‘‘And there’s us,’’ I said.
‘‘And there’s us.’’
He didn’t look sad or excited about it. Just calm. Patient. Waiting for me to say something.
What did one say to someone who had just told you that they may be your perfect soul match? Predestined companion. Yang to your yin, and all that?
‘‘I think this might get a little complicated after all,’’ I said.
‘‘Mmm.’’ He reached over and gently brushed my bangs away from my face. ‘‘Want to ask me anything else?’’
I laughed. ‘‘Not yet. Let me think this over, okay?’’ And there I was, asking him to give me time, to take it slow. He didn’t seem to mind.
‘‘Sure.’’
I rolled over and pressed my back against his warm, wide chest, and he wrapped his arms around me and held me tight.
After what felt like a long time, he said, ‘‘Allie?’’
‘‘Yes?’’
‘‘I didn’t expect this.’’
‘‘What?’’
‘‘You.’’
I was quiet, thinking about that. I hadn’t expected him either. Hadn’t expected to care for him. To need him. Maybe even love him. ‘‘Are you sorry?’’ I asked in a small voice.
‘‘No.’’
I couldn’t help it. I sighed. ‘‘Good. Neither am I.’’
I slept soundly and deeply, which was rare for me. First of all, I had a million thoughts spinning through my head. Second of all, when I’m first sharing a bed with someone, I wake up all night long, forgetting and remembering that I have someone in the bed with me. But Zay’s sheets were soft, his body warm, so warm we had to drape the sheet between us so we didn’t stick together, and his steady breathing lulled me. If he snored, I did not notice.
A beeping alarm clock, however, I did hear. Zay rolled away from me and turned it off.
‘‘What time is it?’’ I asked.
‘‘Five thirty.’’
I groaned. ‘‘Why would anyone want to get up at this hour?’’
‘‘Well’’—Zayvion rolled toward me—‘‘I can think of some good reasons.’’ He kissed my lips, even though I had severe morning breath after the lasagna. I gave him points for being brave.
‘‘What sort of good reasons?’’ I asked innocently.
‘‘It’s a good time to read the paper,’’ he said.
‘‘Uh-huh.’’ I wrapped my leg over his hip and scooted closer to him. ‘‘What else?’’
‘‘Sometimes I get in a run before breakfast.’’
‘‘So you like to work out first thing in the morning?’’ I asked.
‘‘It’s a good way to get the blood pumping.’’
‘‘Then by all means, you should work out.’’ We kissed, and I savored the feel of him against me. I was sleepy, warm, and sated. We took some time kissing before getting into the full swing of things. But then, I’d always been told it’s best to stretch before any strenuous activity.
It was fun sex, casual sex, the kind of sex that didn’t have anything to do with magic, Complements, Contrasts, commitments, or complications. Just warmth, togetherness, and pleasure. I thought it was a perfect way to start the day. From the look in Zay’s eyes, he thought so too.
When we finally rolled away from each other, I stretched out on my back, arms over my head, toes pointed, and moaned. ‘‘So good.’’
Zay put his palm on my bare stomach and kissed my breast. ‘‘What are you making me for breakfast?’’
‘‘Ha-ha. Who’s the guest here? I expect coffee and homemade eggs Benedict to be waiting for me when I get out of the shower.’’
‘‘How about cold cereal?’’
‘‘Do you have milk?’’
‘‘No.’’ Zay absently ran his fingers up my stomach, then down over my hip bone. ‘‘I could see what else Nola packed.’’
I grinned. ‘‘Perfect. Now, if you’ll excuse me.’’
I rolled out of bed, away from his teasing hands. I suffered a twinge of modesty when I realized I didn’t have a robe to cover up with. No matter. It was still dark in the room, and I liked to think I had a pretty healthy body image. Just in case, I kept my shoulders back and sucked in my stomach as I headed toward the bathroom. Good body image or not, posture could do wonders for a woman’s figure.
‘‘Save me some hot water,’’ Zay called.
I crossed the hall into the bathroom. My little stroll had cooled me off and I was prickly with goose bumps. I opened the clean chrome and glass shower door, and turned the hot water on high. I opened a couple cupboards—one was apparently a medicine cabinet, as it had one bottle of aspirin and an extra bar of soap in it. Another held towels. Neatly folded. Of course.
A good, thick steam was fogging up the room, and I stepped into the shower, added a little cold water, and took my time savoring the heat.
Unfortunately, my only choice of soaps were both heavily scented with pine. Another reason why Zay always smelled like a walking forest.
Smelling like a car freshener wasn’t exactly a goal of mine, but since I didn’t have any of my own bathroom stuff, including deodorant, toothbrush, and lotion, it looked like I was going to do with or do without.
And I was so beyond the finicky-girly stage of life. I thought it might even be kind of nice to smell like him.
I washed up and thought about the meeting with Violet. The disks being stolen during a break-in and fire seemed a little hard to swallow in the light of day. More likely there was someone on the inside, maybe even someone she was trying to protect who was behind the theft.
Could it be some of the Authority that Zay had mentioned?
Secret society of magic. I couldn’t begin to count how many ways that freaked me out.
It was just as possible that Violet might be looking for some way to dodge the corporation’s claims to the disk research and development process so that she could either sell the patent or put the technology, and herself along with it, up to the highest bidder.
That kind of tech—portable magic—would go for billions. Violet could be assured whatever kind of life she most desired.
But she’d had that with my dad. Or at least she said she did. The Daniel Beckstrom I knew was not beneath marrying a woman for her mind, then dumping her as soon as he got her intellectual property signed over in his name.
Violet was a smart woman. She may have decided there were more benefits if she were the widow Beckstrom, instead of just another discarded ex-wife.
That made sense, but now that I’d met her, I had a harder time fitting her into the money-hungry, calculating, black widow category. Intelligent enough to pull off that sort of a scheme? Sure. Willing to actually kill my father? I didn’t think so.
Which left me with the break-in-and-fire story for the missing disks. And somehow Bonnie, and whoever she was working for, and Cody fit into this mess.
I dunked in the water, and rubbed at my face. I needed to find Cody. If he really was there when my father died, then he could finger the people behind it. And since I’d healed him and practically bathed in his blood, I was confident I could sniff him out of the city. Where I found Cody, I’d find Bonnie.
I finished rinsing, gargled some hot water, and rubbed my palm over my itching arm.
I turned off the shower and toweled dry. My arm felt like fire ants were swarming over it.
‘‘Damn it.’’ Scrubbing with the towel only made it itch more. Maybe it was irritated by the soap. The ribbons of color seemed brighter, and my unmarked skin was pink from the heat of the shower. Cold water? I thought about turning the shower back on, but spotted a bottle of hand lotion on the sink. I pumped lotion into my palm, sniffed it. It smelled like beeswax, and didn’t have heavy perfumes. I spread the lotion over my hand and arm and shoulder and face, careful not to use my fingernails. Much.
Nope. My arm was on fire, hot to the touch. Maybe I was having an allergic reaction to the soap. Worse, maybe I was having an allergic reaction to the magic I carried. I didn’t even know if that was possible.
Peachy.
My clothes were on Zayvion’s bedroom floor, so I wrapped the towel tightly around me, tucking the corner in at the top. The towel was short and barely covered my butt. Another joy of being a tall woman.
What I needed were my clothes and some anti-itch cream. Or Zay’s fingers.
Bingo. If he could Ground me and ease the pressure of the magic trying to push out through my pores, I might even be able to think straight. Might be able to meditate, regain my control, and figure out what was making my arm itch, itch, itch.
I strode out of the bathroom, into the living room. ‘‘Zayvion?’’
But it was not Zayvion who stood by the couch. It was a plain-looking man, an unhandsome man. Not Violet’s man, Kevin, but someone like him. A man you would never notice in a crowd, someone who calmly paused to decide exactly how he was going to kill me before he muttered a mantra and drew his palms toward each other, pulling magic up from the earth and from the building’s storage. Like most magic users, he did not draw it into his body, but worked a liquid silver glyph between his hands.
All this in less than a second.
‘‘Zay!’’ I yelled, hoping to give him time to catch the guy after I died.
I drew on the magic in me, and whispered a mantra of safety, of shielding. The first one that came to mind was a stupid little spell—one that can be used against rain when you forgot your umbrella, or sharp rocks if you were wading through a pond. It was not strong enough to ward off a magical attack.
Like wings of fire, magic spread inside me, filled me. A trailing salve of power rushed down my arm.
The man brought the tips of his fingers together, then pulled them apart, releasing the glyph.
Magic is fast. Spells cannot be tracked while they are being cast, but can be seen after the fact, like an afterimage burned in the air. I did not see the glyph that wrapped around me, but I could taste it on the roof of my mouth—thick and sharp, like a chemical burn—and I could feel it, cold as a frozen wire squeezing my throat.
I ran my hand over my neck and magic spooled from my fingertips, burning into the cold wire. I unknotted the glyph, and it broke in a shower of blue sparks.
The man pulled a gun.
A gun.
And pointed it at me.
There were spells that could be cast to cause a temporary muscle cramp, say in a gunman’s hand. There were spells that would momentarily blind a person. There were even spells that could make a person sneeze uncontrollably.
Any one of those would do me fine right now. But I couldn’t think of one of them. I couldn’t think of a single spell. It was like the world had suddenly stopped making sense, but had slowed down so much that all I could do was stand there, frozen in shock, wondering why the world had suddenly stopped making sense, and wishing I could think of some way to save my life.