“She could have been really, extremely angry,” Sophie said.
“Maybe. But think about it. You've been running from dipshit for years rather than hurt him. You have every reason to, and I'd cheer you on if you did it. But you won't, no matter how bad it gets. Evie was pretty much powerless, but she was also the type who wouldn't even swat a fly. Literally. I was over here asking for information once, and she gently captured one and freed it outside.”
Sophie smiled. “I've done that with spiders.”
“Weirdo.”
She laughed then. They exchanged a glance, then both looked away quickly.
“Well, as much as I want to believe one of my people wouldn't go evil on purpose, it still doesn't solve the curse.”
“But it might. We need to keep stuff like that in mind. Maybe it'll make a difference.”
She nodded. “Um. Maybe you can come with me sometimes, if you want to.”
“It's really your family business. I don't want to intrude.”
“No, you wouldn't be. I just mean, maybe you'll see something I overlook.”
“What do you want, Sophie?” he asked quietly. “Do you want me there, or are you just being nice by inviting me?”
She watched him. “I want you there, if you want to be there. And maybe it matters to me that you don't think my entire family is crap. Though it's completely deserved.”
“I don't think your entire family is crap. Especially not you,” he said quietly. “And you shouldn't care what I think of you.”
“Because you still think this is going nowhere,” she said, feeling a flush rise to her cheeks in her embarrassment.
He was silent. “That's not what I meant, and at any rate it's not true,” he said after a while. “I meant you shouldn't care what I think of you, because I'm a jackass. I'm bribing you to help me.”
“I'd help you anyway. Even if you weren't holding my house over my head,” she said.
He groaned, and she could tell that it was shame, irritation with himself. “I know. I should have not been an asshole and talked to you first.”
“Well, then someone else would have gotten it. At least with you, I have a chance of getting it back.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, leaned back against the countertop. “As far as this not going anywhere,” he said. “We both know that would be for the best. No one wants to be stuck with a monster.”
“Which one of us is the monster?” she asked with a smile. “Because apparently, I have it in me somewhere to utterly destroy someone.”
“I don't think there was any doubt the other night which of us is the actual monster. And it's only gonna get worse, kitten. Can you honestly say you'd be okay being involved with someone who gets like that? Who would destroy you in a heartbeat if you slipped up? Because it's going to happen more and more often until that's all that's left.” He watched her, and she couldn't answer. “And I know what you're doing. You're separating my beast from me in your mind to make it okay. There is no separate. I am him, he is me. All of the rage, all of the hunger, that's me. I'm just holding on to control better than he does. Barely,” he added, looking away.
She cocked her head, studied him. “We're already involved, Calder. There's no going back, as far as I'm concerned.” She paused. “Is it hard for you, being around me?”
Nothing, and then he gave a terse nod, not looking at her. His jaw was clenched, his hands formed into fists.
“What was it like yesterday?” she asked, not wanting to put into words what she was referring to.
“Kissing you was the most amazing and most painful thing I've done in my entire life,” he said in a low voice, a hint of a growl to his words, and it sent a shiver through Sophie's body.
“I'm sorry it hurt you, Calder,” she said. “I didn't think.”
“You forgot the amazing part,” he said, giving her a small smile. He was sexy when he was serious. But he was irresistible when he smiled.
She was completely, totally gone, and she knew it.
“It was pretty amazing,” she said, blushing again. “It was that first time, too.”
“It was,” he said, eyes on her. “The best thing would be to walk away from you.”
“But you can't,” Sophie said. “And I can't stay away from you either. And I don't want to. I'll tell you right now that I believe in you, Calder.”
He crossed the room in three long strides, took her chin gently in his hand. His touch, just that slight brush of his fingers against her flesh, made her breath catch. “You believe in me?” he asked quietly, his eyes seeking hers, voice low, almost desperate. “Really?”
“I do,” she whispered. “I do,” she repeated, voice shaking as he lowered his lips to hers, claimed her mouth in a way that was both tender and demanding at the same time. She whimpered quietly, and he deepened his kiss, the hair of his short beard gently abrading her skin as he tilted her head back so he could taste her better. Sophie put her arms around his waist, relishing the feel of his hard, warm body against hers. No sooner had she wrapped him in her arms than he removed his hands from her face and buried his fingers in her hair, tangling the curls in his hands, pulling her head back just a little more as he traced her lips with his tongue, gently nipped at her lower lip. He feathered a few more kisses across her mouth, gave her full lower lip one final tug with his teeth, then slowly, gently pulled away.
“You're mine,” he murmured, voice low, eyes locked onto hers.
She trembled beneath his touch. “I'm yours,” she whispered.
“Kiss me again, Sophie,” he murmured and she did, raising her face to his. He kissed her slowly, deliberately, as if he was determined to learn and remember her flavor, as if she was something precious. It nearly made her weep, how much she felt when he kissed her.
“You're so gorgeous,” he whispered when he pulled away. “So soft, so sweet. Strong. You've always had that. I think it's part of what made me so nuts over you, even back then, that quiet strength.”
“I was shy and awkward,” she said with a smile.
“Only with most people. With our group, you opened up. And most of the idiots we went to school with didn't give you much reason to open up.”
She smiled. It was true. At the time, the tiny elementary and middle school they'd gone to just outside of Copper Falls had been all white. While there were many Native American kids around, they tended to go to the school near the reservation. She'd heard that that had closed down since, and everyone went to the public school, for the most part. But back then, it had been different. She'd been the only obviously “other” kid in their school, and there were plenty of jerk kids who liked to point it out.
“I never did ask you, but I always wondered what else you were. We know Ojibwa now. What else?”
She laughed a little. “I'm all mixed up. Ojibwa, black, Mexican, German, Irish. Those are the ones I know, anyway.”
“It's a really beautiful combination, Sophie,” he said, and she swallowed, touched by the tenderness in his voice, the plain, straightforward way he said it.
She kissed him again, and when he kissed her back, she knew, that instant, that she would do whatever it took to save him. Because no one had ever kissed her the way he did, with that aching tenderness and care. Because despite what he was, she'd never felt safer than she felt in his arms. Because when she looked at him, she was looking at forever. And she wasn't giving that up. Nothing, not curses or Shadow warlocks or anything else, was going to stand in her way.
She found her body trapped between his body and the counter in her kitchen, his hands on her waist, her hips, gently tracing the curve at the sides of her breasts, which made her gasp in need.
“So goddamn beautiful,” he growled, and it sent shivers down her spine. He was kissing her again, holding her tight to his body, his desire evident in the hardness pressing into her abdomen. He pulled back, breathless, nibbling at her lips before backing up completely.
“Was that too much?” he asked her.
<
br /> She shook her head. “I just don't want you to be uncomfortable or…”
Calder grimaced. “Well. I'm uncomfortable. And if my stupid beast wasn't raging, I'd be trying really, really hard to convince you to make me more comfortable, kitten,” he said, and she laughed.
“You wouldn't have to try all that hard, Calder.”
He leaned forward and kissed her. “Good to know.”
He led her into the living room, and kisses sitting on the sofa somehow turned into Calder's body on top of hers, his hips settled between her thighs, his lips at her throat, biting gently.
He pulled back with a groan, got off of her, slid behind her on the couch so they were lying side by side.
“You're tired,” he said.
“I'm fine.”
“I'm not,” he said wryly, and she laughed and snuggled back against him.
A while later, after a couple of hours of talking and kissing, he dozed off, and she turned in his arms, watched him sleep. And she was on edge. She shouldn't have been. It was comforting, if a little frustrating, having him with her this way. And yet, the longer they'd been together, she'd felt more on edge, more empty, somehow. It made no sense, and she wondered if maybe she was just confused over getting what she'd wanted for so long. Screwed up over what she'd learned about Luc's and Migisi's ends. She tried convincing herself that that was it, and that the added issue of his curse, his still holding her house as collateral, was what was bothering her.
But that wasn't it. None of that was good, and she was enough of a realist to know that what they had was far from perfect. Whatever it was she had, she thought to herself. But it wasn't that.
She just felt weirdly wrong, somehow. And it irritated her that she couldn't put her finger on why that was. She usually managed to figure out what her problems were. Years and years of being alone had made her good at introspection, if nothing else. But she couldn't place it.
She forced it away, closed her eyes, and snuggled into Calder's body. It would pass.
Calder ended up sleeping beside her all night, and she woke feeling both as if she was in heaven and as if she was walking through the gates of hell. How many times had she dreamed of this, of him finding her again someday, of waking up next to him after a night in his arms? And now, the emptiness, the undercurrent of anger and anxiety that had been gnawing at her the night before only felt worse in the morning light. He woke, and his lips were on the back of her neck, her shoulders, his hands holding her hips firmly against his body. The low growl he gave when she turned her head so he could claim her lips sent a surge of need through her.
His kisses became harder, his hands less soft on her body, and then his body was on top of hers, his thigh pressed between her legs, urging them open. He squeezed her breasts firmly, and she whimpered, gave in to his insistence to open her legs.
“Should mark you right now,” he growled. “Make you mine.”
“Calder,” she whispered.
He was tense, almost bristling on top of her. “Shit,” he groaned. He leapt from the bed, and before she could even say another word to him, he was gone. A few moments later, she heard pained, angry growls from the woods west of her house, and she shivered.
“This is the worst idea ever,” she muttered to herself. “I am an idiot. He's an idiot.” She got up, locked the front door behind him. She headed into the bathroom to shower, knowing enough about Calder and his beast to know that the beast got a special kick out of smelling Calder on her. That whole ownership thing. She muttered to herself the whole time, not only irritated over how stupid she was being (and knowing that the second she saw him again, she'd fall right back into his arms) but also because she still felt weird. Wrong.
She got out of the shower, dressed, pulled her hair up, stepped into her rubber boots. She went out and milked the goats, fed the chickens, had her daily battle with Merlin over whichever spot he was currently trying to weaken so he could escape.
She went back inside, and, just as she'd finished pouring her tea, there was a knock at her door.
She closed her eyes, trying to calm the tumult of emotions running through her. It was Calder. She knew it was. And she was giddy that he'd come back so soon, and irritated with herself for being that way. She went to the door, pulled it open, waved him in.
Calder walked in, a sheepish, guilty look on his face. “I'm sorry” were the first words out of his mouth.
“I think we're complete morons,” she said in response. “I am crazy about you, Calder. I am nuts about you. There is nothing I won't do for you, and that's completely stupid. Seeing you is enough to make my whole day better. You're gorgeous and you make me feel better than I've ever felt in my life, ever. But this is goddamned stupid and we are going to end up hating one another,” she said, stomping through the living room back toward the kitchen.
She turned, and he was smiling at her, a half-grin that made her heart pound. “Finished?” he asked.
“Maybe,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. He walked toward her, lowered his head, kissed her gently, warmly. “We are being stupid, maybe. We've been over this,” he said. “But I will never, ever hate you, Sophie.” He kissed her again, and she felt her irritation fading, just a little. “I'm sorry,” he said against her lips. “You deserve so much better. I'm not a very good man.”
“That is complete nonsense, right there,” she said. She put her arms around him. “I wonder if Luc was anything like you,” she said after standing in his arms for a while.
“What do you mean?”
“If he was, I can see how Migisi fell so hard for him. And if he was, I can also see why it destroyed her to lose him.”
He lowered his forehead to hers. “I think if he was anything like me, and if she was anything like you, he felt the same way. It's always been this between us, Soph. Do you remember the first day of fifth grade?”
She smiled a little. “Maybe.”
“I remember. I was sitting in Mrs. Redleaf's class, acting like a typical eleven-year-old asshole with the other guys in the back corner of the room, and you walked in with Layla. I couldn't stop staring at you, and you stopped short, as if something froze you on the spot. Neither one of us understood it. You only moved when Layla pulled you toward your seat, but you kept glancing back at me. Even dumbass Bobby Hardley noticed.”
“And you punched him,” she said with a laugh.
He let out a short laugh. “And from that moment on, it was you and me, kitten.” Absolute truth. How many boys, including high schoolers, had Calder beat up for saying the wrong thing to her or about her in middle school? Layla had been her best friend, but who had usually been the one she'd turned to with her worries and problems?
“I wish you would have told me some of what was going on back then. Your dad must have been bad already,” she said softly, still resting her forehead against his. Her heart hurt, remembering how often he'd sat quietly and listened to her going on and on about some annoying thing her dad had done or some insult one of the other girls had thrown at her. And he'd been going through so much worse, and never said a word.
“I wasn't allowed to talk about it. I wanted to. I knew you'd listen. So many times, I almost did. But then I was already crazy about you and thought telling you I was destined to become a raging monster who'd eventually lose my humanity was probably not the best way to impress you.”
She smiled, put her hands in his hair. She ran her fingers through it, and he sighed, closed his eyes. “I would have listened. And I still would have been crazy about you,” she said softly. “When we left, I was a mess. It was like they were tearing me away from the only one who understood me at all. I cried for weeks. I tried to run away four times to come back here, hoping I could stay with Evie. I never got very far,” she finished. She'd only stopped trying to run because it seemed like, eventually, her steps were haunted by the dark, brooding man who'd begun showing up everywhere. The idea of being too far away from anyone who knew her with him around was terrifying
enough that it got her to stop running. “I dreamed for years that we'd find one another again someday.”
She was still running her fingers lazily through his hair, and his eyes were still closed, relishing her touch.
“Me too,” he said. “I was miserable after you left. My dad got notes and calls a few times a week because of fights I got into. Started failing classes. It felt like part of my heart was gone.”
“My mom said it was a teenage crush and I'd get over it,” Sophie said. “I very clearly didn't.”
He laughed a little. “Me neither.” He opened his eyes then. “I'm going to keep you safe. From me, from anyone who tries to mess with you. I swear it.”
She felt tears come to her eyes. “I know you will, Calder. And I'm going to save you. Don't try to tell me I can't.”
He smiled. “Okay.”
“I'm not kidding. You've been mine since I was eleven years old. I'm not losing you again.”
Calder kissed her again, and then they cooked together, Calder scrambling a couple of eggs, Sophie brewing coffee and putting bread in the chrome-plated toaster on the counter. Sophie watched him as he ate. It was one of those moments, those seemingly unimportant, mundane moments that she knew she'd remember for the rest of her life. The way the sun slanted in the window behind him, dust motes sparkling in its rays. The way he sat in her kitchen, forearms resting on the edge of the table. The way their eyes met over his coffee cup, the way the side of his foot was pressed to the side of her foot under the table, an unconscious move on both their parts, as if not touching when they were in the same room was a pointless hardship. She would remember it, she knew.
They finished eating, cleaned up, and he followed her into the living room. They settled on the couch, seeming to have come to an unspoken agreement that groping was, unfortunately, off limits for a while. He sat on the end of the couch, and she settled against his side, grabbing Migisi's journal as she did. She leaned against him, her back to his side, and he rested his arm around her, his forearm resting just below her collarbone. She opened the book, quickly cast the spell to allow her to translate it, and he sat silently behind her. She felt him move, glanced back to see him open the Ojibwa history book she'd checked out of the library.
Shadow Witch Rising (Copper Falls Book 1) Page 17