Total pages in book: 139
Estimated words: 130619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 653(@200wpm)___ 522(@250wpm)___ 435(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130619 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 653(@200wpm)___ 522(@250wpm)___ 435(@300wpm)
“Then my familiar could be in danger.”
“No.” He swipes a hand through the air. “I told you, no.”
“Jeremy was strong enough to bind your powers. How do you know those months I was close to him weren’t part of some spellcast that made it possible?” I point to my temple. “Go inside my head. I need you to go inside my head and make sure you can’t find him there.”
“I’ve been inside your head.”
“You said you didn’t read my thoughts. Maybe that changes what you can see or feel. I need you to do this.”
“Ember—”
“And you need to trust me. I need you to trust me. You have to do this for both of us.” I step closer to him, wiping out the space that separates us as if my nearness allows him to better read me. “Please, Micah.”
I’m met with an eternal deadpan stare, his expression unreadable, before he reaches for me. He captures my shoulders, and that calming sensation he creates stirs in me instantly—a warm river washing away the blood and fear of moments before. The intimacy, or whatever this feeling is that he stirs in me, is thick in the air. It’s between us. It radiates from his palm and hums through me.
And I think maybe that’s the point—that’s what he wants me to feel. Some sort of Crystal Seer bond that I’m not sure he was fully prepared for any more than I was. “I can feel what you are,” he says. “I don’t need to go into your head.”
“I think we both know you do.”
“No,” he says, and offers nothing more.
“No? Just no?”
“Just no.”
“You’re too arrogant for your own good, Micah. What if he can hide so deep inside me that not even you can feel him?”
“No,” he repeats, releasing me to step back and wide. “We both need to sleep before we travel.” He saunters toward the couch with that damnable hotness and grace of his, sits down, and picks up my bag of chocolate, holding it up. “I take it you like candy?”
Frustration ticks through me, and I want to push, but it’s clear he’s not going to allow this topic to continue. I ignore the question, joining him in the living room, where he’s unwrapping a piece of chocolate. I step in front of him, on the opposite side of the coffee table. “Where are we going?”
“I’m not telling you that. You have no guard. What you know can be plucked from your head. Someplace safe. That’s all I’m willing to say.” He motions over his shoulder. “Take my bed. I’ve got the couch. Rest. You’ll be glad you did.”
“You’re the Overseer, the king in this place. You take your bed.”
“That would be so very arrogant of me, don’t you think?”
My cheeks heat. “You are arrogant.”
“Confident. And it takes confidence to stay alive in our world.”
“Take your bed,” I press.
“Not happening, sweetheart. Go rest.”
“Sweetheart” from him is not the “sweetheart” of a best friend teasing me or opposing counsel talking down to me. Or the grocery clerks in Texas who seem to love it as much as they do sweet tea. This “sweetheart” is from a man I’ve been pressed so close to I’ve felt almost every inch of him. This is “sweetheart” from a man telling me to sleep in his bed while I occupy his apartment. I want him and hate him and just so many things.
But then he ruins my female fascination by eyeing the book I was reading and picks it up, glancing at the page open to the spellcast I just attempted and then at me. “Magic is dangerous when practiced without training and guidance.”
“You left me the book.”
“And told you to read it, not conjure a damn demon.”
“The spellcast was to conjure my familiar. Again, a familiar is not a snake. And considering he bound your powers, I think you should be concerned that I’m not the only one with a serpent hanging around inside me.” With that, I walk away and enter his room, shutting the door firmly behind me.
Once I’m facing forward, staring at his gigantic bed with the towering posts, the centerpiece of his domain, I wonder how many nights Celine has spent here and curse myself for going down that highly personal path. It’s not my business. I do not care, I tell myself firmly, but I do care. I don’t want to get in between her and Micah, and yet, from the moment I met Micah, there was a spark and a tug, as fierce as an ocean current. There’s something happening between us, me and Micah. You and I, we’re alike, he’d said. I don’t even know what that means at this point, but there’s truth in that statement that reaches beyond the color of our eyes.
With a few short steps, I’m sitting on his bed, the scent of him misting the air around me. This is his domain. I am but a visitor, conceivably a prisoner, but I don’t fear Micah. I fall back on the mattress and stare at the ceiling. I don’t fear him because of what I feel in him. That’s what he’s been telling me. A Crystal Seer can feel the motives of another Crystal Seer. And that connection I feel to him must be about me waking up my senses and recognizing him as being a likeness of myself.