“What earlier question?” she asked, deliberately not sitting.
Nothing good was going to come of that.
“Your magic, Tabitha,” he said. “How did you know what was wrong with that music box?”
His dark eyes were serious, compassionate even.
And the secret had been bubbling in her for so long…
She sighed and sat down after all, folding her hands in her lap.
“I’ve always been good at restoring old things,” she said. “But recently my abilities have been… improving.”
He stretched out on the bed, leaning his head back on his hands. Waiting for her to tell him more.
“I know it may seem impressive,” she continued. “But really I think there’s a logical explanation. I’ve spent so much time learning restoration. I’m sure I’m just remembering old case studies in the back of my mind, you know?”
“I do not know,” he said.
Truthfully, neither did she. The first time she and Sara had visited Helen Thayer, the older woman told them about some mystical event that had opened a nearby portal, releasing long lost magic back into their corner of the world. The thought had stuck in the back of her head since then, where she worried over it like a loose tooth, no matter how much she tried to ignore it.
Was it why her natural gifts had grown stronger?
Was it really magic - inside her?
She tried to puzzle it out, but it was too hard to concentrate with Tristan’s big warm body so close to hers.
He was so beautiful leaning back like that, showing off his bulging biceps, his expression indolent as a lion’s, except for those dancing dark eyes.
“Well, how did you know you had magic?” she countered, trying to keep her mind on the subject at hand.
“I’m fae royalty,” he said, raising an eyebrow. “Magic is like breathing to my kind.”
He studied her for a moment.
“Do you have any fae in you?” he asked.
She chuckled.
“What?”
“Is that like some kind of joke?” she asked. “Where I tell you no, and then you ask if I’d like some?”
He only looked more puzzled.
“Never mind,” she said.
“I was just thinking that some mortals have a trace of fae blood somewhere in their lineage,” he explained. “And it can often make them more receptive to magic. Perhaps this is the case with you.”
“Not that I know of,” she admitted.
He didn’t look convinced. Maybe he was right. How would she even know something like that? It wasn’t like it ever came up at family dinners.
“What about you?” she asked, looking for a way to steer the conversation away from herself and back to him. “Can you just do magic anytime you want? Because I sure can’t.”
He gave her a slow smile and extended his left hand out from behind his head in a closed fist.
She watched as his fingers slowly opened.
A warm amber glow radiated between his fingers.
The light formed into a tiny barn owl as his hand opened.
“Oh,” Tabitha breathed.
Before her eyes, the glowing owl took wing and sailed toward her, swerving at the last minute to soar toward the canopy of the bed and back down into Tristan’s hand where it melted into a ball of light once more.
He closed his hand slowly and opened it again and the light was gone.
“That was incredible,” she said.
He shrugged. “A parlor trick.”
“Where did it go?” she asked.
“Back inside me,” he said. “Unless I send it otherwise, all my magic comes back.”
“Your magic makes people happy,” she said.
“Yes,” he said. “Among other things.”
“You don’t seem happy,” she observed.
“I’m the conduit, not the recipient,” he said.
That wasn’t what she had hoped to learn, but he clearly didn’t want to say more. In fact, he didn’t seem to want to talk about himself at all.
He was observing her with a curious expression.
“When we met today,” he said. “Did you feel something?”
Okay. He was going there.
Tabitha gulped.
The thing was, Tabitha had never really wanted to talk feelings with a guy - any guy.
She’d dated a string of potential boyfriends, but she was never really serious about any of them.
In the beginning, she’d told herself that it was because she lived in a small town where everyone knew her family had money. It would be too hard to tell if that was the reason someone wanted to get serious. So if she never had a long-term boyfriend, she felt like she was on steady footing.
But over time, she discovered that no matter their reasons for staying single, most of her friends were pairing off.
Tabitha figured it was just the passage of time, and the ticking clock of biology. She waited for her turn to begin obsessively scheming about the trade-off between freedom and a family.
But it never came.
And that was just fine with her.
But now even Sara had a man.
Of course, Tabitha had also never felt her heart skip a beat - until this morning. She’d never felt anything even close to that.
Even now, fixed in his dark gaze, she was almost breathless.
She paused, not ready to admit her feelings.
But she also couldn’t look away from him.
Her phone rang, breaking the spell.
“What is that?” Tristan asked.
“It’s… a communication device,” she explained, swiping to pick up the call.
It was Sara, which was odd, because Sara never called, she always texted.
“What’s up?” Tabitha asked, turning away from Tristan, as if not looking at him would change what they had just been talking about.
“It’s one of the creatures,” Sara said, panting as if she were running while she talked. “The banshee.”
Sara and Dorian had been watching the shards of glass that let them see through the eyes of the escaped creatures. Sara must have recognized something from the one that showed the banshee’s viewpoint.
“Where is it?” Tabitha asked, already heading for the stairs. She’d read enough folklore about banshees to know they were serious trouble.
“It’s at the Barrel Grocery,” Sara said, sounding horrified.
“We’re on our way,” Tabitha assured her.
She could hear Tristan’s footsteps behind her on the stairs, and was more than a little surprised at how comforting she found the sound.
8
Tristan
Tristan followed the human girl down the dark staircase, wondering if he wouldn’t just follow her straight into the depths of hell if she asked him nicely.
The King of Light was accustomed to feeling bored. But when this woman was near, he was annoyingly alert, senses amped up, heart thundering.
This morning he had hoped that the flash of awareness he’d experienced looking in her eyes was just him coming back to himself after such a long slumber. Maybe the time spent frozen meant parts of him would awaken in fits and starts.
In his realm, his lust was satisfied regularly by a host of consorts. He seldom had an occasion for longing.