Page 78 of Hexy Beast

Darius chuckles. “Good to know.”

“There are no frog toenails in this one,” Mom says. “Only something old.” Her great-grandmother’s favorite pair of earrings appears in the cauldron. “Something new.” The moto jacket I got the day before I left to help Leona pops up in the cauldron. “Something borrowed.” Juniper’s favorite pink lipstick bobs up out of the swirling purple mist in the pot. “And something blue.” One of Barkley’s feathers with a cobalt streak in it materializes in the smoke. “Now, everyone, send your best wishes to the happy couple to be.”

I’m not sure what to do here. I mean, I am part of the happy couple to be, and right now, it feels like all the wishes I’ve ever had have come true. Then my wolf lifts up her head and howls, taking care of that part for us.

At first, there’s nothing. Darius shoots me a well-that-was-weird look (honestly, I can’t blame him, our family is a little odd). Then there’s a rumble followed by the ground shaking once, twice, three times. Then the familiar scents of Jordan almonds, vanilla wedding cake, and fresh-cut flower bouquets fill the air half a second before all three appear. But that’s not all. The gazebo is suddenly covered in honeysuckles in bloom even though this is totally not the season for that. There are wood benches for folks to sit in. A jazz band is set up on Main Street, and Aunt Artemis herself is waiting on the gazebo steps for us.

“I didn’t send out a request for Atropos to attend,” my mother says, because of course she knows who Artemis really is.

“Maybe not,” I say as Darius and I exchange a knowing look, “but she wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

Only a few short minutes later, I’m decked out in a sleek white silk gown I magicked up for myself and am walking up the steps of the gazebo with my dad. He kisses the top of my head and manages to offer only the tiniest of snarls to Darius before taking his seat next to Mom.

When Darius slips the purple twine ring on my finger and I do the same with his ring, it’s all I can do to keep the happy tears at bay. My life is as unexpectedly perfect as it could ever be. Who could ask for more than that?

We make it through three whole dances at the reception before Darius hooks a finger in my belt loop (you know I made sure to add those to my dress) and pulls me close. I melt against him as he dips his head down and kisses the shell of my ear.

“Ready to be carried over the threshold?”

Oh yeah, like as soon as we exchanged the I dos. “Yes, please.”

He scoops me up and walks down Main Street to the community clubhouse—home of the ginormous bed, to-die-for shower, and fabulous couch where you could binge-watch all sixty seasons of Witchy 911.

“We’re spending our wedding night in the clubhouse?” I’m not totally against it, but it’s definitely not the wedding night I was hoping for.

“I may have lied about that,” Darius says, a slight pinkish hue to the tips of his ears.

“May have lied?”

“Okay, I did lie,” he says. “It’s my house.”

I let out a surprised gasp. “But the bed—”

“Hasn’t been used for an orgy in years.” He brushes his lips across mine in a quick kiss that promises so much more. “However, I do plan on using every inch of it tonight to show you how glad I am that you said yes.”

Then he carries me inside and kicks the door shut behind us. The rest is magic.

What can I say? I’m a very lucky woman with a very talented husband.

Epilogue

Effie…

Three years later…

There’s no kind of chaos like a Sherwood family get-together.

Everyone is gathered in the backyard of my childhood home. My sisters are circled around the cauldron, which has been moved out of the kitchen and into the garden. Whatever is boiling in it smells more like elderberry wine on a fast ferment cycle than a spell. Meanwhile my parents are standing in the summoned darkness by the conservatory talking with Juniper’s vampire fiancé. There are various aunts and uncles, cousins, grandparents, and family friends relaxing on blankets on the lush grass or dancing on the floating floor. Tilda’s husband, Gil, and Leona’s husband, Erik, are shooting flames out of their fingertips to get just the right char to the steaks cooking on the grill. Erik’s sister and brother are talking with Beatrice, and she has that gleam in her uncovered eye that always means trouble. And Barkley? Well, let’s just say he isn’t a rooster in the daylight anymore and no one is more excited about that than Bea—but she’ll have to be the one to tell you all about that.

Everyone is laughing and having a good time basking in the fabulous reality that the Council has been defeated thanks in no small part to Tilda and Leona keeping The Liber Umbrarum out of their hands. Then there was Juniper unlocking the magic of the runes carved into the jail in Arcadia, bringing in the vampires, and escaping The Beyond to bring that information back to Witchingdom. And Bea played no small part when she figured out how to lift the curse that kept her now boyfriend trapped inside Barkley so he could complete the final spell to banish the Council for good.

And me? Well, I guess I helped too by breaking the Aetos Werewolves’ generations-old jinx and bringing all the werewolves in Witchingdom over to our side of the fight against the Council.

We all have a purpose, even if it’s not always the one the world thinks it should be—sometimes it turns out to be so much more.

I lie back on our picnic blanket brought from home so it smells like the Arcadia woods and inhale a big whiff of pine needles and the first chilly fall breeze woven into it. I settle my head onto Darius’s lap, using his thick thigh as a pillow as I watch so many of the people I love celebrating the upcoming Samhain together.

“So what’s this I hear about the troll vegetable garden collective getting an anonymous donation to cover its financial shortfall?” I ask.