Chapter 45 #2
“I was regenerating,” Jackson said, dead serious. “It’s a wellness cycle.”
“It’s a coma,” Sean muttered, but he was smiling.
I took a sip of my drink, letting the citrusy burn distract me from the chaos in my chest. “You two are ridiculous.”
“We’re efficient,” Sean said, now using Jackson’s thigh as a pillow. “He hates waking up early, and I love tucking him in. It’s a symbiotic dynamic.”
Jackson reached down and tousled his hair, which Sean pretended to hate and absolutely did not stop.
I watched them for a moment, this strange, seamless rhythm they’d fallen into—like they were already a unit, even if they didn’t say it out loud.
“Gods,” I muttered into my glass. “You’re one synchronized chore chart away from becoming intolerable.”
Sean raised his drink in salute. “We aspire to greatness.”
Jackson raised his, too. “And to making chore charts.”
“To balance,” I said, clinking my glass against theirs.
We laughed, and for a heartbeat, the room felt…normal. Stupid, safe, warm.
And I realized, I didn’t need anything more.
The next morning, my head felt like it had been split in half by a war hammer.
Drinking? Fun.
The aftermath? Less so.
I decided I’d earned myself a slow day: reading in bed, groaning dramatically, and occasionally crawling to the bathroom to puke my soul out.
A knock on my door changed that plan real fast.
When the object of all my desires walked in, I groaned into my pillow.
Perfect. Exactly what I needed. To look—and smell—like death in front of the one person I was trying very hard to be hot around all the time.
“I’m not available today,” I muttered. “Try again when I don’t feel like a corpse.”
“Rough night?” Caden sounded way too cheerful.
“Wow,” I said, without lifting my face from the pillow. “They weren’t kidding when they said you were the smart one.”
“You know you can literally heal away your hangover, right?”
I blinked.
“How do I keep forgetting that?”
He laughed. I hated how warm it sounded. As if he found me endearing in this state. Disgusting.
He crossed the room, sat on the edge of my bed like he owned the place, and handed me a bottle of water.
“Please get out,” I said, waving a limp hand in his direction. “I smell like a brewery.”
“Get your ass in the shower, Thompson. We have a mission to go on.”
That got my attention. We absolutely did not have any mission planned. I would’ve remembered. “What mission?”
“We’re portaling out to Greenland. Something’s going on at Sisu. We need your translation skills in the Human World to figure it out.”
“Pass.” I took a sip of water just to be petty.
“Didn’t give you that option.” He was all mockery and zero remorse.
“Funny,” I muttered, “I don’t remember you being the boss of me.”
“That’s because you drank away all your memory cells.” He stood, towering way too smugly over me. “Now get your ass in the shower before I decide to help you.”
“I’m not moving,” I declared, burying myself deeper into the pillow. “This is my deathbed now. Tell the others I fought bravely.”
He sighed. Loudly. “I warned you.”
The next thing I knew, the blanket was being ripped off me, and a very warm, very solid arm slid under my legs.
“No—Caden—don’t you dare—”
Too late. I was airborne.
“Put me down!” I flailed half-heartedly, but he didn’t even wobble.
“You had your chance, baby” he said. “Consider it a rescue mission, since you were perishing in that bed. Tragic stuff.”
I thumped a fist against his chest. “You smell like smugness and cheap aftershave.”
“You seriously wanna compare smells right now?”
I stilled. I really didn’t.
Plus, he was warm, and stupidly strong, and not at all out of breath as he carried me like I weighed nothing.
He nudged the door of the bathroom open with his foot, then gently lowered me down onto the closed lid of the toilet like I was made of glass. His hands lingered a second longer than necessary, steadying me.
“You good?” he asked softly.
His teasing was gone, replaced by something sincere.
“Could’ve managed without the bridal treatment,” I muttered stubbornly, “but yeah, I’m fine.”
Caden smirked, then kissed me softly on the lips before stepping back. “Good,” he said, “because I’m not dealing with you puking on my shoes again.”
“Excuse me? Again?” I called after him as he walked away. “When did that ever happen?”
His laughter echoed down my room as he closed the bathroom door behind him.
I shuffled to the sink and braced my hands on the counter, squinting at my reflection.
Yikes.
My hair looked like I’d lost a fight with a blender. My eyes were bloodshot, my skin a shade somewhere between “zombie” and “washed-out paper towel.”
I groaned dramatically and splashed cold water on my face, before I closed my lids, focused, and let the familiar golden haze rise over my skin like mist.
Warmth tingled across my body. The headache faded. The nausea peeled away like old wallpaper. The ache in my joints dissolved until I could stand up straight without wanting to die.
Gods, that was so much better.
After a much-needed shower, I grabbed my clothes and dressed quickly: Boots. Belt. Knives. Jacket.
Mission-ready Emma. Or close enough.
As much as I blamed my boyfriend for not letting me die in bed with a hangover, my pulse quickened at the thought of finally going to Sisu. For weeks, Caden and Rachel had been chasing something there. Some lead even Jackson had been asked to keep an eye on.
And I was dying to find out what all the fuss was about.
As I opened the bathroom door and stepped back into my room, energy buzzed under my skin like static.
Caden was leaning against the wall near the window, arms crossed, looking entirely too relaxed for someone who was about to go out on a possibly fatal mission. His gaze flicked up the moment he saw me.
A slow smile spread across his face. “You look every bit the queen you are.”
I rolled my eyes, trying to suppress the smile tugging at my lips. “Are you going soft on me, Colt?”
Before I’d even finished the sentence, he pulled me against him and thrust his hips against mine, the evidence of his arousal unmistakable.
“I don’t think ‘soft’ is a feeling I’ll ever experience when I’m around you,” he murmured crashing his lips hard against mine.
I moaned into his mouth, and he answered with a low, desperate groan. “Fuck, baby, don’t do that. We need to go.”
Gods, I wanted nothing more than to prove him wrong, but he was right.
Reluctantly, I pulled away, still a little breathless.
“This better be worth skipping some very hot sex,” I muttered, grabbing my pack from the floor and slinging it over my shoulder.
Caden grinned.
“I’ll make it up to you,” he said, flicking the Nexus. Green light flared as a portal opened beside him. He held out his other hand. “Now let’s go.”
I took it before we jumped through into the portal, neither of us knowing the horrors waiting for us at Sisu.