Time Travel Romances Boxed Set (180 page)

Sebastian!

He landed with deadly accuracy, his weight
knocking the breath out of her as he pinned her to the sofa.
Sebastian snatched at her wrists when Lilith started to fight him
and kissed her hard. He stank of cigarette smoke, his touch was
rough and unwelcome.

“
Hey, baby, I’m home,” he
rumbled in her ear, loosing a stench of beer. The faint undertone
of Shalimar clung to him and Lilith had a very good idea how
Sebastian had wiled away the hours he was away.

She fought him, but he wasn’t going to take
no for an answer.

“
Easy, baby, you know you
want me.” Sebastian grabbed Lilith’s wrists and leaned his full
weight on top of her. She was captured and cornered, and she didn’t
like it one bit.

Lilith decided in that moment that she’d
live out her life alone - however long it might prove to be -
rather than put up with having this man underfoot.

Or overtop.

He landed a wet kiss on her, clamping his
lips down hard when Lilith tried to turn away. Sebastian slipped
his tongue between her teeth and a repulsed Lilith bit it hard. At
the same moment, she drove her knee up into his crotch.

Sebastian yowled, Lilith shoved his weight
off of her, knowing that she only succeeded in tumbling him to the
floor because he was shocked.

Lilith bounced to her feet and wiped
Sebastian’s saliva from her lips with disgust. She wanted to scrub
every inch of herself to get rid of his filthy touch.

But first she had to get rid of him. Her
wrists still hurt from Sebastian’s cruel grip on them and she knew
she’d be bruised.

She’d be lucky to have no greater scars.

Sebastian rolled into a ball on the floor
and howled, a response that might have been comical if Lilith
hadn’t been so mad.

“
My tongue! I think you
took the end off it!” He glared at her. “It’s your loss, baby. This
tongue is worth its weight in gold.”

Lilith spat at him and backed away.
Sebastian’s eye flashed, he leapt to his feet and he lunged after
her. He was bigger than her, he was stronger, he was drunk, and he
was mad.

And he wanted one thing from her that Lilith
didn’t want to give.

There was only one thing she could do to
defend herself quickly. Before she could change her mind, Lilith
called down a hex. Sebastian snatched at her as she started to
chant, his handsome features contorted by a menacing snarl.

Lilith danced back, and she sang out the
last line of the curse. She felt the power coil within her, she
felt the heat of it seeking a direction. Sebastian swore and jumped
as Lilith pointed her finger directly at him.

No sooner had the last word crossed her lips
than Sebastian froze.

Lilith sank against the doorframe in relief,
hearing her heart race. Her hands were shaking.

Just in time.

Sebastian was locked in the act of leaping
after her. His hands were outstretched, his fingers distended, and
Lilith knew that in another heartbeat, they would have been locked
around her neck. His features were dark with fury, and his nostrils
were even slightly flared.

And he wasn’t breathing. Lilith listened
carefully just to make sure. He wasn’t dead. He was just …stopped.
He wasn’t hurt or even uncomfortable.

Sebastian was simply stuck in one second of
his life.

Lilith liked him much better this way.

She exhaled shakily once she knew for sure
that her spell had worked. Although he was hardly the most tasteful
sculpture she’d ever seen, in this state, Sebastian was no threat
to her.

At least for the moment.

But Lilith still didn’t know what she was
going to do. The hex would last for maybe a day. She couldn’t put
this spell on Sebastian indefinitely and she knew he wasn’t going
to be a good sport about this incident when he was back to his
usual self.

She didn’t even want to look at him.

Lilith hated casting hexes. They were
unpredictable, and could easily defy her mandate of harming none.
She didn’t think she had had a choice, though. It had been her own
safety or the hex.

Happens
. She heard Sebastian’s
dismissal of the widow’s fate in her thoughts and shivered.

No. She hadn’t had a choice.

Lilith tried to think of what repercussions
could come from her casting a hex. Although technically, she hadn’t
harmed Sebastian, he was mightily inconvenienced. The Rule of Three
did say that all a witch cast out into the world would come back
upon her threefold.

It was a fairly serious motivational tool.
Lilith had a habit of doing only good – her first curse, even for
the sake of saving herself, left her very uncertain of the ultimate
result.

Would she be trapped similarly for three
hours, in exchange for every hour Sebastian spent this way? Or
would the Fates toy with her another way? Would they twist the hex
into something else entirely?

Before Lilith could think any further, the
doorbell rang.

*

Mitch had had enough.

A day and a night hadn’t improved his mood
over Lilith taking on this Sebastian guy and he figured he’d
already given her plenty of time to think things over. There was no
way he was going to get anything done at work today with this
hanging over his head. Mitch bit the bullet, shoved his pride into
cold storage, left the kids sleeping and took a chance.

To hell with how early it was. He went and
rang Lilith’s bell.

She answered really quickly, the shadows
underneath her eyes encouraging Mitch that he hadn’t been the only
one to miss a night’s sleep over this. Relief washed over her
features when she found him on her doorstep. Mitch’s heart skipped
a beat at this sign that he had done the right thing.

“
Lilith, we have to talk,”
was all he managed to say before Lilith grabbed his hand and hauled
him into her foyer. It put Mitch in mind of their first meeting, an
encounter he wouldn’t mind replaying if it could all end more
happily.

But Lilith clearly had other things in mind
today.

“
Look!” she urged and
pointed him toward her living room.

Mitch peeked into the room, and jumped in
shock to find himself about to be attacked.

Then, he realized that Sebastian wasn’t
moving.

In fact, Sebastian didn’t look like he
could
move.

It was as though he was frozen. Curious
despite himself, Mitch wandered into the living room and circled
Sebastian. He even touched the man’s clawing hand and found the
skin still warm.

The hair rose on the back of Mitch’s neck.
Sebastian didn’t even blink, but Mitch had the distinct sense that
his rival was
in there
.

And bloody mad about the whole thing.

Mitch stepped back and glanced at Lilith,
suddenly having a very clear idea how Sebastian had gotten this
way. It seemed that Mitch’s ideas about spells were doomed to
follow the same path as his certainty about magic.

He cleared his throat, and decided that
wasn’t so bad.

It was only then that he noticed how Lilith
hung back in the foyer, her hesitation decidedly
uncharacteristic.

Mitch frowned. “What exactly happened
here?”

Lilith bit her lip, her gaze flicking to
Sebastian with uncharacteristic nervousness. “He jumped me,” she
confessed quietly.

What?
Mitch saw suddenly that there
were bruises already forming around Lilith’s wrists. He stepped
closer and took Lilith’s hand, examining at the marks with a frown.
An anger rose within him, a fury that any man could treat any woman
with such disrespect, that this man had abused this woman this
way.

“
He was gone all night, he
must have been drinking.” Lilith’s words fell hastily. “I fell
asleep on the sofa and he seemed to think I wanted something he
had.”

Mitch met her gaze. “Did he hurt you?”

Lilith’s tears welled, then she shook her
head and blinked them away. “He frightened me,” she admitted, then
glanced at the motionless Sebastian as though she didn’t trust him
to stay put. Lilith took a deep breath. “I’ve never cursed anyone
before.”

Mitch took a long look at Sebastian’s pose,
at the fury in his expression, and slipped one arm around Lilith’s
shoulders. “You didn’t have a choice,” he said softly, pleased when
she turned into his embrace.

Mitch held Lilith closer when he felt her
trembling, his gaze running over her would-be attacker. He would
not think about what this excuse for a man had wanted to do to
her.

“
I wish every woman could
cast a spell like this one.”

Lilith looked up at him questioningly. “I
thought you didn’t believe in spells.”

Mitch smiled crookedly. “So, you’ve
convinced me.”

But Lilith didn’t smile. She eyed Sebastian
from the haven of Mitch’s embrace and frowned. “It won’t last a
day.”

“
Then, what are we going to
do before that day is up?” Mitch asked.

Lilith blinked. “We?”

“
Yes,
we
.” Mitch was
resolute. “Lilith, I meant everything I said yesterday. I love you
and I think you love me. We make a hell of a team and I’m not
prepared to let it all go just because this jerk showed
up.”

Lilith frowned and avoided his gaze, her
move feeding Mitch’s certainty that she was less certain of her
path than she would have liked to be. He bent his will on
persuading her to his side. “You can’t spend your life with this
guy, and you can’t keep hexing him like this.”

“
No,” Lilith
admitted.

“
Lilith,” Mitch said
softly, tipping her chin with a fingertip so that she met his gaze.
Her eyes were wide and dark, wondrous eyes that Mitch could
willingly gaze into for the rest of his days. “I love you,” he
insisted, “and I don’t intend to stop.”

Her smile was fleeting, her frown returning
when she glanced again at Sebastian. “But he’s my destined
lover.”

There was less certainty in her tone than
there had been originally and Mitch dared to be encouraged.

But he’d have to argue on her terms.

“
Says who? You’re the one
who saw all sorts of meaning in my buying the house next to you.
Don’t you think that events - not to mention a dog and a cat - have
conspired to throw you and I together? Who’s to say
that’s
not destiny?”

Lilith nibbled her bottom lip. “But, Mitch,
it doesn’t count. My destiny was sealed before I met you. We can’t
defy destiny.”

“
Why not?”

“
Because we can’t.”
Lilith’s lips set stubbornly.

Mitch gripped her shoulders, sensing that
the tide had turned against him again. “Why the hell not? We just
do it, we just get rid of this loser - we’ll FedEx him to Kashmir,
if we have to - then we’ll live happily ever after. It’s not that
complicated!”

But Lilith shook her head. “No, it doesn’t
work like that.” Something flickered in the depths of her gaze when
she looked up at him and Mitch thought it might be fear. He caught
at her chin, but Lilith danced out of his grip, refusing to look
into his eyes.

“
What are you afraid of?”
Mitch demanded. “What can go wrong? What do you know that you
aren’t telling me?”

Lilith’s lips tightened, then she folded her
arms across her chest, and she looked hard at Mitch. “Why do I get
the impression that you’re not going to leave without an
answer?”

Mitch grinned. “Because I’m not.” He
sobered, his gaze locking with hers. “There are things,” he said
softly, “that are worth fighting for, and this is one of them.”

Lilith held his gaze for what might have
been an eternity and Mitch could almost hear the wheels turning in
her mind.

Then the defiance melted out of the set of
her shoulders. “Challenging destiny comes with a price,” she said
softly.

“
What kind of
price?”

“
I don’t know.” Lilith
licked her lips as though choosing her words carefully. “I’m not
afraid of paying any toll the Fates charge. I’m afraid that they’ll
hold me responsible, if you and I decided to challenge their edict,
because I should have known better. I’m afraid that they’ll bring
misfortune down upon you to teach me a lesson.”

Lilith was refusing Mitch to ensure his own
future. He was humbled by her concern – even though he was certain
it was misguided. He stepped back to her side.

“
But Lilith,” he argued
with quiet conviction, “if we’re together, we can face anything the
Fates toss our way. I don’t want to be lucky if it means being
without you.”

Tears welled in her eyes as Mitch continued.
“Be with me, Lilith, and we’ll surmount any obstacle before
us.”

“
I love you,” Lilith
confessed. “I love you in a way I never imagined I could love
anyone. I was wrong about Sebastian. I saw what I wanted to see in
him instead of what was really there.”

Mitch smiled. “Been there, done that,” he
acknowledged. “It’s not fatal. Besides, I’m starting to think that
the only people who never make mistakes are people who never take
chances.” Mitch offered Lilith his hand and his voice dropped to an
urgent whisper. “Let’s take an chance on happiness, Lilith.”

And Lilith smiled fully, for the first time
since Sebastian had arrived. Her eyes glowed as she took Mitch’s
hand. “There’s no gamble between us,” she declared, “just in what
the Fates cast our way.”

“
Absolutely,” Mitch agreed
as he pulled her into his embrace. “Now, do I get a kiss to
celebrate this happy ending?”

Lilith just had time to slide her arms
around Mitch’s neck before there was a thunderclap loud enough to
pop an eardrum.