Chapter 14
I shouldn’t have worried about sleeping with Miles. Outside of not having an aggressive bone in his body, there was no doubt he was trying to disgust me.
Miles had been a bundle of nerves when we went to his room, flustering about as he kicked piles of dirty clothes under his bed. There was a musty scent in the air and a pile of dishes and cups shoved into a corner on an ink-stained desk.
I was almost entirely sure that something was living deep within the cluttered corners.
He’d changed his sheets while I watched, but sleeping above loads of man sweat made me almost reconsider Damen’s previous offer.
“Sorry,” Miles said, fluttering while he led me to a seat on a corner of his mattress. “I’ll clean soon, I promise.”
“Okay,” I told him. Now, I felt even worse about following Julian’s plan. It hadn’t been very nice of me to put him on the spot. “I can sleep downstairs if you’d want. ”
He glanced at me, mid-process of relocating a terrarium, and I flushed, adding, “I didn’t mean to intrude.”
“Ah,” he replied, then placed the giant, round bowl on his desk. He snatched a few leaves of withering lettuce from a paper plate and tossed them on the floor before returning to me. He stood over me and grabbed my hands. “You’re always welcome to stay with me.”
I bit my lip, and he cocked his head. “What’s wrong?”
“I—” I began, hoping that he couldn’t feel my hands shaking. “I’m a little bit nervous.”
“About?” he asked.
“The—the last few nights have been an exception,” I whispered. “But I haven’t slept with someone in a long time.”
The light expression faded from his eyes, and he furrowed his brow. “You know it’s just sleeping,” he told me. “I would never expect anything else.”
“I know,” I whispered.
He studied me a minute longer, then pulled me to my feet. “We’ll get you set up in a guest room.”
“No!” I twisted my wrist in his hold and grabbed his sleeve. “This was my idea!” And it had been—it wasn’t his fault that Julian and Damen misinterpreted my words. I never would have offered to sleep with one of them otherwise, but now that we were at this point, I wanted to move forward.
As Miles said, it was only sleeping. He’d been next to me on a chair last night. Julian and Titus had already been in bed with me.
I was normal. We had agreed that flirting was okay.
Besides, how could I explain? My face grew hot as I stared at his arm. “Being with you makes me feel safe.”
Much safer than sleeping alone. On the nights that I’d been with them, I never had any nightmares .
“That’s because you are,” he said, picking up a tan and brown crocheted afghan. He wrapped it over my shoulders until it covered me head to toe, and I peeked at him through the gap near my face.
“I’ll finish my training soon,” he promised. “I only have one last project. Then I’ll be able to keep up. I’ll take care of you this time. You’ll wait for me?”
But nothing was wrong with him. Still, he was so sincere that I could only nod.
“I just want to wrap you up and keep you safe forever,” he said, squeezing his hands down my arms over the blanket. “I would never do anything to hurt you.”
My heart was beating so fast at the sweet expectation in his eyes, and I nodded again. “T-thank you,” I said.
He lowered his face to mine, touching me nose to nose, before he wrapped his hands around my waist, picked me up, and set me back on the bed. “I won’t touch you,” he said solemnly. “So make sure you get lots of sleep.”
I gripped at the corners of the blanket as Miles crawled into bed beside me, but when he proceeded to plaster himself along the very edge, furthest from me, my trepidation faded.
He’d turned off the bright overhead light, and a soft orange glow filled the room as a cluster of mushroom lamps illuminated the space.
It wasn’t long before his snoring filled the room, and my eyes shut as I drifted off into a relaxed slumber.
I’d reached for Miles sometime in the middle of the night, but my dreams were so soft it hardly mattered. I was aware of him waking, a short stiffening of his frame against mine, but he slipped away so gently that I drifted back to sleep .
When I woke up next, I was slightly more offended at how quickly he’d run away. Was it truly that terrifying to snuggle? It hadn’t been that long ago when he’d been dragging me around by a jacket. Now he seemed to think I had cooties.
Men .
However, his intentions were of no consequence. And outside of a quiet, lonely breakfast of marshmallow cereal, I hadn’t seen anyone else around the entire morning.
I’d been abandoned and forced to spend time alone, reading The Hobbit in the living room. How was that for welcoming?
Well, except for Finn. He was clicking away on his computer, clearly watching me occasionally. But he didn’t count as decent companionship. It made me sick to look at him, sitting around as if he hadn’t single-handedly destroyed our beautiful duo. We’d had such a good thing going, too.
“Stop thinking mean things about me,” he said, pausing his movements over the keys.
“What?” I leaned back. How did he know what I was thinking?
He sighed. “We’re going to have to discuss things sometime.”
Since he wasn’t in danger of being put to death, at least not any time soon, my sympathies toward him had vanished. “No, we don’t.”
“Hi, Bianca.” Brayden peeked into the room with a grin. “Sorry I’m late! I had some things to take care of, but I’m ready for you now.”
“Huh?” I blinked at the curly-haired man.
“Finn was supposed to tell you.” Brayden’s gaze flickered over to Finn, who didn’t have the decency to look ashamed. “You have a lesson with me today. Did he not mention it?”
“No.” I frowned at Finn. How could he do this to me? He knew I hated surprises. “What lesson? ”
“This is your fault,” Finn said as he smoothly returned his attention to his laptop. “I could have told you if you were talking to me.”
I growled under my breath as I clenched my fists in my lap.
Was he trying to make me hate him? He knew how important this was to me. He’d gone out of his way to put me on the spot, making me look unprepared and tarnishing my reputation with one of my older brothers.
If this were anyone else, I’d say this was done deliberately. He was trying to get under my skin so I wouldn’t forget about him. Hate was, after all, a powerful emotion.
But that was impossible. Finn lacked any emotional depth, and he cared about no one.
He was just a jerk.
“Okay.” I got to my feet and brushed off my skirt. Although I was barely at the point of being comfortable alone with Brayden, it was certainly better than suffering under the weight of Finn’s suddenly very heavy stare. “What are we doing?”
I looked around the gloomy greenhouse, my eyes tracing the faint outlines of plants and the glass walls barely visible in the dim light. This space was a surprising discovery, almost intact enough to use despite its abandoned appearance.
My attention was pulled back as Brayden crossed his arms on the table and leaned forward. It wasn’t until I caught sight of his expectant expression that I realized he’d asked a question.
I blinked. “Pardon?” I asked, turning my full attention to him.
“Who taught you to block emotions?” he asked. “You’re not an expert, but you’re doing all right. If you weren’t, you’d have lost it by now. But I’ve noticed you struggle when you’re distracted. It’ll only get harder when your quintet comes into play.”
I tilted my head. “What are you talking about?”
Now, it was Brayden’s turn to look confused. He raised his eyebrow. “You can’t tell?”
“Well, no. I do what feels natural,” I said. “When I feel overwhelmed, I focus on my breathing. But it’s sometimes hard to distinguish between my emotions and spirits’. But what does my quintet have to do with anything?”
“You don’t know?” Brayden sounded unsure, and I pursed my lips. After all, if I knew what he was talking about, this conversation would be going very differently.
He correctly interpreted my expression. “We aren’t limited to feeling only the emotions of spirits. We can also sometimes pick up on the emotions of our quintets.”
That was ludicrous. Surely, the boys would have said something.
I had my finger in the air, poised to argue. Then, recent events came to mind.
I’d kissed Damen in a moment of passion. Knowing this, everything made much more sense.
It wasn’t my fault. Although I’d attacked him, he’d seduced me just by existing . He had probably been thinking lusty things. No wonder my heart always raced when he was nearby. I was being influenced by outside forces beyond my control.
I had been foolish. I always believed it was only the emotions of the dead that affected me.
What in the world was happening to me?
“The emotions of your quintet are different than a spirit’s. But if you’ve accepted your role, you will feel both,” Brayden continued. “You can learn to compartmentalize. I was worried you were untrained, but I’ve been watching—you just lack confidence. Who taught you before this?”
It was suddenly hard to breathe, and I focused on the double-door entry. “I’m okay with teaching myself.”
Brayden sucked in a breath, but before he could speak, the door slammed open, and Bryce strolled into the room. He was wearing a suit—although it was Saturday—and as he crossed the space between us, he loosened his tie and grumbled under his breath.
I’d never been so happy to see him, and a twinge of concern even touched me at his appearance. At this moment, he was far from the annoying man I’d come to know.
“What in the world is wrong with you?” Brayden dropped our previous discussion.
“It’s Abernathy.” He slumped into the seat beside me.
“Damen?” Brayden asked. “I thought he was painting.”
Bryce shook his head. “No, not that one. I just came from a meeting with the dean.”
“Of the college?” Guilt twisted at me. Why did I have the feeling this was my fault? “Is it because of…” Bryce turned toward me, and I waved my hand. “Us?”