Chapter 5 #2
“Oh no. No way.” Dee scooted to the edge of the couch and held up a finger. “One: You didn’t screw anything up. You didn’t lie about your identity; he didn’t connect the dots. That’s on him. Two: If you feel that strongly about him, why don’t you dig up that bone and put it where it belongs?”
“Right. Let me hunt down a man who doesn’t want anything to do with me and grovel for acceptance.” Her body shuddered from simply saying the words. “That would go against my very nature. Besides, I don’t have his number.”
“Suffering centaurs, Lil. You have got to get better at checking your messages. Where’s your phone?” Eve shot to her feet and grabbed the device from the kitchen counter before shoving it toward her. “I’ve been texting and calling for a day and a half. He came back for you.”
“What?” Her heart slingshotted into her throat, and her mouth hung open, her grip on the phone so light, the device slipped into her lap. The sapling Venus’s seed had become grew into a flower of hope, its petals fluttering against her ribs as it bloomed.
Lilith swiped open her message app and read the thread from her friend. “He wants to apologize?”
Eve pulled a bar napkin from her pocket and offered it to her. “He left his number with the topside barista Thursday morning. I called you the second I found out.”
Her hand trembled as she reached for the napkin. Why in Lucifer’s name was her body reacting this way? Her breath caught at the sight of Spencer’s handwriting, his name neat and small, his number slightly larger, and the words I want to apologize. Please call me. written at the bottom.
“Well?” If Dee scooted any farther forward, her ass would be on the floor. “Aren’t you going to call him?”
Lilith folded the napkin in half and swallowed the strange thickness that had formed in her throat. “I don’t know.”
“What do you mean you don’t know? You like him, right?” Deirdre asked.
“From the half-hour conversation I had with him, yes. But can you really get to know someone in thirty minutes? Maybe I should leave it be.”
Eve growled low in her throat. “I love you, Lil, but right now, I’d like to smack you. Tell me… Did you feel a spark when you met him? An electricity in your chest that intensified when you touched?”
“Well, yes.” The remnants of the magic still rippled slightly beneath her skin.
“Have you ever felt anything like that before?”
“No.” Not that she could recall, but she’d been around for millennia. She could have forgotten.
Eve slapped her palm on the arm of the sofa. “He’s your soulmate. That was your body’s way of telling you, so your mind didn’t get in the way of fate.”
Lilith pressed her lips into a hard line.
Her friends knew what she thought about the soulmate concept, yet they insisted on pushing the idea.
She wanted to be annoyed, to snap back with a salty remark, but that damn hope flower had grown so big that her chest felt like it was stuffed with cotton.
No, cotton candy. The feeling was way too sweet.
“Do you really think it’s possible? That after all these millennia, fate decided it’s my turn?”
“Definitely.” Deirdre nodded emphatically. “I never thought it would happen to me, and Azrael…he’s been around as long as you, right? If it can happen for the Angel of Death, why not for the Queen of the Night?”
“Venus is never wrong when it comes to matters of the heart,” Eve said.
Could it be true? Sweet Persephone, why did she so badly want it to be? “If we’re soulmates, why did he walk out on me?”
“Remember what I said about your mind getting in the way of fate?” Eve asked. “Sounds like that’s what happened to him. Fate may have deemed you a match, but it’s never easy.”
Dee laughed. “No kidding. You both have to get out of your own ways and let it happen. Stop fighting it.”
Stop fighting. She could do that. If it meant saving Esther’s existence, she would do whatever it took. What other choice did she have? Before she could change her mind, she dove head-first into the soulmate concept and dialed Spencer’s number. It went straight to voicemail.
“Devil damn it. He’s out of the country filming a show.
” She dropped her phone on the coffee table and bit her lip.
She’d waited too long. If she hadn’t been wallowing in self-pity and had checked her fucking messages, she could have seen him before he left.
“Who knows how long he’ll be gone? Esther could be dead by the time he gets back. ”
“Do you know where he is?” Dee asked.
“He said he was going to Costa Rica. We didn’t have time to discuss exactly what they were looking for. He could be anywhere in the country.”
Eve grinned slyly. “You know Venus can find anyone when soulmates are involved.”
Her sluggish pulse kicked into as close to a sprint as was vampirically possible. “You’re right. She can.”
“And you’ve got an all-access pass to come and go from The Underworld to anywhere in the world.”
Lilith smiled so big, her cheeks ached, and she shot to her feet. “If you’ll excuse me, ladies, I need to pay the Goddess of Love a visit. I’m going to get my man.”