Chapter One #2
Suddenly, all gazes are averted as an awkward silence falls.
I sigh.
“Fine,” Noah says abruptly. “Sam didn’t buy you breakfast. Caolan brought it for you.
He left a note too. I had to write it for him because the translation spell doesn’t work with written language.
” He holds up a folded piece of paper. It doesn’t escape me that Alistair and Andrew both watch that paper like it’s made of pure gold.
“I didn’t let any of these idiots see it, though. ”
I take the folded paper and stare at it for a long second before shoving it in my pants pocket. How is this my life?
Really. Is the magic testing me? Did I offend it somehow? I’ve always considered myself to be a good person. Hardworking. Dedicated to protecting and caring for the community. But I must have done something to piss off the magic for it to be putting me through this now.
It can’t be something I did in a past life—I’ve had a past life regression, and I know they say it’s the soul that’s eternal, not the personality, but my soul must be pretty damn stubborn, because I wasn’t that different in any of my past lives.
Dependable. Sensible. Or as some would put it, boring.
I’m okay with that. Boring people live longer and are less likely to have knife-wielding one-night stands burst into their place of work shrieking about being done wrong (*cough* Alistair *cough*).
I have my home, my interesting and hectic job, and a small group of people I know I can trust to be there, whether I need them or not.
My life was perfectly ordered, just the way I like it.
Until recently. Until portals between dimensions were opened for the first time in nine thousand years and the elves came through.
Well… one elf. Only one elf makes me want to hide under my desk and hope to go unnoticed.
Caolan of Ebenkreis.
It’s ridiculous. I’m a 463-year-old lauded combat sorcerer with a wide range of subspecialties, and a member of the most senior team in the Community of Species Government.
I answer only to the lucifer. People defer to me as a matter of course.
Some of them are even afraid of me—mostly the ones who’ve pissed me off in the past. Calm and dependable doesn’t mean I can’t wreak havoc when I want to.
But this one elf makes me want to flee in terror.
He claims to be in love with me .
Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that I don’t consider myself a loveable person.
I am. I’ve been in loving relationships before.
There’s no reason why someone shouldn’t fall in love with me.
But Caolan claims to have fallen in love the moment he saw me.
That just doesn’t happen. People who “fall in love” that quickly fall right back out just as quickly when the shine wears off—believe me, I have experience being a no-longer-shiny subject of “love.” But in the meantime, Caolan declared in front of my boss and colleagues—some of whom will never let me forget it—that I’m the most beautiful creature he’s ever seen.
He stares at me all the time , and even though I’ve known him less than two days, on three separate occasions he’s dropped to one knee to tell me he worships at the altar of my glory.
What the fuck does that even mean?
And I guess now he’s bringing me gifts.
The whole situation is made tougher because my friends are delighted by it all and are actively encouraging him.
Just to put that in context, we have Alistair and Elinor, who are hellhounds—need I say more?
—Andrew, a vampire born in the middle ages who would fit right in at a college frat party, Sam, a hopeless romantic whose intimidating boyfriend, Gideon, tries to make sure he gets everything he wants, and Noah, a twenty-year-old human who wants to learn more about elven dating rituals and is sacrificing me to further his education.
Oh, and did I forget to mention my boss and longtime friend, Percy, the lucifer?
Officially, he told Caolan there could be no relationship between us because we’re ambassadors for our respective peoples, but he seems to be constantly coming up with reasons for me to meet with Caolan, or for Caolan to be invited to meetings he really doesn’t need to be at.
It’s all a bit suspicious.
But the worst part? The absolute worst part?
At first glance, Caolan ticks all my boxes. Even the ones I didn’t know I had.
So you can see why this is a disaster, right?
How am I supposed to organize and oversee the migration of his people to Earth and do my bit to prevent Tish and éibhear (our supervillains du jour) from taking over the world and keep the whole thing secret from the humans if I’m all distracted by my hormones?
It can’t be done.
Wait, wait… I was wrong. That wasn’t the worst part. The worst part?
Elves don’t keep time.
I’m the kind of guy whose daily planner is neatly filled out in fifteen-minute blocks. I keep a regular schedule for all things in my life. If you’re organized, it’s easier to deal with emergencies when they crop up.
Elves, on the other hand, break the day up into six parts: morning, midday, afternoon, early night, midnight, and late night.
How can anyone keep a reasonable schedule when you can’t set appointment times?
In less than two days, Caolan and the two other elves who are already here have been late for meetings nearly a dozen times.
It’s doing my head in. In fact, on my to-do list for later today is a trip to a department store so I can buy them all watches.
That might be the only way to save my sanity.
“David?”
I snap back to the present and meet Noah’s questioning gaze.
“Why did Caolan bring me coffee and toast?” If you were suddenly living in another dimension that you had very little familiarity with, would you know that coffee (or its interdimensional equivalent) is the perfect gift?
Wait, that doesn’t make sense.
I pick up the cup and sip. I need more coffee.
“Because he wanted you to have a hearty breakfast?” Andrew suggests with that wicked gleam in his eye that he gets when he’s causing trouble.
“Because he’s courting you!” Alistair sounds far too delighted by that fact.
“Uh-huh. But why specifically coffee—a double-shot latte, my favorite—and fruit toast, which I also love? How did he know to get those items? And where to get them from? And where did he get the money to buy them?”
The treacherous bastards say nothing. Andrew looks up at the ceiling. Ellie looks at her nails. Alistair widens his eyes as much as he can, looking not so much innocent as deranged.
“Don’t be so suspicious, David,” Sam says, sounding so guilty that I’m surprised he’s not shrieking a confession. “Maybe he cast a spell or something.”
“A spell that creates money?” I challenge.
“That’d be a neat trick,” Gideon mutters, and it’s such a ridiculous thing to hear from a scion of one of the wealthiest families in the community that we all turn to look at him.
“Is having so much money that you could literally use it as toilet paper and still never run out not enough for you?” Andrew asks. Gideon flips him the bird.
“Don’t try to distract David,” he says. “He asked you some questions.”
“Traitor!” Alistair gasps. “How could you throw us under the bus like that?”
“That was kind of a douche thing to do,” Sam tells his boyfriend. “I mean, I still love you, but I’m seriously reconsidering what secrets to tell you.”
“You’ve already told me all your secrets. And David’s smart enough to already know the answers to those questions. All I did was skip us past the part where we pretend to be innocent and deny everything.” He straightens Sam’s stapler.
“Okay,” I interject, because this could go on for a long time.
“Let’s pretend I spent fifteen minutes—which none of us has to spare today—wheedling the truth out of you.
” Giving in to the demands of my stomach, I rip open the paper bag containing the fruit toast and take a huge bite from one piece.
Fuck me, nothing’s better than that. I close my eyes to savor the taste and hold back a moan.
“Did we stay strong until the end?” Alistair asks. “What finally broke us?”
“And more importantly, do you want some time alone with that toast? Fuck, David, we need to get you laid.”
I open my eyes and glare at Andrew. He smirks back.
“Isn’t that what we’re doing?” Noah demands impatiently. “Stop being an asshat, Andrew, so we can convince David this is a good thing.”
“Yeah, Andrew, stop being an asshat,” Alistair chimes in, switching sides instantly. “You’re David’s best friend forever. That means you have to be nice to him while you’re manipulating his life for his own good.”
Sam swivels in his chair and squints at Alistair. “It concerns me greatly that you think it’s the job of a BFF to manipulate lives.”
Alistair rolls his eyes. “And yet you had no problem suggesting that Caolan buy David breakfast,” he counters.
I switch my focus to Sam. “Oh, Sam.” I shake my head.
Truthfully, I’m enjoying this toast too much to be truly upset.
I mean, convincing Caolan that I’m not his one true love or whatever will be harder if my friends are encouraging him, but it’s tough to be mad at them for telling him to bring me toast and coffee.
“At least this way you get to eat,” Sam counters. “It’s not good for you to be skipping breakfast.”
Uh-oh.
“I don’t skip breakfast.” I shove the rest of the piece of toast in my mouth, just in case he takes that as a challenge and confiscates my food.
Elinor laughs outright. “Do you seriously think we don’t know you’ve been sleeping in Percy’s office?”
Crap. Do they actually know, or are they guessing?
“Don’t be ridiculous.” I wave my hand as though the very thought is absurd. “I have a very comfortable bed at home. Why would I sleep in Percy’s office?”
Six disbelieving gazes fix on me.