Forbidden Witches (Tarot Witches Book 2) Read online

  V

  After a long night of really bizarre dreams, I finally awakened with a gasp.

  I stared at my surroundings—the blackout curtains on the windows, the unlit black lights, the empty liquor bottles piled on the carpet. Glass jingled softly as the floor rocked.

  Where in the world am I?

  It was a bus of some kind, but the weirdest bus I’d ever seen. Instead of rows of seats, like the Greyhound I used to take to visit my grandparents, it had bunk beds and sofas. There were guitar cases stacked in the back, too. And people sleeping everywhere.

  I was still on The Forbidden’s tour bus.

  The music, the partying, the sex—that hadn’t been a dream after all.

  Twisting around, I saw a naked man with jaw-length hair asleep on the couch behind me. He was using a woman’s boobs as his pillows. Considering the position I was in, I must have spent my night sleeping on his stomach, up close and personal with the male organ draped over his thigh.

  Oh. My. Freaking. Goodness.

  In the darkness, without all the crazy strobe lights, I almost didn’t recognize Rage. He was so relaxed. Still very handsome, still kind of magnetic, but totally unguarded.

  Of all the people in my part of the bus, I was the only one with a blanket covering my body. I pushed it down to find that my corset and skirt and shoes were all missing. I wore a loose black t-shirt that was way too big on me.

  It said “Road Crew” across the chest and it smelled like Donne.

  Donne.

  My thighs clenched involuntarily at the memory of his lips on my breast and his fingers between my legs.

  I couldn’t believe I’d let a stranger explore my body like that. I hadn’t let my ex-boyfriend go down on me and we’d been together for two years. And he’d never slept over.

  But I’d done a lot of very sexy things with these people—these total strangers—and I’d slept over.

  In fact, I’d slept on a Grammy Award-winning rock star as he slept on his groupie. Judging by my loose muscles, I’d been pretty comfortable, too.

  My eyes traveled over the rest of the bus. I’d slept on one couch. The other couch was occupied by the drummer and bassist, who were spooning in a disarmingly adorable way. A few of the other VIP fans had their limbs all tangled together on the upper bunk. It was impossible to tell how many of them were up there from this angle.

  A rustling sound drew my attention toward the front of the bus. A shirtless man was tossing empty bottles and cans into a trash bag.

  Donne.

  His mohawk wasn’t red this morning. It was brown. His skin glistened from the shower he must have taken. Sweatpants hung low on his hips, exposing every single well-cut muscle from his broad shoulders down. Unlike Rage, he wasn’t waxed smooth. He was probably the hairiest guy I’d ever seen. It only served to accent the shape of his muscles.

  One of his nipples was pierced with a silver ring. I hadn’t noticed that the night before.

  To be fair, I hadn’t noticed a lot of things.

  “Donne?” I whispered, so quietly that he shouldn’t have been able to hear.

  But he did. His eyes cut through the darkened tour bus and landed on me. He picked his way through all the sleeping bodies as I tried to stand. “Don’t get up.”

  I did anyway. As soon as I was on my feet, I felt movement underneath me. Everything was swaying and I was pretty sure that it wasn’t a hangover.

  The bus was in motion.

  Fresh panic swept over me. Good morning, Leah. You’ve been abducted by a rock band on tour.

  I had to grab Donne’s arm to keep from falling over. “Where are we? What’s going on?”

  “I told you not to get up.” He shoved me against a counter. My ass hit the edge and he kept pushing until I was sitting on it. “You’ll still be tired. You’ve only slept a couple of hours.”

  “Where are we?” I asked again, trying to keep my voice down the same way that he did. God forbid I wake up the whole bus with my terror at being freaking kidnapped.

  “We’re on the way to the next venue in Los Angeles. We’re already in California.”

  “I have finals this week.” It squeaked out of me in a tiny, pathetic voice.

  Donne’s eyes sharpened. “How old are you?”

  He must have thought I meant high school finals, rather than the last round of tests I needed to take before earning my English degree at OSU. Wouldn’t it have served him right if I was under eighteen? Nobody had thought to ask me the night before.

  “I’m twenty years old,” I admitted. “I’m legal.”

  “Twenty years old. Twenty.” He said it like I had just confessed I was only fourteen. He sounded disgusted.

  My cheeks flamed with heat. “What?”

  “You’re not even legal to drink.”

  I lifted my chin. “It’s not like last night was my first time partying.”

  Donne rubbed a hand over his mohawk. He had a few minor indentations in his scalp—scars that looked like a big dog had bitten his skull—but they only served to make him look more interesting, more handsome, more dangerous.

  “You’re with us now,” he said, as if coming to a decision. “And I will keep you safe.”

  Donne was standing between my knees, and it was then that I realized two things: our bodies were really close, and I was still wearing nothing but a t-shirt. Everything underneath the hem of his shirt was exposed. The smooth skin on the inside of my ankle grazed his sweat pants when he shifted closer, cupping my face in his hand.

  His body between my legs—and my reaction to it—reminded me of the night before. Donne’s mouth suckling my nipple and the cut beside it. The way he had tasted my blood as though it were the richest wine on Earth. His fingers working deep inside of me. Rage’s lips on mine.

  The memory was overwhelming. I sat back and covered my face with my hands. “Oh my goodness,” I whispered. “What was I doing last night? What was I thinking? You drank my blood, and Rage…” I couldn’t even look at him.

  Could I contract a disease just by snuggling up with his naked bits? Had I risked my life for a night of drunken fun?

  Donne caught my wrists. Even though he looked angry, he was so gentle. “I told you that I’m going to keep you safe now. That means safe. Nobody put anything into your drinks. That knife was sterile. I’m immune to blood diseases, and I can’t spread disease either. As long as you’re with me, nothing will hurt you. Ever. You got that?”

  I swallowed hard. Nodded slowly.

  “Do you regret any of what happened last night, knowing you’re safe?” Donne asked.

  The blurry memories flicked through my skull. Ravyn going down on Rage. The bassist pounding some girl on the other sofa. Donne’s fingers inside of me.

  I thought I should have regretted it, considering all the values that had been bestowed upon me by my loving family, our friends, my temple. They would have probably tied me to a chair and tried to perform an exorcism if they’d seen what I’d been enjoying.

  But I had enjoyed it.

  “No.” I sucked in a shaking breath. “I’ve never felt so alive.”

  Dark satisfaction flicked through Donne’s golden eyes. “It’s only the beginning.” The promise in those words made me shiver.

  “But…what do you mean, you’re immune?” I asked. “How can you be immune to diseases? Is it part of the witchcraft thing?”

  He almost looked amused. “Who told you about that?”

  “Ravyn. She said that the band is full of witches who perform sacrifices to gods.”

  “Most of the people on this bus are witches,” Donne said. “As high priest, Rage is the most powerful of them. He uses spells to protect himself and his partners from disease, which makes him virtually immune.”

  “So what are you?” That didn’t sound as nice as I’d meant. “I mean, what kind of witch are you supposed to be?”

  The bus stopped moving. The squeal of brakes was loud enough that I could hear it through the walls.


  There was no way we could have already gotten to Los Angeles.

  As soon as the bus came to a rest, the others started stirring. Grunts and rustling came from the upper bunk where many of the costumed fans had been sleeping.

  “Where are we?” I asked.

  Donne stepped back, giving me room to get to my feet again. His face had smoothed. Any hint of emotion was gone. He was, yet again, the big, scary worker who had been hauling me around the stadium the night before.

  “We’re home,” he said.

  I stumbled from the bus to find myself at a mansion on the beach.

  It was a cool day. The breeze smelled of seaweed and salt. A grassy hill reared over me, its base worn away by the tides, with the mansion beyond sprawled a safe distance away from the water.

  That mansion was a gleaming stone monstrosity—exactly where I would have expected to find a blood-drinking rock band to live. The thing looked almost like a castle with its three turrets. But there were some of those Californian architectural touches, too. The Spanish arches, the open bell towers.

  It should have looked like a hideous Frankenstein’s monster of a mansion, but it all blended together perfectly with touches of ivy and roses.

  Ravyn emerged from the bus, yawning and scratching her butt. “Home sweet home!” She gave me a sleepy smile. Her makeup was a streaky mess and her hair had fallen out of one of the pigtails.

  I tried to push away the mental image of her gagging eagerly on Rage’s erection. “You live here?”

  “We all do when we’re not on the road.” She caught Storm’s hand when he emerged from the bus, dragging him toward the water. “God, I need a swim. That looks sinful.”

  They stripped their clothes off and splashed into the surf half-naked, leaving me gawking beside the bus.

  Rage emerged next. I rounded on him.

  “What are we doing here?” I asked. “Isn’t there another concert you need to perform?”

  The singer hiked his pants up his hips, yanked on the leather cord to tighten them. “Our next show’s tomorrow night. Plenty of time to get you settled in here.”

  My heart skipped a beat. “Settled in?”

  “Now that we’ve found you, you didn’t think we’d let you go. Did you?”

  “But…I can’t…”

  He slapped me on the ass. He managed to get under the hem of the shirt and solidly connect with skin, making my whole thigh jiggle. “Let Graham show you around. We’ve got a room ready for you.” He turned and waved a hand over his head. “Graham!”

  A distinguished man in his fifties approached down the path. The sight of him was a breath of fresh air, especially after seeing all of the crazy costumes everyone else was wearing in full daylight. Graham’s khaki slacks, v-neck sweater, and brown loafers looked like an outfit that anyone might have worn to my temple.

  I blushed when he stopped in front of me. It felt like being seen on the walk of shame by my dad.

  Graham gave Rage a questioning look. “Is she…?”

  “Yeah,” Rage said. “We’ve finally found one.”

  “Nice to meet you.” The older man thrust a hand toward me. “I’m Graham Clancy.”

  It felt so weird to shake his hand when I wasn’t wearing pants. Or underwear, for that matter. “I’m Leah. Um, Leah Todd.” I forced myself to meet his eyes, and surprise swept through me. Graham’s irises, like Donne’s, were a shockingly vivid shade of gold.

  He was oblivious to my reaction. Graham ducked onto the bus, emerged with a plastic bag, then gestured at me to follow him. “Let’s get inside, Miss Todd.”

  Graham led me to the house, keeping a hand on my elbow to steady me as we slipped up the sand, crossed damp grass, and went up a full flight of stairs to reach the front doors. It was a steep climb to Castle Creepy. I was winded halfway there.

  From the looks of the mansion outside, I’d been expecting medieval torture instruments waiting in the entryway. And probably at least one iron maiden.

  I wasn’t let down.

  Rage had swords hanging on his walls. I didn’t know enough about weapons to be able to tell if they were decorative or actual antiques, but they looked old. And they looked sharp, too.

  There were also chains and shackles hanging from the walls that definitely did not look decorative. The keys for the shackles were laid out on a nearby table as though they were frequently used. Very convenient for all the big bondage parties I could imagine the band holding in their entryway.

  Ravyn and Storm and the crew drifted into the house after me. They were talking and laughing as though the dark, looming house and all its buttresses didn’t intimidate them at all.

  Graham led me in a different direction. They headed for one of the wings, and he took me to the second floor.

  At the top of the stairs, the scary decorations turned to something slightly more normal: a bunch of framed platinum records, and even a couple of Grammys in glass cases. They were displayed so that the light through the stained-glass windows seemed to make them glow.

  I scanned the album art as I followed Graham. Some of The Forbidden’s covers were illustrations, like scary demons with claws and stuff. I didn’t look very closely at those ones.

  But there were others with the band in the photos. The lineup hadn’t changed over the years. There was Rage, shirtless as always, and then the bassist and the drummer, all of them looking moody in cemeteries and underneath spooky trees. Some of those pictures were from all the way back in the early nineties, judging by the hairstyles and photo quality.

  It didn’t really look like Rage got any older in those pictures.

  I stopped at the most recent album. Instead of using a photo or a scary painting, they had used the image from a tarot card. It looked a lot like mine, The Hierophant. It had the same general art style. Very striking, very colorful, a little bit frightening.

  Except this one depicted The Fool.

  “The beginning of the journey,” Graham said from behind me. He’d stopped to look over my shoulder.

  “What?”

  “The greater arcana of a tarot deck represents The Fool’s journey. You can tell how far you are in that journey by looking at the number on the card. The Fool is zero, the beginning.”

  I leaned in to get a closer look at the album cover. The Fool was a man walking toward the edge of a cliff wearing tasseled leather pants and no shirt, the same way that Rage did. But his hair was a short mohawk like Donne’s.

  The Fool was being chased by a large, shaggy wolf. He was so consumed looking at the beast threatening to bite him that he didn’t seem to notice the cliff he approached.

  The title of the album was Forbidden Witches.

  “The Fool’s an ironic choice for their farewell album, but it suits Rage’s sense of humor.” Graham continued to walk. I had no choice but to follow.

  “What do you mean, ‘farewell album’?” I asked.

  “They’re retiring—Rage and his crew. They want to focus on seeking those tarot cards,” Graham said. “Rage wants to find the witches that have received them, bring them together, and start building the court.”

  I stopped walking at the top of the stairs, bare feet locked to the crimson carpet runner.

  He turned to see why I wasn’t following him. I must have looked awful because sympathy deepened the lines on his handsome face.

  “I’m not a witch,” I said. “My family is Mormon. I’m not really into the Mormonism thing as much as my parents, but…still, I’m definitely not a witch. I can’t be.”

  Graham scratched his chin. “I don’t think I should be the one to explain this to you.”

  “Please, Graham. I feel like I’ve gone through the looking glass. I have no idea what’s going on, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little bit scared.”

  “I understand that. It’s just not for me to discuss.” He really did look apologetic. “Can I show you to your room? I’m sure Rage will have much more to tell you soon.”

  Fear lodged
itself firmly in my gut. “Do I have any choice?”

  “You’re not a prisoner,” he said gently. “You’re a treasure. We’re lucky to have you here. As long as you’re within these walls, you’ll be treated like royalty.” He patted my arm in a fatherly gesture. “You’ll understand soon.”

  I somehow doubted that.

  My so-called bedroom looked like something out of a museum. Fluffy rugs covered the chilly stone floor. The huge four-poster bed was draped in gauzy cloth. Elaborately carved flowers topped the headboard, and claws gripped the stone floor. I probably could have climbed into the armoire and gotten lost inside.

  There were chains and shackles on the wall opposite the bed, very much like the shackles that decorated the entryway. The sight of them made my cheeks all hot again.

  But there were no bars or locks on the windows. When I pushed them open, it was a two-story drop down the other side. I could have probably climbed the trellis. I didn’t think that would be necessary—there was a balcony connected to my room, too.

  Not a prisoner, just not welcome to leave.

  “Let me know if you need anything else,” Graham said, lingering by the door to the hallway. He hadn’t followed me inside. He was respecting privacy I didn’t have.

  “Thanks, Graham,” I said.

  He handed the plastic bag he’d taken off the tour bus to me. I opened it up to find my costume from the night before inside. Donne must have given it to him.

  I pulled my corset out and grimaced at it. It looked like I’d spilled more than a few of my drinks on it, and I didn’t want to smell like liquor.

  The Hierophant card was hidden underneath my clothes. I dropped the corset on the bed and took that out instead.

  What had looked like a lovely, if confusing, art piece the day before now looked threatening.

  Graham was still waiting in my doorway.

  No, not waiting. He was staring at the card.

  Swallowing a hard knot of fear, I asked, “So can I leave?”

  “After you listen to Rage and Donne’s reasoning behind bringing you here? Yes, you can leave.” Graham lifted his chin in a look of determination. “I’ll ensure it.”