“Most of them, anyway,” Ronan grumbled. “The dagger laceratedmuscle and drove into bone. It was as if the confusion wasn’t only in my brain, but in the wounds. Even after shifting several times, I’m not back to full strength.”
“Of course you aren’t,” I said. “You were stabbed with a Mara blade. You can’t heal wounds like that with human healthcare—no offense, Mauricio, I know you did your best.”
The nurse shrugged. “None taken. I’m aware of my limitations.”
“That’s what I’ve been saying.” Jenny stood and held out a hand for Calvin, who climbed to his feet with her help. I’d need to get him another charm soon. It looked like the one Cecil made to ease his arthritis stiffness was weakening. “You can’t heal a shifter with human medicine—no offense, kid, you did your best.”
“And again, none taken,” Mauricio said.
“You can ask Calvin. I said, ‘Ronan needs a witch,’” Jenny continued as if Mauricio hadn’t spoken, “‘and the coven is the enemy.’”
“The coven is dead,” I said. “The ones responsible for hurting him, anyway.”
Ronan’s head jerked up. His gaze held mine. Questioning.
“Good riddance,” Jenny said without missing a beat. “Now that you’re here, you can help him. He needs you, Betty.”
“How convenient for him,” I drawled.
Ronan scowled. “Betty, godsdamn it.”
“Hey.” Felicia held up her hands. “I’ve been telling him this all along, too. He was the one who said not to call you.”
Ronan cursed under his breath.
“There’s a lot of that going around,” I said, throwing his words from a moment ago at him.
“Come on,” he said. “I screwed up. I get it now, I really do. But my brain wasn’t sending that message to the rest of me for some reason. I swear, it won’t?—”
“No, it won’t.” I dug in my purse for his keys and tossed them to him. “Here. Your truck is at my place because I borrowed it when I was wasting time searching for you. I’ll send Margaux over to take alook at your injuries. You can trust her as much as you can trust the rest of us here. In fact, I’d say she’s got even more beef with Floyd than Felicia and me since he arranged for her to be ousted from her own coven.”
“Whoa,” Felicia said.
“Couldn’t have happened to a nicer person,” Jenny muttered.
“About that. We were all kind of wrong about her.” Ouch. It really pained me to say that. Like physically hurt.
“Ousted?” Ronan frowned. He moved so that he was the only person in my line of vision.
“Floyd bribed Desmond Mace to challenge Margaux for the coven after she refused to kill you at his request. Three of the coven members lied about the winner of the challenge to get Desmond into power, which—long story short—really backfired on them when he turned around and murdered them.”
“What?”
“Follow along here. Your father gave a witch a cursed book as payment for killing you.”
“Cursedbook? No, wait.” He shook his head. “Floyd thought someone like Desmond Mace could takemedown?”
“Hey, don’t get too cocky. The dude was powered by cursed magic. I barely defeated him, and that ended up being a joint project with the rats, the wolves, and me. I’m going to have nightmares about the sounds of all thatchewing.”
“When did this happen?”
“During the time you were hiding out here trying to ‘protect me.’” I used quotation fingers, which was an annoying thing to do, but I was feeling petty. “But, hey, don’t worry. Desmond is dead, and the rats and I saved the good witches. Everything turned out just peachy. BecauseIhandled it.” I slung my bag over my shoulder and stormed out the front door.
“Betty—”
I spun around. “I had him rightfuckinghere, Ronan.” I opened my fist and pointed to the palm of myhand. “I could’ve ended him, and it would’ve taken no more energy than batting away a gnat. All my problems, yours, and those of anyone else your dad has screwed over would’ve gone away.”
“Why didn’t you do it?” The way he asked it, softly and without the anger of a moment before, told me he was glad I hadn’t.
