Authors: Jaycee DeLorenzo
“Stop calling me that.”
“What?”
“My name is Callan. Just Callan. I'm not on duty now.”
“Well, you won't be able to claim this dinner as an office expense then. Pity.” I rolled my eyes, and finished the last piece of chicken.
Callan watched me chew, tension so thick I tasted it between us. He took a sip of Coke. A small dewdrop remained on his lip. “I want to see you again.”
I refused to give in to the jolt in my belly. I cocked my head haughtily. “You told me I scared you. Why on earth would you want to see me again?”
Nerves danced in his eyes; he rubbed the back of his neck. Any other girl would have been swept away by the endearing rejected look he wore. Not me. Of course not me.
My stomach clenched.
Get a grip. He is the law. The enemy. Time to leave, Ocean. You've overstayed as it is.
I made to stand, but Callan's hand shot out and grabbed mine. “Do you have a phone number I can call you on?”
“What? So you can
take care of me
? Make sure I'm safe and well fed?” I laughed. “I don’t need taking care of. Now take your paws off me.” I glared at his hand until he dropped it. “Chase some other tail.”
He stood. I didn't like the look in his eyes. Gone was the calculating surfer boy trying to read me, replaced with a hard edged cop who wanted what he couldn't have. “I want to chase
you
. You're like me. I can tell.”
Now that was the most ridiculous thing I'd ever heard. “Yeah. Okay, Callan. We're both so alike.”
I planned on running out the door while he paid the cheque, but it was obvious with the way his body guarded the exit, it wouldn’t be that easy. Fine. I had another plan.
“I'd like to get to know you, Ocean. You're different.”
“You know nothing about me. Let’s leave it at that.” I took a deep breath; power swirled from my stomach, erupting behind my eyes. Teleporting was a very convenient way to travel, but fuck it hurt. The migraine took over. I wanted to throw up my dinner. I groaned, letting the pressure build.
Callan took a step toward me. “Ocean, are you all right? Here, sit down.” His hand grazed my elbow and I fractured a little. The ground grew soft as smoke. The room shimmered with air wisps. Stealing the solidity and replacing it with a dream of kimono and filigree.
“We are nothing alike and you're right. I
am
different than other girls,” I panted, tugging his shirt so he stumbled into me. His wild, salty scent suffocated me as I whispered in his ear, “I kill monsters. I'm the grim reaper and my work is never finished. I'm not what you think. Goodbye, Callan.” I had no idea why I told him—it was an impulse which I followed recklessly. The migraine burst a rainbow of colours into my brain, and the sushi restaurant disappeared with a
pop.
An imprint of shock and amazement in those sea-foam eyes haunted me as I spiralled into speed and nothingness. I wished the transportation power worked faster, but it took a good ten minutes of stomach warping momentum, and brain haemorrhaging pain, before downtown Manchester wisped around me—condensing from dream to reality, followed quickly by sounds of car horns, voices, and smells of mini doughnuts.
I was in England.
Book One of the Eldaen Light Chronicles
A new adult science fiction romance, by Victoria H. Smith
Available Now.
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Chapter One
“Hey, loser, would you keep it steady on your end?” Piper asked with a huff. “You’re wobbling more than a frat boy after last call.”
I looked around my edge of the couch with incredulous eyes, unable to believe her nerve. I shouldered most of the weight. “Well, maybe if you put out that frickin’ cigarette and gave me some help—”
“Hey, easy with the attitude.” She continued to speak out the side of her mouth, a smoke cloud curling from her lips. “You should be kissing my feet right now. If not for me, we would have paid twice the amount he was asking for this damn thing.”
Her grin was smug as she puffed on her cigarette, or as she liked to call them, “ciggies.” One week-long excursion in Europe last spring break that almost resulted in an arrest involving a monkey and a pretty wigged out local, and the girl thought she was
cultured
.
I waved my hand in front of me, deflecting the vile fumes.
“You aren’t going to make a habit of smoking those things in the house, right?” After two long years of putting up with people sneaking smokes in the dorms, it would be nice to finally have an option of whether or not I would die from second-hand smoke.
Piper whipped around her firecracker-red bob like I just asked her to give me her soul for safekeeping.
“So we’re establishing house rules, now, are we?” she asked. “How about this?” She set down her end of the couch, forcing me to drop mine. She made a sloppy scout’s honor sign with her fingers—as if I’d ever believe she’d been a Girl Scout. “I promise not to smoke in the house, if you promise not to have a stick up your ass the entire time we’re living together.”
The girl really was as sweet as sugar. “Well, since we’re creating terms, how about you abide by one of my own? I promise not to have a stick up my ass, if you promise not to bring a new guy into the house every other night . . .
or
if you so choose to do so, at least grant me the common courtesy of playing your music loud enough so I don’t have to listen to all the moaning and groaning.”
I held out my hand for her to shake. She wasn’t the only one who was good at this game.
She propped her hands on her hips and tapped her foot, looking to the sky while she considered my terms.
“Touché, my friend. You got yourself a deal.” She shook my hand, smiling.
I didn’t know how we did it, but we managed to get the blasted thing all the way up our creaky, splintered front stoop and into the living room without killing ourselves. And we managed to save the fifty bucks it would have cost to hire a moving service. Although I suspected the only reason Piper suggested calling movers was so she could sit in a lawn chair in her bikini and sip lemonade while staring at their asses.
“Thank God!” Piper collapsed on the couch, sending a cloud of dust into the air. She waved a hand in front of her face to clear the particles from her vision. “I guess we can get a slipcover or something.”
She put her hands behind her head, daring to lean back onto the leisure item.
I’m so not going to comment on that right now.
I joined her, leaning my head on her shoulder as I admired our hard work. The room really did open up once everything was inside. When we first leased this house from Campus Rentals, it hadn’t been much to look at; now, it almost felt like home. Sure, none of the furniture matched, the paint was chipping off the walls, and the place smelled a little of stale beer, but the house was ours.
I took in a deep breath, but the beer smell and dust caused me to exhale, mid-breath, sending my body into a coughing fit.
Raising her eyebrows, Piper crossed her long, slender legs. Her stylish, black combat boots made a heavy thump as they hit the coffee table. “Say no to drugs, my friend.”
She laughed and put her cigarette out on the arm of the couch. Seeing my outraged expression, she raised her shoulders. “One more burn won’t make a difference.”
“Maybe, but it doesn’t hurt to try and keep what we have as nice as possible. Unless you’re going to pay for a new one?” It wasn’t every day local hobos had yard sales. We’d been lucky to snag the one we got. I had to practically assault an old lady to get it. She hadn’t left us alone until I offered her a coupon for a free tube of pleasure gel I swiped from Piper. Speaking of, I hoped she didn’t make for her purse anytime soon.
Piper sighed. “Whatever, Ariel. Just loosen up. We got our own place now. Enjoy it and relax.”
She was right. I needed to relax. Things could have been worse. I didn’t know what I’d do if I had to spend another year in those damned dorm rooms. I was starting to feel like an old schoolmarm the way I was telling people to shut the hell up on a daily basis. I kicked off my sneakers and bent my toes forward into points. Feeling a pop in my foot, I jolted into a standing position.
The searing pain when my foot hit the floor made me cringe.
“Whoa. Are you okay?” Piper asked, wide-eyed.
“My feet just realized I had been standing all day, is all.” I tried to laugh it off. “I’m going to go walk around the house a bit, maybe that will help.” I moved toward the stairwell stepping over Piper’s legs.
“Okay, then. Wait, where’s your necklace?” she asked.
A rush of blood went straight to my head as I moved my hand to my chest. I immediately searched the room, throwing pillows and textbooks in my wake.
“Don’t panic, A. We’ll find it.”
Too late. I dove behind Piper’s life-size Superman statue, ripping the cords out of a box labeled
Computer
behind it. Piper worked on the next box labeled
Piper’s Crap
.
I finished mangling my box and rose up, hitting my head on Superman’s ass. “Ouch!”
I grabbed my head, while making my way across the room on my hands and knees. “Piper, you need to get that damn thing out of here. I. It’s an eyesore!”
Normally, Piper would have come back at me with a smart remark, but she knew the seriousness of the situation. If she came at me with more than, “Ariel, you sure look beautiful today,” I would have ripped her a new one. I prided myself on being pretty laid back, but when I panicked, that was another story. It was best she kept her distance, and she knew it.
Piper saw the rapid approach of my psychotic breakdown as I continued my quest. She quickened her pace to aid me, mangling another box labeled
School Crap
. Another one of her brilliantly labeled boxes I was sure.
“When was the last time you saw it?” she asked. “You know, I bet it might be out front. You brushed up against the wall trying to—”
I ran outside. My pupils reacted harshly to the rays of the sun and I covered my eyes with the back of my hand. My vision masked, I tripped and hit the ground so hard my head felt the impact. It didn’t matter. I was headed to the ground to continue my search anyway. The fall just made my trip that much easier.
My fingers scurried through the brush on the walk. I took in a deep breath when I saw a glimmer in the un-trimmed hedge. It was a miracle I even saw it, with how tall the blades were that day.
I heard the sound of Piper’s boots hitting the ground as she joined me. I glanced up to see the pink material of her bare midriff top blowing in the wind.
She bent down, holding her knees at my level. “See, there it is. You had no reason to panic. Ariel, you’re such a spaz sometimes.”
I barely heard her, still in full panic mode.
She placed her hand on my shoulder. “That old thing really means a lot to you, doesn’t it?”
I nodded, closing my eyes as I gripped the octagonal silver emblem. I slid my thumb across the cool moonstone mounted in the center as I continued to calm down. Opening my eyes, I witnessed the swirl of blue inside the stone which sparkled from the few rays of sunshine that made it through the maple canopy. The rounded, eight-point silver mounting still took my breath away with its incandescent shine. I could feel them. I could feel their arms around me again. Relief set in as I pushed myself to my knees. My fingers studied the clasp, analyzing the problem.
Piper waved her hand in front of my face. “Hey, are you okay? Earth to Ariel!”
I ran my hand through my hair. “I’m fine,” I assured her, having finally regained the mental capacity to speak. “The stupid clasp broke.”
“Hmm. Well you probably shouldn’t wear it again . . . you know, until you can get it fixed. You don’t want to make things worse by losing it.”
As much as I wished she wasn’t, she was right.
“Yeah. I guess I’ll keep it in my drawer until I can get it fixed.” The necklace was better there than me trying to play doctor on it with my nail tweezers.
My heartbeat still descended from the event as I walked back inside the old cream-colored house. I climbed the staircase to the second floor and pushed open the first door on the right. My door. I walked toward my unfinished armoire and opened the top drawer. My hand felt for the familiar wood of the ornate box the necklace never spent its time in, since I never took it off. I carefully laid my treasure inside, making sure to sit the box upright before I closed the drawer.
I collapsed on my bed, and ran my fingers through my long, black hair. I caught a couple of tangles; probably time for a haircut. The crisp smell of leaves blew in on a gust of wind through the open window, reminding me of why I chose to attend college in the Midwest. In Southern California, there had been only two seasons—hot and swamp-ass hot. But here, there was actually a fall, with brightly colored leaves and cool breezes. I was relieved to be here, in more ways than one.
With a sigh, I turned my head to the right, taking in the assortment of moving boxes that awaited me. I didn’t own much, so it wouldn’t be too hard to get my things put away. I forced myself to get up and get to work.
I did all the necessary housekeeping by putting up posters of famous paintings by artists I could only dream of one day being half as good as, and filling my drawers with clothes. I placed my alarm clock up on the nightstand, and after I unloaded the last box, I put the finishing touches on the room by setting up my easels and paints next to the window. I was looking forward to capturing the beauty of the ever-changing trees and various tones of the fall sky. This was by far my favorite season for painting. There was just so much inspiration everywhere.
“A! The mail carrier is here,” Piper called in her raspy voice. “Come down!”