His lips were much softer than I expected, and he tasted like valrivia smoke. I don’t remember closing my eyes, but I must have. His mustache grazed my skin, but I quickly became accustomed to it; either that, or I was distracted by the way his tongue filled my mouth and rolled with mine in slow waves. Or the way goose bumps rushed over my arms. Or maybe even how warm his skin felt under my fingers as they mysteriously found their way under his T-shirt to trace the line of golden hair that ran down his stomach.

Somewhere in the back of my head I knew we’d long ago accomplished our goal, but I was genuinely surprised when my knees gave out, and a small moan escaped my mouth as I slipped away from him. He made a quick grab and steadied me, hands circling my waist. That had never happened to me before, and I sure as hell didn’t want him to know that, but he probably sensed my surprise so it didn’t really matter.

By that point, I’d forgotten all about the memory spell. He began kissing me again, then forced himself back with a groan and spun me around to face away from him. He pinned me between his chest and the desk, slinging an arm around my shoulders to hold me tight as his erection pressed against my lower back.

He pushed my hair away from my shoulders and settled his chin in the crook of my neck.

“So …” he whispered huskily in my ear, “we’ve discovered that you can arouse me.” He demonstrated this fact by pressing harder against me, just in case I’d forgotten. “However, we don’t know about you. And there is the small matter of Heka.”

His free hand moved to the button of my jeans, which he deftly maneuvered open with a quick flick. My zipper followed. Then his hand slid into my jeans, under my panties, and kept going until his fingers slid unexpectedly and we both breathed in sharply. When he found the right spot, I moaned, and he made a small noise of happy discovery. He flattened two stroking fingers against my sensitive flesh. My hips couldn’t make up their mind whether they wanted to move forward on his fingers or backward to arch against him, so they alternated repetitively between the two.

Then he unexpectedly broke away, deserting his efforts between my legs and withdrawing his hand. I moaned again, this time in disappointment.

He cleared his throat. “All right. Ready?”

“Oh, yes,” I chirped with great enthusiasm, temporarily mistaken about what I was agreeing to. My brain was having trouble adjusting.

His fingers glistened as they swept over the sigil, leaving behind the Heka needed to charge the spell; so much for the pristine edition of his rare grimoire. When he spoke the incantation, his voice cracked, then settled. His Latin was flawless—as good as mine, if not better. I scrambled to focus on the lost memory that I was trying to recapture, and when the last of his Latin tumbled out, I realized why the spell was called The Wheel.

His energy poured into me in a steady torrent. I felt it, recognized it as his. Such a strange feeling, almost as intimate as sex, and something I’d never experienced. It mixed with my Heka, then left me in a rush, just as if I’d pushed it out intentionally. The energy link. That was what the instructions for the spell had meant. Our combined energy moved in a circle, gathering strength and speed as magick circulated between us. His arms wrapped around me, and mine around them, and we held on to each other like we were in the middle of a tornado, trying to ride out the spinning storm.

A flood of jagged, partial memories surfaced and faded, each one vying for attention. Flashes of faces. Fragments of sentences. My old life returning after years of sitting idle under a layer of dust. Streams of hot, silent tears spilled over my cheeks, but I wasn’t sure why.

Then it became painful. Wrenching. The magical wheel was off-track. Colors blurred into blackness and my mind felt as if it were being bulldozed from the inside out. I strained to break away and heard Lon groaning to do the same. Without warning, the spell derailed completely, and the shock of it threw us backward together. The room reappeared in my bleary vision as I slammed against him. We hit the shelves behind us so hard, a row of books flew out and rained down on our heads as we tumbled to the floor.

I gasped for air and struggled to untangle myself from Lon as someone called in the distance. Three loud knocks pounded on the locked library door. Apparently now home from school, Jupe spoke in a muffled voice from the other side.

“Dad? What was that loud noise? Is Cady here? Her rental car is outside.” He pounded on the door again. “Are you guys okay? What just happened?”

I wondered the same thing as I zipped up my jeans with shaking hands.

19

“Well, Mr. Piggy, it looks like I’m going to be your second mommy for a few days.” Kar Yee bent down to open the door to my hedgie’s crate and reached inside to pull him out. The two long locks of hair on either side of her face were a little messy. It was early; she hadn’t tweaked them into points yet.

“You sure you don’t mind?” I asked, plopping down on the white couch in her living room. Everything in her apartment was white, cream, or gold. Not my taste, but her stuff was way nicer and cleaner than mine, so I couldn’t really complain.

She held Mr. Piggy up to her face and inspected him critically, one eye squinting. I was a little worried that he would take a nip at her for doing that, but he behaved. He obviously knew he needed to make a good impression.

“He can stay in his crate while I’m at work. I’ll put up his pen in the kitchen and let him get some exercise while I’m at home.” She tucked him under her arm and lazily plodded over to an armchair. “If he pisses on anything, he’s getting locked up in the bathroom.”