Charm, p.1
Charm, page 1
Praise for Tracy Wolff’s Crave series
#BookTok
“I have not enjoyed a book like I’ve enjoyed this in a long time.”
—Danisbookish
“I love the Crave series.”
—MunnyReads
“Esta saga es mi mejor descubrimiento (this saga is my best discovery)!”
—Albazamoraexpo
“READ THIS SERIES!!”
—Theemmarae
“OMG! I’m obsessed.”
—Isabellagerli
“Fue tan bueno que lo leí dos veces (it was so good I read it twice)!”
—Marianaboooker
“This is now a Crave stan account!”
—Grapiedeltaco
“I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say literary masterpiece.”
—Heybiancaj
“Ok but why is it so cute?”
—Bookswithsierra
“Absolutely epic love story!”
—caroline_cares
“La Crave Saga para mi: hogar (the Crave Saga for me: home).”
—Letiziaalg21
More praise for Tracy Wolff’s Crave series
A #1 New York Times bestselling series
A USA Today, Publishers Weekly, and Spiegel international bestselling series
“It will keep you on the edge of your seat until the very end… You’re going to be waiting eagerly for what will be coming next.”
—The Nerd Daily, on Court
“A wild ride from start to finish.”
—Hypable, on Covet
“So many twists and turns, you need a roadmap for this thrilling adventure.”
—Culturess, on Covet
“YA Feminist Must-Reads of 2020”
—Glitter magazine, on Crush
“Throw in some deadly intrigue to mingle with the dark secret Jaxon bears, and you’ve got a recipe for YA vampire success.”
—Bustle, on Crave
“Harry Potter meets Twilight.”
—The Charger Bulletin, on Crave
Also by Tracy Wolff
The Crave series
Crave
Crush
Covet
Court
Katmere Academy: An Insider’s Guide
Table of Contents
Copyright
Dedication
1 Nearly Gutless Grace—Grace—
2 Head Space, Talk Space, Give Me Some Space—Grace—
3 I Do Like a Good Cup of Hurl Grey—Grace—
4 Every Little Thing He Does Is Not Magic—Grace—
5 Hot and Not So Heavy—Hudson—
6 In One Head and Out the Other—Grace—
7 Burning Down the Louse—Hudson—
8 Eat, Drink, and Be Wary—Grace—
9 From One Blink to the Necks—Grace—
10 Burning Your Britches—Hudson—
11 Sleep Like the Undead—Grace—
12 Grace on a Platter—Grace—
13 My Life Is an Open Phone—Grace—
14 Diary of a Vampire Kid—Grace—
15 The Best Defense Is More Defense—Hudson—
16 No Vamp Is an Island—Grace—
17 This Is How My Cookie Crumbles—Grace—
18 Trying to Lair Low—Hudson—
19 Put a String on It—Hudson—
20 All the Sizzle, None of the Heart—Hudson—
21 I’m Not RSVPing for This Pity Party—Grace—
22 All Cry, No Punishment—Grace—
23 Welcome to My Jungle—Hudson—
24 Dividing the Room in Styles—Grace—
25 I Mo, You Mo, We All Emo—Grace—
26 Re-Tweeting—Grace—
27 De-Briefing—Hudson—
28 It Dunks to Be Me—Grace—
29 How Do You Say Good-Pie?—Hudson—
30 Uneasy as Pie—Hudson—
31 Stalks and Bonds—Grace—
32 Some Bonds Can’t Be Unbroken—Grace—
33 Fake It or You Don’t Make It—Grace—
34 I Read You All Wrong—Grace—
35 Running Down a Nightmare—Grace—
36 Please Don’t Start the Fire—Grace—
37 You’re Dragon Me Down—Grace—
38 Waking Dawn—Hudson—
39 Keep Calm and Don’t Carry On—Hudson—
40 Don’t Farm It In—Grace—
41 Crop Till You Drop—Grace—
42 She’s Giving Me the Smokey Eye—Grace—
43 One Direction Is Not Just a Band—Hudson—
44 I Can Dish It Out If You Can Make It—Hudson—
45 Don’t Let the Bedvamps Bite—Hudson—
46 I Like to Sleep Tight, But Not This Tight—Grace—
47 You Really Stuck My Landing—Grace—
48 No Farm, No Foul—Grace—
49 Re-Veg Is Sweet—Hudson—
50 I’m Oh So Swan-Yay—Grace—
51 A Not So Savage Garden—Grace—
52 There Has to Be an Udder Way—Grace—
53 Suck It Up, Buttercup—Grace—
54 He’s Got Hangry Eyes—Hudson—
55 Afraid of My Own Shadow Queen—Hudson—
56 Baby Got Piggyback—Grace—
57 Cliffs Notes Got Nothing on Me—Hudson—
58 I Cave It My All—Grace—
59 I Know a Prick When I Smell One—Grace—
60 Tastes Like Teen Spirit—Hudson—
61 Carpe Drink-Em—Grace—
62 Dimples and Curls—Grace—
63 Tic-Tac-Toe and No Chill—Grace—
64 If I Could F(lie)—Hudson—
65 Live and Let’s Run—Grace—
66 Good Will Hugging—Grace—
67 The First Rule of Fright Club—Hudson—
68 I Have Friends in High Places—Grace—
69 Color Me Purple—Hudson—
70 Way Too Hidden Talents—Hudson—
71 Inn-stant Gratification—Grace—
72 Gone Wishin’—Grace—
73 My Lady in Red—Hudson—
74 1D-reams Come True—Grace—
75 Café Lotta Say—Hudson—
76 The Choux on the Wrong Foot—Grace—
77 Ah-Choux—Hudson—
78 All LinkedOut—Grace—
79 Getting the Red Ribbon Treatment—Hudson—
80 Starfalling for You—Hudson—
81 All’s Fair in Love and Ring Tosses—Grace—
82 Star Light, Star Bright—Grace—
83 On Top of the (Other)World—Grace—
84 It’s a Knock-Down, Dragon Fight—Hudson—
85 Dragon Me Over the Coals—Grace—
86 Go Stone or Go Home—Hudson—
87 Let Me Change into Something a Little More Stony—Grace—
88 Feather or Not, Here I Come!—Grace—
89 No One Wants to Catch These Cookies—Grace—
90 Sucker Brunch Me—Hudson—
91 I Know How to Hold My Drink—Hudson—
92 Drinks Are On Me—Grace—
93 I’m Spooning Over You—Grace—
94 Talk Dirty to Me—Hudson—
95 We Roll with the Brunches—Grace—
96 No Such Thing as a Free Brunch—Grace—
97 Time After Time Dragon—Grace—
98 Let’s Talk About the Time Dragon in the Room—Hudson—
99 Distrust but Verify—Hudson—
100 Whine and Dine—Grace—
101 Covering None of the Bases—Grace—
102 Between a Rock and a Hard Grace—Grace—
103 Passing the Pouspous—Grace—
104 How to Rock and Not Roll—Grace—
105 A Whole New Meaning to Stone-Faced—Grace—
106 Always Look a Gift Mayor in the Mouth—Grace—
107 Good Girl Gone Mad as Hell—Hudson—
108 I Want You to Want Me—Grace—
109 50 Shades of Fangs—Grace—
110 Need You Tonight—Grace—
111 Amateur Astronomer—Hudson—
112 Waiting for the Other Dragon to Drop—Grace—
113 One Surprise Deserves Another—Hudson—
114 Sending Out Smokey Signals—Grace—
115 The Tail End of the Deal—Grace—
116 Ripping the Scales—Hudson—
117 From Smokey with Love—Hudson—
118 It’s a Hack Job but Someone’s Got to Do It—Grace—
119 Big Disco Ball Energy—Grace—
120 Death on the Dance Floor—Grace—
121 This Is How You Skew It—Hudson—
122 Love Is a Red-Ribboned Thing—Grace—
123 Grin and Grace It—Hudson—
124 Now You’re Inn for It—Hudson—
125 Kiss My Asset—Grace—
126 A Not-So-Tastee Freeze—Grace—
127 Statue of Limitations—Grace—
128 Here’s Your Horns, What’s Your Hurry?—Grace—
129 Gargoyle Girl Gang—Grace—
130 A Shot in the Dark—Hudson—
131 The Story of Tonight—Grace—
132 You Bite It, You Buy It—Hudson—
133 Cross My Heart and Promise Not to Fry—Grace—
134 The Wheel of Misfortune—Grace—
135 BDSM: Bondage, Dragons, Stone, and Magic—Grace—
136 It’s Darkest Before the Dawn—Hudson—
1 37 Where the Wild Things Really Are—Grace—
138 Buggin’ the F*ck Out—Grace—
139 Don’t Trust Her as Far as I Can Throw Her—Hudson—
140 It’s Not Even My Third Rodeo—Hudson—
141 Is This a Bad Time?—Grace—
142 Full of Light,Full of Grace—Hudson—
143 What Grace Around Comes Around—Grace—
144 Out of the Shadows, Into the Light—Grace—
145 It’s All Coming Back to Me Now—Grace—
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Sneak Peek: Last of the Talons, by Sophie Kim
Stealing Infinity, by Alyson Noël
The Valkyrie’s Daughter, by Tiana Warner
The Liar’s Crown, by Abigail Owen
The Gravity of Missing Things, by Marisa Urgo
Ember of Night, by Molly E. Lee
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2022 by Tracy Deebs-Elkenaney. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.
Preview of Last of the Talons copyright © 2022 by Sophie Kim
Entangled Publishing, LLC
644 Shrewsbury Commons Ave., STE 181
Shrewsbury, PA 17361
rights@entangledpublishing.com
Entangled Teen is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.
Visit our website at www.entangledpublishing.com.
Edited by Liz Pelletier
Cover art and design by Bree Archer
Stock art by Renphoto/gettyimages and Dem10/gettyimages
Interior endpaper design by Elizabeth Turner Stokes
Interior design by Toni Kerr
ISBN 978-1-64937-149-2 (Hardcover) ISBN 978-1-64937-363-2 (B&N)
ISBN 978-1-64937-300-7 (BAM) ISBN 978-1-64937-301-4 (TARGET)
ISBN 978-1-64937-364-9 (WALMART) ISBN 978-1-64937-129-4 (Ebook)
ISBN 978-1-64937-382-3 (B&N BF Signed Edition)
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition November 2022
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For Andrea Deebs,
the most badass mother a girl could ever ask for.
Thank you for being mine.
At Entangled, we want our readers to be well-informed. If you would like to know if this book contains any elements that might be of concern for you, please check the book’s webpage.
https://entangledpublishing.com/books/charm
1
Nearly Gutless Grace
—Grace—
My head feels strange.
Actually, every part of me feels strange, and I don’t have a clue what’s going on.
I think back over the last few minutes as I try to figure out why I feel so hollow and unmoored, but all I can see is Jaxon’s face. He’s smiling at me as we walk down the hall, and we’re joking about—
Just like that, it all comes flooding back. A scream tears through me, and I instinctively jerk away from Hudson’s blade.
Except there is no blade, I realize as I arch backward.
There is no Hudson.
No Jaxon.
No hallway—and no Katmere Academy. In their place is a vast, dark emptiness that has panic clawing at my insides as I struggle to figure out what’s happening.
Where am I?
Where did everyone go?
What is this odd weightlessness that fills my every cell?
Did Jaxon’s brother actually kill me with that sword?
Am I dead right now?
The idea slinks into the corner of my mind and seizes the breath in my lungs.
Panic grows into full-blown terror as my eyes strain to see more than an inch into the inky-black nothingness that surrounds me. I frantically run my hands over my body in an effort to find the death blow. To confirm—or please God, debunk—the idea that I am dying or already dead.
Oh God, I don’t want to be dead. The thought slams through me. Please don’t let me be dead—or worse, a ghost.
Dating a vampire is one thing, but please, please, please don’t make me a ghost. Getting stuck haunting Katmere Academy’s hallways for an eternity as Nearly Gutless Grace is so not my idea of a good time.
But as I finish my personal inspection of myself, I notice there is no wound to find.
No blood.
Not even any pain. Just this weird numbness that refuses to go away as it turns me colder with every second that passes.
I try blinking fast a couple of times to clear my vision, and when that doesn’t work, I rub my eyes, and then I force myself to look around again, ignoring my sweaty palms and shaking hands as I do.
But nothing’s changed. Darkness still surrounds me on every side—and not just any darkness. The kind that only happens when there is no moon, no stars. Only a sky as black and empty as the terror growing inside me.
“Seriously? As black and empty as the terror growing inside you?” a sarcastic voice with a very proper British accent asks from deep in my head. “Melodramatic much?”
I’ve gotten used to a voice in my head sometimes telling me how to survive over the last couple of weeks, but this is totally different. This guy sounds like he wants to hurt, not help me.
“Who are you?” I ask.
“Really? That’s your big question?” He yawns. “Soooo original.”
“Fine, then will you just tell me what’s going on?” I demand in a voice that is way more high-pitched—way more frightened-sounding—than I would like. Then again, truth in advertising is a saying for a reason…
Still, I clear my throat and try again. “Who are you? What do you want from me?”
“I’m fairly certain I’m the one who should be asking those questions, Princess, considering you’re the one dragging me along for this ride.”
“Dragging you?” My voice breaks. “I’m the one trapped here with no clue about where here even is, let alone who I’m trapped with. Of course I have questions, especially since it’s too dark for me to see anything.”
He makes a noise that should sound sympathetic but is actually anything but. “Yeah, well, there is a solution for a large part of that—”
Hope leaps in my stomach. “Which is?”
He gives a long-suffering sigh. “Turn on the fucking light. Obviously.”
A quick, sharp click of a switch being flicked echoes through the emptiness. A half second later, brightness floods the world around me.
2
Head Space, Talk Space,
Give Me Some Space
—Grace—
Pain assaults my eyeballs, and I spend a few interminable seconds blinking like a mole just emerging from the earth. But when I can finally see again, I realize I’m in a room. A very large loft, at least half the size of a football field, with floor-to-ceiling bookshelves stretching the entire length of the wall in front of me.
The top shelf is crowded with candles of every size and shape imaginable, and for a moment, a new worry creeps in. But a quick glance around shows that there’s no altar in sight. No jars of blood. No creepy spell book meant to hasten my journey to the afterlife.
Which I take as a very good sign. I mean, there are only so many times a girl can handle being the human sacrifice du jour. And I’m pretty sure I’ve already reached my limit…plus one.
Another quick glance around reveals nothing scary at all about the room I’m in. In fact, the entire area looks like one of those fancy furniture-catalog showrooms.
The three main walls not covered in bookshelves are painted a bright white, with lamps and chandeliers bathing the entire space in soft, warm light. My gaze bounces around the space, a gorgeous mix of modern and rustic furniture in white, tan, or black arranged into eight distinctive areas by the strategic placement of rugs and seating.
There’s an area filled with albums crowding two giant black metal shelves and an impressive media cabinet. Farther down is an exercise space, a target-practice area, and then a gaming section dominated by a massive flat-screen TV and a super-comfy-looking couch with game controllers scattered on the white cushions. There’s a bedroom area with a big white bed, library space with rows and rows of books filled to bursting on too many bookshelves to count, a reading nook with a black accent wall, kitchen, and what must be the bathroom in the rear.
