Magic and Darkness: Fated Magic Series, #4

By Ally Summers

I'm not the only one with a destiny.

The problem is his might destroy us.

Someone is terrorizing and kidnapping women in New Orleans. I need Finn to get it together, but he's distracted. After years, he finally has the one element he needs to complete his quest.

Was trusting him again the biggest mistake of my life?

Welcome to Sullen's Grove and the world of Ivy Grace, where time travel, magic, shifters, love and heartbreak run rampant. Ivy is a bad-ass heroine, ready to fight for what matters most. This is the fourth in the complete six-book series.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Head Over Heels Press
• Release date: Aug 7, 2019
• ISBN: 9781393638094

Book preview

Chapter 1

Finn and I stood behind the brick building for what seemed like an hour, but minutes pass slowly when you realize the choices you have made have set things in motion you can’t take back or undo. We stared at the jasper resting in my palm.

I think we need to talk about this. I reached for his hand, but he stepped away and slid both his hands in his front pockets. Like the line loosening on a fishing pole, I felt one of the strings holding us together slacken and unravel.

There’s nothing to talk about except where we’re going to find Emmy Harper. He smiled at me, but I could tell he was struggling to regain his usual charming demeanor. I wondered if he could feel the threads loosening too.

You don’t think we need to discuss that, out of the blue, a jasper you’ve been searching for, for years shows up in an old building in New Orleans, while we happen to be in pursuit of a kidnapper? I couldn’t imagine discussing anything but this.

Babe, it’s not coincidence. It can’t be. It was obviously planted to distract me. To throw us off. There is nothing unplanned about this jasper. But I’m not going to let it. It actually makes it more of a clue than what we had before.

What do you mean? I questioned.

He plucked his sunglasses from his jacket pocket and slid them on, covering the crystal blue eyes that were now tinted with a mask of shadows.

He sighed before explaining. There are only a few of these stones in the world, and only a few people who even know they exist. He took the jasper from me, tossed it in the air, and tucked it in his crisp, white shirt pocket. If anything, this little rock just gave us a suspect list.

He had a way of turning things around, but no matter what he said he couldn’t spin it enough to make me forget what that blue rock had already done.

Abreeze drifted off the water, and the humid morning was tolerable as long as the wind kept sending waves of cool air. I watched the horizon as a barge floated past.

Finn was on the phone while I ordered coffees and a plate of beignets for us at one of the cafes near Jackson Square. He was far enough away that I couldn’t hear what he was saying, and I wasn’t sure who was on the other end of the call.

He was going to have to redirect the police investigation and somehow keep them at bay while we located the real kidnapper. He would have no trouble leading them down the wrong path. This was a moment when I was actually grateful for his deceptive skills. I settled into my chair and watched the pigeons hop in and out of the chair legs, rooting for leftover crumbs.

The discovery of the blue jasper confused everything. I had renewed hope that we would find Emmy. At the same time, I worried Finn wouldn’t be able to walk away from the Shadow Quest now that he held the missing piece.

I didn’t know much about Finn’s quest. I put together the bits and pieces of a broken story he scattered in front of me when we dated. That was part of the deal. Magaix on a quest couldn’t share details.

I grilled Ian about any information he could give me about Finn when we first started dating, but those two had a brotherly code that even my sibling status couldn’t break.

The only magix I knew who had accepted a Shadow Quest was Holly’s father. Sometimes I thought that was why she had a soft spot for Finn. She saw slivers of her father’s struggle in him.

It wasn’t until Finn left me in Savannah, and our romantic weekend turned hellish that I discovered he had a quest. On the drive from Savannah back to Sullen’s Grove, I had conjured every imaginable scenario—the top offender being another girl. I didn’t expect the quest. I showed up on his doorstep to retrieve my ring, and demanded an explanation.

I knew he would try some kind of excuse to smooth things over. Even when he was confronted. Even when he didn’t want me to leave. Even knowing he had shredded all the trust between us, he wouldn’t tell me what his mission was or what he was trying to accomplish.

He was full of apologies and lines, but he expected me to forgive him based on the sheer fact that he had a quest. I couldn’t. He should have told me from the beginning.

I exhaled and then sipped on my coffee. I pinched off a bite of the beignet. Finn was leaning on a pillar, one ankle kicked out in front of the other. The sun made his dark blond hair look lighter on top. He pressed the phone against his ear and reached in to tap the blue jasper with his hand. I could tell he was already worried about it.

He had always been secretive about his past. My body and heart felt as if they knew him inside and out, but really, I didn’t know much of anything.

Finn wasn’t from Sullen’s Grove—that I knew from the beginning. During one of our weekend beach trips to my parents’ summer home, he finally told me he was from Georgia.

Mama called me at work one afternoon to let me know she and Daddy couldn’t make it to the beach, and she wanted to know if Finn and I would be interested in going for the weekend.

I just hate that no one is going to be at the house this weekend. I mean, it’s just sittin’ there, and I loaded the fridge with all kinds of things last weekend, she said.

My mother was notorious for over-shopping at the grocery store. She said she did it to make sure Daddy had everything he needed for his gourmet meals. I always thought she was stocking up for the next hurricane, as if we wouldn’t have ample warning.

Really, Daddy’s ok with Finn and me going to the beach house alone? It didn’t seem possible.

Oh, sure. Of course, honey. We have too much going on at the restaurant, and there’s a big engagement dinner next Friday I’m working on. You two just go and have a wonderful time. She paused, and I realized the likelihood that my father hadn’t given his blessing at all on this weekend, but she rambled on before I could approach the topic. Like I said, there’s plenty of food, and you know where the extra wine is. All of the beds have been changed, and I might have even left a load of clean towels in the dryer. It would be such a huge help if you could fold those for me.

If folding a load of laundry was all I needed to do to have a solo weekend with my hot, sexy boyfriend at our beach house, I was in.

"Got it, Mama. I can do that, and let