Xavier laughed and pulled me out into the falling snow. “Okay, Miss All-Star, we’ll see how mean your fast ball is after we build Frosty.”
I frowned and looked around. How the hell did one even start to build a snowman? Xavier shook his head at my perplexed expression. He gathered a snowball together in his hand and then started to roll it through the snow. The more he rolled, the bigger it got, until it was huge. The base of the snowman. He packed another snowball together and handed it to me with instructions to start rolling. I scrunched up my nose and sighed. I was not getting out of this. So I started rolling and rolling and rolling.
The snowball was the size of two basketballs when I felt the first smack in the back. I whirled and took one to the face. Oh, he so did not! I dived behind the base of the snowman, but it wasn’t good enough cover, and I took several more before I was able to scoop up enough snow to pack a ball myself. I peeked and dodged another one.
“Stop!” I called. “I need a second!”
Xavier laughed and dropped the snowball he had in his hand. “I warned you…” Mine hit him square in the face. I had several more waiting and drove him into hiding behind the trash cans. “Foul ball, Rose!”
“Ha! I had my back turned when you hit me!”
For the next hour we traded snowballs and dodged around anything that could provide shelter. Xavier had me at a disadvantage as I wasn’t used to the cold, but I didn’t care. He was right and it was fun.
I heard the sound of the wind whistling as his next ball came at me. I was getting tired of being hit, though. Do not mess with a witch in tune with all the Elements. I called Air to me, and the snowball stopped in mid-air. I stood up and embraced Air. I could feel the rush of wind as it blew around me, felt it in my bones, and sighed in sheer pleasure.
“Unfair advantage,” Xavier called, backing up. “Damn, you’re beautiful with your hair flying in all directions.”
“Flattery will get you nowhere.” Snowballs by the dozens rose up out of the ground and lined up like good little soldiers. Xavier’s eyes widened, and I shouted, “Fire!”
Xavier blurred, and I blinked, seeing something shoot up in the air as my snowballs landed harmlessly against the trees on the edge of the property. I looked up and gaped. Xavier stood about thirty feet up in the air, humongous black leathery wings shooting out of his back. He laughed at my expression. Then bombarded me with snowballs. I barely had time to throw up a shield, before he’d dived and grabbed more snow.
“Flying is a foul,” I shouted as he flew over me, testing my shield with snowballs.
“Calling up the Elements is a foul!” he shouted back, the laugh in his voice evident.
I dropped my shields and used Air to target him with more snowballs. He dodged and dived down, catching me around the waist before I could throw the shield back up. I screeched like a girl when we flew up several hundred feet. I wrapped myself around him and hid my face in his neck, terrified. Flying without an airplane wrapped around me was another thing so not on my bucket list.
Xavier laughed, and sound vibrated through me. “I’m not going to let you fall, Rose.”
“I don’t want to be up this high!” I whisper-screamed.
“Shh,” he soothed. “Trust me. Just look. It’s beautiful.”
I peeked up and looked over his shoulder and gasped. The sun was starting to set over the lake, and the snow glinted in muted colors of pink and orange. It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. I’d seen some gorgeous sunsets in California, but they had nothing on this myriad of colors glinting off the snow.
Xavier pulled me closer, and I found myself snuggling into him. He made some kind of purring or humming noise, and I looked up at him, startled. “What’s that noise you make? I’ve heard you do it before.”
“It just means I’m content, happy.”
“I’m terrified,” I told him, holding on as tight as I could.
“Don’t be afraid, sweetheart,” he told me, his black eyes swirling with emotion. “I’m the one person who’ll never let you fall.”
“What if you’re what I’m afraid of?” I asked. “What if not letting me fall means killing me?”
He sighed and buried his face into my hair. His wings beat at the air around us, cocooning me in heat. “It won’t come to that. I believe in you.”
“But what if it does?”
“Then I’ll be glad I won’t be alive another minute without you.” His voice held sorrow and pain, but I could hear the sincerity in it. “You mean more to me than you can ever realize, Rose.”
Yeah, I could realize. That was the problem. Witches aren’t like normal humans. We feel things more deeply, are more in tune with nature. I understood what I was feeling, what he was feeling. I just didn’t want to admit it. I needed to process this, to think and analyze.
“Don’t analyze it, Rose,” Xavier said. “If you overthink this, you’ll twist yourself up like you always do. For once, just go with it.”
“Can you read my mind?” I asked, startled that he knew what I was thinking.
He chuckled. “It would be so much easier if I could, but no, Rose, I can’t read your mind. Your emotions, yes, but not your thoughts.”
“I’m just…I’m confused. I didn’t want any of this. I came here to make them all pay, and then you go and dump all this stuff on me, and I want to help you, I do, but Jenny…”
“Shh, Rose. You don’t need to make any decisions right now. Will you promise me one thing?”
“What?” I asked cautiously.
“Will you at least think about everything I told you today?”
“I can do that.”
“That’s all I’m asking.” His soft expression turned wicked. “Ready for some fun?”
My eyes widened, and I didn’t even have time to take a breath to scream before we were soaring across the mountaintops. I held on for dear life and closed my eyes, praying to anyone who could hear me to keep me from falling. Xavier laughed, the sound echoing around me. I must have been praying out loud. “It’s not funny!” I shouted.
His arms turned me around and held me in a strong grip. “Open your eyes, Rose. Feel the wind as it rushes you. It’s amazing.”
“No! I’m chicken!”
That earned a full body laugh. “Just look, Rose, before the sun completely sets.”
I cracked open an eye and then another. It took me a second for my eyes to adjust, but when I was able to fully look out over the landscape, I sighed in sheer joy. I only ever got this feeling when the Elements surrounded me, but this was as close to pure bliss as a person could come. It looked like a winter wonderland sparkling like diamonds in the dying rays of the sunlight. It truly was beautiful.
“See?” Xavier whispered against my ear. “Aren’t you glad you opened your eyes?”
I nodded. “It’s…I have no words, Xavier. This is…”
“I know,” he said. “Just relax and enjoy the ride, Rose. You’re safe with me.”
And I was. Xavier made me feel safer than anyone else, so I did what he asked. I relaxed and enjoyed the ride. I could worry about everything else later.
Chapter Seventeen
~ Jenny ~
January 24, 2013
Sebastian and I have been going out for a couple weeks and I don’t think his friends like me very much. I’m not the kind of girl he usually dates. I’m not supermodel gorgeous, but not I’m not ugly either. Their attitude pisses me off, but I try not to say anything or make a fuss about it. They’re his friends, have been his friends since before kindergarten. They look down on me though, and they stare at me with this disdain in their eyes. No one’s ever looked at me like that.
Mandy’s the worst. When Sebastian first introduced me to everyone, she flat out told him I wasn’t good enough for him with me standing right there! He kind of laughed it off, which upset me, but later he told me that she has issues with new people. Some kind of phobia he said and to not take it personally. How can you not take that personally? She looked at me like I was less than dirt. I mean, sure, my dad doesn’t make millions every year like hers does, but he makes decent money. I have everything that I need and I may not have diamonds coming out of every orifice of my body, but I’m just as good as she is!
It really bothered me that Sebastian didn’t defend me to his friends, that he laughed it off. I mean, I don’t want to cause trouble between them, but I’m his girlfriend. He’s supposed to take up for me, to tell them to stop acting like idiots and leave me alone. That’s what boyfriends do, but he didn’t. I’m not even sure he understands why I was so upset. He even got hateful with me when I tried to explain it to him and stormed off. He’s known them longer than me, but at the same time, I’M HIS GIRLFRIEND!
Then I feel really bad because Sebastian is so good to me. He’s sweet and kind and tells me how happy he is every day. I overlook a lot of his mood swings because of this. I mean, he can be hateful sometimes, especially when I get a little clingy. He doesn’t like that. He prefers a girlfriend who’s independent and doesn’t rely on him so much. We do spend a lot of time together, and he’s awesome usually, but sometimes, he can snap at me for no reason. I think I’ve shed more tears the last two weeks than I have in four years. I don’t like that. It shouldn’t be like this, but everyone tells me how lucky I am to have The Sebastian Caine as my boyfriend. And I feel like that most of the time.
I don’t know. Maybe I’m just being stupid. I want to talk to Mel, but I’m afraid she’ll tell me I am being stupid and to dump his ass. The fact that I’ve thought about that makes me wonder if maybe I should. I feel so confused. He makes me feel confused. One second he’s loveable and looks at me like I’m the only important thing in his universe, and in the next breath, he can tell me how stupid I’m acting or to stop being worthless and just do as I’m told.
Should I break up with him? I don’t know. It’s the softer side of him that makes me hesitate. It’s that side of him that I’m falling hard for. Maybe I’ll just give it a little time and see. Yeah, I’ll just wait for a little while and see if it gets better. He is Sebastian Caine and he’s normally really sweet to me. I can give him and us more time.
Chapter Eighteen
~ Feelings ~
It was full on dark by the time we reached the cabin, and I felt frozen solid. The sheer joy of the flight could almost make me forget everything Xavier had dumped on me earlier, but it did weigh heavily on my mind. How was I supposed to react? To deal with it all? My mind felt numb from the sheer daunting size of the responsibility he’d lain at my feet.
Xavier hustled me over to sit in front of the fire and threw a blanket around me before working to get the fire blazing again. He kept giving me furtive glances. The Fates only knew what kind of expression I wore. Xavier made us both hot chocolate before settling beside me. I sipped mine and stared into the flames, lost in thought.
Not only did I have to deal with the whole save the world thing – Wonder Woman, I was not – I also had to deal with Xavier himself. I understood what I was feeling, even if I shied away from admitting it. Just the thought of condemning his soul made me ache now that I’d accepted my feelings. Could I do that to him? Was my revenge more important than anything else? Earlier today I would have said yes, but right now? I wasn’t so sure, and it was tearing me apart.
“I know it’s a lot take in, Rose,” Xavier said. “Don’t try to make any decisions tonight. Just think it through. You’ll come to the right decision. I have faith in you.”
I sure was glad one of us had faith, because I didn’t. The need to make them pay for what they did to Jenny burned hot inside my soul. I wanted them to suffer, to hurt, to feel the pain my sister had felt in the weeks leading up to her death. If that made me a black witch, so be it. Those who deserved it would pay for her death, and even if I couldn’t kill them, they
would
suffer.
“What if I don’t kill them?” I asked, staring into the flames. “What if I just make them…hurt?”
Xavier sighed. “You and I both know magic is all about intent. If you perform magic with the intent to harm, then it becomes dark magic. It’s the same thing they did to your sister.”
Dammit.
My head hurt.
Xavier took the cup out of my hand and set it down in front of the fireplace, before taking both my hands in his. “It’s okay to feel the way you do, Melinda Rose. I’d be more afraid if you didn’t feel like this, but you know deep down, this is wrong. Your father raised you right, and when the time comes, you won’t go through with it.”
He sounded so sure. Why couldn’t I be that sure of myself?
“My Rose, you always overthink things,” he said and shook his head.
“I’m not your Rose,” I said, trying to pull my hands from his. I still hadn’t recovered from his earlier reaction to our kiss. He made me feel things no one else ever had, ever would, but he’d responded badly.
Instead of letting me go, he pulled on my hands, and I tumbled forward into him. “Not so fast, Rose. We still have things to talk about.”
“We do?” I asked, my voice a little more breathless than I liked. My eyes focused on his lips. Why did he have to have such gorgeous, well sculpted lips? They were made for kissing.
“Umm-hmm,” he whispered, “I need to apologize.”
“For what?” I looked up, surprised. His black eyes burned with an intense desire that made me try to scoot back, but he held tight, one hand wrapping around me so I couldn’t wiggle free.