“I carried you. You were shivering on the couch, so I brought you here. You thanked me and said I was the nicest guy in the world, which is a serious ego-buster. Nice is boring. Nice is what you call the guy at Starbucks who gives you extra cream.” I was going for a laugh, but instead, she looked at the rumpled beddings and pink crept on her face. “What is it?”
“Where did you sleep?”
“Right here.” I patted the area next to her, then got off the bed before adding, “But that’s not my fault. I left a huge space between us, but you didn’t like it, so you scooted closer and put an arm around me. I had no choice but to hold you.”
She closed her eyes. “Sorry I asked.”
“I’m not done. When I woke up this morning, you must have decided I was your personal body pillow, too.” She was covering her face when I finished. “I didn’t mind.”
“Can you not talk about this? Please?”
“About you hogging the bed or me loving being your body pillow?” I carried the tray back to the bed. “Sit up and eat. We have things to do.”
Just as I suspected, the topic change did the trick. She stopped covering her face, until she sat up and realized her robe was gone.
“Where’s my robe?” she asked in a squeaky voice, frantically looking around.
“Behind you.” I watched her shrug the robe up and belt it, then placed the tray across her lap. “Tea or apple juice?”
“Apple juice. Why didn’t you wake me up sooner?”
“And miss watching you sleep?” I placed the tumbler of juice next to her plate, then lay on my stomach across the bed, propped my chin on the heel of my palm, and gave her a slow smile. From the glare she threw my way, I’d be charbroiled if she could shoot fire through her eyes. “I think you were dreaming about me because you sighed my name a couple of times.”
She paused in the process of eating a scoop of eggs and I was sure they’d land on my head instead of her mouth, but she must have decided against it. The fork went back to the plate and she leveled me with a stern look. “Go. Away.”
“Why?”
“I’m serious. Either behave or go away.”
“So I shouldn’t tell you the truth? You are big on honesty, but I can lie with the best of them if that’s what you want. I could say I don’t like having you in my arms when I sleep or—”
She groaned. “Eirik. I’m not a morning person and all this”—she waved to indicate my face—“is too much for me this early. I want to eat in peace.”
“But I like talking to you.” I stole one of her scones and pinched off a piece. “Besides, I have good news.”
She studied me intently as though trying to see whether I was lying. Then she nodded. “Okay. What?”
“Eat first.” She opened her mouth to argue and I shook my head. “Food first, Dimples, or you’ll have to follow me around for the rest of the day, begging me to tell you—and I won’t.”
“You are such a jerk.” She picked up the fork and sampled the eggs. “These are good.”
“Maera had a pig slaughtered this morning just so you could have bacon.”
“If you’re trying to make me feel bad for the pig, think again. I love bacon. Some people like theirs crispy. I love it just like this. Semi-crisp with fatty parts.” She picked up one and lifted it. “Wow, this is huge.”
“Wrap it around your hand.”
She did, laughing. I liked that she could be in the moment. She ate while I watched her. That didn’t seem to bother her. In fact, she was doing a good job of pretending I wasn’t there, and I didn’t like it.
“Can I have some?” I asked, invading her personal space and giving her my guaranteed-to-make-a-girl-cave smile.
She threw me a disgusted look. “Does that work on girls?”
“Most of the time.”
“Then you just ran out of luck. I’m not like most girls.” She took her time bringing the piece of bacon to her lips. From her smile, she was deliberately baiting me. I caught her wrist, brought it to my mouth, and bit off part of the piece. She shoved the rest in her mouth and finger-splashed me with her juice. I engaged the right runes and the droplets disappeared.
“You can do that?” she asked.
“Yep. Want to know what else I can do?”
She studied me suspiciously. “Uh, will I like it?”
“Oh yes.” Something in my eyes must have told her I was teasing even though I wasn’t.
“No, don’t want to know.” She drank her juice. “It will just be another corny one-liner to get a rise out of me. Since you insist on staying, why don’t you tell me about Kayville High? From your T-shirt, you were a swimmer. Oh, I hope you don’t mind that I borrowed it.”
“You can borrow anything of mine anytime, Dimples.” The boxers rode up her thigh, the one closest to me, and without thinking, I reached out and ran a finger along the edge. Her eyes widened and she went still. I had a feeling she even stopped breathing and was waiting to see what I’d do next.
I couldn’t kiss her last night because she’d been asleep, but I wasn’t passing this moment. I didn’t care that it wouldn’t be fair to her. That she could be leaving today and my interest was in Kayville. Cora seemed so far and Celestia was here. I was living in the moment and claiming the girl. I leaned in.
She did too, then gasped and leaned back. She’d knocked over her juice and spilled it on the tray. She scooted out of the bed and put some distance between us. I followed, drawn to her like a moth to a flame.
“I’m sorry I scared you,” I said.
She placed the tray on the cart, looked up, opened her mouth, and then closed it. For once, words failed her. I closed the gap between us, reached up, and touched her cheek.
She swallowed. “Eirik…”
“I know I should not be doing this, Dimples. Every cell in my body tells me it is not the time, but I can’t help it. There’s something about you that pulls me.” I stroked the corner of her mouth and her lips parted. Her gorgeous, full, sexy lips. I wanted just a taste. Her eyes said she wanted this, too. “I know you’re going home today and I don’t know when we’ll see each other again. And I, uh…” I had way too many things on my plate. Things my mother expected me to accomplish. The promises I’d made my father. “And I—”
“Have Cora,” Celestia finished.
I stared at her in shock. “What?”
She looked away, but not before I saw the pain in her eyes. “I know about Cora, Eirik. The girl you’re crazy about.”
Crazy about Cora? Had I said something in my sleep? Besides, Cora wasn’t here now. Celestia was. “Look, Dimples—”
“I have a boyfriend at home too, Eirik.”
Her words hit me hard. Of course, she’d have someone at home. She was gorgeous. “I see.”
“And I want to get back to him just as much as I’m sure you want to get back to…” Her voice shook to a stop and her chin went up, her head turned away. “Anyway, I just want to go home.” I didn’t have to look into her eyes to know she was fighting tears. Did she miss her boyfriend that much? “We need to figure out how we can talk to Trudy’s father about the Jötun in the cave,” she continued, her voice still shaky. “I was going to do it last night but couldn’t.”
“We don’t have to. I know a way to get you home,” I said, and for a bit, she went still. Then she turned and the look in her eyes almost brought me to my knees. There was so much pain. I reached for her.
“Don’t, Eirik,” she whispered. “If you touch me now, I’ll… Just don’t. Give me a second.” She ran into the bathroom and locked the door. I paced, then paused to stare at the bathroom door, indecision eating at me. We needed to talk.
I marched to the door and knocked. “Celestia.”
“Give me a moment,” was her mumbled response.
“Talk to me.”
“There’s nothing to say.” She sounded like she was crying. The sound that followed confirmed it. She just blew her nose. “I want to go home.”
To
her boyfriend. Did the bastard deserve her? “Do you love him?”
There was silence.
“Do you?” I asked, yet I knew I had no right to demand answers. I had Cora. I might have Cora. I still had to win her from Echo. Was it my destiny to always long for what I couldn’t have? Lose the women I wanted to other men? “Does he love you?”
Her shadow appeared under the door as though she’d moved closer. “Yes, Eirik. He adores me and I’m sure he’s hurting because I’m still here instead of home.”
Damn! I took a mental step and focused on our discussion. “Remember the portal entrance the Grimnirs use to bring souls in?”
“Your father said I couldn’t use it without causing some supernatural, catastrophic event,” she mumbled through the door.
“I know a way around it.”
The door opened and she stared at me with red-rimmed eyes. She’d been crying. Without weighing the consequences, I reached out and cupped her cheek. Maybe it was the suddenness of my reaction or maybe she needed the contact, but she didn’t pull away. Her eyes were puffy and red, the vulnerability in them heartbreaking, yet she’d never looked more beautiful.
“I hate to see you cry.” Her chin trembled again. “Don’t. You are going home. I’ll make sure of it.”
She blinked rapidly until she had her tears under control. “What’s the way around it?”
“You need to possess someone to use it. I’m offering my body.”
I got a frown instead of a smile. “I can’t.”
“What do you mean you can’t? Don’t you want to go home?”
The frown became a scowl. “I do, but not that way. I don’t do possession. My grandmother told me to never, ever try it. It messes with a Witch’s powers and the possessed person gets affected, too.”
“I don’t care. I can engage my runes and get you across in a fraction of a second and minimize the effect. As soon as we cross over, we separate, and you enter the astral plane. I’ll hang around to make sure you’re okay.”
She shook her head. “This is against everything I was taught.”
“You have two choices, Dimples. You either do it my way or stay. I like the second one better,” I added, hoping to get a smile or an eye roll. Instead, her eyes clouded. “Think about it.”
She sighed. “Fine.”
“Okay. Finish your breakfast and rest or work on your sketches. I promised Rhys a sparring partner, so I’m changing and heading to the gym. I’m going to pick his brain, too. We’ll scout the cave this afternoon.”
~*~
CELESTIA
I stared after Eirik as he disappeared into the closet. I couldn’t have heard him right. “Sketches?”
“I noticed the pad when I carried you to bed last night,” he called back.
Oh no, this was getting worse by the minute. First, I fell asleep in his clothes, which I’d meant to hide underneath the robe. Then I almost let him kiss me when he had a girlfriend. I’d deliberately pretended Cora didn’t exist during those heart-pounding moments because I loved his touch. Loved the way it made me feel. Then, I broke down like a stupid, stupid girl because he didn’t deny having Cora and I fabricated a boyfriend to save face. Now, he’d seen the drawings of him I’d done. I was sure they screamed crush.
I rushed to the table. The book was closed. It must have fallen off my lap last night. “Did you look through it?”
“Nope. Wouldn’t dare,” Eirik said.
Oh yes, you would. He had zero boundaries.
“I saw a few sketches,” he added. “You are gifted. When I meet your father or Hayden, I’d definitely recognize them.”
I knew it. “Did you see others?”
“I didn’t recognize the rest. I assume one is of your cousin and the other one—you have more drawings of him—is he your boyfriend or something?”
Oh, thank goodness he hadn’t recognized himself. Most of the pictures were just his face. A few included his chest. Wait a second. That was insulting. He hadn’t recognized himself? I was a damn good artist.
“Nah, some guy I thought was hot, but he turned out to be a total douche.”
He laughed and I knew he’d known all along the sketches were of him. He was such an asshat. I turned to go back to the bed and saw my backpack and coat.
“Did you bring my things from the dungeon?”
“Yep. In the middle of the night.” Eirik walked out of the closet, pulling down his tank top. I caught a glimpse of his flat abs before he covered them. The shirt clung to his torso and stretched across his chest. There was something different about him, yet I couldn’t put my finger on it. “When I realized your things were missing and you’d used your tank top to cover my wound, I went looking for them. By the way, thanks for taking care of my head.”
“What happened and why couldn’t you self-heal? Were you in a food fight?”
He frowned. “Why would you say that?”
“Because you had food in your hair. I had to clean the goopy stuff before bandaging your head. What happened to our old room? It was like a tornado blew through it or something.”
“Something.”
The way he said it meant he knew. “Was it your mother? She was mad at us—Trudy and me—for hiding in the Sorting Hall while she talked to souls. It was really my fault. I was scared that Hayden’s soul might be in the room and Trudy told me about her hiding place. I should have said no, but she can be so infuriating and arrogant. Now, I’m confined to these quarters and I’m not supposed to hang out with her.”
Eirik’s expression had slowly changed from amusement to annoyance before I was halfway through my explanation. Now his amber eyes burned with anger. “Change. You are coming with me.”
“Eirik, don’t. We were wrong to sneak into the Sorting Hall.”
“And my mother was wrong to punish you.” He shoved his foot inside a sneaker and reached for the second one. “Did she talk to you personally?”
“Yes.”
His eyes narrowed suspiciously.
I sighed and shook my head. “She told Maera, and Maera told me last night when she brought my dinner. But it really doesn’t matter. We were in the wrong. Besides, I’m just a servant as far as she’s concerned.”
“Like hell you are. I’m not having you cooped in here because of one misunderstanding. She told Maera because Trudy is her responsibility. You are mine. If she has a problem with you, she talks to me.”
Taking the blame and making him see reason wasn’t working. I ran and caught up with him just before he stormed out of the room. I changed the focus to him. “Listen, I don’t want her getting mad at you. She already trashed the dungeon—”
“She didn’t. I did, but that’s another story. She needs to understand you are out of her reach. She can play mind games with me, but not with you.”
I slid my hand through his and covered it with my other hand. “I’m leaving, Eirik. So a day indoors until I do is not a big deal. You can pose for me and I’ll sketch you.”
“Not today, Dimples. This is her way of showing me she’s in control of my life.”
Before I could protest again, he engaged his speed runes and was gone. Air rushed to replace him and the door swung closed behind him.
“I swear, I’ve never met such a pig-headed guy in my entire life.” I went in the bathroom and got my things, which had dried. I pulled on my leggings, but kept his T-shirt. My poor undershirt was on the floor along with the facecloths I’d used. Not sure what to do with them, I picked them up and dumped them in the sink.
“Celestia!”
I hurried out of the bathroom.
“Oh, I thought you’d left.” He closed the gap between us and grabbed my hand. “You stay with me. You can use the gym, too.”
I was sports-challenged. My fear of water meant no swimming. Trancing when least expected meant no machines. Running—I just hated it. There should be a law against boobs and running.
“I’m allergic to sweat,” I said.
“Cute, but you
’re not getting out of this. If you don’t want to work out, watch Rhys beat the crap out of me. He’s pretty good.”
Now that would be something.
CHAPTER 16. THE WOMAN IS CRAZY
CELESTIA
“The two guards are following us,” I whispered.
Eirik didn’t glance behind us. “I know. Mother and I compromised. I just need her to completely forget the leash she keeps trying to wrap around my neck.”
“And you?”
“Trying to see her point of view, which is really warped. She wants me to be prepared for the future, but she wants to dictate how I go about it. In a way, she reminds me of Svana, Raine’s mother.” He frowned. “Actually, Svana is a lot less anal.”
“Maybe she’s just learning to be a mother,” I said.
He shot me a weird glance. “What’s there to learn?”
“Plenty. I had a mother who sucked, but after she left and my grandmother took over, I noticed the difference in their parenting right away. Grams was strict, yet loving. She had expectations and laid them out, but she didn’t act like I was a complete failure when I fell short.”
“That’s what I’m talking about. Why should they do that?”
“Because they see the potential in us. At least that’s what Grams used to say. Without her, I would not be the amazing Witch I am today.” I lifted my chin and gave him a toothy grin.
He did something so unexpected I stiffened. He put his arm around my shoulder and tucked me to his side. My heart did a stupid rickety dance and my stomach hollowed out. If he noticed that I’d stiffened, he didn’t show it.
“Your grams sounds scary,” he said.
“Your mama is scary.”
He stopped and frowned. “She is, but at the same time, she just does things her way and they work.” We continued our walk, comparing notes on our parents.
“Grams was a taskmaster, yet my cheerleader. We stressed over my failures and celebrated my successes. For every case I helped solve, I got a trip to my favorite ice cream shop.”
“Cases?”
I explained about working with my father. “He is pretty awesome. He has zero magic, but he respects it. He often says he’s seen what people can do with it and he’d be a fool not to respect it, so he watches from the sidelines in case magic fails. He’s a bit overprotective, but I have a way of working around that.”
Demons (Eirik Book 1) Page 24
