Hazel

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There was nothing in this house that I wanted to keep. If a tornado came through and took everything, that would’ve been just fine with me.

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Because fuck my parents for everything they put me through but fuck them twice as hard for what they did to the people I cared about.

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“You really don’t want any of this?” Danna asked as she trailed her fingers over the books in my father’s secret library.

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“Not any of it. If there’s anything the coven wants in here, you can have it. Everything else is going to the regular library.”

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“That’s why we thought you should look through it.” Miller leaned against the door jamb. “Make sure nothing witchy makes it into the humans hands.”

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“This is quite the collection.” She looked at me. “I’ll get it done as soon as possible. Luken said he’d help but of course, he didn’t show up.”

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“I’m right fucking here.” Luken’s voice startled me.

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Of course, most things startled me since the big showdown with the Shadow Coven. No one was sure if we got them all so I was still paranoid that they were going to show up at any time.

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At least we knew Michael was dead. That meant he for sure wasn’t going to come back for me to try to convince Miller to join them.

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“We’ll leave you to it.” Miller took my hand and pulled me from the room, leaving the two of them in the secret library that the guys had found but I had no idea was even there before that. He led me up the stairs to what used to be my room. We were just starting this process and eventually, Miller and I would take over the bigger room, my parent’s old room, but I couldn’t do that yet.

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Hell. I couldn’t sleep here yet. We were going to gut it and paint and make it our own first.

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“Are you sure you want to do this?” Miller asked as he shut the door.

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“Live here? Yes. It seems dumb not to. Even if we sold it and bought something else it’d be a waste. Gia needs somewhere permanent here.” Since she and I had recently both pledged ourselves to light magic, Echo Valley was our coven and we were going to stay close. “Once we’re finished, it won’t even be the same house. I swear.” And we had the money to do it all since my parents had not in fact shielded the wealth from me before they died.

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His hands settled on my hips as he backed me toward the bed. “As long as you’re sure.”

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“I am.” I fell onto the mattress with a single bounce. “I don’t have great memories here but I also don’t have bad ones. All of my memories are out there in the woods. In here it’s just… a house.”

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Miller climbed over and kissed me while pressing me back until I lay down with him hovering over me. There was no way we were having sex with his friends—our friends—downstairs. It didn’t matter how hard his erection got.

 

“I want to ask you something.” I’d brought the kiss to an end just for this. “I feel terrible about your parent’s cabin.”

 

“It wasn’t your fault,” he said immediately. It was the same promise he’d made to me several dozen times by now as he wanted to assure me that all of this fell on the feet of the Shadow Coven.

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“No. I know. I still feel bad. But I have more money than I’ll ever need and was wondering what you’d think about me paying to have it rebuilt. However, they want it. It could still be a safe place for future witches but we could do all things to it now. Update solar panels and everything.”

 

He sighed. “It’d be a lot of money.”

 

I swiped my finger over the tip of his nose. “Luckily, I have a lot of money. Seriously. I know you don’t care about that but I have it and I want to use it to help.”

 

He kissed me again like he was trying to distract me. “We’ll talk to them about it at dinner tonight.” His lips were on mine again, but his hand pushed up under my shirt this time.

 

“Miller,” I gasped. “We have friends downstairs.”

 

“I don’t care.” His words were soft yet determined, and I knew he’d stop if I told him to.

 

Funny thing was, I didn’t want him to. Yet once I gave him the go-ahead, he stopped kissing me. I loved the man but he was frustrating.

 

“Do you think I need to wait to ask you to marry me?” He leaned on one elbow to take most of his weight off me and his thumb stroked my cheek.

 

My heart threatened to either stop or take off on its own race.

 

Marry Miller. Of course I wanted the rest of my life with him but so much had happened in such a short time that any of those decisions should wait. So I told him that.

 

“I don’t think we should make those kinds of decisions right now,” I told him. “I think you should wait. It’s not because I don’t want that life with you. It’s just that there’s still so much to work through and I don’t want anything we do to be a knee-jerk reaction. I want it to be something we decide in a moment of calm. Plus, I’m barely an adult.”

 

He chuckled then kissed the tip of my nose. “You’re fully grown. Trust me.”

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My cheeks burned. I knew exactly what he was talking about and instead of trying to match him in the flirting—which I absolutely couldn’t do—I reached for him so we could spend a little time naked.

 

Yes, with friends downstairs.

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And I didn’t even care.