Microwavable dinners.Why am I not surprised?Though, perhaps that was safer than whatever would happen if sheactuallyattempted to cook something.
“But,” she continued, turning back to me, “I do have chips. And fresh fruit. And since the fridge is probably connected to the same power source that’s currently on the fritz thanks to the storm, it’s all going to go bad soon, so we might as well eat it so I don’t feel like I wasted my money.”
I studied her for a moment, taking in the sincerity in her expression, and decided, for once, not to comment on the state of her kitchen or her electrical situation. She didn’t need another lecture from me tonight, especially when she was trying to do something nice.
I cleared my throat, forcing something that resembled a polite smile, though for once, I wasn’t entirely sure it was fake. “Chips and fruit sound great,” I replied.
She smiled. “Chips and fruit it is.”
Chapter 5: Kara
IT WAS ONE THING to consider the idea of Octavius being in my house, but it was another thing entirely for him to actuallybehere. Not just here, but staying the night like some impromptu slumber party.
The minute he stepped through that door, I should have told him to leave, a demand that probably would have been ignored, but one I should have insisted on anyway. Because him being here—a shifter in a very human home—would only raise alarm bells. You know, the exact thing I was desperately trying to avoid. Keeping my head down, blending in, not letting anyone see too much of me.
But when I saw it was Octavius bursting through my door, there had been a flicker of relief, because for a split second, I had been convinced it was Zavier or one of his goons coming to drag me back to that hellhole of a den.
The fear had come rushing back the moment I ever so gracefully began to free fall from the ladder, right up until Octavius caught me. And just like that, there was relief again. Not just from not cracking my head open on the floor, but from what he had taken from me, what his tentacles had clearly absorbed as they wrapped around my body, pulling that fear away.
Which meant he had to have felt it how bad that fear was. And I could only hope he had chalked it up to my near-fatal fall, not the past I was desperatelytrying to escape.
The way his tentacles had felt, though... magic or not, there had been something steady and grounding in the way they held me, strong enough to quiet everything else, even if only for a second.
I swallowed hard and pushed the thought away, refusing to linger on how that feeling had stayed with me, shifting into something that had nothing to do with fear anymore.
Instead, I handed him a bag of chips like that somehow made this normal. He took them without comment, settling in with that same quiet, controlled presence he seemed to carry everywhere.
I grabbed the fruit because I needed something to distract me, something that wasn’t retreating back into my fear of Zavier or my very obvious attraction to the shifter in my living room. I couldn’t risk giving myself away by staring at him too long or noticing how the dampness from the rain clung to his shirt in a way that made it completely unfair to my ability to focus on literally anything else.
Thinking about him was a better option than thinking about Zavier though, and even better than addressing the anxiety creeping in as I held my poker face steady. I still needed to pass as a sea sprite with too much diluted blood in her veins, the perfect excuse for why I was the way I was.
Anything but the truth.
Even though I tried to stay calm, my mind wouldn’t settle. If I told myself I was fine, could he still feel the truth? The nerves under my skin? Or worse, could he feel where my thoughts kept drifting when it came to him? Or did that only happen when he touched me?
I shifted where I stood, biting into a slice of apple just to give myself something to do. Outside, the storm picked up again, thundercracking as rain slammed against the walls hard enough to make the whole place groan. I flinched, but almost welcomed it, because at least this fear made sense. I could only hope that if he sensed anything from me, he’d attribute it to the storm.
“Are you all right?” Octavius asked.
“Yeah,” I said quickly, a little too quickly. “I just... I don’t do well in storms.”
Which wasn’t exactly a lie, and honestly, another reason why my late-night, very questionable home repair attempt had been a blessing in disguise. It had been a distraction, something to focus on that kept the fear at bay. But now there was nothing to distract me except the handsome shifter in my home, and that was the sort of distraction and tension I absolutely did not need.
“What do you usually do?” he asked. “To get through it.”
