He’s teasing. I can see it in the mischievous glimmer in his eyes, but my cheeks flame even as I chuckle.
“We got it,” Lukan assures the group. “I was very thorough.”
I try to cover my scorched face but Roan grabs my wrist and tugs me into his lap.
“You have to watch your holes around Kellen. He likes putting weird stuff up there,” he informs me with Kellen raising the corner of his mouth in a filthy smirk.
“Complaining?”
The tips of Roan’s ears go red and he looks away.
For me, the interaction raises a bunch of new questions. Questions I’m not sure I know how to ask.
“I’d like to know where they came from. The candy canes,” I ask instead. “Did you have them in your pocket?”
Kellen only smirks like that’s a secret he’s taking to the grave with him. Instead, he reaches for the mug on the end table and passes it to me.
“Drink your tea, little one.”
I snort but accept the offering. The spicy scent fills my nostrils with a familiar calm that has me cradling the steaming cup to my nose.
“I love this tea.” I relent when Roan tugs me back against his chest. “Can’t believe Aunt Laura liked the same one.” I take a tentative sip. Let the scalding liquid burn across my tongue and down my throat. “So good.”
“Drink,” Roan coaxes in my ear. In my hair. He nuzzles the side of my neck. “All of it, baby.”
I obey and take another deeper pull.
“What are you guys doing with these books?” I ask, muscles soft and lax. Head warm with contentment. “I really don’t think you should touch them.”
Lukan bends at the waist and brushes a kiss to the top of my head. “Don’t worry, sweetheart. We’re going to burn them.”
I take a deep breath and feel my eyelids droop.
“Don’t want you possessed,” I slur, suddenly so tired. “Jenna won’t...” I forget what I was going to say until Kellen slides one book on top of another to stack them. “I marked those. Jenna will kill me...”
“No one will touch you,” Roan promises softly.
“These books don’t belong in the hands of mortals,” Kellen explains, and I giggle.
“Mortals. Malicuri. Evil books. You’re all kinds of biblical today.”
He smiles fondly the way one would smile at a child. “Finish your drink, love.”
It takes me a second to find the rim with my lips and only with Roan’s help.
The perfect bite of ginger and turmeric slides across my tongue. It rolls smoothly down my throat and straight to my head. It floods my already fuzzy brain in a warm cocoon of such sweet bliss.
“This is so good,” I breathe, staring into the shiny surface.
I don’t remember glitter. The faint glimmer across the surface. I don’t remember it being so thick. But I can’t stop myself from taking another longer, deeper pull and moaning as the rush sweeps down my limbs. Pools in my belly. A sensation of being so full and empty at the same time.
“What is this?” I slur.
Hands come out of nowhere and catches the mug when it slips sideways between my fingers. It’s so quick. In between blinks.
Mug.
No mug.
