Free Abandoned (Book Two of the Castle Coven Series): A Witch and Warlock Romance Novel by Hazel Hunter

anything to say about it, they won’t hold it for much longer.”  
    “You have no idea what our time together was like! You know nothing about what I felt then or what we did together!”
    In her anger, she threw the covers off, uncaring that she was naked. She stood and struggled for her clothes.
    “Hailey, I don’t need to know what you did together to know that he acted inappropriately. He was never in a position to make promises to you. He would never have stayed.”
    The quiet words were like dark birds pecking at her spirit. For a moment, she could not understand what he had said. Then she felt a rage boil up inside her.
    “That is not something you can tell me,” she hissed. “This conversation is over. This is not under discussion.”
    Piers started to say something, and then he shook his head.
    “You’re right.”  
    He turned and dressed as well. The silence between them stretched out, tense with electricity and fraught with what lay between them.
    Hailey’s thoughts were a tumble of fractured images and conflicting feelings. Her body could still feel the warmth of Piers’s hands on her. One moment, they evoked all the care the man had, for her, for his coven, for all of the witches and warlocks in the world. The next, they made her remember with anguish Kieran’s hands. The thought of Kieran being hurt, of him being forgotten tore at her heart until she could barely stand it.
    “Hailey?”  
    She looked up, feeling as fragile as a china dish. Piers was holding out his arm for her as if he were an old-fashioned gentleman come to call on her. She had no idea what he wanted at first. Then she realized that he was offering her his power again.
    “Take it,” he said softly. “What’s passed between us is no matter. I am still who I am, and you are still who you are. You are a brave and passionate woman who has shown me that she can be trusted and who I very badly want as part of my coven.”
    “And you?”
    The words came out before Hailey could stop them. For a moment, there was a riot of emotions on Piers’s face before he shrugged.  
    “I am a fool,” he said softly. “Please.”
    She touched his arm, closing her eyes and reaching for that power again. It was a sea of light, and this time, it was as if it lapped against her. It wanted her, responded to her. She wondered if something in their joining last night had affected the way this transfer occurred. There was something terribly familiar about it, both pleasurable and deep, but that didn’t make any sense. It was not quite like the times she had pulled power from him before.
    “Are you ready?”
    She nodded. He pulled the door of the safe base open and gestured her through it. There was something terribly final about the way he did it. A part of her didn’t want to leave the quiet, private world that they had shared in the safe base, when it had just been the two of them.  
    It was never just the two of them, she realized. Kieran was always there, waiting in her mind, waiting for her.  
    Outside, the Wyoming morning was just beginning to break over the horizon. The air was crystal cold, and for a few moments, it hurt to breathe. Then she acclimated and stepped out over thin air, floating before rising a bit above the treeline.
    “Can you follow me?” Piers’s words were quiet, but to her relief he sounded normal.  
    There was no recrimination in his voice, no anger. She wasn’t sure if she could have taken any harshness in that moment. She felt like she wanted to shatter into a million pieces and let those pieces be scattered all over the world.
    “I can,” she said instead.
    He sped towards the Castle. Hailey fell into place behind him. As she flew, she heard a sleepy call from an owl. It was likely Merit, telling her that all was well. She wished she could tell her beloved familiar the same thing.

CHAPTER EIGHT

    THE FLIGHT RETURNING to the Castle was quiet, but a part of Hailey still rejoiced when she saw the golden walls