Could one of them dance right into someone’s dream, though? Anything was possible at this point. Not that it mattered-Azriel had warned me long before my dream. Delilah backed him up with her own assertions as well. The coincidence of it all was just too perfect. I needed to watch my back. Hadn’t the Shaede child tried to warn me too?
I felt dizzy just thinking about the skipping girl.
Stepping from pure sunlight, I became my solid self just inside the entrance to my apartment. Tyler sat at my table, working on a mammoth sandwich. He had a tendency to eat when he was worried, and he was chewing as if the damned thing were stuffed with nails rather than ham. I moved soundlessly across the hardwood floor, and he didn’t even flinch.
“Where’ve you been?” The casual tone he’d been going for failed miserably. In fact, his voice sported something altogether darker. Worry, party of one. “You didn’t call-”
“Because there was no reason for me to call.” I walked around the table, my hand trailing across the sculpted muscles of Tyler’s shoulders. He raised his hand to mine, his fingers pausing on the silver ring I wore on my thumb. He’d given it to me when I first met him. It was engraved with a bear, the protector-and his symbol. “I went to Xander’s. Trained with Raif. Nothing unusual. Relax.”
My short answers didn’t do much to assuage his overprotective attitude. He’d been on me like white on rice for weeks. I could handle the protectiveness. In fact, it came standard issue with Tyler’s Jinn nature. But for the past couple of weeks, that nature had grown from sweet to downright severe.
“I don’t like the way you smell when you’ve been there,” he said, setting down the sandwich as if it had a cockroach on it. “You smell like
“Him” being the High King.
“You know there’s nothing between Xander and me.” Tyler’s ego didn’t usually need this kind of stroking. What the hell was up with him lately?
“I’m not talking about Xander,” Tyler said.
Oookaaay. “Well, then, who the hell are you talking about?”
“Raif.”
My jaw dropped on rusty hinges, and it wasn’t closing anytime soon. Come again? Raif? I couldn’t even put my voice to the words of astonishment juggling around in my head. I mean-Raif? As in, like-a-brother-to-me Raif?
“You spend every day with him. Nights too.”
Come on, mouth-work, damn it. I cleared my throat only to get a brooding hazel-eyed stare in response. One more try gave my vocal cords the get-up-and-go they needed. “Ty, what the hell’s wrong with you? You
Tyler’s eyes lost a little of that hard edge, and he ran his fingers through his hair, making him look a good five years older. He sighed, flexing his arms as if his skin suddenly felt too tight. “I know,” he said, his gaze cast toward the floor. “Sometimes the bond can make me a little twitchy. Darian, this is new for me. Usually the bond doesn’t go hand in hand with romantic attachment. It’s stronger
Usually, Tyler was the most levelheaded person I knew. We’d been bound for years. In fact, Tyler had made the bond between us without my even knowing because he thought I’d shun his protection. Can you say overprotective? Aside from that, I didn’t know much about the effects of the bond. As my genie, Tyler had more or less made a commitment to grant my wishes (but only when it was something I truly needed) and protect me to the point that he’d sacrifice his own life to keep me safe. But beyond that, I hadn’t a clue how the bond affected him. He definitely wasn’t acting like himself. He’d been just as keyed up as I’d been lately. Maybe we both needed a few weeks of vacation.
“I don’t mind a little jealousy now and then,” I said, bringing his hand to my mouth so I could kiss each of his knuckles. “It’s a turn-on.” The spark returned to Tyler’s eyes, no longer flashing with anger but with passion. “But not when it comes to Raif.”
He brushed his thumb across my bottom lip, his eyes glued to my mouth. “Like I said, I’m a little twitchy. The bond just needs to settle a bit.”
We’d been bound for five years. Jesus, how long did it take to settle? I laid my cheek against his cool palm. “I like that you want me all to yourself.”
I left my chair and rounded the table to stand behind him, my hands kneading the tense muscles above his shoulder blades. “Ty, if I wanted to find someone, could I just wish for it?”
Tyler craned his neck around so he could look me in the eye, and he sat up a little straighter. “That depends on who you’re looking for and why.”
“Well,” I said, peering at him through lowered lashes, “let’s just say I want to find someone who isn’t human. Could you deliver her to me if I wished for it?”
I pulled a chair right next to his and sat, rubbing the tip of my nose along his cheek, rough with stubble. I inhaled and held the scent of him in my lungs. His warm, spicy aroma had a homey quality and reminded me of comfort and trust.
“First of all,” he said, his voice thick and husky, “if you don’t stop that, I’m going to have you-right here on the kitchen table. Secondly, what are you up to?”
I smiled and took his earlobe between my teeth before gently pulling away. He groaned, and the sound sent a pulse of excitement zinging through my veins.
I knew the rules for making wishes, more or less. Tyler had spelled them out for me when I’d first become aware that he’d bound himself to me. Wishes, just like everything in the natural world, were regulated and restricted-balanced. So wishing for a million dollars or world peace was out of the question. I could wish only for something I needed. Just wanting something wasn’t good enough to justify wish granting. I couldn’t wish the dead back to life, or the living to be dead. I couldn’t wish to change the natural order of things, so that secret desire of being able to shoot laser beams from my eyes was a definite no-go. And I could never wish to break the bonds of others, no matter what they might be. As far as our own bond was concerned, though Tyler had made the bond, only I could break it. He could choose to bind himself to another only three times in his life, and I had no idea if I was number one or three.
What I was about to wish for definitely fell under the “want” category. But someone I cared about needed it. So I thought maybe by virtue of the loophole, I’d get my wish. “It’s just a simple question of finding someone,” I said, building the framework for my request. “Can you do it if I ask?”
A curling strand of my strawberry blond hair drifted into my line of sight, and I huffed it away before fixing my gaze on Tyler’s face. I tried not to stare directly into his eyes. They’re gorgeous, and I sometimes lose myself entirely in the hazel orbs. What can I say; I’m a sucker for pretty eyes.
“Could you find a Shaede if I wished for it?”
“Maybe,” he answered slowly. “There might be extenuating circumstances that would prevent me from granting that wish.”
I leaned back in my chair and deposited my legs onto his lap. “Such as?”
He smiled, a good sign, and began to massage one of my calves. “Well, this particular Shaede might not want to be found. Or there could be magic stronger than mine protecting him or her. Also, is this something you need? Or just a passing whim?”
I raised a dubious brow.
“Who are you looking for, Darian?”
I sighed as I felt a tightening in my center that branched outward toward my limbs-the barest perception of the heavens shifting. The noon sun had reached its zenith, dipping lower into the sky. I pushed the sensation to the back of my mind and tried to focus on the matter at hand. How I hated unceasing time.
“I want to find Raif’s daughter.”
Tyler paused in midmassage, the dark shadow returning to his eyes for a fleeting moment before he shook it off. “Raif has already tried to find her, Darian. Unsuccessfully, I might add. Besides, didn’t he tell you she died?”
“Yes,” I murmured as he moved to my other calf, artfully rolling it in his palm. “But I think she’s still alive.
