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with the intention of waking him up, but she held back.
He needed his sleep as much as she did and her instincts told her that tonight might be even more difficult than the previous night. The fae acting behind Axton was working fast on his behalf. Who knew what the pair would throw at them as the evening marched on.
More than once, she wondered if Margetta might be the fae, the one who’d created the Invictus. Her bid to take over the Nine Realms wasn’t over and her army was always looking for wraiths to subvert. What if she’d discovered the existence of the Ashleaf Colony and wanted the pure-bloods for her army of vile wraith-pairs?
When her brain finally cleared and her thoughts made sense, she rose quietly, showered, and dressed for the night in jeans and a purple, tank top. After all that she’d been through, she didn’t really want to be in a gown or even in her favorite long skirt.
She padded barefoot across the rope bridge toward the main treehouse. The waning sunlight bothered her a little and would definitely blister Malik given his extreme vampire sensitivity to the sun. But her faeness wasn’t quite as affected and the short distance made it tolerable.
Right now, however, she wished she had a spell that could counteract the effect for Malik’s sake.
When she reached her living room, she almost wept with relief. Her home looked perfectly restored and a bowl of fresh fruit sat on the counter with a note propped up beside it.
She opened the folded paper, and her eyes blurred with tears. Hank basically said that a couple of minor things needed to be taken care of, but otherwise her home was good to go.
Her spell had blocked all the noise, and by the looks of the repairs, Hank’s crew would have made a serious racket for hours on end.
She slid the bowl across the counter and started working on a wonderfully ripe pineapple. A nice fruit salad would be exactly what was needed. Perhaps some eggs. Maybe a frittata.
And coffee. Definitely, coffee.
She spent the next half hour pulling ingredients together, including cutting thick slices off a slab of bacon. She set the table for two.
The scene was so homey that a fluttering started in her stomach and kept ranging northward to her heart. Between having found herself several times cradled in Malik’s arms during the night, and seeing a table set for two, the solitary nature of her existence rode down on her like a heavy, autumn rain.
She had to sit down for a moment. Not once had she ever regretted her decision to become the wraith colony’s Protector. And she didn’t even feel any regret right now.
But during this short time with Malik, she was left with deep longings she couldn’t easily set aside.
Maybe she’d been flippant last night — a state induced by the fact that she’d imbibed almost two beers in a very short period of time — when she’d asked Malik to bond with her. But right now, she swore that if he suggested it, she’d say yes.
The bacon sizzling in the pan called to her, and she returned to flip the strips again. The frittata was almost done as well.
She thought about returning to the bedroom treehouse to wake Malik up, but right then he called out that he’d join her shortly. She loved the sound of his deep male voice in her home.
The evening twilight had disappeared and full-dark now covered the forest, but her flexible fae vision began adjusting so that the woods always looked as though bathed in a soft golden glow.
How she loved her home and her world.
The night-birds, peculiar to the Nine Realms, had begun chattering as well, streaking from branch to branch, diving down to the stream to drink and to bathe. From the kitchen window, she could see down into the stream and that an entire group of sparrows splashed in shallow eddies, tending their feathers.
“Hey.”
Malik’s rich, masculine voice brought her turning away from the sink and the window.
She’d meant to greet him as well, but dammit if she didn’t forget how handsome he was. And this time, with the apparent intention of supporting her journey through a domestic-bliss fantasy, the man helped her along by wearing jeans, a snug black t-shirt that accented his incredible body, and like her, he was barefoot.
She knew her lips were parted as she unabashedly checked him out. And she truly had meant to offer a greeting, but her mind couldn’t seem to force the words from her throat.
His smile broadened. “You look beautiful.”
“So do you,” she gushed. “And you look great in jeans.” That’s when her cheeks heated up. She felt like a schoolgirl with a crush. “Uh, coffee?”
“Love some.”
She poured him a large mug, which he took then sipped with his gaze fixed on her. And that’s when his rich forest-like scent, like leaves in the fall burrowing into the earth to replenish the land, swept over her.
She turned the flame off beneath the bacon and pivoted in his direction.
