Chapter 5: Better Latte Than Never

Beatrice POV.

We pass the dancing men on our way into KingsGuard. There is a small dedicated crowd trying to keep the men covered, and police to keep everyone level headed.

“Bastards,” Lucas growls when we pass the men by.

Inside, I take out my employee ID to hand to Glen the security guard. It’s something I’ve done hundreds of times over the past year. But Lucas holds up a hand.

“Not necessary,” he tells Glen and the man steps back.

“Who are you exactly?” I ask as we step into the elevator.

Lucas leans against one side of the car and I mirror his pose on the other.

“Lucas Night,” he shrugs.

The confined space of the elevator allows me to really focus on this man who’d been sent to collect me.

He’s built like one of those men who play that human sport football. He wears head—to—toe black with combat boots that are scuffed and well worn. His beard is full and his hair skims his shoulders.

The deep burnt red hair and pale blue eyes lend to him an otherworldly look that has no place in the cool, corporate surroundings of KingsGuard.

Like any rule there are exceptions, but witches tend to have an odd, eccentric look about them. It’s as if the magic coursing through our veins demands features that are always an offshoot from perfection: a too large nose, hair that cannot be tamed, freckles and moles, eyes eerie colors, or proportions that prefer round rather than lean.

We are a beautiful people, but sameness is not our aesthetic.

I think of Bash with his symmetric face and vaguely familiar mannerisms. There is something comforting about sameness, or at least, about not having to always be unique. It feels like an invitation to exhale and just be. I hope my compulsion spell sticks; I’d rather he forget me than be horrified by what I did, by who I am.

I tilt my head, “No, who are you to Sebastian King?”

He folds his arms across his chest, and I catch how he straightens.

“I keep him safe.”

The slight movement of his body pulls the sleeve of his jacket up to expose the sigil tattooed on the inside of his wrist.

“You’re a hex.”

A muscle in his jaw ticks.

“Sorry,” I stammer, “I don’t like the term any more than I do B*tches.”

Yet, I’m guilty of using both because other people do.

This time my magic doesn’t have to speak up. The taste of guilt, sharp and bitter, sits on my tongue.

I am not am I?

Those are the words the hexes’ sigil tattoo represents in a single sharp line. It appears on any son of a witch when he goes through puberty, a single gift of magic from his mother when he was an infant.

It’s meant to be a beacon to witches when it comes time for us to bear a child. Mating with a hex is said to strengthen a daughter’s magical potential.

I am not am I?

Those words and the label B*tch apply to me, don’t they? I am not the witch I was supposed to be. I ran from my coven. I escaped, or more accurately, I’m still escaping.

I steal a glance at Lucas’ wrist, but he’s already tugged the sleeve back into place. The sigil cannot be removed by magic or tech because of the specific kind of magic used to create it.

Blood magic. My magic.

The elevator reaches our destination, and the doors open to a floor of KingsGuard I’ve never been on. The IT department suffers from cubicle farms under fluorescent lighting and blue grey carpet. The executive floor is marble, glass, and spanning skylines of the city.

It’s late, but a loyal receptionist sits dutifully before a set of heavy oak double doors. There is no one else around, and I shiver at the echo of our footfalls on the marble.

I’ve barely looked in the mirror in two days, but I know whatever state I’m in it isn’t going to impress Sebastian King.

“Are billionaires required to make everyone else feel small?” I murmur to myself.

“Nah, they’re born that way,” Lucas clicks his tongue, “Try not to be too hard on ol’Bash. He means well.”

Bash.

Oh, goddess.

No.

There’s no way.

Lucas pushes the doors open and gestures for me to enter. And there’s the nice, normal guy from my coffee shop sitting behind the desk.

Sebastian King.

“You’re not who you said you are.”

I blurt it out as Sebastian King stands.

Inside, I’m trembling, but I clamp down on the emotion. The image of that steel box appears again in my mind’s eye. I shove every ounce of outrage into it. I will not let my magic escape again. I won’t.

“You’re not either,” he says.

There’s nothing ordinary about this man today. The brown hair I’d found charmingly boyish in how it flopped across his brow is now slicked back. He slips the first button on his suit jacket into place, and everything he is can be summed up in that single gesture.

Cool. Contained. Confidant.

Okay, that last one isn’t a surprise, but the rest of him is. An arresting one. Betrayal feels too strong a word for his lie, but it feels like betrayal. It feels like yet another trick the world has played on me.

Then Sebastian King smirks.

That f*cking dimple—the one that made him stand out to me—appears. His smirk stokes that deep well within me I don’t fully understand. It’s the part of me that requires that steel box to contain my most dangerous emotions.

“You, Beatrice Hathaway,” he says, “are a necromancer.”