8. Jax
8
JAX
I didn’t think Jolie could steal my breath away any more, but her brushing against me outside tonight knocked the wind from my lungs. Playing with her long, dark tresses, skating along her exposed skin, my magic’s starved for her as much as I am. For the first time since I felt that nagging thrum post-hibernation, I’m at ease. Satisfied.
I could sway with her for hours. For eras. There’s nothing more beautiful than the way she spins under my chilling spell.
My tempest.
The word drawn across her chest fractures me, sinking deep between my ribs, giving it new meaning. Jolie’s a storm of motion threatening my very delicate ecosystem.
I want her all the more for it.
My willing yet unknowing partner. Can she sense our connection through the veil keeping us apart?
When her fingers turned blue, I ushered her inside as best I could. I must keep my mate safe, even if she doesn’t acknowledge that I’m here.
I follow her, keeping my distance as she moves quickly down the hall toward her roommate’s room. Has she seen my message? I’d left it hastily before arriving in Massachusetts, blowing my way down the East Coast, stopping just past Philadelphia, and then finally returning. Apparently, my extra visits haven’t gone unnoticed. Weather reports of extended cold fronts have finally caught up with me. Now we’ve been ordered to do extra duty up north and avoid this area. Oops.
Jolie heads past me, something wooden and rectangular clutched in her hands. She moves straight for her desk, setting the box on it and rifling through it.
I slip into the bathroom and find my words erased from the mirror. Had they even been there by the time she’d gotten back? Shit. It’s probably for the best, considering I’m not supposed to be interfering. Disappointment claws at me, nonetheless.
Jolie glances around the room over her shoulder. I freeze in place—no clue why since I know she can’t see me—but when I look back to where she is staring, it’s at the empty mirror.
She did see!
Hope drifts through the air like gossamer flurries, fragile and gone far too soon. I zip into the bedroom and over to the corner by the desk, careful not to blow any of the papers in her journal. Her eyes are back down on the rich mahogany board with fancy lettering.
“Eww-I-jah,” I sound out slowly, reading the single word carved at the top. Ouija.
Peering over her shoulder again, she rests her fingers on the curved triangle atop the board. Her hands quiver the tiniest bit. “Are you here?”
I take a closer look at the board. It’s nothing I’ve seen before, but that doesn’t stop the excitement that streaks through me.
This is something I can work with.
Using my magic, I blow wind out of my lips along with a few flecks of snow that catch on the strangely shaped apparatus. It moves toward the YES at the top, and I inch it farther with another gust. Her fingers shake atop the plastic and her body shudders. “Why are you here?”
I sweep my breeze to shift the triangle across the board, spelling out—
YOU
Her hands lift, body stilling. Crap. My brows furrow as I continue to move the plastic device around the board, sensing her fear.
YOU ARE SAFE
She exhales loudly, a puff of white floating from between her mauve lips. I can’t help but imagine them against mine. “Wh-who are you?”
A howl comes from outside, and both our heads snap to the window. Jolie pops out of her chair and rushes over to it. I scoot out of the way, watching her intently. Does she think it’s me?
I can’t tell if she’s more scared or curious. Curiosity I can work with. Fear won’t do. I’ve observed enough seasons to know that far too many people rely on fear to get what they want. I never will. Not when it comes to my mate. But you better believe if her prince comes back here, I won’t hesitate to scare him off. Even the thought of it has me giddy. There’s only so much torture a harbinger can take.
“Maybe it’s the wind,” Jolie mutters, as if reassuring herself. Her gaze cuts back to the board where the circle encases the letter J . “This is crazy.”
I quickly swipe the triangle across the board to NO . Once she sits down again and I know I have her attention, I carry it over each letter to answer her question. She says each one aloud, her brows scrunched together.
“J – A – X.”
I halt my movements and wait.
Just say it. Please. I’m fucking begging.
“Jax?”
Frost blasts from my lips, and the Ouija board flies across the room, cracking in half against the wall.
“Oh my god!” she said, cowering.
I swirl some snowflakes in the air, hoping it’ll ease her mind. Her gaze darts around, following them, and she bites her bottom lip.
Shit. I couldn’t help myself, though. While my full name is Jaxon, the idea of her calling me Jax, like I’m something close to her, someone close to her, does something to me. Her pulse flutters within my rib cage, and it gets me all the more excited at the prospect that she could believe in me.
See me.
Want me.
I sigh in relief when her shoulders relax. Her pulse slows. Taking a pen in her hand, she writes my name in big letters across the next page of her journal.
My heart twists in my chest. The sensation is painful and equally glorious. It’s everything. Every-fucking-thing. If only she could see me.
I imagine floating with her on the breeze, dancing with her. Claiming her. Then the only invisible forces between us would be the bond and our love. Not this veil hiding me in plain sight. I’d take her into my arms and love her beyond this world, beyond time, beyond a fickle fate that keeps her away from me.
There has to be a way. There just has to. Maybe they’ll make an exception for us since my mate is mortal? I haven’t gone back since winter started. We aren’t really supposed to…but I’m desperate. Anything has to be better than this agony.
My fingers brush the skin on the back of her hand, and she drops the pen, eyes following the white flecks drifting toward her windowpane. With another breath, I cover the glass, scrawling my name with snow.
She stands from the chair and slowly approaches my message. Her delicate fingers trail the frost, and every stroke of them against my magic is as if she were touching me directly. My body hums under the attention, and I will my excitement to get ahold of itself. She knows my name. That I’m here for her and she’s safe. I’m so close to reaching her.
Her eyes dare a glance at the cracked board and her face falls.
No.
Retreating quickly from the window, she fumbles behind herself, grabbing her phone and bringing it to her ear. I move in front of her, waiting for her to see me. To acknowledge me. To find me.
Us.
But she continues to stare right through me, at Jax Frost spanning the window at my back. “Dr. Tanner, I know I’m only supposed to use this number in case of emergencies. But this is an emergency. I think I’m…seeing things.”
She goes silent, and I’m too focused on the strain in her jaw to eavesdrop on whatever the feminine voice on the other line is saying.
“No. I don’t think I’m a harm to myself or anyone else.”
My brows scrunch together and I clench my fists. I’d freeze the world before she could anyway. No harm comes to my mate. Not ever. I’d trade my immortality before that would ever happen.
“Okay. I’ll be there at 12:30. Thank you.”
She hangs up, phone shaking in her hands as she backs away and climbs into the bed, pulling the covers around her. Her breaths release in shallow pants. I follow her, halting by her bedside table, hating to see her fear. Fear over me .
White puffs slip in the space between us. When she sees them, her panic only grows, and a tear streaks her cheek. It crushes something inside me, and I transport myself to the park and shift, my paws crunching against the grass.
And then I run.
And run.
But no matter how far or how fast my feet carry me, I can’t outrun the fear that thrums in my chest…and the painful realization that comes with it.
Convincing Jolie I’m real might be the worst fate I can give her.