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“No,” I responded, forcing those thoughts out of my head. They had no place divulging into now. Last night, I had wanted to see him, but I had found resolve in why I couldn’t and had even thought of it after I had woken up. “Did you not bring yourself back?”
“I. Did. Not,” was his reply.
How did that make any sense at all? Not that I wasn’t glad to see Kipp, but he had left me…for whatever reason that I still intended to find out, but first…“Why would that be?” I asked Gretchen.
When she stared blankly at me since, of course, she couldn’t hear Kipp, I huffed. “Oh, right. Sorry ‘bout that. How would Kipp come back here if he didn’t want it and we didn’t bring him?”
With a furrow to her brow, she scanned over the spot where Kipp stood next to me. “I haven’t a clue.” She took a seat on the edge of the bed and shrugged. “Honestly, I’m stumped.”
Looking back at Kipp, he stared at me with his sexy little smile, and I allowed myself to relish in his reappearance…just a bit
. The way he looked at me, so heated and loved, brought a smile to my face regardless we didn’t know the reason. “Okay, so, you’re back.”
He winked. “Appears so.”
I remained staring at him, wondering if he would poof out of existence on me again, and maybe still in shock he stood here now. He’d left so quick before and clearly, it’d done some irreparable damage. My pulse increased with my slight panic and my palms grew clammy.
My pause must’ve been long enough since his eyebrows raised and he said in a low whisper, “Something on your mind, sexy?”
I swallowed past the emotion rising in my chest, wondering if I really wanted to know the answer or not. “Well, are you staying, like forever?”
He frowned. “You don’t want me to?”
“No, it’s not that,” I countered with a flick of my hand and knelt on the mattress, coming closer toward him. I relished the icy coldness his body exuded. “Of course, I want you to stay, but you said it wasn’t safe here. Maybe you should go back. Maybe I did something that brought you here. Like really wanted it or something. With my connection grown in the Netherworld, perhaps I made it happen.”
He leaned down, coming closer to my face, and the frostiness of him washed over my flesh, making me shiver and stealing the heat he’d put there. “Now you want me to go back?”
How ridiculous was that statement? All I’d wanted was for him to come back to me and now I was telling him to go away. But an ugly truth hung over my head. “You said it’s safer to stay away. And by the way, what in the hell did you mean by that?”
Before Kipp could answer, and without any warning, my bedroom door slammed open. Dane rushed in, looking ready to kill. His dark eyes were intent and a serious scowl marred his face. “I told you to not come back.”
I gasped and Gretchen let out a little scream at Dane’s sudden appearance. He stormed toward the bed, settling in next to Alexander, and his eyes narrowed into slits. Hot rage filled me. Perhaps because with Kipp in the room, my protective instincts rose and I bit off, “You sure as hell didn’t tell me that!”
Dane crossed his arms over his chest, widening his stance, as if he was ready to unleash the Devil I knew lived inside of him. “I told Kipp that.” He glared at the spot where Kipp stood since apparently, he took notice of where I’d been looking. “I warned him back in Memphis not to come anywhere near you. It’s not safe. And you didn’t listen.”
While I had it in me to beat on his chest since it seemed he implied he’d ordered Kipp away, I knew my Kipp and he’d never allow such an order. I had seriously been thinking Dane had done some crazy-ass spell, but right now, I was entirely lost in this conversation. “Wait. What? ”
“You think I’ve been out to get you, but you’re wrong.” Dane blew out a loud breath, uncrossing his arms. “I’ve been trying to help you.”
Chapter Twenty-One
The bedroom somersaulted around me and I stared at Dane, searching for any deception in his gaze. What he said had been the most absurd thing I had ever heard in my life, considering he’d been the bane of my existence. “You’re helping me?”
He gave a firm nod, the flickers of rage dimming in his eyes as his posture became lax. “I left the note for you the other night.” He shook his head in frustration. “A warning that you paid no attention to.”
No, this made no sense at all. Dane was my archenemy, the villain, the Devil. All he’d done had been to ruin my life, not improve it. I glared at him and snapped, “I don’t believe you.”
“Believe it or not, it’s the truth.” Dropping onto the bed near Alexander, he gave him a seriously hard look before he turned to me. “Before we get into that—care to explain why Alexander is in Caley’s body?”
I looked at Gretchen at that statement and nearly snorted at myself for not trusting my instincts. “See, told you he knew.”
Her eyes widened. “How?”
I really couldn’t blame her for looking a bit lost. In the last seconds, shocked wasn’t an accurate description of my current emotional state for all the shit that went down in what, minutes?
Dane stared at Alexander for a minute longer before he shrugged at Gretchen. “Because when I sensed him at the swamp, I did a spell to tap into his energy, which is how I knew he’d entered Caley. And I’d done the same spell with Kipp in Memphis and that’s how I knew he returned now.” He gave me a hard look. “Tell me why?”
“Simple—someone cast a spell that weakened him. Caley let him possess her so we could talk to him and figure this mess out.” Dane appeared relatively stunned Caley had allowed such a thing, and I still hadn’t fully accepted it either. But I wouldn’t let him dodge the subject any more than he had. “Now, you tell me what in the hell you’re talking about. Explain why you’ve been trying to help me, in the most fucked up way ever, I might add.”
