Page 39 of Somnium

Perfect. Now she was comparing parts of him to food. Not good. Definitely not good.

His eyebrows lifted, and Cadi realized that she was still staring, and he was still waiting for her answer. Sucking in a breath, she tried her best to remember the basic elements of sentence structure and conversation.

“It feels great,” she said, the corners of her mouth tipping up. “Though I think it would have been easier if Polly hadn’t been so nice.”

Elias let out a soft laugh, his gaze lowering to the ground between them. “Yeah, she’s always been that way. She has a real talent for getting people to say yes to things just because they don’t want to disappoint her.”

Cadi perked up. “You knew her?”

Elias nodded, lifting his gaze to hers, which forced her to focus hard to keep from melting. “Our paths crossed. It never made sense to me how someone with such a pure heart could get pulled so deep into an organization like that.”

She had never thought about the fact that Elias likely knew many of the members populating the higher ranks of the Order. After all, he had been part of it for … well, come to think of it, she had no idea how long he had been involved with the sect.

Cadi opened her mouth to ask one of the million questions dancing on the tip of her tongue, only for them to be wiped away when the door to the bar swung open. Music poured from the venue as a group of inebriated mythics stumbled onto the sidewalk.

Elias twisted to watch them, and Cadi found her eyes drawn to the same neck muscles that had plagued her thoughts only moments ago, caught in the hypnotic way they shifted beneath his skin. He turned back, and she quickly fixed an innocent smile to her face.

“I suppose we better head back in,” she said, “I feel bad that we left Sera all by herself in there.”

Elias chuckled, shaking his head. “When I left, she was making eyes at a group of sirens. She may regret her choices later, but I wouldn’t worry too much about her feeling ditched.”

Cadi’s heart seemed to take on a mind of its own at that unsolicited bit of intel, but she cleared her throat, forcing the organ to settle itself back into place. So they weren’t together, and it would appear that Elias may not have the right setup to be Sera’s type anyway. But that didn’t change anything. And Cadi knew better than to believe that it did.

“Well, in that case, we should save her from a watery demise,” she said.

Elias let out a full laugh, the sound nearly taking her out at the knees as he pushed off the wall and gestured for her to lead the way. He fell into step next to her, the healthy distance doing nothing to ease the charged air that brushed against Cadi’s skin as they walked together back toward the bar.

12

CHAPTER TWELVE

CADI

Cadi reached for the door, but a low grunt beside her made her pause. She turned to find Elias staring down at her, a single eyebrow raised.

Message received.

Rolling her eyes, she took a step back and held up her hands in resignation. He flashed her a satisfied smirk as he stepped forward to pull the door open, revealing the bustling interior.

Cadi crossed her arms, the urge to be irritatingly obstinate overwhelming her desire to rescue Sera from her choices.

“Am I allowed to go inside now?” she asked, blinking up at him innocently.

Elias huffed out a laugh, shifting to rest his forearm above his head. His tongue darted across his lips in a tiny movement that nearly made Cadi’s brain short-circuit as he leaned forward with a crooked grin. “Get in the bar, Kismet.”

It had never been so difficult for her to hide a reaction as it was in that moment. The gentle command in his voice nearly had her withering onto the sidewalk, but instead, she schooled her face into a look of boredom, making sure to shrug as she stepped past him.

Somehow the bar felt even more crowded than when she’d left, and she had to push up onto her toes to have any hope of finding Sera. Elias quickly reappeared at her side, bending down to shout over the booming music, “When I left, she was headed toward the pool tables.”

Cadi nodded, trying hard not to think about how close his face was to hers. Friends. Friends. Friends.

But her thoughts dissolved into nothing more than static when Elias pressed his palm against her back, and the strange fluttering sensation stirred in her chest again as he guided her forward into the crowd. He cut a path for them with ease, navigating the mess of tables, chairs, and shoulders while Cadi was doing everything in her power not to trip over her own feet.

There was no way this many people didn’t violate the fire code.

Just as they skirted around a large group hovering at the edge of the dance floor, a bleary-eyed manticore lumbered into their path, and Cadi had to stumble backward to avoid being smacked in the face by its wildly swinging tail.

Elias’s hands wrapped around her shoulders, pulling her back flush with his chest to keep her steady as the mythic passed. The heat from his body soaked through her shirt, stirring up all sorts of unwelcome, yet not entirely unpleasant thoughts.