Silver snatched it with poor grace, and dropped Kara’s used one on our toes before grunting a thank you as she wrapped it around our back to tuck a corner in our armpit. We needed to get our wet underwear off but we felt so raw, and being naked in front of Corinne didn’t appeal to either of us.
I asked, “Where did she go?”
Corinne crossed her arms and legs at the same time. It looked funny with her thin leggings and the bulky sweater, like she was a dreidel that had frozen mid-spin.
She frowned, making an equal sign on the skin between her eyebrows. “I would imagine she’s getting dressed.”
Our eye sockets felt heavy, as if they might drag our face to our knees. I hitched the fluffy terry cloth more securely around our chest. “I know we’re asking you for a lot, Corinne. We probably don’t have the right. I trust you to be honest with her. I trust you to push and annoy the shit out of Kara until it’s just easier for her to do what we want.”
Corinne relaxed and unclenched her limbs, standing straight and looking strong. “Persistence can be a virtue but it doesn’t always work. Do not hold me responsible for her decisions. If Kara wants to fade no one can stop her. I would suggest you share with James about his sister’s plan immediately. This is something he should know.”
Silver leaned us sideways into the open shower and wrung the ends of our soaked hair. “No duh. I’m not looking forward to that little reveal. I can’t believe she’d even think I’d say yes. Cass and I are a unit. In one breath she says she loves us as we are and then she tries to gift me her husk. Uh-uh. She’s gone squirrelly.”
In a hesitant voice, as if the words were bombs, Corinne added, “It’s not an entirely crazy notion.”
I clamped in control of our body and shoved Silver to the background. “Go find James and tell him we need to talk right this second. Tell him it’s more important than those Council farts. You are not objective. Take a break.”
Silver’s mind nearly imploded with rage at Corinne’s comment. “If that bitch ever says something like that again I’m gonna bust her teeth.”
I nodded and said out loud, “Duly noted, Silver, now go find James in the Web.”
When I could feel my twin was gone I rubbed a hand from our forehead to our chin in my best Kal impersonation. Now I knew why he did it. “You’ve got to stop goading her, Corinne.”
The robotic blonde was getting more personality in fits and starts. She still had a habit of making cold, calculating statements that totally ignored human emotion. Thinking back on how she’d intentionally provoked a response from Kara earlier I had to amend that thought. She wasn’t annoying to be annoying; it had a purpose.
My avenue of thought became confirmed when she said, “Kara is a weak spot you need to shore up. You run every time she needs rescuing, and our enemies will have figured that out by now. It makes her perfect bait. Essentially you’re drawing a huge target on her back.”
I wiped our face clean of emotion, or at least tried to, but our eyes felt hot. “I understand. You should understand that I can’t always control Silver. If you push her too hard, she’s going to come after you. As you said, Kara’s a weak spot.”
Copying my response to Silver earlier, our frosty bodyguard replied with hooded eyes, “Duly noted. I’m going to check on my new buddy and make sure she’s not willing herself to die or anything.”
I held the towel with one hand and snapped an index finger at Corinne’s nose. “That’s exactly the kind of talk that’s going to get you dead.”
She turned on her heel and threw a parting shot over her shoulder. “Silver isn’t here though, is she, Cass?”
Corinne left the door to the hall open and cold currents rushed in to push the moist warm air upward. I shivered. The bathroom was a mess so I gathered all the wet clothes and the two towels off the floor to stuff them hastily in the already full wicker hamper. Our dry clothes were neatly folded and I wondered if Corinne had done that not out of kindness but because it was a way to keep busy in an emotionally charged room.
James came up the stairs at the end of the hall as I reached my bedroom door. His vibrant green eyes reflected concern and I felt Silver settle back into our head. Her presence was comforting and normal. What would I do without her?
Silver absorbed the sadness I felt at the possibility of a life alone in our body and spat back, “Let’s not find out.”
With an extra burst of speed James suddenly invaded our space. His face changed as it took in our nearly undressed state and soaked clumped together hair. Confusion reigned. “Why are you in soggy underwear and a towel? Not that I don’t appreciate imagining you out of your clothes…I thought this was an emergency?”
I grabbed the slick crystal doorknob and opened the bedroom door. “Just come in. We need to speak privately and you may want to sit down for what we have to say.”
His voice deepened in worry. “Ooookay.”
Silver tossed our clothes and boots on the dresser to bang against the tall mirror mounted on the wall. It rocked precariously as if it might fall and we watched it for a moment, distracted by the possibility.
James shut the door with a click and zipped over to grab the dark wood frame, frowning in disapproval. “What is it you need to say? You’re acting stranger than normal.”
I felt the words rush past our lips in a tangled torrent of terror. “Kara is fading. She thinks Silver should flesh permanently with her empty shell because of the DNA patch. We said no and assigned Corinne to be her bitch-tastic minder.”
His shield was still up so when the vent he was standing under started to pump air conditioning in a fresh gush; his hair stayed still. James looked gut-punched and his already pale skin whitened to the consistency of thinly sliced gypsum. “You know this how?”
Silver took over our mouth because I felt incapable of speech. “When we left the clinic Kara came to see us and she looked pretty tore up. When we made her drop her shield she stunk to high heaven. Turns out your sister hadn’t bathed since Melody cut her hair.”
He clapped a hand over his mouth and took a deep breath through his nose with his eyes closed. “What else?”
Silver sighed and lifted one of our hands toward James then dropped it. “We dumped her in the shower and made her wash then asked Corinne to be her buddy. She broke down some after Corinne picked at her intentionally, so we hopped in to help her out. Kara’s shattered and I have no idea how to fix a person who doesn’t want to live—I’ve never not wanted to live. What do we do, James, what do we do?”
James bowed his head and moved both hands to cover his face. His fingers were clamped so tightly to his forehead that his knuckles were wrinkled and glowed a yellowish white color. With a jerk, he stood light pole straight and both hands dropped to his waist. “I can tell you we aren’t going to panic. We’re persuasive, strong minded, intelligent people that love her. Kara will see reason, Silver. She has to.”
I broke in with, “You sound so confident…”
I could sense it when he tore his shield away like a football team running through a banner before a game. It was impressive and somewhat shocking. His sweaty palms gave lie to his demeanor as they cupped our bare shoulders. “What else is there? Maybe if we will it hard enough it will happen. I don’t know, Cass, but I do know she isn’t gone yet so there’s still a chance. That’s better than nothing.”
His eyes drank us in. Green lasers drilled into the straps of our wet bra and his thumbs knocked the thin elastic off. My breath caught in our throat for a non-grief related reason.
Silver threw up mental arms. “Ah hell, I’m out!”
Five years was a long time to wait and six months on top of that was apparently too much for either of us to endure a minute more. Long clammy fingers parted the towel and let it fall. I wrapped arms around my middle and shivered.
James asked, “Is Silver gone?”
I nodded. “For as long as we’re alone together, yes.”
He set his wrists to either side of my
neck. “I’ve wanted this forever. Do you?”
I stood on tiptoe to press my lips to his in a grazing caress. Our breath mingled.
That was all the signal James required. Our afternoon was spent in a succession of panting exertions interspersed with sweat glazed, tangled limbs as we tried to cram a lifetime of happiness into mere hours.
Chapter Four: Reality Bites
James was heavy. I didn’t want him to move though. Our bare skin on skin was addicting and the electric buzz of our attraction never faded. This honeymoon period had to end, but I wanted to pretend our problems didn’t exist for a few seconds more. His kiss-swollen lips nuzzled my earlobe. I could feel his manhood stir and thought, again?
His bass chuckle made things low in my stomach clench, begging for another round. “I could stay inside you forever, Cass. You know I love you, right? There is no other for me. The girls while you were gone, they were just killing time. Not one of them can light a candle to you.”
I slapped his shoulder blade. “Why did you need them at all then?”
He pushed up on his forearms, face serious. “I thought you were doing the same thing.”
I snorted. “You mean you assumed, James. You know what they say about assuming?”
He touched an index finger to my eyebrows, tracing each of them with a dreamy unfocused look in his eyes. “True enough. None of it matters if we have each other now and forever does it?”
My answer died on my tongue as I felt a tug from the Web, and by the expression on James’ face, he was getting tagged too. We closed our eyes at exactly the same time with matching lazy, crooked smiles.
The Web lapped at me with its currents of multi-hued forgotten dreams and intentionally discarded painful memories. Maggie’s orange hearth light bobbed and flared.
Voice bemused she sent, “I’m ready to go home and be with my children. Somebody needs to come and collect our visitors. They’ve been polite but I’m ready to call it a day. Oh, and by the way, they cannot sleep in my clinic, not without someone being on site. David’s going home too.”
James answered for us. “We’ll be there as soon as we get dressed.”
Maggie’s light sputtered sparks of orange and red. “TMI, James. I don’t need to know, nor do I want to know, just get here.” She left and her essence drifted like an errant sun.
I shot a flare of white light at James’ and he absorbed it into his smooth jade mass without a ripple. “I’m not hiding from anyone, Cass. We’re adults, people need to know how it is. Which room are we sleeping in from now on?”
Whoa. “Um, I never said I was ready to move in together. Why are we rushing?”
Silver’s presence intensified, going from a half away state to fully in residence. “You’re gonna have to split time, Romeo. Mez is due back within days.” Her elation was brilliant streamers of light shooting joy into the black.
Jealousy, just as green as his glowing orb, filtered through the space separating us before he could put a damper on it. “So what, are you going to have us on a rotating schedule? I get Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays one week and he gets them the next?”
My core shriveled at his mental tone, all the afterglow from our afternoon delight evaporated in an instant.
Silver expanded. “Just who do you think you are, James Thaddeus Lee? We didn’t trick you! We’ve been us the whole time. I’m with Mez and Cassandra is with you. Just because my sister loves you, doesn’t mean her world and mine revolve around your gargantuan ego.”
Mental voice feeling like frozen gas I shouted, “Enough! Maggie needs us. We’re so not doing this right now. Silver, can I have a minute to get dressed with James and then you can come back…please?”
She huffed. “Alright. He better straighten up and fly right though, or I’m gonna knock his block off.”
James threatened, “Just try it, Silver.”
I sank back into awareness of our body. James’ weight didn’t feel cozy anymore. I felt trapped by his unrealistic expectations. When I was sure he was back in residence I shoved with reinforced arms and legs, throwing him to the other side of the bed—almost onto the floor. He caught himself with the headboard just barely, eyes ablaze with worry. It was hard not to be distracted by his naked, toned body. Hormones can be traitorous, inconvenient, biological booby traps to reason.
I sat and swung my legs over the side of the bed. How could everything go so wrong so fast today? The morning had seemed normal and then bam! The muscles on the inside of my thighs protested when I flexed. The soreness was just a sad reminder that this could be my last and only interlude with James. My heart and my head hurt worse than my overused flesh. Goosebumps raced across my skin all the way to my scalp, making the hair feel as if it were growing.
He spoke right before a warm finger touched my back. “I’m sorry.”
I stood to get away. The dresser felt miles from me but I made it on rubbery legs. I dug around blindly in the top drawer where Silver and I kept our underwear, feeling for a bra and panties with numb fingers. Warm skin pressed against the back of my body and James crossed his arms loosely over my breasts to cup my shoulders.
James rested his cheek on the crown of my head. “I really am sorry. I don’t have any idea why possession got ahold of me. I have no reason to be jealous. We don’t have to sleep in the same room yet, but I want to eventually. Silver does have the right to be with Mez, and I already know that. I messed up. Please don’t give up on us so soon because I’m an overeager asshole.”
I raised my light brown eyes to meet his in the mirror over the dresser. “You can’t hurt me like that, James. I have to trust you. I have to know you won’t say one thing and mean another. I need your honesty and your strength.”
He sucked in a breath and lifted his head. Eyes aflame with emotion, he said, “You have it, Cassandra. You have me.”
Did I dare believe him? I wanted to. I smiled and blinked back tears. “Let’s get dressed so we can rescue Maggie from our uninvited guests. Where are you planning on having them stay?”
He pulled away and I missed his warmth immediately.
With a shrug of his broad shoulders, James bent to gather his clothes from the floor. “Gerome was full of surprises. We have a house fully equipped with surveillance systems disguised as home security—motion sensors and cameras in every room. The cameras are set to activate the monitors at the station if the motion sensors get tripped. Otherwise they stay off.”
I stepped into a clean pair of cotton panties as I watched James’ reflection button his shirt in the mirror. “Okay, so if we had that option why did you throw the old farts at Maggie?”
He laughed into his chest as he bent to don his pants. “Because I want them to think we weren’t prepared for them. I’m going to push for a Council meeting tomorrow while they’re here. You, Silver and Corinne need to be in attendance and on point. I don’t like that they came all this way. They want something.”
Silver stuck a toe into our head, testing the waters. “Can I come back now?”
I glanced at James out of the corner of our eye. “Yeah he’s dressed, Silver, you’re home free.” I finished fastening our bra and Silver reached for our shirt.
When she bent us at the waist to put our pants on she hissed at the achiness in our inner thighs. “Good Lord, Cass! Have a care for our body when you’re doin’ the worm. I’m gonna have to heal us tonight!”
As she zipped our fly I answered, “Excuse you, but I seem to remember feeling worse than this right before we left Axsa! Shut your face.”
Silver snorted. “If I shut our face how will you talk?”
Our eyes caught James in the mirror again and he had a silly grin stretched across his lips. I felt self-conscious so my voice came out demanding instead of curious. “What?”
He showed more teeth, hands on hips. “Both of you, fighting like Kara and I do, but with the same mouth.” At the thought of his sister he sobered. His pupils dilated to pinpricks and he rubbed his stomach through his
no longer crisp white shirt.
Both of us had sex hair. I dove into the driver’s seat again, grabbed our wide tooth comb off the dresser and stomped over to James. “Bend over or kneel.”
He blinked and his whole countenance shifted sideways with a look of silent confusion but he put down one knee at a time until I could see the top of his head. I dragged the neon pink comb through his thick near-black hair until his part was linear. The white skin of his scalp practically glowed. I circled him and finished up the back then tapped his shoulder with the flat of the girly colored grooming instrument. “Our turn, James.”
Silver pouted out loud. “If he pulls our hair I should get to punch him.”
James stood looking relaxed. Maybe he liked being fussed over? This was knowledge to store away for a later date. He cupped our shoulders and turned us to face the mirror. He didn’t make immediate use of the comb as he gathered all the stray hairs toward the back of our head. Still damp hair hit our shirt as he let go of the makeshift ponytail.
Gentle short pulls of the comb began as James spoke. “I didn’t apologize to you yet, Silver. I believe the term I used to describe myself earlier was ‘overeager ass’ and that was probably being too nice. First off, you’re right about you and Mez. Second, I and my gargantuan ego need to cool it. I’m not really sure where my jealousy came from. Maybe it was worry about Kara? It wasn’t right regardless.” He coughed as he expertly worked through the tangles. “I’m also sorry for outing our…activities…to Maggie. It’s kind of embarrassing in hindsight.”
I could sense Silver’s surprise. She mulled his words over and I let her fully pilot to answer him. Her thoughts were a jumble of worry. Silver directed our eyes to the mirror and James paused with the comb poised for a down stroke.
“I told you once that you weren’t strong enough to be what Cass needed. Maybe if you keep this whole admitting your mistakes thing going, you can be.” She paused, wrinkling our brow. “That came out super bitchy. I was trying to compliment you and now I just sound condescending. Who told you to stop with the comb, Romeo?”
PHOENIX (The Weaver Series Book 4) Page 4