Oblivion

  shirt, pulling my mouth to hers.

  I fell into that kiss.

  What started off as slow and questioning escalated into a flood of deep, raw sensations that crashed over us in waves. Kissing her. Touching her. It could never be enough. I could get drunk on the way she tasted, high on the breathy sounds she made as my fingers slid over the bare skin of her belly, forget the world because of the way she wrapped her arms around me, holding me tight, and live off how she felt beside me, under me.

  I pressed her down, carefully settling my weight over her. The kisses took on a harder, deeper quality. She curled her leg around mine. Her fingers tugged on my hair, and when she moved, my name was a gasp on her lips that nearly broke me.

  “I need to stop,” I said, voice rough to my own ears. Kat and I had been on the verge of taking everything to the next level, to that level, for a while now. But moments like this, when we were so close, when I knew she was as ready as I was, I was seconds from doing something stupid. Like getting her out of her clothes in the middle of the woods, and man, that was so not where our first time should take place. Or losing myself completely without us even getting to that part, because damn, I was close. “Like right now.”

  Kat threaded her fingers through the hair at the back of my neck. “Yeah, we should.”

  Good idea. Great plan. We did need to stop. Like right now.

  I kissed her again.

  And Kat held me tighter, sliding her hands down my back until they were under my shirt, and that kicked up a whole new riot of sensations. She arched her back, pressing her chest into mine, and I could feel her heart beating at the exact rate as mine. Our breaths were coming fast as my fingers brushed over the delicate lace of her bra.

  A shiver of awareness skated over my skin. I stiffened a second before I heard my sister shriek, “Oh, dear God and baby Jesus in the manger, my eyes!” Dee shrieked. “My eyes!”

  Kat’s eyes flew open as I lifted my head. Dee stood a few feet away from us, arms folded across her chest, staring at us like she’d just walked in on us engaging in wild animal sex.

  Kat yanked her hands out from under my shirt as she whispered, “Oh my God.”

  “Dee, you didn’t see anything.” And then I added much lower, “Because you have impeccable timing.”

  “You were on…her and your mouths were doing this.” She unfolded her arms and smushed her hands together repeatedly. I frowned at the gestures. That was not how Kat and I looked. “And that’s more than enough I want to see. Like ever.”

  Kat pushed at my chest, so I rolled off her. She sat up, twisting around.

  “What do you want, Dee?” I asked.

  She huffed, pressing her hands on her hips. “Well, I don’t want anything from you. I wanted to talk to Katy.”

  Kat stiffened with tangible surprise. “You do?”

  “Ash and I were going to this new little shop in Moorefield Saturday afternoon. They sell vintage dresses. For prom,” she added.

  “Prom?”

  I looked over at Kat. The way she said “prom” was like it was a totally different language. While our heads hadn’t been wrapped up in all things prom-related, it was a given that we would go to it. I didn’t care what anyone had to say about it, I’d be damned if she didn’t get to experience her senior prom.

  “Yeah, prom’s at the end of the month.” Dee looked over at me. “And most of the dresses are going to be gone. And I don’t know if the place has anything, but Ash heard about it and you know how she is with clothes, so she’s in the know. Like a couple of days ago, she found this really cute cropped sweater that—”

  “Dee,” I said, a small grin tugging at my lips.

  “What? I’m not talking to you.” She faced Kat, exasperated to the point I wanted to laugh. “Anyway, would you like to go with us? Or have you already gotten a dress? Because if you have gotten a dress, then I guess the trip is pointless, but you could still—”

  “No. I haven’t gotten a dress,” Kat said.

  “Good!” Dee grinned. “Then we can go on Saturday. I thought about asking Lesa if she wanted to go…”

  “Wait,” she said. “I wasn’t planning on prom.”

  “What?” Dee’s mouth dropped open, and my brows flew up. “It’s senior prom.”

  “I know, but with everything going on… I haven’t really thought about it.” And that had to be a lie, because the entire school was plastered with prom flyers.

  Dee’s incredulous expression grew. “It’s senior prom.”

  “But…” Tucking her hair back, she glanced me. “You haven’t even asked me to go.”

  I smiled. “I didn’t think I needed to ask. I assumed we would go.”

  Dee rocked back on the balls of her feet. “Well, you know what they say about people who assume.”

  My grin faded, because Kat was staring at me like I grew a second, not nearly as attractive head. “What, Kitten?”

  She blinked. “How can we go to prom with everything going on? We’re so close to having enough tolerance to go back to Mount Weather and—”

  “And prom is on a Saturday,” I said, pulling her hand away from her hair. “So let’s say that in two weeks we’re ready to go, it will be Sunday.”

  Dee hobbled around with excitement, and it was really weird to see. “And it’s only a few hours,” she insisted. “You guys can halt the self-mutilation for a few hours.”

  I could see the indecision on her face, and I knew where it was coming from. It didn’t have anything to do with practicing with the onyx. I slipped my arm around her and leaned in, keeping my voice low as I spoke to her. “It’s not wrong, Kat. You deserve this.”

  She closed her eyes. “Why should we get to celebrate when she can’t?”

  Hell.

  I rested my cheek against hers. “We’re still here, and we deserve to be normal and do normal things every once in a while. It’s not your fault.” I kissed her temple. “Will you go to prom with me, Kat?”

  Dee shifted some more. “You should really say yes, so we can go dress shopping and so I don’t have to witness a really awkward moment of you turning my brother down. Even though he deserves to be knocked down a peg or two.”

  Kat laughed as she glanced at Dee. My sister gave her a small smile, and I hoped that smile was a white flag. Five months of each of them circling each other was enough time.

  “Okay.” Kat took a deep breath. “I’ll go to prom—only because I don’t want this conversation to get awkward.”

  I tweaked her nose. “I’ll take what I can get for as long as I can get it.”

  Kat was acting a little weird after school on Thursday. She was quiet and tense. I picked at her until she relaxed, and by the time we left the post office and made it to her house, she was smiling more than she was frowning, so I considered that a win for the day.

  Once inside her house, she opened a window in the living room while I helped myself to a glass of milk. When she walked back into the kitchen, her appreciative gaze was hard to ignore as it roamed all over me.

  My head immediately went to a happy and fun place, but I had a surprise planned for her today, and if I got too distracted—and that wasn’t hard around her—I would never get to show her what I wanted before we had to go down to the lake.

  But we were alone, so…

  Sitting the empty milk glass on the counter, I moved wicked fast. In front of Kat, I cupped her cheeks and tipped her head back, kissing her as I backed her toward the bottom of the stairs.

  She pulled away, her eyes soft as she grinned a little. I kissed the tip of her nose and then lifted her. She wrapped her legs around my waist. I carried her upstairs and into her bedroom. Inside, it was no small feat when I lifted my mouth from hers. I grinned.

  Lips swollen, her brows knit in confusion.

  I looked at her desk pointedly and then put her down.

  She followed my gaze, and her mouth dropped opened as she saw the MacBook Air in a cherry-red sleeve. “I…” She looked at
me and then at the desk again. She took a step forward and stopped, facing me once more. “Is that for me?”

  There was no keeping the smile off my face when I felt her heart rate kick up. “Well, it is on your desk, so…”

  “But I don’t understand.”

  “See, there’s this place called an Apple Store and I went there, picked one out. They didn’t have any stock.” I paused as she stared at me. “And I ordered one. Meanwhile, I ordered a sleeve. I did take some liberties since I prefer red.”

  “But why?” Her eyes were wider than I’d ever seen them.

  I laughed softly. “Man, I wish you could see your face.”

  She clasped her hands over her cheeks. “Why?”

  “You didn’t have one, and I know how much blogging and that stuff means to you. Using the school computer isn’t doing it for you.” I shrugged. “And we really didn’t do the Valentine’s thing. So…here we are.”

  A moment passed. “When did you put it here?”

  “This morning, after you left for school.”

  Kat took a deep breath as she turned back to the desk. “And you got this for me? A MacBook Air? Those things cost a lot of money.”

  “Thank the taxpayers. Their money funds the DOD, who then turns over the money to us.” I laughed as she wrinkled her nose. “And I save money. I have a small fortune stashed.”

  “Daemon, it’s too much.”

  “It’s yours.”

  Her hands slipped down and she folded them under her chin. “I can’t believe you did this.”

  “You deserve it.” The thing was, she deserved so much more.

  Kat was still and then she launched herself at me. Laughing, I caught her around the waist as I sat down on the bed. “Thank you. Thank you,” she said in between kissing every inch of my face. She was so excited, she drove me down, flat on my back. “Thank you.”

  Laughing, I tipped my head back against the comforter. “Wow. You’re pretty strong when you’re excited.”

  She sat astride me, grinning. “I can’t believe you did this.”

  “You had no idea, did you?”

  “No, but that’s why you kept bringing up the blog stuff.” She smacked my chest playfully, referring to the one hundred and one hints I’d dropped over the week. “You are…”

  I folded my arms under my head. “I’m what?”

  “Amazing.” She leaned over, kissing me. “You’re amazing.”

  “That’s what I’ve been saying for years.”

  Her laugh was warm against my lips “Seriously, though, you shouldn’t have.”

  “I wanted to.” I watched her glance at the desk. “It’s okay. I know what you want to do. Go play.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yes.”

  Squealing, she kissed me again and then hopped off, racing toward the desk. Grabbing the laptop, she climbed back on the bed and sat next to me. She immediately started playing around with it, and over the next hour, I helped her get familiarized with the different settings and themes.

  “There’s the webcam,” I said, leaning over her shoulder. Opening the application, she squeaked when our faces appeared on the screen. “You should do your first vlog right now,” I suggested.

  She hit record and squealed, “I have a MacBook Air!”

  Burying my face in her hair, I laughed. “You dork.”

  She turned off the webcam and closed the lid before placing it on the bed. Throwing her arms around me, she squeezed me tight. “Thank you.”

  Lying back down, I pulled her with me. Several locks of hair fell forward, so I brushed them back. My hand lingered against her cheek. “I like it when you’re happy, and if I can do something small, then I will.”

  “Something small?” Shock heightened her tone. “That’s not something small. That had to have cost—”

  “It doesn’t matter. You’re happy. I’m happy.”

  Her eyes lightened. “I love you. You know that, right?”

  I grinned. “I know.”

  Kat stayed in my arms for a moment and then sat up, kicked off her shoes. She glanced out the window. “You’re never going to say it, are you?”

  “Say what?” I sat up, placing my hands on her hips.

  She looked over her shoulders at me. “You know what.”

  “Hmm?” I slid my hands up her sides, wondering how much more time we had before we had to go down to the lake. Glancing at the wall clock, I saw that we had absolutely no time. Sigh. I kissed her cheek and then slid off the bed. “I’m glad you like it.”

  “I love it,” she replied.

  I raised an eyebrow.

  “Seriously, I do love it. I can’t thank you enough.” “I’m sure you can.”

  Rolling her eyes, she pushed me and then started scanning her bedroom floor. I had no idea what she was looking for. She knelt down, lifting the edge of her comforter as she peered under her bed. Then she lay down on her belly and stretched. I heard her hand smacking the floor.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “Trying to get my flip flops.”

  “Is it really that hard?” And couldn’t she just use the Source to do that?

  She ignored me. “What the…?” One flip-flop flew out from under the bed and then another. I stepped back as she wiggled out and sat up. She opened her hand. “Oh my God.”

  “What?” I knelt beside her and then saw what she held. I sucked in a sharp breath. “Is that what I think it is?”

  She held a shiny black stone, streak red through the center, like a flame, in her hand. I’d seen a similar stone before. On Luc.

  Kat was holding a piece of opal.

  Chapter 20

  For several moments, Kat and I stared at each other. It was all we could do, because neither of us could believe that we’d found a piece of opal under her damn bed of all places.

  Obviously, it had to have been Carissa’s, and somehow, when the room had been wrecked and we cleaned it, the piece of opal must’ve ended up under there. We made it downstairs; that was as far as we went.

  Kat dropped the stone in my hand. “Try something—like that reflection thing.”

  Folding my hand over the stone, I concentrated on the environment around me—the couch, the floor, and the TV. I figured it would be the same as reflecting the image of a person, but what did I know? I’d never done this before.

  Energy skated over my skin, seeping through tissue and bone. I could see the faint shimmer appearing over my hand and it traveled up my arm. A second passed, and then my arm blended into the floor.

  Kat’s eyes widened. “Daemon?”

  I chuckled.

  “Daemon?” She turned toward the couch. “I can’t see you at all.”

  “Not at all?”

  She shook her head as her eyes narrowed. Stepping back, her forehead scrunched as she stared right where I stood, in the front of the couch. “Oh my God, you’re totally like the Predator.”

  “This is so cool.” I let go of the reflection. “God, I am so going to sneak into your bathroom like the Invisible Man.”

  Kat shot me a bland look. “Give me the opal.”

  Laughing, I handed it over. “Want to hear something crazier than me being completely invisible? It barely took any energy away. I feel fine.”

  “Wow.” She turned the stone over. “We need to test this out.”

  We headed to the lake about fifteen minutes before anyone else was supposed to show. “You try it.”

  Kat stepped back from me. In one hand she held the opal, and she lifted the other hand. Within seconds, a ball of whitish-red light appeared on her hand. “Wow.” She glanced at me, awed. “This