couldn’t see it because he was only looking at me. I tried to keep my focus on him, but I couldn’t. It was Chase’s room. He was trying to get my attention. The light stayed on, and his silhouette was in the window. He was watching me. My body tensed.
Alex leaned into me and kissed me again. I kissed him back, but my eyes stayed glued to the window. Glued to Chase.
Chapter 14
Who was I? I didn’t want to be the girl who thought about another guy while kissing her boyfriend. I forced my eyes away from Chase, which, surprisingly, was harder to do than pulling away from Alex.
“Sorry, I’m freezing.” I wrapped my arms around myself.
“No problem. Let’s get you inside.” He put his arm over my shoulder and kept me close as we walked inside.
My eyes rose to Chase’s window. His light was off, but I could sense he was still watching us. I laced my fingers through Alex’s. He walked me to my room and kissed me goodnight.
“I’ll come get you before breakfast.” He gently kissed me again.
I smiled and nodded before going in my room and shutting the door. I leaned my back against it and slid to the ground. I was out of control. I shouldn’t want anything more than Alex. He should’ve been enough. My teeth chattered again, so I got up and took my third hot shower of the day. Then I crawled into bed and pleaded with myself to only dream of Alex, but the second I closed my eyes, it was Chase’s face I saw.
I tossed and turned all night, afraid to let myself sleep long enough to dream. I actually set my alarm and repeatedly hit snooze so I would keep waking up. It was pure torture, but it was better than waking up to a room full of corpses. Or should I say half-full. We were running low on corpses these days.
Alex met me before breakfast, like we’d planned.
“Hey, did you have trouble sleeping? You look beat.”
“Thanks, that’s just what a girl wants to hear from the guy she’s dating.”
He laughed and kissed my cheek. “You look beautiful, but I can tell you didn’t sleep well.”
“I appreciate the little white lie. I woke up a lot. My alarm kept going off.” There, that wasn’t a lie.
“Is it broken? I could look at it for you.”
“No, that’s okay. I think I fixed it.” Yeah, I fixed it, when I finally shut it off.
We passed Chase in the hallway. “Sleep well?” he asked.
I wondered if he had any trouble sleeping. Probably not. “Fine.” I looped my arm through Alex’s as we walked past Chase.
Breakfast was louder than ever. No one could stop talking about the Ophi from Serpentarius coming today.
“What time are they getting here?”
“Are any of the guys cute?”
“Should I set some extra plates?”
“Whoa,” I said. I didn’t really know the details. Chase was the one who had convinced Mason and the others to come. I turned to Chase. “Tell us what you know.”
He downed his orange juice and leaned back in his chair. “Okay, Uncle Mason said they’d be here some time today. He had to close things up there. I’m sure he worked late last night, so I’m guessing they won’t be here before noon.”
Arianna nodded and got up from the table. “I’ll plan for a big lunch then. What are we taking about, number wise? I’ve made up all the beds to be on the safe side, but I need to know how much food to make and how many plates to set.”
Chase counted on his fingers. “There’s Uncle Mason, Aunt Carol, Thayer, Jared—”
“Jared?” I jumped at the name. I knew him. He was Matt’s cousin.
“Yeah, he’s a bouncer there.”
“I know. I used to date his cousin.”
Alex put his hand on my leg. He’d known Matt. They hadn’t gotten along, and Alex had ended up having to kill Matt after I turned him into a bunny-eating zombie, but he knew I had cared about him. He knew it wasn’t easy for me to talk about him. “You going to be okay with having him here?”
I nodded. “But I’m confused. How were they cousins? Matt is—was—human.”
“They weren’t really cousins.” Chase surprised me. I didn’t know he knew who Matt was.
“You knew Matt?”
“Yeah. I told you I used to hang out with humans a lot.” The way he said it made it sound like he and I had had some big heart to heart. I knew it was intended to make Alex suspicious. “Jared introduced us. Their parents were good friends, and Matt always called Jared’s father Uncle Thayer, so Matt assumed Jared was his cousin. They weren’t really related.”
I couldn’t help feeling jealous that Chase and so many other Ophi could be around humans and keep their powers under control. I wanted to change the subject. “So who else is coming?”
Chase eyed me for a second before rattling off five more names.
“All nine of them.” Arianna looked stressed. Sometimes I forgot that she used to work there and knew all of them. “I’ve got a lot of work to do this morning.”
“We’ll clean up after breakfast, and we can help with lunch, too,” I said.
“Oh, no you won’t. You all have more important things to be doing.” She turned and winked at Randy. “I heard someone has almost gotten the hang of summoning multiple souls. Wouldn’t it be impressive to show the other Ophi from Serpentarius when they arrive?”
Randy smiled and took another bite of his pancake. “That’s why I’m eating a little extra this morning. I want to have enough energy to get it right this time.”
I didn’t have the heart to tell him summoning the dead had nothing to do with food. He was so excited.
“I’m ready to get out there when you are, Randy.” I finished my coffee. I usually tried not to drink caffeine, but with the little sleep I got it was a necessity this morning.
“Just let me finish these first,” he said with his mouth full.
“Are you two training alone?” Alex asked, keeping his voice low.
“I think that would be best. Randy is really close to getting this right. I want to help him as much as possible.”
Alex nodded. “I’ll take Leticia and work on controlling souls after they’ve been raised. She’s getting better. I think in a few more days she’ll have it.”
“Take her to connect with Medusa before you go out. I think that will give her the confidence boost she needs.”
“Good idea.”
“Does this mean you and I aren’t going to work on joining our powers?” Chase was standing right behind me. I hadn’t even noticed he’d gotten up from his seat.
“Oh, um, yeah. Not today. Helping Randy is more important right now.”
Chase shook his head. “I doubt that. Uncle Mason is going to be pissed if he gets here and finds out we lied about our combined powers.”
I looked at Alex. He was trying to stay calm, I could tell. I also knew him well enough to know it was a struggle for him.
“We’ll tell Mason that it’s a power drain on me, and we had to slow down our training until my blood gets used to the connection.” I pulled that out of nowhere, but I thought it sounded pretty good.
Chase glared at me for a second before walking out of the dining room.
“Guess that means I’m stuck with him this morning,” Alex said.
“Sorry.”
“No, it’s fine. I’d rather have him where I can see him. I don’t trust him, and I don’t want him near you.”
