“Really? You have an industrial kitchen and enough food stores to feed a marching army, plus me?”

Linda’s gaze warmed. “He does have a very healthy appetite.”

Ruby snorted. “He needs a southern-cooking granny who equates love with food and stuffs him to the gills every time he visits.”

“I’m not a grandmother, but I’ll see what I can do while he’s here.” Linda allowed herself a small smile, but made a tentative gesture to hold Ruby an additional second. “One last thing. I was talking to Derek, and he agrees we should reinforce the fault line, thicken the energy at the place where it was weakened. A Great Rite would be appropriate.”

“Makes sense.” Ruby’s fingers curled into balls inside her hooded sweatshirt pockets. I don’t want to see that. I can’t watch Derek lie upon another woman, raise energy with her….

“So you concur?”

“Yeah, why not?”

Linda arched a dubious brow, telling Ruby she should have started the day by chugging a pint of Deception. “Sheila, another of our coven members, is Miriam’s best friend. She’s understandably staying with Miriam for the next few nights. Might even move in with her for a little while, until the residual effects of the soul-eater contact die back. So without Derek and you, we’re down to eleven. With you both, it will be thirteen, the best number for a strong energy raising.”

No way was she going to stand there during a Great Rite featuring Derek and Linda. If the intent was a strong energy raising, they’d get it. Ruby would probably turn the circle into a crater.

“I think you two should perform the Rite,” Linda said. “I’ll coordinate as head priestess.”

“What?” Ruby didn’t realize she’d taken another two steps back until Linda followed her, probably because Ruby looked ready to put something the width of a football field between them.

“Is that a problem? I don’t discount my own abilities, but I admit things have me a little rattled. I’d do better in a support role this time. The two of you are the most capable magic users here. We need the energy flow to be as strong as possible. And since you and Derek already have an obviously strong bond—”

“Bonding doesn’t mean anything. Grant and Lee had a bond. They didn’t become golfing buddies.”

Linda pressed her lips together. “I’m sorry; I misunderstood. I was just thinking of what might be best for mending this rift, and it seems the two of you would be the best avenue to that.”

“Coffee. I’m going to drink coffee. Then we’ll deal with this.”

Chapter 12

RUBY PIVOTED AND MARCHED TOWARD THE HOUSE. A Great Rite? Sure, why not? She’d just had visions of hanging Derek with his own rope and turning Linda into a lard stew. Why not put her in the center of a powerful energy raising, where she could become a bomb, capable of exploding into shrapnel inside a closed circle?

She stopped outside the side door to the kitchen, breathing hard. Okay, yeah, she was a bit volatile right now, but it was boiling to the top quicker and more often because she’d taken herself out of a routine, a controlled environment. She needed to get the hell out of here. When she got home, she could contain it.

However, even fighting her own reaction, something Linda said filtered through. Derek agreed….? He thought this was a good idea?

Yanking open the door, she stomped inside, determined to tear a strip off his ass for planting such a ludicrous idea without even discussing it with her first. Now Linda was involved, and she was going to be disappointed or confused— more than she was already.

As Ruby stepped into a laundry room that led to the kitchen, her arm was caught and she was flipped around. Before she could do more than yelp in surprise, she was lifted onto the top of the washer. Derek put himself between her knees, caught her face and put his mouth on hers.

It was an entirely unexpected assault on her still-foggy morning senses, but it brought back last night with vivid clarity, particularly when one broad hand clamped down on her ass and snugged her up against him. Her legs faithlessly curved around his hips, her canvas sneakers sliding down hard thighs, the tender insides of her knees remembering the way his backside felt without denim covering it.

He had the other hand on her jaw. Every man who’d ever been smart enough to watch Richard Gere kiss a woman knew that was a devastating assault on her senses, the way those fingers could stroke temple, cheek, throat, ear, all those little erogenous nerve centers. An overwhelming level of emotional stimuli was communicated by a hand on the face. It made the focus on her, not just her assorted pink parts.

Of course, since Derek had been alive way before Richard Gere, maybe Richard had picked it up from him. She didn’t care, couldn’t care, and was lost in the demanding heat of those firm lips on hers, reminding her he’d possessed her body fully last night, that he considered her his in every way. And that he had implied, rather strongly, that he considered himself hers.

He pulled back when fluttering moths had inundated her empty stomach, her heart was pounding, and she was wet between her legs. She looked up at him, trying not to appear as dazed and off-balance as she felt. “You bastard,” she said weakly.

“I figured I’d get this out of the way before you start taking shots at me.” He braced his hands on either side of her hips, kept his face steady and square in the field of hers. “What’s got you riled up already?”

“Great Rite? You told Linda—”

“I agreed a strong energy raising would be good after last night. She decided the Great Rite would be most appropriate. I didn’t suggest it, but you and I both know she’s right. It’s one of the most powerful means of delivering Light, particularly with a coven that’s still learning its way. The magic of a Great Rite is connected to the root energy center of our souls, so when needed it can be more instinctive than learned.”

His brow creased at her look, and he flicked a curl over her ear, giving it a little tug. “Ruby, you of all people know what a Great Rite’s about. There’s no need to be jealous. Linda’s a fine priestess, but I don’ t—”

“She doesn’t want you to do it with her, you arrogant ass. She wants you to do it with me. Thinks it makes more sense.” She glared at him, shoved him back, which of course was like trying to move a brick wall. “I want to get down.”

“In a minute. I do better at getting answers when I can keep you cornered.”

“A cornered animal will bite,” she advised.

His blue gaze twinkled at her, despite the hard set of his mouth. “Thanks for the warning.” When she made a noise of frustration that sounded remarkably like a trapped and infuriated badger, he sobered. “Seriously, I didn’t make the suggestion, Ruby. I don’t lie.”

The bite to his voice suggested which of the two of them was guilty of that sin. But before she could get her hackles up over the entirely valid accusation, he pressed on. “But it does make the most sense.”

“For who?” This time she managed an awkward but determined hop off the appliance and ducked under his arm, pivoting to face him, her arms akimbo. “Derek, I can’t. And I won’t. So you’ll just…. have to do it with her. And I won’t help. Twelve will be fine for a circle. We held it last night with three; for a Great Rite, twelve will be plenty. It’s time for me to go. I need to go.”

“Ruby, this is about more than your secrets, or you and me. Something’s going on here. Things that aren’t making sense. I know you’ve asked yourself the same questions. Why has Asmodeus chosen this place? Why did he send forerunners to scope out our defenses? If it was a simple breakout, he’d have done it fast and dirty, done his worst and tried to vanish again before I could catch him above ground and do enough damage he’d have to stay in the Underworld for the next twenty years to recuperate.”

She could do enough damage he’d have to stay down there ten times that length. Long after she was dead and gone.

“Because I don’t have those answers yet,” Derek pressed onward, “I want this line strengthened as much as we can make it. Seeing your capabilities last night, the power reserves you have, your participating in the Great Rite is vital to what we’ll face going forward. Hell, we might even be able to reinforce this fault line enough that we set them back to square one, so that they lose heart and go look for another access point.”

When she said nothing, he sighed. “You want to go back to North Carolina after that, fine. While I think the ladies could benefit from at least a few more days with you, we’ll call it square if you can do that much. The truth is, if you refuse to participate in this, based on what happened last night, I’m going to need to pull in another magic user of similar strength. There aren’t that many available on short notice.”

Another magic user of similar strength. No matter how much she accused him of it, Derek wasn’t into bullshitting, and definitely didn’t do idle praise. While the compliment last night had been validating, hearing that he truly considered her a strong magic user, a peer, rocked her on her axis.

“I don’t know,” she said sullenly. “I haven’t had coffee.”

“Come eat.” Giving her a considering look, he tugged her by the hand into the kitchen. She saw a plate full of pancakes on the kitchen counter. Next to it was a platter that she suspected had once held quite a few more of them. Setting hands to her waist, Derek boosted her up on a stool next to him and that plate of pancakes. He pushed it toward her, handing her a second fork. “Maple syrup’s right there. I didn’t soak them up yet, because I know you like to eat them before they become soggy with it. I’ll take this end and we’ll work our way to the middle.”

A choice of words she knew wasn’t idle. “I’m not doing it, Derek.”

“I think you’ve already decided you will.”

“You think so? A snowball fight in Hell says you’re wrong.”