“Good.” He ran a few strands of my blond hair through his fingers, his expression turning uncertain and vulnerable. “Because I hate to see you cry, Daisy. I really fucking hate to see you cry.”

Since I didn’t have a response, I kissed him again with lip-bruising savagery, then pulled myself upright to ride him for all it was worth, his hips thrusting upward to meet mine, my tail curling between us, shuddering my way to one minor and one fairly earth-shattering climax before Cody swore and arched his back in his own, his nails raking my thighs, his cock spurting inside me.

Okay, so that happened.

The thing I loved best about the aftermath with Cody was the sheer physical easiness of it. We were comfortable together. I lay with my cheek pressed to his chest, one leg thrown over him, while he stroked my spine from the nape of my neck to the tip of my tail, occasionally scratching the base of it with perfect and delicious unself-consciousness.

“We shouldn’t have done this,” I mumbled.

“Probably not,” he agreed, his fingers working their magic on the base of my tail. “Are you sorry?”

I wriggled against him. “No. But I should go.”

Cody looked at me. “Don’t.” Hoisting himself on one elbow, he fished the leather pouch of Sinclair’s hex charm from beneath the pillows and threw it as far away as possible. “Stay.” His topaz eyes were gentle, without a trace of green. “You shouldn’t be alone, Daisy. Not tonight, not after what you went through. It’s late—the sun’s coming up in a few hours. Stay with me.”

So I did.

      Twenty-one

I slept soundly in Cody’s bed, with Cody wrapped around me. I’m not going to lie—it was nice. Very nice. It made me feel warm and safe and protected, which was exactly what I needed.

Of course, there was a certain irony to the fact that the thing I feared the most was the result of my own impulsive desires and struggles with temptation, but . . . never mind. I’d think about that later.

Thanks to daylight saving time, it was late when the dawn woke us, after seven thirty. I felt Cody stir, the bristles on his chin catching on my hair, and turned over beneath his arm. “Good morning.”

“Morning, Pixy Stix.” He smiled at me, eyes crinkled with sleep. “Did you sleep okay?”

“I did.” I rubbed one hand over his raspy cheek. “You?”

Cody’s smile deepened. “Mm-hmm.”

I glanced at the clock. “You’re not on duty this morning, are you?”

“No.” He shook his head against the pillow. “I’m back on the night shift tonight. But one of us ought to call the chief ASAP and let him know the Night Hag’s been bound and banished,” he said in a more pragmatic tone. “He’ll want to hold a press conference to announce it.”

“Good point.”

Cody levered himself upright, groping for his pajama bottoms. “You should have the honors, Daise. You’re the one who got the job done.” He yawned. “If you want to wash up first, go ahead. I’ll put on coffee.”

“Deal,” I said.

Okay, so I felt a little self-conscious calling Chief Bryant while wrapped in Cody’s plaid bathrobe, but the satisfaction I got from the chief’s sincere praise more than made up for it. In the kitchen, Cody got a pot of coffee brewing.

“Help yourself when it’s done,” he said. “Let me brush my teeth. Then I’ll see about breakfast.”

I raised my eyebrows at him. “Let me guess. Venison sausage?”

Cody raised his eyebrows back at me. “For your information, Daisy Jo, there are bagels and cream cheese in the refrigerator. I just need to get the toaster out of my workshop. And, um, a butter knife.”

“I’ll get it,” I offered.

“No, you sit tight.” He pointed at the couch. “Relax. Turn on the TV, read the paper. You’re my guest.”

Thinking that I could at least tidy a bit and make room to sit, I hauled the ridiculously large—and frankly, quite hideous—brown-and-orange crocheted blanket off Cody’s couch and folded it into an unwieldy parcel. Since I hadn’t seen anything resembling a linen closet, I figured he stored the blanket in the battered steamer trunk that did double duty as a coffee table. At the moment, it had a couple of recent issues of the local newspaper and Cody’s clunky old laptop sitting atop it.

I swear, I was not snooping. All I did was shift the laptop to the couch, but I must have hit a key or the touchpad. The screen was already up, and when the laptop emerged from sleep mode with a low, grinding whir, I couldn’t help but see.

I froze.

Apparently, Cody had been carrying on an IM correspondence with a young woman named Stephanie. Based on her profile picture, she was lovely in a wholesome, sporty kind of way, with a frank, open face, blue-gray eyes, broad, high cheekbones, and glossy brown hair.

I closed the laptop softly, feeling like I’d been punched in the gut.

Cody emerged from the bathroom. “Daisy.”

I turned to face him. “I’m sorry,” I said dully. “I didn’t mean to pry. It was an accident.”

“Daise.” He sighed and ran both hands through his hair. “I’m so sorry. We were chatting before you called last night. She’s a member of one of the Seattle clans. They set up a private forum where we could look over each other’s profiles before the mixer, maybe get to know each other in advance.”