Chapter Seven #3
When my body eventually calmed and his hand withdrew, he kissed me still, slow and sweet, lulling my Flame from its elated roar down to a soft, contented purr in my chest. He pulled back, and gathered me to him, lifting me from the shelves just to slowly drop to his knees and settle us both on the floor, his back to the shelves and me in his lap.
He curved his arms around my back as if I might leap up, but I had no strength in my trembling legs and no desire to move – so we sat there, staring breathlessly at each other.
He hadn’t caught fire, but little paths of flame had erupted down the lengths of my arms and lit his beautiful face where they rested against his broad chest, throwing a shine to the satisfied glint in his eye.
“I’ve wanted this from the very first scowl you sent my way,” he said. “D’you know that?”
I hadn’t. Or maybe some part of me had, all along, the part most closely acquainted with my stubborn, covetous Flame.
The conflicted thoughts must have passed over my face, because he laughed softly, then kissed me again, just a soft brush of his lips over mine before he went on, speaking gently against my mouth and kissing me intermittently.
“All I saw was your golden hair, the way you held that star in your arms like a divine weapon; like you’d raze whole armies to the ground with a single stare. You looked like a vengeful sun goddess, and I wanted to burn in your orbit so fucking badly I could barely think about anything else.”
His kisses were drugging, but his words spoke to my Flame, and it roused with drowsy interest.
“Did you know?”
He stopped kissing me, and didn’t answer for a long moment. But his green eyes were thoughtful as he tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear, then played with the lengths of it, winding it around his finger.
“I knew there was something about you. I knew there was a light to you, some warmth I didn’t completely understand. Probably what drew me in to begin with.” He grinned then, teeth glinting like fangs in my firelight. “Cold blooded and all that.”
“Makes sense,” I mumbled dryly, just to hear him laugh again. I dropped my head to his chest and let the sound of it rumble through me. In afterthought, I mused aloud; “I wonder why my magic is so drawn to you.”
Caelan tensed, and so did I. What had I said that for? Too vulnerable, too fast, with none of the wry, teasing humour of his own admission. Dagda save me, all he’d had to do was feel me up a bit and let me drift in his lap, and I was docile as a kitten.
“It likes me, then?”
I could hear his smirk, but to raise my head would be to let him see the blush burning in my cheeks. Gods forbid he get the wrong idea. Whatever that was.
“It has a mind of its own,” I said, a little pointedly even with the yawn that caught the edge of my words.
“Does it now?” He laughed. “Well, it so happens that I like your magic too.”
He smoothed a hand down my back, soothing and perhaps a little placating.
My eyes were growing heavy, the rhythm of his broad hand stroking down my back slowly lulling my mind to the same dark depths as my drowsy Flame.
When I finally curled tighter against his chest and succumbed to the temptation of that sated exhaustion, he kissed my crown, then rested his head on mine.
His gentle whisper was the last thing I heard before I fell asleep.
“Would it mind, though, if I said I like you best?”
???
I woke with the Captain’s warm arms wrapped around my back, but it was not his voice that roused me from the peace of my dreamless sleep.
“Roz?”
“Mm?”
I struggled to peel myself from delicious oblivion, even as something in the voice that called my name rose the hairs at the nape of my neck. The solid embrace around me was too soothing, the broad chest beneath my cheek too comfortable – until it shifted, and jerked.
“Shit,” Caelan hissed. “Rosie.”
The hands that had so gently coaxed me to sleep now curled around my arms to jerk me violently upright, and I snarled as my eyes finally wrenched open, squinting against the light.
The light.
Not the calm golden glow still pulsing at the centre of my chest, but watery, early morning sunlight spilling through the open door – where Sorcha stood watching us, eerily still.
I scrambled out of the Captain’s lap, yanking my sleeves back over my bare shoulders as I went, endlessly grateful that we’d never quite gotten around to undressing as much as I’d wanted him to.
“Oh gods,” I groaned, staggering to my feet, off balance with my legs half-numb and my head still spinning with sleep. “Sorcha, this isn’t what it looks–”
I stopped dead.
“Sorcha?”
She remained entirely still, frozen on that threshold but for the slight wobble of her lower lip. Her eyes were rounder than ever, the bluest I’d ever seen them, swimming with tears.
I lurched for her.
“What is it? What happened? Are you alright?”
She shook her head, one quiet sob shuddering free with the movement. Her voice was so small and hoarse I strained to hear it, gathering her closer so I could bend my head to hers.
“I-it’s Tanner. I went out to check the letterbox and – f-found him. He’d been out there all night. There’s frost in his eyes, I-I –”
“Is he here? Is he –”
I don’t know why I asked. I knew the answer, really, and I wished at once that I hadn’t made her say it. My sob echoed hers before she even managed to force the words out.
“Roz,” she wept. “He’s dead.”