Warmth from my exaggerated breathing fanned across my face. I couldn’t stay pressed against the bathroom door forever and hope to solve the mysteries surrounding me and my sisters.
Also, I was hungry. Really hungry, as in the left side of my stomach was gnawing on the right side. Pangs emanating from my belly made me wince. But it wasn’t hunger for food that motivated me to turn the door handle; it was the more personal, more intimate part of my legacy.
I had been blessed—or cursed—by a phenomenon known as the Demesne. Passing through generations of my mother’s side of the family in an endless, uncuttable ribbon of connection, the Demesne was like fated mates, but for witches. The force of it arising had sent me and Laszlo to our knees within moments of our first encounter. We later learned the same instantaneous attraction had happened when my aunt met her lover, Alabastair. And decades earlier between my mother and father.
It was the lure of my mate and the primal need to satisfy the Demesne’s imperative that I connect with Laszlo physically—and soon—that made me squeeze the handle and tug open the door.
My demon was waiting for me in the narrow, carpeted foyer. The mirror on the sliding door of the closet opposite the bathroom reflected his muscular backside. I hugged his waist and admired the view. A thick braid of silvery white hair hung to his lower back. Over a wrinkled white shirt, a black leather vest sculpted his midsection. He’d left the vest’s lacings loose and tucked his tuxedo pants into scuffed combat boots. Though I couldn’t see his weapons, I knew they were hidden in the pockets and pleats of his masculine finery.
“Are you okay?” he asked, nuzzling the top of my head and gently enfolding me into the cool expanse of his chest. Laszlo’s parents were fire demons. He’d become an ice demon at his mother’s behest. Considering his mother was Queen of the Reformed Realm, I assumed he hadn’t been given much of a choice.
Experiencing the Demesne with me was yet another life-altering event forced upon him. Though he was being very gentlemanly about the change to his relationship status, we had to talk. I loosened my hold, lifted my heels, and reached up. The reassuring comfort of his horns filled my grasp. Solid and slightly cooler than his skin, they nestled snugly against the sides of his head and were partially covered by his abundant hair.
“I’m starving,” I said.
“We can have dinner here in town or at my home in my quarters realmside, or anywhere in the world you’d like, Clementine. Paris. Santiago. St. Petersburg.” He kissed the top of my head and slid his hands to my shoulders.
“I should check in with Beryl and Alderose. We were supposed to have dinner together. All of us.” Was it too soon to confess to Laszlo that, now that he had his arms around me, I wanted more of exactly this?
“Let me text my brother,” he said, keeping one strong arm curled around my shoulders. I rested the side of my head on his chest and listened to the steady beat of his heart. “He says they’re all exhausted and plan to order room service. We’re invited to join them.”
“Can you ask him to let Beryl and Alderose know I’ll…I’ll text them in the morning?” Maybe food and rest and time apart would be good for us all.
“Sure. Do you have much to pack, if we decide to head out of town?”
“No.” I pointed to the small rolling suitcase he’d retrieved from the other room, the one Beryl rented on Friday night. “Everything’s in there. I think. Let me check.” I popped the suitcase onto the luggage rack. Inside, the few clothes I’d brought were in a jumble. I unzipped the toiletry bag. Toothbrush, toothpaste, all the essentials. At the sight of the tube of my mother’s magical mascara, I knew I had to have more of her belongings with me: her shop coat, her favorite pair of scissors, and a snippet of the spelled threads guarding the entryway to Needles and Sins.
Laszlo rubbed the back of my neck. The ease of touch between us continued to surprise me. “There’s someone your aunt wants you to meet.”
Bouncing my forehead against the center of his chest, I murmured a reluctant “Okay” and turned to meet our mystery guest.
Light from a single table lamp topped with a bell-shaped shade infused the room. I blinked. A stranger was seated on the end of the single bed closest to the curtained window. My aunt sat diagonal from the young woman in one of the low-backed upholstered chairs. She had her hand on the stranger’s knee.
Laszlo guided me into the stuffy room. Gray, wispy bits clinging to the visitor made me wonder if she was a water mage, like the one I had met over the weekend. But something about her subdued demeanor swept that notion away. She was definitely a Magical, but she didn’t exude the palpable power of a mage.
I sat near her, on the edge of the other narrow bed, and extended my hand. “I’m Clementine Brodeur.”
“Pleased ta meet yeh, Clementine. My name is Fentress. Most folk call me Fen.”
Her touch was a cool, ephemeral invitation to give in to the pull of an invisible undertow. I found the sensation unsettling.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, drawing my hand away.
Fen shrank into her thick, felted loden green coat and woolen leggings. “Your mother was the one who saved me.”
One of my mother’s magic-imbued threads floated near the crown of Fen’s nut-brown cloche. I reached into whatever accompanied Fen’s delicate touch.
Warning.
DEMON LINES is available on Amazon
