“I like my brain nice and dirty, thank you.” She bit into her Cobb salad. It tasted particularly good, considering. She hadn’t realized how hungry her flip-flopping stomach was until it started growling on the bus out of The Land.
Aiden laughed. “As you should.” He took another bite of his sandwich, watching her closely as he chewed.
This hotel smelled different from the hotel at The Land. No waffles and booze. More like beer and booze. Branson had a lot of alcohol in it. She took another sip of her soda before scrunching up her nose.
Branson had weird-tasting water, too.
“How old are you?” she asked. He looked slightly older than her seventeen years, but with Fates and Shifters, she knew you couldn’t go on looks alone. He could be five hundred years old for all she knew.
Aiden set down his sandwich. “My license says I turned eighteen three months ago.”
“Oh, oh, no way. How old are you really?” She wiggled her fork at his nose.
“Let’s just say when I was born, a beautiful woman such as you would have been long married and on her third child.” He rolled his eyes. “Total bullshit now and total bullshit then, as well. But Fates don’t have a lot of say about who we end up with.”
She pointed her fork at his nose again. “Aren’t you supposed to be part of a triad? Brothers and sisters or something?”
“Sometimes triads aren’t related. We were brought together to make babies.” This time, the eye roll was accompanied by the saddest frown she’d ever seen on a guy.
So his Fate Cupid abilities didn’t extend to himself, though she picked up a strong sense of family. And maybe that not being in a strong relationship hurt as much as using his seer.
“Do you have kids?” Was this cute guy a daddy? What was it about her and attracting daddy types?
“No.” He frowned again. “They have kids. They got married. I’m the third wheel.”
Did he get kicked out of his triad? “That’s terrible.” No sex for Aiden. “Is that why you’re alone?”
He nodded and stuffed the last of his sandwich into his mouth.
“I’m alone because a douchebag named Kobayashi chased my mom and me out of Perth. He found us about a month ago. He let it slip that someone at The Land might be my father and I didn’t have any place else to go.” She pushed lettuce leaves and carrot shavings around her plate, no longer hungry.
“I wish I could help more. But…” He frowned again.
Daisy sat back. She wasn’t sure, at this point, that he could help anyway. “How did you break your seer? Did you fall off a horse or something?”
Aiden laughed. “A very powerful Fate decided he didn’t like me. I made… friends with his daughter.” He shrugged and tried to look nonchalant, but it didn’t work. “So he tore a hole into the weave of my seer.”
Aiden tapped his temple again. “It’s hard to explain.”
“Tore you open?” What the hell could Fates do to each other?
“If you’re inexperienced and don’t know how to fight it, it’s possible.” Aiden closed his eyes and sat back. “Right now, when I use my seer beyond a very limited range—the world and people right around me—I get flashes of one very specific future. It’s nasty.”
No wonder he didn’t use his seer.
Daisy reached for his hand again. “Oh my God. A healer can stop it?”
Aiden propped his chin on his other hand and looked out at the rest of the still-damp restaurant. “Maybe. I don’t know. I thought it might be worth a try.”
If only she knew where the doctor was. He’d probably be able to help. But she vowed she’d not think or talk of him, so she kicked that thought away. She shouldn’t have thought it, anyway. But the lack-of-adrenaline fog loosened her control.
There had to be other healers.
Like her. But she wouldn’t know for sure until her mom activated her. “My mom’s an enthraller. Well, an animal enthraller. I’ve been told I’m probably a bloodhound enthraller, but there’s a chance I’ll be a healer, too. Most Shifters carry two abilities. Do you think I’ll be a healer?” She’d rather be a healer than an enthraller.
Aiden pulled his hand away and wiped his fingers on his napkin. His face hardened and he blinked. “It’s likely. But I don’t know.”
“Don’t look if it hurts.” They didn’t know where her mom was, anyway.
Aiden set his napkin next to his plate. “You’d heal me? We just met. As far as you know, I might be some asshole Fate looking to play you. Because there are terrible Fates out there, Daisy. Like the guy who hurt me.” He tapped his temple again.
“Oh, I know.” Daisy wiped her finger and set her napkin next to her plate. “I met a pair.”
Aiden’s eyes widened. “Who?”
“Two blonde women. A past- and a present-seer. Nasty psycho bitches looking for something my mom stole.”
Aiden’s mouth opened and closed. “You got away?”
Daisy nodded. “Dawn saved me.” Not quite the truth but close enough to pay the bills.
“That’s one good dog.” Aiden nodded once. “I think we need to get her back for you.”
“How? Neither of us should return to The Land.” Not without some sort of training. Or backup.
“We find your mom. We get you activated. And we walk into The Land of Milk and Honey as equals to the people who just drove us out by threatening to force themselves on our minds.” Aiden tapped the booth’s table. “I don’t like scurrying off like a rat. Too many of my kind—and too many Shifters—are rats.”
“You’re not a rat.” The man sitting across from her was the nicest guy she’d ever met. Daisy picked up her breadstick for one last bite.
And, she thought, proof that her Social Studies teacher was right: People are more than the groups they belong to.
Aiden smiled, but he still looked sad. “Thank you. You ain’t too bad for a hot Shifter chick.” He winked and fiddled with the bill sitting between them on the table. “Listen, I’m going to need a good night’s sleep if I’m going to try to look for your mom tomorrow. And a lot of ibuprofen.”
The breadstick waited an inch from her open mouth. He thought she was hot?
Daisy’s entire body felt as if he’d attached faery threads to every one of her cells and was now, slowly and with great precision, braiding together the cord he needed to draw her over the table and onto his lap.
And he’d said his compliment in the offhand the way guys let words fall out of their mouths when they don’t realize what they’re saying.
“I don’t want your head exploding from using your seer.” Daisy bit into the bread to force her mouth shut.
Aiden tapped the money with his finger as if counting, then dropped a couple of large bills onto the table. Big bills adding up to way more than their meal and a fifteen percent tip.
“I need to prep,” he said. “I’ll do what I can. We might get a lead. We might not. But trying is the least I can do for you.”
He slid out of the booth and jammed his hands into his pocket as he stood, waiting.
Daisy slid out as well, and stood across from him, her hands in her own pockets. “How long do you think it will take?”
Aiden stepped closer. “As long as it needs to take.” He tipped his head the way he had when they met. “You’re wondering why I’m doing this. Why I’m helping.”
Why he wanted to help was only one of the questions floating around inside her head. She also wanted to know why his hands felt so good when he held hers. Why they felt so warm, strong, and real.
“There’s a war going on. One that’s been raging between my people and yours for as long as there’s been mine and yours.” Aiden wove his fingers into hers and tugged her toward the restaurant’s exit. “It probably didn’t seem stupid to the people who started the war, but it’s stupid now. And I don’t see any reason for it to continue.”
When they rounded the corner into the front lobby, some random guy leaned against the check-in desk and flailed his
arms at the clerk. The girl kept her calm but even from ten feet away, Daisy smelled the anger and the frustration, so when she checked in, she tried to act as nice as possible. Aiden waited a couple feet back, picking at the seam on the back of one of the lobby’s bright red chairs.
After she finished, he tugged her toward the stairwell. They walked up hand-in-hand, taking the stairs together, and at the same time. As equals. At her door, he let go long enough for her to insert her key and the lock to click over to green.
“Do you want to come in?” She shouldn’t ask him into her room. Not so quickly after they met, but she really didn’t want the evening to end. Or to be alone. It had already become this blur of Aiden smiling and holding her hand.
Her tummy hurt still and she’d had Dawn to cuddle with every night since she lost her mom and now she had no one.
Until tomorrow. When Aiden used his seer.
Aiden grinned and scratched at the back of his gray knit cap. “Good night, Daisy.”
She turned away, her hand on the handle to her dark, damp hotel room. The place she’d run to when the storm hit in so many ways.
“Daisy.” Aiden curled his arm around her waist. He didn’t move her toward him; he moved his body to her, stepping to the side and into her space. The fingers of his other hand danced across her cheek and into her hair and he pressed his strong, lean body flush against her front. Aiden kissed her deeply, his lips pressing into hers, his tongue touching gently and only for a moment.
He tasted faintly like his roast beef sandwich, but also like she’d imagined he would—savory just before salty. Wonderful and intense.
He backed away too fast. Left her too soon and she couldn’t stop the sigh.
Aiden moved closer very much like he wanted to kiss her again. Like he wanted to wrap his arms around her waist again. But he stopped.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. He pointed over his shoulder. “I’ll see you in the morning. I’ll call your room before I come down.”
Aiden walked backward, still watching her, toward the stairwell. When he bumped into the door, she laughed. He smiled too, and pulled the handle.
Daisy watched him go, her tummy warping and pulling, and walked into her dark hotel room alone.
Chapter Nine
Aiden held out a bottle of water the moment Daisy opened her room’s door. “Thirsty?”
Daisy took the bottle and stepped to the side. The gray hat had been replaced by a naked black baseball cap today, one with no markings or even obvious stitching. The gray hoodie remained, but the t-shirt underneath was a forgettable blue tone. She watched his ass as he sauntered in, mostly because she couldn’t help herself.
Aiden dropped onto the edge of her room’s flat, square bed and took a sip from his own bottle. “Still tastes like Missouri swamp water.” He held it out to toast with her.
Together, they downed a good chug. He was right—it did still taste like swamp water.
“Maybe we should buy a national brand.” The label looked local.
He tightened the cap onto his bottle and set it on the floor. “We’ll go to the store later. Hopefully, they’ll have some. With the storm and all.”
Aiden leaned back on the edge of Daisy’s bed, his legs stretched out and his arms holding up his body. He formed a nice, long, masculine line from today’s black cap to the tip of his black boots.
He watched her for a moment before reaching for her hand. “Hey, beautiful.” The black hat made his gray eyes all but glow. “Sometimes the ibuprofen doesn’t settle well and seeing your face helps.” He picked up his bottle and took a sip.
He did look pale. “You okay?” She dropped next to him on the bed and scooted close enough their thighs touched.
Electricity not all that different from the ionized storm air last night danced through the denim of her jeans and to her skin. Not touching him took considerable effort, as did not leaning against his shoulder or stroking his arm.
One of her few clear memories from last night was the feel of his skin against hers, his hand around hers, his fingers stroking the back of her hand. The feel of his lips against her mouth. He was mesmerizing.
She hadn’t lived a sheltered existence in high school. She dated. But none of those boys made her body tingle the way the man on her bed did. Aiden watched her. Truly, deeply watched her move. He listened when she talked. And he was willing to take on what she suspected would be a lot of pain to help her.
He curled his free arm around her waist and pulled her closer. Her body responded on its own, conforming to his, and the next thing she knew she was cuddled against his chest, her head against his neck and her hand on his opposite shoulder.
He sipped from his bottle again. “My life is, for the most part, a flat thing,” he whispered into her hair. “I float along on the pain seeing but unable to offer help. Real help. It’s as if all the colors and patterns of my world want to lie down and stop caring. It makes me want to sleep.” A kiss touched her scalp, his lips lingering. “Meeting you brought me back to life.”
Daisy sat up. He leaned into her carefully, his arms tight around her but not too tight. The kiss first touched her cheek. He pulled back enough to search her eyes, as if making sure she wanted to be kissed.
Every muscle, every fiber of her body wanted to be closer to him. To fold into his arms and to tangle with his legs. His touch calmed her fears and took away the nagging thoughts pinching her brain.
The anger at her mom. The loneliness since leaving San Diego. The worry because, by default, she’d just dropped out of school. She had no job, no skills, and only a little money left. Her anxiety and her fear made the last two days a blur. She had the strength to go it alone—she knew she had the strength to do it—but she didn’t have to anymore. She had help.
And her help was an amazing kisser.
Aiden’s lips glided over hers, searching, touching, learning. When she sat back, his eyes twinkled. “Thank you,” he whispered, his fingers gliding over her cheek.
She should be thanking him. Where would she be without his help? Alone out in the woods somewhere? Stealing a new car? She didn’t even know how to steal a car. She’d seen people in movies hotwire vehicles by yanking out wires but did that even work on new cars?
She would have been totally lost.
Aiden leaned his forehead against her temple, his mouth against her skin. He didn’t speak. Not really. But she felt his words: Whatever you need, I will get for you. Always.
Surprise locked her body into a rigid pole. He sounded as if he wanted to be with her.
Aiden blinked and for a single split second, a micro expression of shock and his own fear flashed across his face, like he’d just realized what he’d said. Like he’d let it slip even though he knew he shouldn’t say such words to someone he’d just met. Like he meant it but was now absolutely terrified that he’d come on too strong.
Like she might kick him out and he knew even without his future-seer that he’d just lost the most precious opportunity of his entire life because he opened his mouth too soon.
His mouth opened and closed. When he spoke, his words came out so fast she barely caught them all. “For Fates like me the present and the future blend and sometimes we… skip steps. I’m sorry, beautiful.”
He pulled his gold chain from around his neck. It wisped against the collar of his t-shirt when he placed the ring on her palm. “It colors what I see.”
Aiden was seeing them together? In the future? “But Aiden, we just met.”
The fear she’d seen earlier flashed across his face again. “It’s not set. Nothing’s set unless you want it set, Daisy. I swear.” He scooted away on the bed and held up his hands. “Maybe what I’m seeing isn’t now. Maybe it’s years in the future. I’ll go back to my room and not bother you. Hell, I’ll go three time zones over, if that’s what you want. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable. I won’t.”
He was trying to look all stoic and bad boy and nonchalant about it but he wasn’t doing
a good job. His posture, though erect, looked pained. His face tightened and twitched, and his pupils dilated.
His scent didn’t change, though. He still smelled the same almost-salty, almost-savory, breathe-deep scent of man she’d picked up earlier. That same I want to rub my face on your chest scent that to her nostrils said nothing other than male.
And in particular, male who wants me.
He wasn’t lying. At least not in a way she could tell. The whole situation had her mind reeling. Sorting the moment seemed more difficult than it should. “But you can’t see.” Some stuff didn’t make sense. Or she wasn’t making sense of it. It all seemed foggy.
Aiden pulled her tight to his body and pressed his face into her neck. “I can when it’s me.” A kiss landed on her neck. “When it’s you, beautiful.”
Her entire body melted against his. His next kiss landed on her cheek, the next on her bottom lip. “I swear to you,” he whispered. The next kiss took her top lip. “I swear.”
“Aiden,” she breathed. She saw only the openness he showed in his eyes and face, felt only the skin of his hands as they glided over hers. Knew only his fingers weaving through hers.
But he didn’t kiss her again. He pulled back like he wanted to say something important. His face serious, he handed over her water bottle before picking up his own. Together, they took two large sips, both steeling themselves for what Daisy suspected would be a difficult moment ahead.
Aiden clamped his mouth shut and looked up at the ceiling.
“What?” Daisy bounced a little on the bed. She knew. He was going to say it. Their present together was now, a moment—a day—but their future must reach on forever.
He looked like he was about to burst. “I’ll speak when the present is correct.” The kiss that followed almost blanked her mind.
She hadn’t worked her hand under his t-shirt and across his abs yet. Hadn’t moaned or pulled him on top of her because, like him, she was trying to be “correct” in the present.
But it was getting harder and harder not to just be a quivering, squirming sex fiend.
“We have plenty of time for that.” Aiden danced his exquisite lips over the ticklish skin under her earlobe. “Time for it again and again and again.”
Bonds Broken & Silent (Fate Fire Shifter Dragon Book 4) Page 16