As we piled into the hallway, we closed the door behind us to preserve our bungalow’s warmth. Removing our boots, we slipped off our jackets and ski overalls and hung them over a radiator to dry.
This was our first day in the ski resort and I was already feeling like we couldn’t have chosen a better spot for our honeymoon. Moving into our living room, we stood together near the heater by the window, letting its warmth soothe our stretched muscles. Lawrence slipped an arm around my waist as we gazed out at the breathtaking view. We were perched fairly high up in the foothills, which afforded us enjoyment of the majestic peaks, as well as the rolling slopes of snowy white beneath us. This place held the magic of a winter wonderland even in the summer.
Darkness was falling upon the enchanting landscape and it had started to snow. Snowfall seemed like the perfect way to begin our night.
Lawrence leaned down to kiss my cheek. “Want something warm to drink?”
“Mmm,” I murmured, closing my eyes and smiling against his kiss.
I followed him into the kitchen, where he fixed us some creamy hot chocolate. Then we returned to the living room where I knelt on the thick rug in front of the fireplace. I struck a match and used my fae powers to ignite the hearth until it crackled and emitted a divine halo of warmth. Then I resumed my seat on the cozy couch next to Lawrence and, after taking two sips from my hot chocolate, nestled against him. He gently ran a hand down my shoulder and along my right arm, leaving behind a trail of goosebumps.
Our cabin had a TV that could stream on-demand movies, but neither of us reached for the remote. The fire dancing in front of us and just being in each other’s presence were all that we needed.
We had stopped for a meal in a cafeteria on the way back to our cabin from the slopes, so after finishing my mug of hot chocolate, I felt perfectly content.
I stretched out over Lawrence, resting my head against his knees. He glanced down at me with a warm smile.
“Ready to sleep?” he asked, a twinkle of mischief in his eyes.
“Um…” I caught a strand of his hair and twirled it round one finger. “Not quite yet.”
After he’d swallowed the last of his hot chocolate, I draped one arm over his neck and eased him down so that I could taste his lips, still moist and sweet from his drink.
Then I rolled myself off of him and onto the chunky rug in front of the hearth, while catching his hand and pulling him down with me. As he crawled over me I felt the muscles beneath his shirt tensing. He engulfed my mouth before his lips spread their tender caress to the rest of my face, my nose, forehead, cheeks and then down the arch of my neck to the base of my throat.
My heartbeat quickening for him, I fumbled for his shirt buttons and undid them one at a time. Once I’d bared his torso, I gazed up at him, admiring the man I was now privileged to call my husband. Lawrence Conway, my hero and best friend.
I sat up, feeling the urge to take the lead in showering affection. We knelt on the rug while I landed kisses across his broad shoulders and collarbone. Then, leveling with his face, I let him wrap his arms around my waist, pull me closer and claim my lips.
With each stroke of his palms roaming my back beneath my shirt, and with each knead of his lips against mine, my heart felt warmer and warmer, fuller and fuller. It felt like it was ballooning within my chest, and there was no way I could adequately show how much love I felt for this man.
“I wish I could show you what I’m feeling,” I whispered into his ear while his hands began to ease off my shirt.
“Show me, Grace,” he breathed back, pulling my shirt off and discarding it on the floor by his own. He kissed me again intensely before raising his head. His tawny brown eyes were burning with desire as they roamed my face.
“It’s impossible,” I said, while arching my back to make room for his hands sliding beneath me and unclasping my bra. Then we removed each other’s lower garments and stood together in the center of the rug, the fire glowing at our feet.
His hands cupped my cheeks and lifted my face so I could gaze into eyes. “Then let me try, Mrs. Conway,” he whispered.
It felt like I was melting into his touch as we sank to our knees on the rug, and he laid me on my back. Running his hands down the back of my thighs and stopping beneath my knees, he parted my legs. Heat surged through me as he began to lower himself—gently and slowly at first—but his intense, glazed eyes locking with mine betrayed his passion. I caught his hands, twining my fingers through his, until he had descended near enough for me to reach his face. His body closing down on me—enveloping and folding me—I managed to breathe out his name before his lips captured mine.
Lawrence showed me his love deep into the night, while the snow outside fell thick and steady, and the hearth crackled with contentment. He showed me his love until I felt too full, too complete, to keep taking it from him, and I needed to take control so I could attempt to show him mine back.
As we woke the next morning on the ruffled rug, the embers beside us faded, our limbs coiled and entwined, it felt like last night had been our first time all over again. I supposed we had made a good start to showing what I believed could never truly be shown. But there was no rush. Lawrence and I still had the rest of our honeymoon to explore and discover… and then the rest of our lives.
Hazel
“Murkbeech,” I said through a mouthful of cereal. “The name hardly inspires.”
I was paging through the brochure of the little Scottish island that my brother, Ruby, Julian, and I were supposed to be spending the next two weeks of our summer vacation on.
“It’ll be much better than it sounds,” my mother said from across the table as she topped up my glass of orange juice.
“Really?” my brother Benedict asked, his thick, overgrown eyebrows rising. He sat to my left at the table, peering over my shoulder at the adventure island’s promotional material. “Then how come you and Uncle Ben never wanted to go there? You preferred to escape to Hawaii.”
My mother smirked as she rolled her eyes. “Your uncle Ben and I had already been to that island several years in a row. The first time we went, we enjoyed it. Just like you will. You’ll make new friends. Go canoeing. Rock climbing. Learn how to survive in the wilderness. Plus, the center has been closed since last Christmas for renovation. They’ve upgraded the residences and introduced a whole bunch of new, exciting activities that weren’t available when we attended the camp. You guys will be among the first group of teens to arrive on the island since they re-opened, so all the facilities will be squeaky clean and new.”
“You should be their brand ambassador,” Benedict muttered, biting into his toast.
Tired of my brother’s dragon breath so close to me—he had an annoying habit of waiting until after breakfast to brush his teeth—I pushed the brochure in front of him so that he no longer had to loom over me to see it.
“Do you know what time we’re leaving?” I asked my mom.
She called over her shoulder, “Caleb, have you got news about the time yet?”
“Eight-fifteen,” my dad called back from his and Mom’s bedroom.
My mother glanced at the clock before her gaze returned to us. “That means you guys need to hurry up.”
My mom was already dressed and ready. Her brown hair was tied back in a tight ponytail, and she wore her navy-blue GASP uniform. She looked kick-ass.
She and the rest of the members of GASP were heading off to Crete to solve a mystery, while my brother, Julian, Ruby and I—all humans—would be dropped off at Murkbeech Island along the way. If any of us were vampires already we would probably have been allowed to accompany them, except for Benedict, who was too young at fourteen, and Julian, who was fifteen. I was seventeen while Ruby was twenty. But as things stood, we were useless to GASP and would only pose a risk to their operations. We were expected to have a normal summer, just like any other human teenager.
I’d checked the weather in Scotland on the internet yesterday. It seemed pretty bad—c
loudy and chilly and… murky. But apparently weather on that side of the world was never great, even in the summer. It was supposed to get a bit sunnier, though, over the next week.
Whatever the case, I preferred this kind of vacation to one lounging around on a beach in Hawaii. We already had a beach in The Shade, which I rarely frequented. Sun Beach had been more fun when I was a kid. These days, unless I was building an epic sandcastle with my friends or burying my brother in a sand grave, I found the beach boring. Yes, swimming was fun—to an extent. But it wasn’t something I could do for hours, let alone days. And I wasn’t a fan of sunbathing—neither was my skin. It was sensitive and broke out in a heat rash if I got too much sun. A vampire in the making, as my mother said.
Benedict and I quickly finished the last of our breakfast before we washed up and headed to our respective bedrooms. I had already packed my stuff the night before—well, at least most of it. And I had laid my clothes out on my bed: a pair of jeans, a comfy t-shirt and a baggy hoodie. I hurried to the bathroom and took a shower before returning to my room and getting dressed. I fixed up my hair in a messy bun, applied some lip balm, and then went about finalizing my luggage.
I rummaged through my bag—a tall, heavy-duty hiking backpack—checking that I hadn’t forgotten anything. It contained primarily clothes, and wasn’t completely full. We were supposed to travel with minimal stuff, because we would be given a bunch of survival gear when we arrived on the island that we’d need to carry around with us. Apparently we would be hiking all over the island, learning how to live in caves, find water, etc. And then toward the end we would be given a test to see if we could survive on our own for three days in a row, with no trainer or instructor present. We would be sorted into groups; I guessed that they would keep friends together, so Julian, Ruby, my brother and I would be together. But that was a call that the trainers would make, based on our various strengths and aptitudes for survival we showed throughout the course.
Once I had finished my final packing—including a few spare sets of socks, underwear, and an extra hoodie—I hurried to the music room and grabbed my flute from one of the shelves. I figured some music would be fun around the campfire.
Then came a knock at my door.
“Yeah?” I called.
My brother stepped inside, carrying his backpack. “Mom and Dad are waiting by the door. You ready?”
I zipped up my backpack and pulled it onto my back before giving him a firm nod. “Let’s do this.”
Hazel
As we approached the clearing outside the Black Heights where GASP’s giant helicopter was waiting, the first person I laid eyes on was Julian. He was standing next to his mother Ashley and father Landis, and was dressed in casual, comfy clothes, like Benedict and me. He looked sleepy—his brown eyes hazy behind his spectacles—and his tall, slim physique was hunched as he held his backpack.
“Hey, Jules!” Benedict called to him, as he and I approached with my parents.
“Hey,” Julian croaked.
My parents greeted his parents—who were also dressed in GASP uniforms—while Benedict and I stood with Julian.
“Did you bring Hell Raker IV?” my brother asked, his eyes positively bulging with enthusiasm.
I grimaced. Hell Raker IV was a video game. Julian owned a portable video game console, which Benedict was obsessed with. Our parents had actually bought one for Benedict for his thirteenth birthday, but because of his inability to pry himself away from the device, they’d confiscated it less than two weeks later on the grounds that it was interfering with his school work.
Benedict’s alternative was to leech off of Julian whenever he saw him.
“Yeah!” Julian responded. With only one year between them, they shared the same kiddish excitement whenever the subject of video games was broached.
Rolling my eyes, I returned my focus to the clearing, where dozens of GASP members were already climbing into the helicopter.
Then I spotted Ruby. Her blonde hair trailing down one shoulder in a braid, she was striding toward us with a smile on her face, her parents Claudia and Yuri by her side.
I strolled over to meet her.
“How’re you doing?” I asked, grinning back at her.
“Excited,” she said breathlessly. “Aren’t you?”
“Yeah, I am.” I glanced back over my shoulder at Julian and Benedict, who were now stooped over the console. “I’m sure glad you decided to come, though,” I told her, “or I would’ve been stuck on the island with those two.”
Ruby chuckled, shifting her backpack on her shoulders.
“Are you sure that’s not too heavy for you?” Claudia asked, gazing up at her daughter in concern.
The height difference between Claudia and Ruby was quite comical. Ruby definitely took after her father in the height department.
“Yeah,” Ruby said, sighing, “It’s fine.”
“She’s a strong wee lass,” Yuri said in a high, Scottish accent.
I snickered, as Claudia and Ruby rolled their eyes.
“My dad turned into a Scotsman the day he found out about our trip,” Ruby muttered.
As we approached Julian’s and my family, I couldn’t help but notice Julian looking up from the game. His eyes passed over Ruby before he averted them. It seemed that girls were the one thing that could distract boys from video games, and Ruby was a girl Julian had obviously had a crush on for a while.
“All right, Julian?” Ruby asked with a friendly smile.
Julian nodded, coughing his throat clear. “Yeah.”
Ruby didn’t bother talking to my brother. He was lost in the world of Hell Raker. Whatever the heck that even was.
We headed together to the chopper and boarded it. Julian, Benedict, Ruby and I took seats near the back of the aircraft, opposite each other (myself next to Ruby, Benedict next to Julian) while the adults moved toward the front.
Once they were strapped in, the boys continued to busy themselves with the video game. I looked past Ruby—who was closest to the window—and gazed outside.
Folks were piling in quickly. I guessed we would be taking off in about ten minutes.
More often than not, when we needed to travel somewhere from The Shade, we went by the witches’ magic. But I enjoyed traveling by aircraft. It was a nice change, and felt like more of an adventure. GASP usually took the chopper when they thought they might have to stay on-site for several days without returning to The Shade. The interior of the helicopter was designed to be converted into a sleeping area, and came with a fully stocked kitchen.
Ruby and I chatted until—fifteen minutes later—we took off. She went quiet after that. She suffered from airsickness, so she kept her eyes fixed firmly outside the window. We chatted for a bit once the aircraft had steadied, and then she decided to take a nap. She curled up beneath a blanket and fell into a light slumber, leaving me to either stare out of the window, watch the boggle-eyed boys in front of me, or… go on an adventure with my e-reader.
I stood up and opened the overhead compartment where we’d stuffed our bags. I slipped out the device I’d placed in one of the mesh side pockets for easy access. Resuming my seat, I switched it on and began scrolling through my library. I had a bunch of books I’d downloaded in anticipation for the trip… all of them romance novels. That was the good thing about e-readers—nobody knew what you were reading. Romance stories were my guilty pleasure. I’d always loved to read, but I had gotten hooked on romance in particular when my parents had gifted me an e-reader for my sixteenth birthday. Contemporary, human-only romance was my favorite genre—without any paranormal or fantasy elements. I had enough fantasy in my life already.
I found it endlessly interesting to live life through the eyes of a normal person, someone who hadn’t grown up in The Shade. Though, thanks to all the supernaturals that had descended on Earth over the decades, you had to read the book descriptions carefully. Annoyingly, the contemporary and paranormal romance categories had all but merged.
Benedict was also into music. His main instrument was the trumpet. Yeah. That sure fit his character—at least when he was younger. He was becoming a bit more reserved in his old age.
Ruby woke up after a couple of hours and plugged into her own music player, while I remained immersed in my novel. It was about a football-playing hunk happening to fall for the plainest girl in the college. Maybe in all of America. Yeah, I had read tons of books with that cliché before but somehow, I hadn’t gotten bored of it yet.
By the time we arrived, I’d managed to finish the book, along with two other novellas, as well as taking a nap.
As Kyle called out that we had reached our destination, I yawned and stretched out before standing up and pulling my bag from the overhead compartment. I replaced my e-reader in a mesh pocket, then pulled the bag onto my shoulders. I handed Ruby her bag, then did the same for Benedict and Julian. The four of us stood in the aisle as our parents and Corrine approached. There was no need for the whole aircraft to descend. They would stay in the air while the witch escorted us to the port, where we were due to meet with the adventure island’s reps.
“You guys all ready?” my mother asked, looking each of us over.
“Yes,” we replied.
I moved to the front of the aircraft with Benedict to say goodbye to my great-uncle Xavier and great-aunt Vivienne, along with my grandparents Sofia and Derek and great-grandpa Aiden.
Then we returned to gather around the witch, and the aircraft disappeared.
A chilly wind hit me as my feet landed on solid ground. The sky was dim and the atmosphere felt moist. We were standing in a narrow alleyway surrounded by high brick walls. I smelt the sea air—Corrine must’ve landed here to avoid us being spotted suddenly manifesting. Neither I, my brother, Ruby, or Julian were recognized by the public. And our parents wanted it to stay that way. So did we. We had signed up for the course with fake surnames to avoid being outed. We wanted this to feel like a normal vacation.
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