Copyright © 2024 by GroveltoHEA
At first, I put the visions down to exhaustion.
After putting in twelve hour days at my business, I left work and drove around every night to all the places I knew Magnolia frequented and eventually widened my circle, desperate to find her. Hoping for even a fucking glimpse of her. I'd finally give up at around three in the morning, go to my room at the club house to grab a few hours of sleep before doing the same thing the next day. Work. Hunt for Magnolia. Sleep.
Then I put them down to hunger mixed with the exhaustion.
What I'd done to Magnolia gnawed at my gut so persistently and left me feeling so disgusted with myself, I couldn't eat. No appetite. The little food that I could choke down past that ever-present lump in my throat wasn't much, so I began drinking protein shakes, but even those weren't enough to stop me from losing weight.
Seeing the state I was in, my brothers put it down to sexual deprivation and wouldn't let up. They found it hilarious that I wasn't seeing any action and there were times I was ready to kill every last one of my brothers. For the first time since I was fifteen, I just didn't care about sex. It was as if destroying Noli when she'd caught me balls deep in Lamia had destroyed my interest in sex. It was like quitting smoking cold turkey only it was sex.
It'd taken getting caught to make me own up to the shit I was pulling, to the lies I was telling myself, to the risks I was taking with our health. I always used condoms, but those weren't one hundred percent foolproof, and after Magnolia left, I'd had myself tested monthly just to make sure I was clean. I was, but I kept getting tested as if it were a compulsion.
"Come on, Warlock," the brothers called to me in the mornings when I was heading out for work, trying to leave without having to talk to any of them, "Magnolia's gone. Just give Lamia a call tonight and get yourself straightened out. You've been a total asshole since your girl dumped you --"
"She hasn't fucking dumped me," I snarled at them, grabbing Smack, the brother who'd said that, by the neck and shoving him against the wall. "We're still fucking together, asshole. She'll come back to me eventually and we'll get through this."
If I could find her to talk this out and beg for her forgiveness.
"She's been gone for months. You sure she's coming back?" Gremlin taunted me.
That was all it took. I had a shorter fuse than normal lately, and I let go of Smack and threw myself at Gremlin, beating the shit out of him until the other brothers pulled us apart.
"Fuck all of you," I said and stalked off to begin another miserable day at work.
Where are you, Magnolia?
That was the first day they started happening. Magnolia had been gone just over five months, and I was at work, overseeing my guys executing one of my more intricate landscape designs, when I heard giggling in my head. Swear to fuck. Giggling. Then Noli appeared right in front of me and was looking straight at me. She was smiling softly. I knew that sweet smile and I'd missed it.
"Noli," I breathed, so fucking happy she was back I could hardly catch my breath. I tried to step toward her but found I couldn't move. Then, from my left side, some blonde fucker appeared and took her hand.
What the everliving fuck?
"NO!" I shouted, but neither of them looked at me, and then the two walked away and disappeared. As soon as they were gone, I unfroze and ran off in the direction they'd headed, but I couldn't see them.
"Uh, Boss?"
I spun around and saw all seven of my installers looking at me warily.
"You...OK?"
YOU ARE READING
WORK IN PROGRESS: Three Witches #1: Magnus and Magnolia
RomanceI fell in love with Magnus, and I thought he fell just as hard for me. Then my class got canceled and I went to the club house so we could spend an unexpected evening together. Unfortunately, someone else was already there keeping him company. My he...
