by Wendy Cole
“How long?” I said, the words feeling more like thumbtacks as they left my mouth.
He shrugged. “Couple of days. Maybe more.”
“One day.” I held up a finger and gave him a stern look.
“Four.”
“One,” I repeated.
Brady shot me a calculating look. “You drive a hard bargain, Sweetheart. Alright then. One, not counting today.”
“Deal.” I held my hand out, but Brady didn’t shake it.
He looked to the offering, then a smile once again spread across his face. “I’m gonna need more than that.”
I held my breath. “What?”
“A kiss.” He tapped his mouth. “Given freely.”
My eyes traveled to his perfect lips, and the memory of the last time we’d kissed made me shift in my seat.
“I haven’t got all day, Sweetheart. I’m a man with limited time.”
I gave him a flat look but leaned forward anyway. Brady’s mouth parted and, the moment I started towards him, his eyes flashed that electric neon blue.
My hands landed on his shoulders, holding myself up as I was forced to lean too far off the edge of the mattress. I felt him tremble beneath me, and it caught me off guard. I paused. Why did he look so affected? He didn’t touch me, hands two fists within his lap. His Adam’s apple bobbing along the column of his throat was the only movement I could decipher from him. Each muscle stiff, locked in place. The anticipation in his eyes seemed too much, considering he’d kissed me before.
Brady watched me closely, his gaze fixed on my mouth, willing me to continue.
I took the leap, and when I did, the world shifted. Something happened to me. The moment I pressed my lips to his, a jolt ricochet through my chest. An army of chills marched down my spine, and I could feel it, something, a tether.
Brady relaxed, lips curving into a satisfied smile against my mouth.
I broke the contact and gave him a perplexed look. Something was different. I could feel it. The same feelings I’d been having since the first time he’d touched me strengthened, growing and stretching until they seemed alive.
“What just happened?” I looked down at myself, as if I’d be able to see the change and finding nothing.
“The first step of many,” Brady hummed, arms suddenly gripping me, pulling easily from my precarious position and into his lap. His mouth found mine again, kissing me deeply, and with so much emotion before he smiled again. “Bonding happens in levels, Sweetheart, and you just completed one of them.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“What does that mean? What layer? Put it back!” I tried to pull away, but Brady held firm.
His smile was wide, his eyes incredibly bright, and that neon blue seemed to shimmer just beneath his irises. I couldn’t help but stare at them, but then his words hit me again, and I shook my head. “You lied to me!”
“I didn’t lie.” His fingers trailed my back, causing a sensation far more powerful than ever before.
My breath caught, and my eyes widened. What had I done? I’d started it, the bond? Did that mean I was stuck with him? “You didn’t tell me.” I started to panic. “That’s the same as lying.” I felt strange like I’d just gotten a tattoo I didn’t want. I wiped my mouth, as if I could undo the damage, but it didn’t stop.
The pull grew and stretched. I could feel it, just beneath my skin, drawing me to him, urging me forward.
“Would it help if I lied again and said I was sorry?” His eyes danced.
I glared at him. “I want you to leave.” Each word felt vile and unnatural. “I don’t want to be around you right now.”
Brady’s smile dulled to a smirk. “And why is that?” Even as he spoke, he lifted us both and deposited me onto the bed.
He didn’t stay, to my surprise. I didn’t know whether I whether to be relieved or disappointed. Once again, my logical brain and the traitorous rest of me went to war. One wanting to run, and the other wanting to beg him to come closer.
Brady slowly walked to the other side of the room, his eyes darting back to look at me. He gripped a chair from the table, spun it around to face me, then lazily took a seat. “Better?”
No. I moved backwards, as far as I could go without falling off the mattress. Every part of my body rebelled against the action. I felt like an apple fallen from a tree. Staring over at Brady, his body exposed, his dark eyes fixed on me, he was the Earth, and the laws of physics themselves worked against me.
“Take it back,” I said, my voice strained.
“I wouldn’t even if I could, Sweetheart.” He continued to stare. “It wouldn’t be so bad if you didn’t fight it. Why put yourself through this?” He leaned forward, and his eyes flashed electric blue. “It gets worse.” His voice was smooth, like a song specifically meant to draw me to him. “You feel it in your veins.” He showed me his hands, then motioned up his arm. “It tightens you up and makes your skin itch. Like a burning fire. Compelling you. Telling you what you need to do.”
Every word he spoke only increased the sensations coursing through me. My fingers scratched the cover beneath me, then gripped it as if I needed a tether. Inside my head, I kept repeating the same thing, over and over. Locked together for eternity. It helped to keep me stable. If nothing else, I knew I didn’t want that. I wanted to live. I needed my chance for a normal life. It was what I’d dreamed of, and it hadn’t even been allowed to begin.
Brady leaned back and smirked. “I’ve got to hand it to you, Sweetheart. You’re tougher than you look.” He placed his hands behind his head and stretched back. Each muscle flexed as he did, and I tried not to look, but I couldn’t help it.
He was beautiful.
“Stop it,” I bit out.
Brady’s eyebrows lifted. “I’m not doing anything.”
“Yes, you are!” I took a deep, steadying breath. “I need some time alone. Go away.”
Brady chuckled. “Do you really want me to leave?”
No. “Yes! Go! Go away!”
His head tilted. “Alright then.” He stood up, and the chair scrubbed against the floor as he slid it back into place. “I’ll be outside.”
I ground my teeth as he slowly left my view, and the moment he did, a switch flipped. Desperation filled me up like a water balloon. The longer I sat there, the more it expanded until it became too much. “Wait!” I cried out. “Brady!”
He sauntered back in like a cat, and his smile spoke volumes. “Yeah, Sweetheart?”
“Oh! Shut up! Turn it off!”
“Can’t do that, either.” He continued towards me, and I threw up a hand.
“Don’t come any closer!”
Brady let out a laugh, deep and rumbling. It echoed through the room and seeped into my skin. I made a noise as the sensations grew.
He sighed. “What is it you want me to do? Be here, or don’t be here?”
I bit the inside of my cheek and stifled a frustrated scream. “I want you to turn it off!”
“There’s only one way to turn it off, Sweetheart.”
The way he said it made the air thicken. Images filtered through my mind. What would it feel like to touch him? He was right there. He was willing, more than willing. I could just—No! “You’re lying Brady. You’ve got magical fucking powers. Use some and make it stop.”
He grimaced, and the bone along his jaw jumped. “As you wish.” Each word was dry, the humor completely was gone.
He waved a hand, and the feelings eased. I heaved a breath as I allowed myself to relax.
Brady watched me closely. “Why?” The solitary word came out so scorned, my heart stuttered.
His jaw clenched, and his hands formed two fists on either side of him, but his face held no anger. Those deep eyes seemed to cut right through me as I read the hurt within them, the rejection.
I couldn’t answer.
Brady waited another long moment, before giving a curt nod and walking away, out of the hut without so much as a backward glance in my direction.
>
The need didn’t return at his absence, but a new feeling took its place, much worse. Guilt. Hurt. My chest ached, and I couldn’t stand it.
Without thinking, I climbed out of bed and followed his steps. I found him sitting on the sand, muscles stiff as he looked out over the ocean.
“I’m sorry,” I said weakly as I approached him.
He stiffened further. The muscles along his neck bunched, and his shoulders did the same, but he didn’t acknowledge me, didn’t speak at all.
“Brady?”
He made a noise as he jumped to his feet and whipped around to face me. “Do you know who I am?” he asked, then snorted. “Of course, you don’t. Let me tell you.” A smile spread across his face, but there was no humor behind it. “I’m an anomaly, Sweetheart. The chosen one.” Sarcasm dripped from each word. “It’s never been seen before. I was born with more magic than most grown jinn possess, and for my entire life, I trained. Harnessing and growing.” He formed his hands into a ball and an orb of blue light filled the space between them. “Many women would kill for a chance to be mine. Do you have any idea how many came, just to check and see if they were the one?” The orb disappeared, and he looked at me. “You’re the equivalent of a queen, and you don’t even want me.” His eyes flashed. “You think I’m a monster.”
I stared at him for a full minute, unsure of what to do. His mention of other women was like a knife to my heart. It hurt, and I couldn’t seem to shake the feeling away. The back of my mind still whispered warnings, that this was all a trick, that everything he’d said was a lie, but the words had become faint. Because deep down, I believed him. “That’s not true.”
Brady snorted. “Since when? You fight the bond with every fiber of your being. You deny it so fiercely, you exceed the limits of what you should even be capable of.”
“I’m just not ready.” I took a step back. “My normal life just started.”
“You are my life!” He snapped. He took a step forward and gripped me. One arm wrapped around my waist while the other forced my face up to look at him. He leaned down until his lips hovered just above mine. “You deny me, not because you don’t feel it, but because you can’t accept me.”
His voice carried so much hurt; I felt it in my very soul. Pieces of me began to shatter and crack, breaking apart until I could barely breathe. “That’s not true,” I repeated, but it was. His words matched the thoughts I’d been having since he’d told me about the bond.
Brady sneered, then let me go. “It is.”
I reached for him. “I just—” The words stuck on my tongue. “I’m scared.”
You would have thought I’d slapped him. Brady jerked, and his gaze fell to the ground. “Exactly.” He lifted his head up to look at me. “Because no matter what I do, you’re always going to see me as a monster. It wasn’t me.” He took a step closer. “That wasn’t me, Amelia.”
“I know.” The statement shocked me. It was true. I believed him. As much as I didn’t want to, I couldn’t deny that his story added up. It made sense. “I believe you because that’s when it stopped. Your story. After that night, the monster didn’t come again.”
Brady continued to stare a hole straight through me. “That’s because I never left.” His voice was gruff. “I’ve been waiting a long time, Sweetheart. You can’t even imagine. It’s torture. That feeling you had, it’s so much more than that, and I carry it with me always. There’s no turning it off. There’s no spell to dull it.”
The guilt hit me again, and I chewed my lip. “What can I do?”
Brady’s eyes flashed. “Accept me,” he took another step forward, back within arm’s reach. “Accept me, Sweetheart. End my suffering. You can have your life. I’ll give you a life you never imagined.”
My heart clenched inside my chest, and I couldn’t believe what I was about to say. “Can we take it a little slower than that?” I felt insane. I was insane. Nothing about what I was about to say could be considered normal, but regardless, I said it anyway. “I’ll accept you, but no bonding yet. We can date, get to know each other better, then maybe later—”
“No fighting it,” Brady cut in. “I’ll give you time if you stop demonizing me inside your head. You have to treat me like you would any other man.”
I nodded. “No magic. You aren’t allowed to use your powers on me. If I decide to do this, then it needs to be me who makes that decision.”
His eyes darkened. “Agreed.”
I’m dating a genie, I thought to myself, letting my eyes roam over him once more and not bothering to fight the feelings it caused.
Brady continued to watch me like a wounded animal, and I knew the first thing I needed was to make him stop. It was too painful. For as infuriating as his teasing was, I’d prefer him to torment me every day for the rest of my life rather than have to feel his pain another moment.
I slowly stepped forward, my eyes locked with his, and he held completely still as he watched me approach.
My hands hit his stomach, running upwards to his chest then settling over his shoulders. I pulled him, and Brady obliged me, lowering himself down where I could reach him. His expression remained stoic, but I could feel the heat simmering just beneath his surface, barely contained. I touched my lips to his in a soft kiss, then leaned back to look into his eyes. “I’m not afraid because I think you’re a monster, Brady.” He didn’t move a muscle, didn’t make a sound. He held my gaze with his intense dark orbs and listened intently to what I was saying. “I’m afraid because I don’t.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Brady was quiet for hours after our conversation, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t grateful. It was just what I needed. A break. Time to gather my thoughts and think over the huge change that had occurred in the past twelve hours.
Brady wasn’t the monster. My mind still couldn’t wrap around it. I’d never in a million years would have seen it coming, but the discovery wasn’t necessarily a good thing.
In a way, a huge way, I was glad it wasn’t him. At least, now I could feel slightly less crazy for being attracted to him... slightly. But the bad part of it was that I had to worry about a new threat. When Brady appeared, I felt an overwhelming frustration that my nightmares had returned. But as the time went on, I’d stopped being as scared. Things had been different. The relief from that was now scattered like ashes at my feet.
My monster hadn’t changed. It was the same as it had ever been, and it was waiting for me.
Brady stepped into the room, holding a damp towel in one hand. He’d chosen to shower, and I hadn’t commented on the fact that he was most likely capable of using magic to do the job. Being a virgin didn’t make me completely clueless. I owned a television. I’d seen movies, and I knew the lack of steam coming out of the bathroom meant no heat was involved in his washing.
He wore a button-down white shirt and a pair of nicely fitted jeans. He looked good, and I allowed myself the pleasure of admitting it.
“I left you some clothes in the bathroom,” he said. Then he took a seat at the table and conjured a drink in front of him. No wine this time. A rock glass filled with amber liquid graced the surface, and Brady tipped it back in one before filling it again.
I watched him as I slowly stood and walked to clean up. “Thank you.” My words were so soft; I was surprised he heard them.
“You’re welcome, Sweetheart.”
I shut myself inside the room and found the clothes hanging on the inside of the door. It was a dress. Nothing fancy. Nothing revealing like the bathing suit. It was white cotton, simple, with only a small amount of lace at the hem. Everything else was in a bag beside it.
When I turned on the shower, the water needed time to heat up, confirming my suspicions and causing my cheeks to warm. I’m not going to think about that, I told myself. No good will come from thinking of that. I took my time, enjoying the privacy, and once again losing myself to my thoughts.
You need to treat me like any other man. I knew that would be
the hardest part of all of this. How could I treat him like any other man, when he could do things no normal man could do? Normal men couldn’t control sharks, create bubbles and travel to the bottom of the sea. Normal men couldn’t go poof, then suddenly be knee deep in lobster tail.
More importantly, something told me a normal man wouldn’t make me feel the way he did.
The dress was a perfect fit, hugging me in all the right places but loose enough to be comfortable. I brushed my hair out and left it wet, then slowly walked out to find Brady in the same place I’d left him.
He glanced at me out the corner of his eye, then refilled the glass in his hand. “You look very pretty,” he said quietly.
“Thank you.” I walked around and took the seat beside him.
He downed the contents, then placed the glass on the table. “I’ve been thinking—”
“I would assume so. I didn’t know it was possible for you to shut up for so long.”
His eyebrows lifted, and I watched as his smirk returned to lighten up his gloomy demeanor. “Anything’s possible when you’re me, Sweetheart.”
I snorted, and his smile widened.
“Like I was saying.” He gave me a pointed look, then produced a drink for me.
I took a sip and was happy to find plain sweet tea. I guess even he didn’t think me and alcohol were made for each other.
“I’ve been thinking about how I’m going to get inside your sundress.”
I sucked in a breath that was more tea than oxygen, then broke into a fit of coughs.
Brady let out a chuckle as he reached over to pat my back. The minute he touched me, the feeling disappeared. I shot him a glare. “Very funny.”
“Who says I’m joking?” He gave me a look that very much resembled a fox, and made me feel very much like a big, fat, plump hen.
I swallowed hard.
