She wrinkled her nose at me, and I fought a smile as she flipped back to the front of class. Relieved that Kat was here and she was normal, I picked up my pen and tipped my desk forward. I poked her in the back.
“Yes?” she whispered.
I grinned. “You look a lot better than the last time I saw you.”
“Thanks.”
My gaze glided over her, and I spoke low so only she could hear. “Know what? You’re not glowing.”
Shock splashed across her face. “Like, at all?”
I shook my head.
Kat stared at me a moment longer and then slowly turned back around. Class started and I righted my desk, sitting back in my chair. A huge amount of relief was currently lifting some of the weight off my chest, but my mind kept going back to Kat’s absent trace. Was it the fever?
Or was it something else?
Instead of heading for the cafeteria like I normally would, I bypassed the noisy room and kept walking down the hall. A few students were milling through the wide hallway, and as I hung a right, I nearly plowed into some dude I’d never seen before.
The brunette guy jumped back. “Whoa,” he said, a grin splitting his tan face. “Sorry about that, man.”
I nodded in response and the guy stepped around me, disappearing toward the cafeteria I assumed. The musty-smelling library was busier than I thought it would be during lunch. A young librarian sat behind the circulation desk, her eyes widening when she saw me walk in.
Was it that odd to see me in here?
I smirked.
Probably.
A couple of underclassmen sat at the computers, eating their lunches. I turned down the first aisle and found myself in the back of the library. Eastern European culture. Doubted anyone at this school would be frequenting this part of the library.
There were maps of places virtually unpronounceable tacked to the tiny cubicle wall. The longer I waited, the more I felt like I needed to work on my world history knowledge, because I had no freaking clue there were so many countries in Eastern Europe.
The odd shiver along the back of my neck announced Kat’s presence before she appeared at the end of the stacks. I grinned when she spotted me and raised her brows. She took her sweet-ass time walking over, and when she stepped into the cubicle, I made no attempt at giving her space.
I’d decided I’d like to be all up in her personal space. “I was wondering if you were ever going to find me.”
She dropped her backpack against the wall and sat on the desk across from me. “Embarrassed someone would see you and think you’re capable of reading?”
My lips twitched. “I do have a reputation to maintain.”?
“And what a lovely reputation that is,” she retorted quickly, and it might make me a freak, but when she mouthed off at me, it turned me on.
Totally turned me on.
I stretched out my legs to accommodate that fact. “So what did you want to talk about?” I dropped my voice and was rewarded with a shiver. “In private?”
“Not what you’re hoping.”
I smirked. Funny that she thought she knew what I wanted. Cute.
“Okay.” She gripped the edge of the desk. “How did you know I was sick in the middle of the night?”
The question caught me off guard, bringing back memories of her pale and out of it, and the feeling of helplessness that I’d dwelled in while she’d been in the hospital. I didn’t want to think about it. “You don’t remember?”
Her eyes met mine for a moment, and then she stared at my lips. My grin went up a notch, and her gaze flew to the map over my shoulder. “No. Not really.”
Interesting. “Well, it was probably the fever. You were burning up.”
She was back to staring at me. I liked that. “You touched me?”
“Yes, I touched you.” And I wanted to touch her again, and not for the reasons I was touching her then. “And you weren’t wearing a lot of clothes. And you were soaked…in a white T-shirt. Nice look. Very nice.”?
She flushed prettily. “The lake… It wasn’t a dream?”
I shook my head.
“Oh my God, so I did go swimming in the lake?”
Her visible distress over the least important thing that had happened out of everything was sort of adorable. And telling. I moved away from the desk and was so close to her, I could feel her warmth. “You did. Not something I expected to see, but I’m not complaining. I saw a lot.”
“Shut up.”
“Don’t be embarrassed.” I tugged on the sleeve of her cardigan, and she smacked my hand away. I grinned. “It’s not like I haven’t seen the upper part before, and I didn’t get a real good look down—”
Kitten had claws. Couldn’t forget that. She came off the desk with a mean right hook. I was faster than her and jerked back, catching her hand before it connected with my face. Since I had her wrist, I used it to my advantage. I did what I’d been wanting to do since I saw her in class this morning. I hauled her against my chest, immediately pleased by that, and lowered my head. “Don’t hit, Kitten. It’s not nice.”
“You’re not nice.” She tried pulling away, but she wasn’t going anywhere. “Let me go.”
“I’m not sure I can do that. I must protect myself.” I dropped her hand.
“Oh, really, that’s your reason for—for manhandling me?”
“Manhandling?” I moved forward until she was pressed against the cubicle desk. “This isn’t manhandling or whatever the hell that is.”
She didn’t say anything at first, but I knew where her brain had gone, which was right where my brain operated pretty much every time I was with her. Her eyes dilated. Her pulse picked up. Even her lips had parted.
“Daemon, someone is going to see us.”
“So?” I carefully picked up her hand. “Not like anyone is going to say a thing to me.”
She dragged in a deep breath. “So my trace has faded, but this stupid connection hasn’t?”
I’d been hoping that the weird connection was going to end when the trace did. “Nope.”
“What does that mean, then?”
“I don’t know.” I didn’t really care at this moment. I slipped my fingers under her sleeve, smoothing the tips over her soft skin. I liked the jolt of electricity. Added bonus of touching her.
“Why do you keep touching me?”
“I like to.”
?“Daemon…”?She placed her hand against my chest, and satisfaction swelled inside me.
“But back to the trace. You know what that means.”?
“That I don’t have to see your face outside of school?” she said.
Such a mouth. I laughed, and her eyes flared wide. “You’re no longer at risk.”
“I think the not-seeing-your-face part outweighs the safe part.”
“Keep telling yourself that.” I brushed my chin along her hair, savoring the feeling as I moved on to her cheek. I could feel her heartbeat revving, crashing in her chest. God, I wanted her. Some would say it was wrong, but I wanted her. “If that makes you feel better, but we both know it’s a lie.”
She tipped her head back, her eyes flashing up at me. “It’s not a lie.”
“We’re still going to be seeing each other,” I murmured. “And don’t lie. I know that makes you happy. You told me you wanted me.”
She blinked. “When?”
“At the lake.” I tilted my head. Our mouths were so close. It would take nothing for me to kiss her, but it would be worth everything. “You said you wanted me.”
Her other hand landed on my chest. “I had a fever. Lost my mind.”
“Whatever, Kitten.” I dropped my hands to her soft hips and lifted her back up on the edge of the desk. “I know better.
“You don’t know anything,” she breathed.
“Uh-huh. You know, I was worried about you.” I eased in between her legs. “You kept calling out my name, and I kept answering, but it was like you couldn’t hear me.”
She blinked
as she lowered her hands down my stomach. I wondered if she even knew she was feeling me up. Or when her hands reached my sides that she tugged me closer, against her. “Wow, I must’ve been really out of it.”
My eyes met hers, and in spite of the heat building at the base of my spine, when I looked down at her, I saw her lifeless and limp in my arms. I tasted that fear again, and I spoke the words I couldn’t admit to Adam. “It…scared me.”
Surprise flickered across her face, but I didn’t give her time to really think about that. I lowered my mouth to hers, and the moment we touched, her fingers dug into my sweater. She could tell me all she wanted that she didn’t desire this, but she wanted it as badly as I did, if not more.
I focused on the seam of her lips with my tongue, teasing her, working her, slowly coaxing her open. And when she did, I wanted to shout, but that would require me lifting my mouth from hers. Her arms looped around my neck and then she was kissing me back just as urgently, just as feverishly.
And I wanted more.
My hands slipped under her shirt, spreading along the bare skin of her sides. I hadn’t forgotten what her flesh felt like. I couldn’t get the damn memory of it out of my head. I knew she couldn’t either. This was meant to happen, and I wasn’t surprised when her lower body tipped against mine and she moaned against my mouth, and her response had me wanting to find a much bigger area than this cubicle and more—
Something snapped around us, popped, and then cracked. The smell of burned ozone immediately filled the cubicle.
I pulled away, and breathing heavily, I looked over my shoulder. An old-ass computer was smoking. Heh. Electronics did not fare well around us. I turned back to her, ready to pick up where we’d stopped, but the moment my gaze centered on her, I knew that wasn’t going to happen.
Her walls were up. She was pissed, looking like a cat that was about to get dumped in bathwater. She pushed—she pushed hard—and surprised, I let go, moving back a step. Something weird unfurled in my chest. A deep twinge of…of hurt. Well, now that I knew how that felt, it sucked. Sucked ass.
“God, I don’t even like this—kissing you,” she said.
Oh, wait the hell up. Not true. I straightened to my full height. “I beg to differ. And I think this computer tells a different story, too.”
A nasty little look pinched her features, and for some messed-up reason, it made her cuter. “That—that will never happen again.”
I arched a brow as I stared at her. Yeah, it would most definitely happen again. Challenge thrown down. Challenge accepted. “And I think you’ve said that before.” When her face looked like she swallowed something sour, I sighed. “Kat, you enjoyed that—just as much as I did. Why lie?”
A moment passed, and then she shook her head. “Because it’s not real. You didn’t want me before.”
“I did—”
“Don’t you dare say you wanted me, because you treated me like I was the Antichrist! You can’t just undo that because there’s a stupid connection between us.” She sucked in a sharp breath, the flush leaking out of her face. “You really hurt me then. I don’t think you even know. You humiliated me in front of an entire lunchroom!”
Looking away, I dragged my hand through my hair. She was right. I had hurt her. I had embarrassed her. I couldn’t go back and change that, even though I wished I could. “I know. I’m…I’m sorry for how I treated you, Kat.”
She stared at me for a few seconds and then bit down on her lip. “Even now, we’re all the way hidden in the library, as if you don’t want people to know you made a mistake that day and acted like a dick. And I’m supposed to be okay with that now?”
What the hell? My eyes widened. Did she think I was hiding her? “Kat—”
“I’m not saying we can’t be friends, because I want to. I do like you a lo—” She cut herself off. “Look, this didn’t happen. I’m going to blame aftereffects of the flu or say that a zombie ate my brain.”
My brows furrowed. “What?”
“I don’t want this with you.” She started to turn, but I caught her arm. Her eyes narrowed on me. “Daemon…”
I looked her dead on. “You’re a terrible liar. You do want this. Just as badly as I do. You want this as badly as you want to go to ALA this winter.”
Her mouth dropped open. “You don’t even know what ALA is!”
“The American Library Association midwinter event.” I was quite proud of this. “Saw you obsessing over it on your blog before you got sick. I’m pretty sure you said you’d give up your firstborn child to go. Anyway, back to the whole you-wanting-me part. You do want me.”
Kat drew in a deep breath as a weird mix of amusement and irritation flashed across her face. “You are way too confident.”
“I’m confident enough to wager a bet.”
Her eyes rolled. “You can’t be serious.”
I grinned. “I bet that by New Year’s Day, you will have admitted that you’re madly, deeply, and irrevocably—”
“Wow. Want to throw another adverb out there?” Her cheeks were bright red.
Winking at her, I came up with another one. “How about irresistibly?”
“I’m surprised you know what an adverb is,” she muttered.
“Stop distracting me, Kitten. Back to my bet—by New Year’s Day, you’ll have admitted that you’re madly, deeply, irrevocably, and irresistibly in love with me.”
Kat choked on a laugh.
“And you dream about me.” I released her arm and folded mine across my chest, cocking an eyebrow. “I bet you’ll admit that. Probably even show me your notebook with my name circled in hearts—”
“Oh, for the love of God…”
“It’s on,” I promised, and I meant it. For real.
Chapter 6
Friday evening I went out on patrols, mainly to stop myself from finding some reason to bother Kat so I didn’t come across as having a one-track focus, er, obsession. Who was I kidding? I totally had a one-track focus. It was weird. I had never been this wrapped up in someone before. I guessed it was normal.
I couldn’t shake the taste of her kiss, the sound of her breathy gasps, or the way she had melted into me like warm butter. All day my brain had been replaying those hot moments in the library.
Which made class kind of awkward.
I circled around the colony and then traveled to the edge of the county, staying in the thick woodland. There wasn’t a single sign that an Arum was around. Good news, but I knew it wouldn’t stay that way.
It was a little after ten when I shifted back to my human form seconds before I stepped out of the woods and onto the road leading up to our houses. A few steps and I felt the warm shiver along the back of my neck. My gaze went to Kat’s house and then mine, and there she was, coming out of our house.
“Kitten.”
“Hey.” She looked everywhere but at me. “Where, um, so what have you been doing?”
“Patrolling.” I stepped onto the porch, and even though she was eyeballing a crack in the porch floor, I smiled a little as I stood close to her. Close enough to feel the warmth rolling off her tense body. “Everything is all quiet on the western front.”
Her lips twitched. “Nice reference.”
I lowered my head close to her temple. “It’s my favorite book, actually.”
Kat’s head jerked toward mine and our mouths almost lined up. “I didn’t know you knew how to read the classics.”
Smirking lazily, I stepped closer. Our legs and arms brushed. “Well, I usually prefer books with pictures and small sentences, but sometimes I step out of the box.”