Oblivion

by Jennifer L. Armentrout

  glass.

  Kat giggled again.

  “Okay. These are terrible,” I admitted, placing the cup on the table. “How can you mess up pancakes?”

  “I don’t know. I never made them.” She raised a shoulder. “I kind of eyeballed the whole ‘add water’ part.”

  I stared at her, sort of dumbfounded. “All you have to do is add water. It’s not that hard.”

  Her lips twitched as she ducked her chin. “Guess you should’ve gone with Waffle House then.”

  My eyes narrowed as I pushed my plate back. “There’s a huge part of me that hopes you messed them up on purpose.”

  “And why’s that?”

  “Because if you can’t make pancakes then I’m not sure we can be friends.”

  “Oh.” She placed her hand to her chest. “I’m so heartbroken.”

  “You should be,” I told her, lowering my lashes. “I’m a good friend.”

  Kat snorted, but what she didn’t say hung in the air between us. Kat and I had not gotten off on the right foot and spent the whole summer and most of autumn at war, mainly because of me. I fully admitted that, and if I could go back and change the way I treated her, I would. I’d realized that when I was fighting Baruck and had come close to losing not only my life, but also my sister’s and hers. The thing was, even I couldn’t go back in time. I could only move forward.

  It was time to change the subject. “Has anyone said anything to you about the trace—Dee or Matthew?” I asked, knowing the Thompsons wouldn’t talk to her. Well, Adam would talk to her, but he wasn’t a problem.

  “Dee said something in the beginning, but it’s been easy to explain away. Everyone knows I was there when…” She wet her lower lip, the action drawing my attention. “When you fought Baruck. So they don’t think anything is too strange.”

  “Good,” I murmured.

  She yawned loudly as she stood and picked up our plates. Her steps were slow as she walked the plates over to the trash. I glanced at the wall clock. It wasn’t even six in the evening. “Is your mom working tonight?”

  “Of course,” she replied, dumping the pancakes into the trash. The line of her spine stiffened as she walked over to the dishwasher. “She’s always working.”

  My head cocked to the side, and a moment passed. “You don’t like that, do you?”

  She glanced over her shoulder at me as she opened the dishwasher’s door. “Mom has to work a lot.” She shoved the plates in and then went for the bowl, placing it in the sink. “The bills don’t pay themselves.”

  “I get that.”

  She looked away from me as she fiddled with the faucets. “Not all of us have the government dumping money on us because we’re aliens.”

  I raised a brow at that.

  Kat yawned again. “It does get kind of…lonely here.”

  “I can imagine,” I murmured, not liking the idea of her being alone whenever she was home and she wasn’t with one of her friends or me.

  She didn’t say anything for a long moment. “I get you feel like you have to do the babysitting thing, but I’m not going anywhere. I have a test to study for and biology homework. You don’t have to stay here.”

  Pushing to my feet, I made my way to where she was standing. “You can—”

  Kat gasped as she spun around. “God, Daemon! Do you constantly have to do that? Geez,” she said, leaning back against the counter. “You’re like a ninja stealth alien.”

  One side of my lips tipped up. “I wasn’t even that quiet.”

  “Yeah, you were. Like a ghost,” she said, lifting her chin so our eyes met. “A creepy ghost.”

  I chuckled. “Why am I a creepy ghost?”

  “I don’t know,” she murmured, her gaze dropping to my mouth and then lower, to my chest. “You’re all up in my personal space.”

  I was totally up in her personal space. There wasn’t more than an inch or two between our bodies. When I forced my lungs to inhale, I caught the peachy scent that was all hers. “Sorry.”

  “You’re not sorry at all.”

  “True.” I tilted my head to the side and saw a tiny speck of pancake batter next to her ear. How in the world did she get it there? Reaching out, I pressed my thumb against her cheek. Her chest rose on a sharp inhale, causing my gaze to flicker back to hers. “You have pancake batter there.”

  Kat’s lips parted, and her wide gaze fixed on mine as I swept my thumb along her cheek, smoothing away the tiny piece of batter. My hand lingered even though the spot was long gone, fingers spreading along the side of her neck. The way we stood, so close to each other, with her head tilted back and my hand on her, made it appear as if we were seconds from kissing. All I would have to do is lower my mouth a couple of inches. I stilled just thinking of that.

  God, I wanted to taste her mouth again.

  Doubted she’d be down for that, though. Probably punch me. Those thick lashes lowered, shielding her eyes. On second thought, she would be all over it, but when we came up for air, she’d be spitting mad.

  Kat wanted me, but she wasn’t ready to admit it. Nowhere near it. She thought what I felt for her wasn’t as strong as what her parents had felt for each other, and she didn’t want to settle. Couldn’t blame her for that. Truth be told, I wasn’t exactly sure what it was that I did feel for her. Lust? Hell yes. I wanted all over her and in her, but it was more than that. There was a deep fondness for her. I respected her. My chest did damn strange things when I was around her, thought about her. I cared about her. Strongly.

  I just didn’t know what all that spelled exactly.

  But I wanted to find out, needed to find out. One thing I knew, whatever I was feeling had nothing to do with the fact that our hearts were beating in tandem—whatever that meant—or anything that I might’ve done to her when I’d healed her.

  “Kitten?” I slid my fingers along the nape of her neck.

  “Don’t call me that,” she said with a shiver.

  I lowered my chin, and we were so close that when I tilted my head to the side, my nose grazed hers. She didn’t pull back or push me away. “But I like calling you that.”

  “But I don’t care,” she replied.

  I grinned. “Kat?”

  “What?” she whispered.

  There was a lot I wanted to say to her, so much, and I knew all of it would send her running. Ignoring the near-primal need to really get all up in her personal space was harder than facing down a hungry Arum. I pulled back just enough to see her pretty face, letting my hand slip off her neck. “I’ll clean up.”

  Kat blinked. “Huh?”

  My grin kicked up a notch. “I’ll clean up. You can go start your homework or whatever.”

  The flash of disappointment was so quick I might’ve imagined it. “Okay. Sounds good to me.” She darted out from between the counter and me. “Have fun!”

  Looking over my shoulder, I watched her shuffle out of the kitchen, the bounce and sway from earlier out of her step. Sighing, I turned back to the mess.

  Why in the hell had I offered to clean up?

  I was half tempted to just fry everything as I grabbed the bottle of dish detergent and squirted some of the blue liquid into the bowl too big to go in the dishwasher. My mind wandered as I cleaned up. We needed to work on getting the trace off for pure safety’s sake. When I was done, I was going to have to pull her away from her homework and get her physical.

  My mind immediately swan-dived into certain activities that were physical.

  I pushed those thoughts aside as I waved my hand, drawing the griddle over to the sink. Kat and I hadn’t talked about what had gone down at Homecoming since the day I returned. I knew she was holding it together, because damn, that girl was strong, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t worried about how she was dealing with everything.

  And that wasn’t even taking into consideration the fact that something had most definitely happened when I’d tried to heal her when Baruck was coming down on us. Somehow she had tapped into the Sour
ce, and no human could do that.

  None that I knew of.

  It had changed her. How? I didn’t know yet. All I could hope for was that whenever the trace faded, anything that I might’ve done to her disappeared also.

  Cleaning up the kitchen took about fifteen minutes. When I was done, I headed out, turning the ceiling light off as I went. The low murmur from the TV lured me to the living room. Kat was going to hate me, but she was going to have to stop whatever she was doing, get up, and get…

  I stopped midstep and stared.

  Kat was tucked into the corner of the couch, her bio textbook open in her lap. Tiny toes peeked out from the hem of her jeans, brushing the gap between the cushions. Her arms were folded against her stomach, and the side of her head was resting against the cushion. The obsidian necklace had crept out from under her sweater and had slid to the side, resting against her arm.

  She was out cold.

  Knowing there was no way I could wake her, I walked over to her. Carefully, I picked up the textbook and closed it, placing it on the coffee table. Grabbing the quilt off the back of the couch, I placed it over her legs.

  Then, without really thinking about it, I placed one hand on the arm of the couch, braced myself, and then bent down. I pressed my lips to her cool cheek and then drew back. Fiddling with the quilt for a few moments, I made sure it covered her and then stepped away.

  I could leave now. Kat wasn’t going anywhere.

  But as I stared down at her, even as the tension in my face softened, I let myself go there. For just a second, I let the full weight of what had happened, what I had done, settle on my shoulders.

  I closed my eyes.

  I’d broken so many rules. Exposed what I really was. Told Kat the truth. Healed her, not once but countless times. I almost laughed, but none of it was funny. Her life was in danger, would continuously be in danger, especially if she remained around us—around me—and I was such a selfish prick, because now…

  Now I wasn’t staying away from her.

  Chapter 2

  I waited about ten seconds before I leaned forward and poked Kat with my pen. Her shoulders rose on a sigh, and then she twisted around in her seat. Gray eyes met mine. “Good morning, Kitten.”

  She eyed me warily. “Good morning, Daemon.”

  As I tilted my head, hair fell forward, almost into my eyes. I needed to get a haircut someday. “Don’t forget we have plans tonight.”

  “Yeah, I know. Looking forward to it,” she said drily.

  The excitement almost knocked me over.

  I leaned forward, tipping my desk down as I did so. To my right, I could see Carissa and Lesa watching us. The corner of my lips curved up.

  “What?” she said when the silence increased between us.

  “We need to work off your trace,” I said, low enough that only she could hear. We’d lost yesterday when it came to working the trace off. We couldn’t lose tonight.

  Kat picked up her pen. “Yeah, I figured as much.”

  Because I liked getting a rise out of her, watching her get all feisty, I said, “And I have this really fun idea of how we can do it.”

  She surprised me when she smiled.

  “Liking the idea?” My gaze dropped to her full lips.

  “Not in this lifetime, buddy,” she replied.

  I almost laughed. “Resistance is futile, Kitten.”

  “So is your charm.”

  “We’ll see.”

  Rolling her eyes, she faced the front of the classroom. Our teacher strolled in, looking older than he had yesterday. I wasn’t done with Kat. I poked her again.

  Turning around, she glared at me. “What, Daemon?”

  I moved lightning quick. With a grin, I swiped my fingers along her cheek, like I’d done last night when she had pancake batter on her face. This time I got a tiny piece of fuzz out of her hair. I was so damn helpful.

  Kat stared at me.

  “After school,” I reminded her.

  She didn’t respond, but I knew she understood. Kat might fight me tooth and nail on, well, everything, but she wasn’t dumb.

  Throughout class, Kat looked like she was about five seconds from passing out in front of me. She yawned so many times I began to wonder if she was going to injure her jaw. This wasn’t normal for her, especially since she had slept through the evening last night. When I left around ten, she was still asleep.

  At the end of class, Kat dragged herself out of her seat and headed for the door. I trailed behind her, barely listening to what Carissa and Lesa were chattering about. We parted ways at that point.

  The morning dragged by and I ended up skipping the period before lunch so I could head down the street to grab something more appetizing than whatever the school was trying to pass off as food. I think meat loaf was on the menu, and I was sure that whatever was in that stuff was not meat. As I ordered a sub, I spied smoothies on the menu. Weren’t strawberries Kat’s favorite? Grinning, I added one of those and then grabbed a freshly baked cookie.

  No one looked in my direction as I strolled in through the doors and made my way to the cafeteria. It had always been that way. Our kind could come and go as we pleased. It helped that there were Luxen on staff, not just Matthew.

  As I walked down the hall, a warm tingle danced across the nape of my neck, filling me with a measure of unease. It had happened when I’d returned with the piece of obsidian and again when I arrived at school yesterday and was near math class. The same today. It happened whenever I was near her. It had to be a product of healing her on such a…a major level like I had. Whether it was permanent or would fade with the trace was a wait-and-see kind of thing.

  The hum of conversation and the scent of mystery were heavy as I walked through the open double doors. I scanned the tables, spying the Thompsons near the back. My gaze collided with Ash’s. Her eyes narrowed, and I looked to my right, immediately spotting Kat. Her back was to me, but the rigidness in her shoulders told me she knew I was there. My sister sat across from Kat, two plates in front of Dee. Nothing in front of Kat.

  Cutting around the line still picking up food, I walked up and dropped down in the empty seat next to her. Without saying a word, I handed over the smoothie, well aware that everyone at the table was eyeballing us.

  Kat’s eyes widened a bit, but like I expected, she didn’t refuse the smoothie. She took it from me, her fingers brushing mine. A shock of electricity jumped from her hand to my skin. She moved her hand away and took a sip.

  Peeking up at me through thick, dark lashes, she said, “Thank you.”

  I smiled at her.

  “Where’re ours?” Lesa quipped.

  Looking across the table, I laughed. “I’m only at the service of one person in particular.”

  Kat scooted her chair over, away from me. “You are not servicing me in any way.”

  I moved my chair closer to hers. “Not yet.”

  Lesa watched, her eyes glimmering with amusement.

  “Oh, come on, Daemon. I’m right here.” Dee frowned at me. “You’re about to make me lose my appetite.”

  “Like that will ever happen.” Lesa rolled her eyes, and that was so true.

  I pulled my sub out and then the little bag. Fishing out an oatmeal cookie, I handed it to Dee. Her face lit up like I’d handed her a diamond. She pulled a Gollum, snatching it from my hand and holding it close.

  “Don’t we have plans to make?” Carissa asked softly.

  “Yep.” Dee grinned at Lesa. “Big plans.”

  Kat lifted a hand, wiping it across her forehead. “What plans?”

  “Dee and I were talking in English about throwing a party,” Carissa explained, and I swear, that was the most I’d ever heard