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When I’d tried to intentionally read the mind of another person—Jesse and Sera both—I’d left them with a raging headache. That made honing my telepathy skills near impossible. Still, I caught stray thoughts, and with Eli, they were always about me or us.
I shoved the instinct to try to read him away, too. If I wanted to know what he was thinking, I’d simply ask. Truth be told, I knew he’d answer. The problem was my hesitation in letting him know I had questions.
He’d brought two chilled glasses, each with only a couple cubes of ice, and an unopened bottle of Casa Dragones Joven. I paused when I saw that.
“The whole bottle? What’s the occasion?” I asked cautiously.
He poured, not glancing at me. “Us.”
“How so?” I accepted my chilled glass of expensive, delicious tequila.
“You’re here after a job. Alone. Tired. Blood on you.” He stared at me, not yet drinking. “This means you would like my help.”
“What if I just wanted a drink with a friend?”
“Then you would’ve gone to see Jesse or perhaps Christy,” he said lightly. “Am I wrong? Is there somethingelseI could do to please you, bonbon? Or are you here to resume our partnership? I’ll say yes either way.”
I lifted my glass. “To partnership.”
“To partnership,” he echoed, laughter barely hidden in his voice. Even if I’d hidden my desire, he still knew it existed.
We drank in silence for a moment. Honestly, such tequila deserved at least that much respect. Around us, the bar filled with a crush of people—more than a few darting admiring glances at Eli. I couldn’t decide if I was feeling protective or possessive, but I sent out a jolt of accidental magic toward the room.
He refilled our glasses. “Should I ask what that was?”
“No.”
He nodded. This was one of the many reasons I liked having Eli around—despite his need to repeatedly call me by some sort of dessert. In fact, I enjoyed his company enough that I pointedly hadn’t asked why he did so. I was happier not knowing. Realizing how much meaning he layered into the mundane, sometimes I simply chose to wear my ignorance like a well-loved dressing-coat.
“So, Geneviève, what would you ask of me?”
“The job seems like a simple enter, behead, and exit.” I leaned back and watched him.
“Stealth?”
“Lafayette Number One,” I said.
Eli grinned. Sometimes, I thought he took too much glee in helping me, and it made me wonder about his past. But I wasn’t asking too many questions these days. Every job left me a little closer to exhausted, more than it should.
But as quickly as his amusement had arrived, it was gone. “You know I’ll do my best. You have my word.”
“I trust you,” I reminded him. “You’re a good fighter, too.”
Despite the tension that had grown between us, Eli had never let me down. Honestly, that was part of the problem. He was everything I could want—if I wanted someone to keep.
“I am honored,” he said with a dip of his head. His voice was rough, and that spoke volumes, too. Eli said no more; he simply finished his drink and stared at me.
I wondered again if there were nuances in our conversation that I’d missed. It wasn’t like I could find a how-to book on navigating a complicated, sexually-charged friendship with a faery. And while Eli didn’t broadcast his heritage, his fae nature was obvious.
When asked, Eli admitted to having “some fae.” Calling him half-fae was like calling me “a little bit witch.” Whatever his heritage, he managed to look like he ought to be in every glossy magazine, selling anything, promising everything. Instead, he was making promises to come out into the dark and protect me as we broke into a cemetery and beheaded drooling face-gnawers.
After a few more quiet moments, I refilled our glasses again. “Why do I always feel like I’m saying more than I realize?”
“Because, my lovely peach pie, you are a clever creature,” he said mildly.
I shook my head. “That’s not comforting, you know?”
Eli laughed and stood. “You will tell me when you need me?”
