Sacred Places

Chapter One

Deri Sullivan stood just outside the entrance to the seaside pub. The sounds of waves crashing in the ocean just below the bluffs somehow managed to be louder than the current storm brewing. It rained a lot in Grove Bluff. The pub, a local favorite from all she'd been told, had a certain old-world Scottish charm to it. Yet didn't feel out of place in the tiny American town. Felt as if it fit right in. As if the town itself had been created to accommodate it.

Even with the current economy, the pub and the area businesses managed to always have a steady clientele. Grove Bluff had become somewhat of a tourist attraction after being featured on a number of American-small-towns-that-are-must-sees television shows and magazine articles.

Another film crew left only last week after spending a few days visiting the tried-and-true establishments. The locals held great pride for their town and she couldn't blame them. Grove Bluff did have a certain level of charm to it that other small towns she'd been in over the years lacked. It was as if it were a small village taken from Scotland rather than nestled along the shores of eastern USA.

Deri had always had something of a fascination with Grove Bluff. Her family had driven through it once when she was just a child and it had felt perfect. A place immune to goings-on around it.

Far from problems.

Far from what was normal.

A place that was safe. And she needed safe right now.

More than ever.

Grove Bluff was the first town that popped into her head when she had to select somewhere, anywhere, to start over. This would be her home, or so she hoped. It would work at least for as long as she could stay in one place. Chad would make laying down permanent roots difficult. He'd already threatened as much.

A fresh start wasn't just wanted, it was downright necessary for her survival. A do-over that didn't include anyone knowing the truth about her. These people could never know she was a natural-born witch, descended from a long line that could be traced back to Scotland.

No.

To them she would be just Deri.

Nothing more.

Perfect.

She'd considered changing her first name too, like she planned to do with her last, but she couldn't bring herself to part with it. Her father had named her and had been proud that she was given a name passed down through the generations by the women in his family.

It broke her heart that she could no longer go by the surname Sullivan. She had yet to think of one she could use. None seemed to fit. She'd had to settle on one and fast. Especially if she was to be considered for a job here at the pub.

They'd expect some sort of name.

It was times like this she wanted to call upon her magik and contact one of her sisters. They'd know what to do. They'd help her think of a believable name, a good cover story, and help her find a life that wasn't one on the run. But she couldn't. No contact with anyone from her past.

That was one of the rules.

One of the many rules governing her life.

She hated rules and she hated the Council of Magiks. As far as she was concerned they could take their rules and shove 'em. She didn't want anything to do with them. If it wasn't for her family, and her love of them, she'd have told the council as much.

Probably more.

She wished she was powerful enough to handle them. Make short work of them and maybe send them to some deserted island in the middle of nowhere and see how they liked being cast-outs. Problem was, they held more power in their pinky fingers than she did in her entire body. And she was hardly a wimpy witch.

Far from it.

The Bureau of Paranormal Investigations (BPI) would be all over her if she dared step out of line again. They had her dead to rights on a magikal infraction that had nearly cost a mortal their life—but the truth of the matter was she'd been framed.

Everyone always claimed they were innocent. But Deri really was. She was only guilty of falling for a smarmy, lying, son-of-a-bitch dark sorcerer who had everyone else convinced he was on the side of right and good.

Asshole.

Chad Miston lied as easily as he breathed in air. He had a way about him that made others hang on his every word. Deri had been guilty of as much in the beginning. She'd thought the man hung the moon. Little did she know he drew his power from darkness and preyed upon witches. She'd been the latest victim in his quest for power, and for some reason she'd become his obsession. Turning him down had been out of the question. She'd done it anyways and was now paying the price for her actions.

Stupid BPI bought every single misrepresentation that slid off Chad's snake-like tongue. In the end, Deri had been lucky they'd only cast her out of the magikal community and exiled her, banning her from using her powers. They could have locked her away for life or demanded her death.

The infraction had been that significant.

The only reason they cut her some slack and gave her another chance—so long as she started over and gave up what she knew—was because of her father's pull with them. The second chance meant leaving her family. She was close to her sisters and her parents, but even they knew she had no choice. She had to go and make a clean break or she'd spend the rest of her life sitting in some remote facility that was warded to look like something it wasn't—like an abandoned warehouse— with a bunch of other supernatural lawbreakers.

That held little appeal.

She sighed. Starting over was a bitch. She'd been a Certified Public Accountant and had managed to get a fair number of steady clients—enough to open her own office. She'd no longer worked for anyone else and had been doing well for herself. None of that mattered. It wasn't as if she could hand out a resume with her credentials, not without raising a giant red flag for Chad to find her easily. She had to begin anew or else.

Instead she was in Grove Bluff trying to start over. Damn Chad and damn his ins with the BPI. Love was for fools. She'd never make that mistake again. No. She was not going to ever put her heart on the line or trust a man fully again. Especially not a supernatural male.

She'd find herself some unsuspecting, clueless human and eventually settle down once she figured out what she was going to do with her life. Until then, she'd work whatever jobs she could find and do her best to stay below the BPI's and therefore Chad's radar.

She had been a resident of Grove Bluff for exactly two weeks, and so far Dagger's Edge Pub had been recommended again and again as a place to go for a job. What a strange name for a watering hole. The locals claimed the owner needed help with running the place and its day-to-day activities, along with managing the books. They said he had one girl who worked for him but that was it. Since she was beyond qualified for such a job, Deri was hoping she'd be able to land it. The catch was, she couldn't exactly hand him a slip of references or announce just how qualified she was. Well, she could, but the minute he looked into it all to check if she was telling the truth, Chad would be all over her.

That just wasn't an option.

There were no visible signs from the front of the pub announcing the place was looking to hire. Nor had she seen any ads in the local newspaper, or online, for that matter. The air smelled of pending rain and she glanced off in the distance, her gaze skimming over the ocean. It certainly looked like rain was on the horizon.

Great. Just what the area needed.

More rain.

Seemed like all it had done was rain since her arrival. Grove Bluff was starting to lose some of the allure it had held for her as a child.

She sighed, running her hands through her long, unruly, deep red hair. She'd look like something the cat dragged in soon enough if she waited outside much longer. She hadn't exactly planned for the cooler weather. She had been given less than an hour to pack what she could and go, taking nothing more than a backpack with her. At the time she wasn't sure where she'd even go, let alone what the weather would be like there.

Her father's hurt expression still haunted her. He'd been ashamed that she'd violated the sacred oaths of magik. That she'd used it against another with the intent to do serious harm and, at least according to the story floating around that the BPI had spread, she'd been unjustified.

All lies.

But her word against countless heads of the organization meant little. She'd thought her own father, who managed to carry weight within the BPI, would come to her defense. He hadn't. He'd agreed to her punishment. To be exiled from their community for a period of no less than twenty years. She'd never believed the day would come when her father would allow any of his daughters to move away, let alone stand over her, looking hurt, and then turning his back on her as she walked away.

Yet he had—with her.

Deri held her head high. She would not cry again. She would not give in to the emotional, bottomless pit she'd living in for weeks since the verdict had been handed down.

No.

She was a stronger woman than that.

Chapter Two

Coyle O'Caha bent over his woodworking bench and continued to carve into a piece of oak he'd been toying with for several weeks now. He disliked when he came across oak trees being cut down, and often bought them in bulk to avoid them going to waste.

Oak was special to his people—the druids. Humans held little regard for oak in the way they should. Truth be told, humans did not care for much, other than themselves. He was not a fan of them but understood they were a necessary evil. An evil he was charged with protecting.

Stupid rules.

He sighed. There were days he often wondered if the goddess selected right when sending him to be birthed to a family of druid sorcerers and then tasking them with overseeing humans' safety as well as the training of other magiks.

He didn't mind magiks so much.

Though, more and more the new batches of witches coming through his doors for guidance held less and less respect for the craft and for its roots. They merely sought power for the sake of power. Those types almost always ended up going bad—souring and becoming something Coyle, his brothers and cousins hunted.

It had been a month or more since the last dark sorcerer had surfaced. The O'Caha boys dispatched him quickly, ending his life and harnessing his dark magik to keep it from reentering the ether and causing issues later. The dark sorcerer had more bluster than actual power. Guess he should have waited to go to the dark side before he started issuing threats and trying to be a badass, because he'd not had the juice to back his threats. Most threats were easy to deal with considering the ages of the O'Caha boys. Though, every once in a while one would crop up who took some real effort.

Korey, his first cousin and best friend, had just returned from a hunt for a dark sorcerer like that—one who took a toll on the person or people hunting him. Korey had gotten a little banged up but was fine. The same couldn't be said for their cousin Gordon. He'd already suffered at the hands of demons and was paying the price. All the O'Caha men held guilt over Gordon. They each felt as though they'd failed him in some fashion.

And they had.

He'd been brutally attacked and held captive for months by a dark sorcerer who had turned to the ways of the vampires— the blood drinkers. Gordon had not come out the other side of the ordeal the same as he'd gone in.

Who would?

Gordon now was also considered a vampire, though none of the O'Caha boys would ever dream of hunting him. The damn eejit thought himself a danger to mankind and was doing a damn fine job of trying to end himself. The fool had no idea that the good-hearted man he'd once been still remained. That the blood drinker side of him did not rule him.

Couldn't get it through Gordon's thick skull, though.

Another O'Caha faulty trait.

Stubbornness.

Coyle glanced at the wall, wondering if he should try, again, to call Gordon. The man was refusing to answer his cell, and even mystical summons were yielding no results. If Gordon didn't respond soon, Coyle would bring in the big guns.

Their grandmother.

She'd straighten him out or pull him by his ear to the rest of the boys so they could. Many a time in his seven hundred years Coyle had found himself on the receiving end of her pointed finger, her gaze narrow, her other hand on her hip. For a woman who didn't even come to his shoulder, she was scary when she wanted to be and extremely loving and nurturing all other times.

Oh yes, he'd bring her in for sure if Gordon didn't respond to him soon.

He smiled, his focus returning to the Oak King sculpture he was carving. So much of his time had been poured into carving this or that. At his age, getting lost in a project was a must. If he didn't, he'd dwell on the past, on all the things he could not change yet desperately wanted to. Worse yet, he'd dwell on the fact that none of the O'Caha boys had found their chosen ones. Women who were the other halves of their immortal souls. Other immortals they knew had found true love. But none of the O'Caha men had.

Coyle wondered what their line had done to piss off the goddess. They respected her and feared her. She did not seem to find them in her favor though, for they were all still very single.

Some liked that.

Others, such as himself, were ready to start families and have something more in life. He sighed. It hadn't happened in seven hundred years and didn't look as if it ever would. For now, he'd do what he always did with his spare time—he'd stay busy. He carved around the mouth of the statue, paying extra attention to each pass he did, letting his love of his past pour forth and into the oak.

The idea for the Oak King had come to him while he slept, as many of his better ones did. The soft sounds of music from the motherland played as he lost himself in his work.

The pub's building was large enough that Coyle could have a workshop in the back without issue. He had an apartment above it. While he could live like a king, as could any of the O'Caha men, he chose to live a simple life. Others did not need to know he was worth millions, perhaps billions—he tended to lose count.

Money meant little to him. He could still vividly recall when he and his clan had lived in the Highlands, hunting for food, living off the land. So many modern conveniences meant so many took so much for granted.

Not Coyle.

He held great respect for the land and for the magik that created it all. That same magik ran through his veins, often wanting to be free. With his age and position came high titles within the supernatural magik community. He and his brothers and cousins each held positions upon the High Council of Magiks. There were so many O'Caha that the other members often joked the vote would never be in their favor.

Not true.

The O'Cahas were fair and just.