I wonder,” I started but then shook my head because I didn’t understand how that could be.

  “What?” Lorcan asked.

  “I didn’t tell you because… well, I was actually going to tell you, but then I thought it was more important to tell you about my feelings…” That thought trailed off as another one occurred to me. “Wait a second… you think the blood bond is gone?”

  He nodded. “I’m fairly sure it is.”

  “But… you said ‘I love you’ earlier.”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “But if the blood bond is gone…”

  “Then I must truly love you,” he answered on a smile that turned into a chuckle.

  “But I said I loved you too,” I said, still frowning down at him.

  “And if we follow the equation set by your own logic, then that would mean…”

  “That I love you too?” I asked, shaking my head. “Like… for real.”

  “Yes… like for real, for real.” He chuckled again. “Is this not reason to celebrate?”

  I inhaled deeply. “Maybe, but maybe not?”

  His expression dropped. “Maybe not?”

  Though something had happened between us, now that I thought about it. I’d felt it before the horrible exhaustion had set in, but then that full-body orgasm had pretty much taken center stage. Yet, if I were being honest with myself, things did feel different between us. That crazy need to be near him was gone and in its place was… peace. Happiness.

  Love.

  It was then that I explained to him what had happened with Janeth—how she’d drained me nearly and then fed me her blood. He frowned all the while and there was an expression of confusion in his gaze.

  “I thought if another vampire finished my blooding, I’d lose my mind and go feral?” I asked. “Wasn’t that what you said would happen?”

  He nodded, but then something seemed to occur to him. “Such is what happens to humans,” he said as he held my gaze.

  “But not Blood Witches?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “I’ve never heard of a Blood Witch being halfway sired by one vampire and halfway by another.”

  I nodded. “We need… we need to find Betanya.”

  ***

  “Come in, come in,” Olga said as she opened the door wide and we walked in.

  Betanya was sitting in the living room of the house, hunched over a dusty tome, red hair pulled into a tight knot at the back of her head, where she sat transcribing something into another of her journals. She paused when she spied us.

  Shutting the tome, she set it aside gingerly, trying and failing to look casual. Her eyes kept flicking between the two of us. It was as though she detected something.

  “It appears you’ve… resolved your problem,” she said with a big smile. So she knew!

  She stood up and walked a circle around us, inspecting us all the while. Then she nodded.

  “The instability of your bond,” she said as she came to a stop in front of us. “It’s definitely resolved itself. I theorized it could happen that way, but obviously with Roscoe being himself, I never wanted to test it.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked, voice shaking.

  She settled into her chair, not looking at either of us but checking something in her journal. “When Janeth gave you her blood, what she did was sever the blood bond between you and Lorcan.”

  “How?” I asked, shaking my head.

  “Because she wiped away his authority over you,” she answered as she looked at Olga. “That’s the very same conversation the two of us have been having while you were asleep.”

  “Then you knew?” I asked.

  “Ya-ya, we knew,” Olga said.

  “We theorized,” Betanya corrected her.

  “Then is Janeth now my sire?” I asked, voice dropping.

  Betanya shook her head. “No, no one is. What Lorcan started, Janeth erased.”

  “So there is no bond between us any longer, then?” I asked. “Not with Janeth and not with Lorcan?”

  “There’s no blood bond with either of them any longer, no,” Betanya said with a clipped nod.

  “But?” I asked because it sounded like there was more.

  She smiled. “But… even though Lorcan’s Kiss has been returned to him, there is still a bond between the two of you.” She faced Lorcan then. “Do you no longer feel that uncontrollable blood lust towards Wanda?”

  He nodded. “I feel… better than I have since I met Wanda that fateful day—it’s as if that missing part of me has been returned and I feel… sane, no longer out of control.”

  “Exactly,” Betanya continued. “Because the blood bond is gone.”

  “But what about me?” I demanded, shaking my head. “Aren’t I going to lose my mind and go feral in the same way that happens to humans when another vampire finishes the job?”

  Betanya laughed at that. “Of course not.”

  “And why not?” I insisted, throwing my hands on my hips because I didn’t appreciate being mocked.

  “Need I remind you, you’re a witch?”

  I swallowed hard. “Speaking of… if the blood bond is gone, why does it still feel as if I’ve got my dark magic? I can still feel it inside me.”

  “Because you’re still a Blood Witch,” she answered with a shrug.

  “How?” I asked.

  “Because Janeth’s blood simply dissolved the bond between you and Lorcan—it didn’t destroy the bond between you and your death magic.”

  “Because Janeth is a vampire,” Lorcan said.

  Betanya looked at him and nodded. “Exactly.”

  “Then all it took to dissolve the blood bond was another vampire?” I asked, thinking all the while of Maverick and his awful sire. If we could free him from Janeth, then that was exactly what we needed to do. And very soon—before she came for him.

  Betanya inhaled deeply and then raised her eyebrows. “I suppose so.” Then she shook her head and sighed. “Information I wish I’d had all those years ago.”

  “Then you’re free,” I said as I faced Lorcan. “We both are.”

  “Well, not so fast,” Betanya answered as she stepped closer to me and then held up her hand, touching my forehead with her fingertips. She closed her eyes and whispered something, and then I felt the tingle of her magic covering every inch of my skin.

  “Interesting,” she said on a smile. A second later, she dropped her fingers and stepped away, opening her eyes.

  “What?” I demanded.

  “The power of your blood is still in her,” she said as she faced Lorcan before looking at me again. “You’re still bound, but not in the same way you were before.”

  “What? What does that mean?” I asked, sounding frantic.

  She swallowed hard and faced me. “By any chance, did you both recently have sex for the first time ever?”

  Neither of us answered. I wasn’t sure if Lorcan was leaving the opportunity to me or if he was just as completely flabbergasted by the question as I was. Leave it to Betanya to be… direct.

  “Um, what?” I managed.

  “Yes,” he answered finally, when it seemed I couldn’t find my tongue. “Yes, we just did.”

  “That’s what did it,” Betanya answered with a smile as Olga nodded.

  “Ya-ya, das ist vhat did it.”

  “That’s what did what?” I asked.

  “Before, your bond with Lorcan was physical. Blood to blood, lust to lust. This… now… well, it’s spiritual. You’re bound at the soul.”

  “Bound at the soul?” I repeated. “What in spell does that mean?”

  “Essentially?” Betanya asked as she faced me with a huge grin. “You got married last night.”

  Dead silence.

  And then someone dropped something to the floor with a heavy thud and looking down, I realized it was me—I’d dropped myself.

  “We did what?”

  The End

  ~~~~~

  Return to Haven Hollow in:

  Raising Cain

  ~~~~~

  Return to the Table of Contents

  RAISING CAIN

  Haven Hollow #17

  (Spook Society)

  by

  J.R. RAIN

  &

  H.P. MALLORY

  Raising Cain

  Published by Rain Press

  Copyright © 2022 by J.R. Rain & H.P. Mallory

  All rights reserved.

  Ebook Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Raising Cain

  Chapter One

  Most folks who heard about the Spook Society assumed it was a bunch of horsefeathers at best, and a fraud at worst.

  If I hadn’t already been kicked off by my last fella (who turned out to be a real punk), there’s no way I’da believed in spooks, even if they still gave me the heebie-jeebies.

  But the second I crossed the office’s threshold, I knew it was the real deal, a genuine establishment. How was I in the know? ‘Cause the amount of sheer power I felt crammed into that one itty-bitty place left me reeling like I’d had a double shot of the giggle water.

  Bailey, a medium and my tour guide for the day, noticed me wavering, because she reached up to pat my shoulder real concerned like.

  “You look a bit flustered. Let’s check out the quiet room, Darla.”

  “The quiet room?” Years of training kept the unease outta my voice, but ‘the quiet room’ still sounded pretty creepy. I’d had plenty of quiet for way too long, thank you very much. Empty rooms, empty houses, silence so thick, you could choke on it.

  Bailey just smiled, revealing the faintest hint of lines around her kisser and at the corner of her lake-blue peepers. “Don’t worry, you’ll love it.”

  I doubted I’d love anything with the word ‘quiet’ in it, but I could be a good sport.

  It was hard not to crane my head ‘round like a kid at the circus, staring at everything. Even though there weren’t no elephants here and none of them funny clowns, it was still swell. Being able to go out and about on my lonesome was still a might fresh—I’d only been a real person for a little over a year, so I was still getting the hang of it. The freedom was as heady as the psychic energy buffeting my senses.

  I followed Bailey down the hallway, my heels clicking against the hardwood floors. It put a little more starch in my spine, to hear that distinctive clack. Maybe the sound was a bother to some people, but I loved it. It announced my presence and the fact I even had a presence was just berries. I was here, in the flesh, and for the first time in a long time—impossible to ignore.

  The solid oak door at the end of the hallway had a little brass name plate on it. Bailey swung the door open and stepped out of the way so I could see inside. Not that she needed to, I was more than a head taller than her. At 5’8”, I’m usually a head an’ shoulders over most dames.

  When it came to the purely physical, heck, me and Bailey were as opposite as opposite could be. She was real short and curvy. And my body was as straight up and down as an ironing board. I didn’t have much in the way of bubs on my chest, but my gams were real long and pretty nice, especially in a pair of those crazy heels Wanda was always prancing around in.

  Bailey’s waist length hair was so pale, it looked white, like old lady white, but it suited her real nice. I was in the middle of growing out my black, chin-length bob that had been so popular when I was young (in the twenties). So, now here we were—united in all things ghostly.

  The quiet room wasn’t what I’d been expecting. Dim lighting, big squishy easy chairs. And it didn’t exactly live up to its name since there was soft instrumental music playing. Not the good instrumental kind, mind you, with lots of brass and cymbals, and a beat you could move to. This was more like windchimes and flutes. There was even a small fountain in the corner, with water trickling gently over the rocks.

  Bailey stepped in behind me, pulled the door closed, and oh.

  Oh, it was quiet.

  The energy that had been slapping me in the face since I’d walked in the front door, all set for my interview, vanished. My ears popped, and I hadn’t even realized I’d been hearing whispers until they were gone.

  One by one, all the muscles in my back relaxed, and the sigh I heaved practically came up from my toes.

  “We’ve got some pretty serious wards set up in this room,” Bailey explained. “Feel free to use it whenever you want to or need to. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, or you need to cleanse, or you just want a place to sit and think.”

  “Oh, I sure will.” My words came out too serious, like I was making a vow. I could get used to the limp music if it meant relaxing in this kind of peace and quiet.

  The door opened behind us, and a real pretty dish swanned into the room.

  “Oh!” She blinked at us, heavy lashes sweeping pale cheeks. I’d have needed two sets of falsies to get that kinda effect. “I didn’t know anyone was in here.”

  She reminded me of Wanda, with her silk blouse, red-soled shoes, and long dark hair. The resemblance ended there, though. Wanda was my pseudo mother (‘course don’t let her ever hear you call her that ‘cause if there’s one thing Wanda don’t like, it’s being a ma to me and that stiff of a zombie). Anyhoo, Wanda would meet your eyes directly and then she’d dare you to look away, real fierce like.

  This gal’s gaze flitted around like a butterfly. And that weren’t the only difference between them.

  Heels were a weapon to Wanda. She could and would step on you with them, while this moll took a couple mincing steps into the room, looking like the heels were walking her rather than the other way round. Then she tucked her long bangs behind one ear and gave me a smile that looked like she’d rehearsed it in the mirror a couple hundred times.

  “Sorry to burst in on you,” she said, mainly to Bailey. “But I just had a reading with Mrs. Rutledge, and now I’m in desperate need of a cleanse. That woman’s energy is sticky.” She shuddered dramatically, flapping her hands like she thought she was doing the Charleston. “Inverted two of hearts, three of swords, and seven of swords. You know what that means.”

  I clearly didn’t know my onions ‘cause I had no earthly idea what she was yapping about.

  Neither did Bailey from the pinched look around her peepers. Fortunately, the dame didn’t wait for either of us to answer, but just opened her kisser and, like a steamboat all excited to explore the open sea, words started pouring forth.

  “Oh, there are dark times ahead for that woman. That husband of hers is going to find out about the affair she’s been having any day now. Mark my words.” She clucked her tongue like she thought she was a real hen. “I warned her. Not that she’ll listen. Not that anyone listens. Sometimes, I swear I don’t know why they even call me in to read their cards if they aren’t going to listen to what I have to say.” Then she sighed real serious like. “It can get so frustrating.”

  “And on that note,” Bailey cut in (and thank god she did ‘cause I had an idea this gal was one of them dames who bumps her gums all day long). Then Bailey gestured to me.

  “Summer, this is Darla, our newest hire. Darla, meet Summer Solis.”

  That had to be, without a doubt, the goofiest name I’d ever heard. And boy, I’d heard some doozies. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from saying something I’d come to regret. It was taking some time to relearn my social filters now that everyone could hear me again. When you’re a ghostie, it don’t much matter what you say ‘cause ain’t no one round to hear it.

  Don’t get me wrong, being alive was still the duck’s quack, but it had gotten me into a couple of embarrassing situations.

  When I was sure I’d gotten my wayward thoughts under control, I offered a pleasant smile and a, “Pleased to meet’cha.”

  Steamboat Solis offered me her hand like she was a real dowdy Mrs. Grundy, or like she had something long and cylindrical stuck right up her backside. But back to her mitt she extended to me, she wasn’t offering it for a shake. Nosiree, she held that hand out to me like she was the Majaraja of Haraja or wherever the Majaraja is from. And the way she looked at me—like I was supposed to peck the back of it or something! I took that little paw o’ hers, and bobbed it awkwardly a couple times, not sure what else to do with it.

  A little pucker formed between her delicately arched eyebrows, but she grinned back. “Charmed.”

  And that was a line if ever I’d heard one.

  “Well, Bailey,” Steamboat Solis (or SS for short) turned back to my tour guide. “If you and your friend are done with your tour, can you shut the door behind you?” SS’s hand fluttered to her forehead. “It’s only that I desperately need to ground some of this energy from my aura before I read for Mr. Bloom. He’s got money troubles and you know how hard those are to deal with.” Then she sighed real dramatic like. “It’s that inverted ten of pentacles, it’ll get you every time.”