by D. N. Hoxa
When I tried to reach for his pants, he almost made it impossible because he wouldn’t stop kissing me and letting me move. Abruptly, he fell to his knees with me still wrapped around him. He put me with my back against the floor, and the cold tiles could have been a king-sized bed for all I cared. I now had easier access to his whole body, and I couldn’t wait for him to take me.
When he fell on top of me, it was all I could do not to let myself go completely. We both cried in pleasure when his hard erection met my center again, and we immediately began to rock against each other in perfect rhythm. My hands traveled down to his stomach, his hips and then the band of his jeans. I pulled them just enough to make room for my hand to slide easily inside, and finally, I touched the smooth skin of his erection.
His head fell back with a moan, and I pushed my hips up because my center was jealous of my hand. I wanted him inside of me, all of him. I frantically tried to push his jeans and underwear down, but Aaron didn’t let me. He grabbed both my hands and pinned them to the floor at my sides. He kissed me like he was starving for my lips before he raised up on his knees, in between my legs.
Aaron watched me go up in flames for him. He held my hands until I stopped trying to break free, and he looked into my eyes like he was pouring out his soul into them. I no longer moved as he slowly caressed my arms and moved up to my rapidly moving chest, my breasts, my waist and my stomach. I couldn’t fill my lungs with enough air as he, in awe, watched his own hands dance on my skin, and let out those small noises from his throat I was beginning to love so much. And as if the moment wasn’t already perfect, he looked into my eyes every few seconds like he couldn’t believe I was there, under him, breathing for him, waiting.
His hands traveled to my hips, and they met in the middle, right at the button of my pants. His fingers, agonizingly slowly, unbuttoned them, and all the while he kept watching my face, eager to see what he was doing to me on my face. I had the feeling that he knew, he could tell that I was his forever. I didn’t need to tell him how much I loved him. Aaron already knew.
“Damn it, Star…” he whispered and then brought his body on mine again.
“Aaron, please,” I begged and took his face in my hands. I needed him as much as I needed air to live.
“I’ve never wanted anyone so much in my life, baby. You’ve got me mad,” he whispered as he blew kiss after kiss on my lips, cheeks, eyes, temples…“But I need to know that you’re a hundred percent in this with me. I need to know that you want to be mine as much as I want you to be. Because if you are, you are only mine…” kiss, kiss, kiss, “mine forever.”
I pushed my hips against his hand and cried in pleasure when his fingers rubbed against me.
“Please…Star, please, tell me. I need to hear you say it. Tell me that you’re mine,” he urged.
The words were at the tip of my tongue. I held onto him so tightly that you’d think I’d die if my skin wasn’t touching his. He was the sun and the air in those seconds and forever, and I was his. My heart would always belong to him for the rest of eternity.
But that was as far as we could go.
Tears in my eyes again. The promise I’d made to Thomas, Aaron’s dead father, turned the fire in my veins to ice. I’d never been more tempted to break a promise in my life, but if I did, and if Aaron found out, what would he think of me? Would he still want an assassin, a soulless vessel and a damn liar?
Not likely.
A second later, Aaron realized I was no longer moving. I was no longer holding him tightly against me, as if he were my lifeline. When he wiped a tear I hadn’t felt slip from my eyes, he looked as much in pain as I was.
“Tell me…please, just tell me, baby,” he repeated, over and over again, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t bring myself to say a single word.
So I just lay there and looked into his ocean eyes and analyzed the emotion flashing in them. Hurt, sadness, anger…but they went back to sadness. They remained sad after he closed his eyes, let go of his breath and kissed my forehead with longing.
A heartbeat later, he was on his feet, putting on his shirt again, and I was alone, half naked, lying on the floor of a janitor’s closet. Pretty fitting.
I managed to find my shirt by searching around with my arms, blindly, but I didn’t have it in me to stand up. I felt shocked. Embarrassed. Broken.
The silence held in itself every touch, every kiss and every whisper we’d shared. Every feeling. I was exhausted. So weak. So powerless that I was even having second thoughts about everything. I’d never experience something as powerful as the love I felt for Aaron Hart. It gave me everything I’d ever dreamed of and more. But when it took, it took it all without regards, even the will to live.
After a while, Aaron sighed loudly and came to sit on the floor right in front of me. The small, heartbreaking smile he gave me nearly brought me to tears again.
“Did you know that you look angry when you’re sad?” he whispered and made my heart skip a beat.
“I do?” I’d had no idea.
He nodded. “Must’ve been pretty confusing for people.”
“But it never confused you.” Not even when I wanted it to.
Aaron laughed a bit, but even his laughter was sad. “Don’t you remember? I see right through you.”
The tears came back, this time with a vengeance. Every word he said, every breath he took—even the air around us tasted of goodbye. Not literally because we would still see each other every day, but it felt like goodbye to anything we might have been if we’d lived in another time or place. Another life.
“Which is how I know that you’re hiding from me,” Aaron continued. “You’re so full of shit, and I am, too. Apparently, my word means nothing because I promised I’d stay away from you, but I can’t seem to do that.” He shook his head, smiling. “But I’ll drop the bullshit. And soon, you will, too. You’re going to tell me what it is that won’t let you be mine, and very soon.” It sounded dangerously close to a promise.
“There’s nothing to tell, Aaron,” I said, but anybody could’ve guessed how big a lie that was. A lame attempt on my part, but I just needed to say something that would stop this whole conversation from being so heartbreaking.
“We’ll see,” he said, and when he stood up, he offered me his hand. I took it. He was no longer mad, not at himself or at me, and just like that, I wasn’t either.
“So…um, I came to…” As soon as the words left my mouth, it was like seeing Audrey in Aaron’s arms, kissing him. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried again. “I came to tell you about what Evan said…” but what the hell was it that wouldn’t let me focus?
Pathetic is what it was, but nothing that usually calmed me down was working. I even bit my tongue and drew out blood, but I still couldn’t stop myself. I was just selfish like that.
“Do you like her?” I said, and I should’ve regretted it the second I said it. Only, I didn’t. I couldn’t. I needed to know, no matter how much of a hypocrite and a bad person that made me.
“Who? Audrey?” Aaron asked, taken a little by surprise. Not that I could blame him. My mood swings were pretty fucking terrible.
Aaron didn’t say anything for a few more seconds, and I was burning inside by the time he spoke.
“I like her.” It was like he stabbed me right through the heart, when… “Just as much as you like Arturo.”
Hypocrite, bad person, whatever, I followed him out of the janitor’s closet with a smile on my face. I didn’t want to ask him how he knew how I felt about Arturo, but I was going to take his answer and I was going to enjoy it as much as I could.
When Aaron saw my smile, he raised a brow, but he didn’t look confused. No, instead he grinned like he couldn’t help himself, either.
***
As I sat in my room with both Aaron and Jack, I realized that just minutes ago, I was thinking of the best way to kill Audrey and get away with it. What felt like seconds ago, I was thinking about having Aaron inside me until he became my w
hole existence. Now, I was discussing a war. Weird fucking times, even for me.
“I had a little chat with Evan-the-shifter this morning. He gave me some interesting information,” I said to the guys, and they silently listened when I told them about everything Evan had told me: from the river where the training area was to the fact that the Council was cooperating with humans— or better yet, Samayan was. I also told them how we could use that to our advantage. People were going to like that very much. Samayan was promising them a world with humans at their feet, and he was working with them behind their backs at the same time. Plus, the fact that he was using the potion on supernaturals without their consent was going to be the story of the day. I just hoped they were wise enough to finally accept it, stop being afraid and rise against the Council.
I showed them the plan of the conference that Sam sent me, and I told Jack to arrange transportation.
“Via fairies?” He sounded surprised.
“Yeah, via fairies. Will that be a problem?”
Jack’s flinch made it obvious that he wasn’t thrilled about the idea, but what better choice did we have? We definitely didn’t want to get five choppers in the air and attract unnecessary attention. Too many of us were going to be there, and everyone was meeting at the Base at ten o’clock in the morning.
“Okay, boys, time to get going. I’m going to need a few minutes,” I said after we covered everything, and I pointed at the door.
“Aw, man! Just when I was getting comfortable,” Jack complained like he always did, and Aaron looked at me suspiciously, also like he always did. Who knew what was going through his head? I wouldn’t have been surprised if he had even figured out what my sun-shaped necklace really was.
“I’ll see you in the training room,” I said and avoided Aaron’s eyes from fear of thoughts and memories from just an hour or so before.
It was impossible, though. When they left, as I unlocked Illyon’s chain and took it in my hands, all I could think about was Aaron and Aaron’s hands and Aaron’s body and Aaron’s lips. I was already flushed. Only the thought of him made me go crazy.
When I by some miracle managed to focus on the piece of gold that was lying innocently on my palm, I immediately felt Illyon’s magic pulsating against my skin.
I was going to need to be extremely fast and careful not to set any alarms off or any spells. I had no idea if the book could be tracked, but I kept my hopes on Grandmother’s necklace to protect us both.
Illyon took its time to let go and connect to me, and I was patient. It was so powerful, it surprised me all over again. It felt so alive that it was impossible to think of it as just an object. It scared the hell out of me, and I didn’t want to open it ever again, but I knew I had to, so I kept the connection intact and growing.
I had to find the formula to Veritas. It was the only way we had any chance of making people tell the truth. What a twisted truth. My body shivered at the thought of what I read the last and only time I had opened the book. Illyon told me that I was soulless. Immortal. The ultimate soldier who held the power of the Sky. And I knew that when the time came to face Samayan, I was going to have to read that part again. All of it, because I was going to need to learn all about that power if I had any hopes of beating a vampire like Samayan.
But for the moment, I was only interested in Veritas, and somehow, I had the feeling that I would be able to read it. I would be able to read every part of Illyon so long as I needed it. It was something nobody had told me, and I hadn’t read anywhere—I just knew it.
When the air around me sizzled with unconfined energy, and I felt almost one with Illyon, I shut my eyes tightly and worked my power. I slowly stretched the glowing ball of gold that was now in front of my mind’s eyes, and I played with it. My fingers touched its texture, and my eyes caught every small ray of light it let out. I became completely one with it before I slowly pushed it into taking its true shape. I persuaded it to become The White Book of Wisdom again, and soon enough, the energy began to change.
I felt the magic write itself on the thick yellow pages as my heart picked up the beating. So many emotions crossed throughout me in a second. Every emotion. I held my breath and waited for the transformation to be complete before I very slowly started to move my fingers to touch the leather that was now in my hands.
The book was definitely there.
I opened my eyes and smiled widely at Illyon that greeted me from my lap with its beautiful brown leather covers.
I sighed. Now, I only had to open it and read it, copy the formula and the spell for Veritas, and I could transform it back into a necklace again. Easier said than done.
When I opened the cover, its energy hit me in the chest and took my breath away. Just like the first time, it was beautiful and so full of everything. Even though I couldn’t read a thing from the symbols on the pages, I felt the energy of them, the great power trapped beneath them, the songs it sang in my ears and the stories that it told. Stories without words.
I flipped through the thick pages one by one with a bright smile on my face. So many things were in there, and once again, I had the feeling that I would never be able to get to the end of this book even if I wanted to. I took my time and touched the texture of the pages with the tips of my fingers, felt them, smiled at them and enjoyed them. Time lost sense and so did space. It was just me and the beautiful hand-drawn symbols for a long, long time.
And then I flipped a page and my heart skipped a beat.
Veritas, the Potion of Truth.
I wasn’t even surprised that it was in English. Somehow, the book knew what I needed and gave it to me. I was its Guardian so that must’ve been why. Either way, I didn’t question it. I made myself more comfortable on my bed, and I started reading through the page.
The first few paragraphs told the story of how the potion was created, to whom the book gave the formula first (some dude named Ketta in ancient Babylon) and what it did.
Then came the hard part. I reached in my drawer for a pen and a paper because there was no way in hell I was going to memorize everything that was written in there.
First, the ingredients. I started writing without having the slightest idea what most of the things there were. I only hoped that Horatio would understand it. I wrote the lines exactly as they were in the book. At some point, I had to write eye of tiger as an ingredient. And then, there was Sophie’s silk, ashes of a goat’s horn and I was surprised that I didn’t see cat’s piss or a witch’s nails when I finally finished it.
When I finally made it to the spell itself, it only had one line:
Screttous vine dyssharemm’athes.
Weird. I didn’t have the slightest idea of how to even pronounce those words. But I wrote them letter by letter and a couple of minutes later, it was done. I sighed in relief.
The next second, the letters in English were gone. The symbols eagerly took their place because Illyon knew I no longer needed them.
For a second, I thought about flipping to find that page about the Elemental again. A shiver ran down my spine and all the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. I closed the book immediately. That was going to happen another day, unfortunately.
After I folded the piece of paper and put it in my pocket, I relaxed and closed my eyes again. I put my palms above the leather covers again, but this time, I was connected with its energy and I didn’t have to do it all over again. I was almost one with the book. Stretching the brown leathers into the bright golden light of the energy of Illyon came naturally to me now. I touched its smooth texture of smoke with my fingers, and I willed it to turn back to the beautiful sun-shaped necklace.
I could feel the air and the light changing as the book shrunk and shrunk in my lap, but its power was never weaker or less than magnificent. When I opened my eyes, there it was. My golden sun-shaped necklace lay innocently in my hand.
“Star?”
I jumped from the bed, and the necklace fell on the floor. I had two knives ready to cut through
whoever was in my room.
Until I saw Aaron standing there looking at me dumbfounded.
“What the hell are you doing, Aaron? You can’t just pop into my room uninvited! And I locked the fucking door!”
I put the weapons away, but I’d never been as startled. My hands were still shaking, my heart racing.
“Relax. I didn’t mean to scare you. Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. You just caught me off guard, that’s all.” I still needed a few deep breaths to get my shit together. “What the hell are you doing here, anyway? I told you we would meet in the training room.”
“Yeah, after you did something that you had to do…” he said, trying to sound suspicious. “Which waaaas…?”
I rolled my eyes.
“Nothing.” I simply said.
“Nothing? Are you kidding me? Something huge happened in here, Star. I know it did, so why don’t you just tell me what it was?” He came closer to me.
This was impossible. “How the hell do you know that?!” I hissed. It was really getting out of hand. How did he always know?
“Lucky guess?”
He’d made a habit out of shrugging innocently every time I asked him that. Like hell it was a guess. Something was very wrong with him because there was no way in hell that he could be so precise about everything, even lying.
And there was only one explanation for it.
“You can read my mind.” That was it. It had to be.
Aaron laughed. “I can’t read your mind, Star,” he said, but I wasn’t buying it. He was definitely a mind reader. I didn’t know how or when or whatever, but he was.
“What am I thinking of right now?” I asked.
“What?” He looked genuinely surprised.
“What am I thinking right now, Aaron? Come on, tell me.” He was going to do it. He was going to guess right again, I was sure of it.
Aaron sighed. “Ella. You’re thinking of Ella,” he said, shaking his head and smiling that half smile of his.
“Aha!” I shouted. He guessed right. He guessed right! I was thinking of Ella!
