by Tee, Marian
“I couldn’t exactly wear a Gucci when I’m disguised as a garbage truck driver, could I?”
I clasped my hands in a show of gratitude. “Oh, the things you do for me,” I gushed. “I am forever in your debt.”
His eyes danced with sly, wicked humor. “Not to me, surely, but perhaps Lucian? After all, he’s the one who had to kiss you for a long, long time so you could get warm. So tell me, Deli, sister of my heart, where and how exactly did he kiss—”
“Enough.” A familiar shade of red darkened Lucian’s sharp cheeks.
It made me giggle and forget my embarrassment.
“It was the only way,” he said defensively.
“I could have kissed her,” Dyvian pointed out.
“Over my dead body.”
Dyvian and I succumbed to laughter, further increasing the sense of déjà vu.
When Dyvian had sufficient control of his mirth, he sprang to his feet and smiled down at me. “I hope to see you back home with us, Deli.” He waved jauntily before disappearing from view.
“That…was his most polite way of giving us time alone.” Lucian cleared his throat. “Deli—”
“Where are we?” I blurted out. I wasn’t ready yet to talk about what had happened at DVC.
“The park,” he answered, and I had a feeling he was disappointed at my question. “Just below Hallir’s cave, if you want to know. We stopped here to rest and wait for you to regain consciousness.”
“The cannon,” I breathed out, remembering what made me unconscious in the first place. “What happened?”
“It didn’t fire. Dyvian swiped it away in time. Then you fainted in my arms.” He inhaled. “You tried to save my life.”
“I would’ve done it for anyone.”
“I see.”
His mind, which remained unbarred, showed me how my words had hurt him, and I almost confessed it was a lie. But I didn’t. Not just yet…
“The Zekan…Aure-something…”
“Aurelius.” A ghost of a smile flickered on his face. “You can memorize the names of a million celebrities yet you can’t even manage one name of your enemy?”
I sniffed. “They matter. He doesn’t.”
Silence resumed between us, and though I could normally talk a mile a minute, I couldn’t think of a way to postpone the inevitable. I just didn’t want to risk finding out that all he had done was out of guilt, that he had realized he had overreacted and that he didn’t really love me. Inconvenient truths were hell.
Lucian gently hauled me up so I could rest against his chest. He tilted my face toward him. “You’re thinking silly thoughts again.”
“Are you reading—”
“No. But I know you.” He paused. “And I love you.”
I burst into tears.
To his credit, he didn’t even wince. “I’m sorry, Deli. I’m sorry for deceiving you, but I promise you with all my heart I meant you no harm. I just couldn’t help listening. I’ve never trusted anyone and then there you were, and I could hear your every thought.”
“Why was it so important for you to know my thoughts?” I whispered.
“Because I liked you right from the start and I was scared. You made me feel weak…weaker even than I had ever been when I was young. You made me feel almost…helpless.”
He stroked my face, tenderly tucking away the wisps of hair that had plastered themselves on the sweat-drenched skin of my forehead. “I have to be honest. I don’t think I even wanted to tell you,” he confessed awkwardly. “If I had stopped hearing your thoughts, I never would have had the courage to love you.”
“Coward,” I said between sobs.
“Indubitably,” he agreed in a grimly self-mocking tone. “It was cowardice that stopped me from telling you we were immortal, fearing that you would change because of it. It was cowardice that made me call you my ward when I wanted the whole world to know you were mine and that I was so damn lucky to have you love me. I was scared that you would think one day I was too old and boring and leave me. It was cowardice that made me stop from telling Dyvian he was right…that I love you.”
“Jerk.” I was crying harder than before, after hearing him say things I had never ever dreamt he’d be able to utter.
He winced. “I know. But I’ve learned from my mistakes, Deli. And I never make the same mistake twice.” He cupped my face and bared his soul. “I love you.”
Remembering how hurt I had been by his deception, I couldn’t make myself let things go just like that. “What if I don’t love you anymore?”
The hand stroking my hair lovingly stilled for a moment. Then he sighed and—his hand trembling just the slightest bit—resumed its rhythm. “I see.” There was no emotion behind his words.
“That’s it? You’ll let me go then?”
“Of course not,” he denied, shock visible in his face.
I was confused. “But—”
“I’m sorry, but I can’t let you go.” His arms tightened around me, as if the mere thought of it was already a threat and I wanted to cry even more.
“I’ll just make you love me again. I have an eternity to do it.”
That was my cue for my happily ever after, but I wasn’t done torturing him. Maybe I was being vengeful and bitter, but Lucian had known everything about me through my thoughts. He had to give me the same privilege. It was the only way I could feel we were on equal footing.
“And what if I love Michael?” I held my breath.
He had gone still again. “Do you?”
“Just answer my question.”
“I’ll step back…”
I tried to hide my disappointment, knowing I should be flattered but I wasn’t. I liked it better if he fought for me instead.
“…And then I’ll wait for him to die before I work on making you fall in love with me again,” he ended.
I gaped, unable to believe someone as honorable and well, proper, as Lucian could think something like that. “That’s so…yucky?”
“I love you that much,” he said so simply and, of course, I had to burst into another bout of tears.
Giving up fighting the inevitable, I babbled almost incoherently, “I love you, Lucian. I love you, and I really missed you, and I thought about you all the time, and I—”
He pressed one finger to my lips, his eyes wary. “Does this mean,” he asked slowly, “you forgive me?”
“Like I could ever not forgive you.”
“But—”
I pulled his face down and kissed him, not in the mood to hear all his stupid reasons for thinking he wasn’t worth forgiving. A long, luxurious sigh escaped me as our lips touched. This was what I had been aching to do since he tried “warming” me up to turn invisible.
When he finally lifted his lips from mine, I said quickly, “I want something.”
“Anything,” he replied with such speed and certainty I couldn’t help kissing him again.
“Well?” he prodded with a smile when we broke apart.
I gave him my best angelic smile and said, quite baldly, “I want to…uhh…I want to make love to you.” I was stumbling all over the words, but I was determined to say my peace.
He smiled back, dazzlingly so, and his answer was just as quick and certain as earlier. “No.”
“Lucian.”
“Don’t be absurd,” he scolded gently. “You’re still too young.”
“But I hate it that Angelica knows you that way and I don’t.”
He kissed my pouting lips, my nose, my hair, and in a second, he was carrying me in his arms, walking toward the park entrance.
“Lucian,” I nagged.
“You’re still too young.”
“You did it with Angelica. She’ll always make it seem like I don’t know you as well as she does—”
“Then she’s wrong because you know me where it really counts.”
I had to giggle. “Lucian, is that you? That was so mushy.”
He muttered something incoherent and distracted me by
nuzzling my cheek.
“Wait.”
He stopped the delicious things he was doing with his lips and raised a brow.
“How long do I have to wait?”
“At least till you graduate from college,” he replied after a while.
“That’s too long,” I wailed.
“Don’t be such a baby. Besides, if you want to worry about something, consider your sister.”
That shut me up.
He groaned. “I’m sorry. It was a stupid thing to say.”
“But you’re right.”
“No, I’m not. I’m a cold, tactless jerk and I’m lucky I have you. Davie’s all right,” he assured me. “I suppose you know the Zekan prince is in love with her?”
I nodded.
“He’s a good sort, actually. Just…misguided. It’s really too bad he’s Zekan. I’m certain he’ll keep her from harm, but if you want us to try rescuing her now, we will.”
“No,” I decided after a moment. “I trust you, Lucian. If you say it’s better to wait for her to get well then that’s what we’ll do.” My eyes narrowed. “But back to what we’re talking about—”
“No negotiations.” He nuzzled my cheek.
I sighed, told myself I had an eternity to convince him otherwise, to quit complaining, and enjoy Lucian’s newly discovered affectionate side.
