When the Starrs Align (2 page)

She’d often wondered if their unique birth was why people seemed so drawn to them. As much as she’d disliked their incessant teasing about her budding figure and constant attempts to scare her with insects and small rodents, she’d been fascinated with the pair.

Handsome, charming—even occasionally to her—smart, popular. They could do no wrong in the eyes of most of the town and featured in every girl’s fantasies. Hell, she continued to have odd dreams about them, now and again. Hard to explain, even to herself, considering she hadn’t seen either bully in a decade.

Not liking her incessant curiosity about the pair, she tried to shake off the annoying interest and trotted back to her father’s house. The twins would know she’d want to spend time with her father, so in the event they tracked her to his house, she’d worn something to camouflage her scent and voice. An amulet that still sat around her neck, fixed to what looked like a collar.

After climbing up to the second floor of her father’s old studio, she slid inside and shifted into her human form again, pleased to wear her own skin. But not for long. She’d returned to town at the behest of her father to witness the twins’ Becoming, at the rite of the blood moon, a procession that had members from covens across the country in attendance. She understood the significance. Everyone in Darkton would benefit from two such powerful warlocks to maintain order and protection over the enspelled town. With the Starrs contributing to the power structure, there would be no more threat of vampire or demon takeover.

She’d wanted very much to come back as herself, but she knew that would only make it easier for them to screw with her again. And she wanted her own revenge before they became too important to mess with. Taking that watch had been the first of many such pranks she intended to pull. Harmless stuff, but actions that would relieve old wounds.

So instead of remaining in her own form, Regan concentrated and let her bones and muscles reshape themselves into the appearance of her aunt. With a sigh, she slowly stepped into the clothing she’d left behind before she’d shifted three hours ago.

Once again dressed in slacks, loafers and a thin, rose-coloured sweater, she patted her aunt’s bun of mahogany hair streaked with grey and walked down the steps into the space her father now used mainly for storage.

Touching the amulet at her neck and confident no one would see it for the powerful charm it was, she left the studio and walked through the backyard to her father’s house.

Inside the red, two-storey colonial, an eclectic mix of old and new decorated Phil Riley’s humble abode. An artist of great renown, her father painted with magic, infusing each of his pieces with wonder and skill. Nothing so ordinary as portraits or landscapes—her dad crafted magical renderings of unicorns and centaurs, old myth versus new magic. Her favourite, the duelling wizards, hung over her bed at home in Seattle.

That the wizards in the picture bore startling resemblance to Warrick and Chance meant nothing. The men were handsome. Why shouldn’t her father use them as his muses?

“There you are.” Her father smiled at her. “I was hoping to find you back,
Olivia
.”

The emphasis on her aunt’s name warned her to play along. “Yes, Phil. Just inspecting your garden out back as well as your old studio. Marvellous space.” Years of living with her aunt gave her imitation authenticity. A good thing, since her aunt had visited her father more than once over the years.

Waiting for whatever had urged her father to caution, she soon found it a few seconds later. From the hallway came double trouble. Warrick and Chance turned the corner and entered the living room. They stood side by side and studied her with an intensity she could feel deep inside.
Good God, they’re sexy.

Not sexy,
she corrected herself.
Annoying. Brutish. Mean.
Except they didn’t look mean as they smiled sweetly at her aunt.

Determined to get her head on straight, she reminded herself of the time they’d filled her bedroom with snakes and frogs, and inwardly shivered. Back then she’d seriously freaked out. But after realising nothing had tried to bite her or been venomous, she’d overcome her fear of snakes awfully fast. Still, she refused to let the past repeat itself. In her father’s house, she remained safe.

She didn’t fear them taking her away, not when she stood inside a warded home, but she’d wanted to go about town incognito while she was here. She could only hope her ruse would hold.

Regan gave them Aunt Olivia’s sweetest smile. “My. You boys sure have grown.”

“Why, Olivia Riley. You look prettier every time we see you.” Chance
would
resort to flattery. Warrick just stood there looking grim.

“Oh, now. Stop.” She patted her hair. “Now tell me, what should I expect from your Becoming? It’s all anyone in town can talk about. Are you two ready to take that step?”

The Becoming happened once in a witch or warlock’s life, when they grew into the final phase of their powers. The ceremony normally included them bonding to a lover or taking a familiar—if the mages in question had no inclination yet to bond and didn’t have an animal through which to cleave their energy—to facilitate a path towards their innate power.

From what the twins had said earlier, they had no familiar. But she also knew they remained single—a fact much lamented in town. She’d heard that Candace Stafford was dying to nab the brothers, and a more grating woman Regan couldn’t imagine for them. Then again, Sue Weston, Maggie Hilderbranch and a plethora of single women from town, in addition to those visiting from other covens, also hoped to snag the most powerful warlocks born in five centuries.

Women, prestige, power. The Starrs had it all. So why bother chasing her?
Because they can, that’s why.
Someone needed to stand up to these bullies and take them down a peg while it was still possible. She knew the elders on the council had safeguards in place to handle any mage too powerful to contain one-on-one. But she wondered if they’d factored in Chance and Warrick’s unique situation.

Meh.
Not her problem. As soon as she’d witnessed the ceremony, to make her father happy, she’d go back West. There she planned to join the Seattle coven. She’d been toying with the idea for a while. Life with too many magic users in Darkton hadn’t suited, but a life devoid of magic didn’t work for her either. Perhaps a mix of both would fit her in the grand scheme of things. Because being back here, even for two days, had shown her how much she missed using her skills without having to hide them. Well, at least from those not having the last name of Starr.

“…and we’d be glad to have you stop by.”

She blinked and realised both brothers and her father were staring at her.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I was wool-gathering. What was that, dear?” She had to force herself to add the endearment when she really wanted to knock the warlocks around. Nothing too harmful, just enough to see the Starrs endure a fraction of the humility she’d suffered.

Her father answered with an odd expression, one that made her nervous because she couldn’t read it. “I was just telling the boys that you’d be happy to escort them home and pay a call on Lisabeth. What with Regan unable to come home now, it’s the least we can do to pay our respects.”

Had the man lost his mind? “Oh, I don’t know. Lisabeth is a very important person. I don’t think she’d want me interrupting her during this vital—”

“No no, Ms Olivia. Our mother thinks the world of you.” Chance nodded.

That much was true. Despite being born a null—a witch unable to practise magic—Olivia had the wisdom and bloodline of the Rileys in her veins. Though Regan had gained her mother’s ‘freakish’ shapeshifting talent, she too felt a witch’s power humming in her blood, a power she’d never been able to tap.

“Well, if you’re sure,” she said more to her father than the guys.

He nodded, his smile too big for his face. She didn’t trust it. Then her father was shoving her through the doorway, practically tossing the lot of them out of his house. “Bye, honey. You’ll be fine. Trust me.”

She drew a deep breath then let it out slowly, more than aware that the brothers now flanked her, and that Warrick had a tight grip on her forearm. To help her or hold her hostage?

The gentle smile he gave her told her he hadn’t yet figured out her charade. Best to go along until she could escape. She’d remain out of sight until the blood moon ended. Period.

“So, Ms Olivia,” Chance said with a smile as they walked along the sidewalk heading for the heart of town. Where Lisabeth and Theo Starr had a huge house. But then they made a few turns and instead walked back in the direction towards the brothers’ large plot—the one she’d run from not long ago. “How’s tricks in Spokane?”

“Oh, the book business is fine. Life is good. Slow, but good.” Perhaps their mother waited at their house? Regan slowed her step even more, in no hurry to see that witch Lisabeth. Both a literal and figurative description.

“And Regan? How is your beautiful niece?”

Beautiful?
She stumbled and Warrick righted her. “How’s that?”

“You know, your stunning niece,” Warrick rumbled, and she felt the hum of his energy bleeding through their contact, where the weight of his hand seemed to grow heavier. “We’ve looked for her over the years.”

Her heart raced and she fought for calm. “Did you now? She was with me. Easy enough to find.”

“Funny. The few times we stopped by, we had the sense she hadn’t been anywhere near you.” He sighed. “We were so awful to her when we were kids. Our magic turned us ugly. Really ugly.”

Chance frowned at him. “Some uglier than others.” When Warrick shot him a glare, he continued, “But he’s right. We only ever wanted to apologise and explain why we’d grown so out of control. I’m sure it wasn’t the case, but we felt guilty that maybe Phil had sent her away because of us.”

Wait. They had a reason for being immature little snots?
“Well, you two were a handful.”

“And we still are, I’m sorry to say.” Warrick’s grip grew tighter.

Chance had his hand at her neck before she could blink, and the charm that should have been resistant to warlocks and witches alike suddenly vanished from her throat. “Welcome home, Regan.”

Before she could turn into a snarling jaguar, Warrick pulled on her power and darkness overwhelmed her.

Chapter Two

“Okay, now I know that wasn’t the best way to go about instilling trust, but you won’t sit still long enough to behave.”

Hours later, Warrick couldn’t tell if Regan was listening to Chance or not, because though her mouth had firmed into a grim line, her eyes still seemed cloudy to him. Not that bright, glowing green that usually accompanied her smart-mouthed remarks, but a dull jade, as if the fugue of his temporal displacement spell hadn’t yet faded.

“Assholes,” she slurred.

“Ah, there you are.” Chance beamed. The idiot.

“A word, brother?” Warrick felt safe to leave her be, tied in restraints in the chair, warded against shifting or any use of magic aside from what they allowed.

“What?” Chance didn’t leave his seat facing hers. He and Regan sat knee to knee in the living room of their home, where the little thief had earlier stolen his watch.

“We’re not convincing her we’ve changed by tying her up.”

“We let her go, she’ll take off.”

“He’s got that right,” Regan said with a slur and a grin.

Damn, the woman had grown even better-looking, were that possible, since the last time he’d seen her. Long brown hair threaded with bands of red and gold framed a siren’s face. Deep green eyes, a haughty nose, high cheekbones and a mouth made for sin completed the picture. Those full lips had starred in more than one fantasy of his, wrapped around his cock while he surged deep. And her body… She had the nicest body he’d ever seen, and he knew she’d fit him and Chance perfectly. He swallowed hard and worked to control his responses.

If he could have limited that attraction to only the physical, it wouldn’t bother him so much that she couldn’t seem to stand them. But he lusted after her laugh, her quick wit, her joy, her fucking
soul
.

Sure, he and Chance had made mistakes with her. But shit, he’d been all of sixteen years old and perpetually horny when the nightmare of his obsession started. And while every other girl in school—hell,
in town
—had made eyes at him or thought him the best thing ever, Regan had treated him and Chance with disdain. Problem was, she was the only girl he’d ever wanted to notice him.

And the woman
still
managed to piss him off, arouse him and shame him that he couldn’t act like a gentleman in her presence.

“Same old Starrs.” She snorted, then laughed.

“Do something with that.” Warrick waved at her—an unspoken order to Chance to sober her up. They always understood each other. A twin thing. Light and dark, two sides of the same coin.

Of the same soul. A secret they’d go to their graves keeping.

Chance sighed and muttered an incantation under his breath that reverberated in Warrick’s mind. Hmm, he wouldn’t have thought to call on air for aid.

But it worked. He watched as Regan blinked and stared at Chance, then him, with a growing frown. “What the fuck did you two do now?”

Chance smiled. “Well, well. Little kitty’s back. And so pretty.” He eyed the too-small slacks and tight, rose-coloured sweater that fitted her like a glove. She’d grown out of the tiny shoes she’d worn and was now barefoot, her toes painted a sexy red. Small onyx stones in her ears were her lone concession to jewellery. No ring, as it should be. Without the charm that had hidden her true identity, she sparkled like a shiny weapon he longed to hold in his hands. And stroke, long and deep.

“Why is he looking at me like that?” she said to Chance, keeping her gaze averted from him.

“Who, Warrick?”

“Yeah. He looks like he wants to eat me.” The moment she said it, she froze. “Uh, I mean, like he wants to beat me or something.”

Chance’s lips quirked but he ignored the obvious entendre.
Good man
. “Look, Regan. We’ve been on the wrong foot with you for years. I think it’s time you heard us out.”