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She stood close behind him. Her cheek a soft curve at the corner of his eye. “Maybe so. But it’s clear he also planned a sacrifice. Could this be why the Amhas-draoi marked him for death?”
He breathed in her lavender scent. Felt the pounding rush of his blood settle as he traced the faded marks of the crescent and broken arrow on the diary’s cover with one slow finger. “I don’t know.” He lifted his eyes to her worried gaze. “And for the first time, I’m not certain I want to.”
Curled like her namesake on a chaise lounge, Cat’s head ached with a buzzing tightness, so that any flick of her eyes sent the pain flexing down her spine and into her stomach. The diary lay open on Aidan’s desk to the page where she’d left off, her corresponding sheet of translation trailing from the comprehensible to near chicken scratch as the sickness increasingly turned interpretation to torture.
But no more references to the ritual sacrifice of Aidan’s brother. No more clues as to why it had been planned and whether it had been achieved. One more mystery to add to the growing list.
Closing her eyes, she snuggled deeper into the cushions. It had been an interminable day with no end in sight. She’d been locked away with Aidan since after supper and now all she wanted was the sweet oblivion of bed. Alone.
She slit her eyes to take in the strong-jawed features, lips she now knew could tease her into stupidity, a stare with a hypnotist’s stun power. She curled tighter into her seat.
Yes. Definitely alone.
Thankfully, he’d made no more mention of their kiss. And, both grateful at his discretion and perturbed at his nonchalance, she’d settled into igno
ring it too. Or as much as she could when forced to spend every waking moment in his somber company. She sank back.
The soft weight of a lap rug across her shoulders broke into the troublingly delicious vision of Aidan that had survived every attempt to exorcize it. She opened her eyes to catch him watching her, the concerned look on his face adding kindling to the dream spinning.
“You look awful,” he explained.
She fought her fantasy with sarcasm. “Just what every woman wants to hear.”
Laughter teased his mouth into a rare smile. “I only meant you seem wrung out and tired.”
A squirmy feeling that had nothing to do with the diary shivered her stomach, and she offered him a more gracious “Thank you.”
That should have been it. Quick. Over. Back to work. Instead, Aidan’s mesmerizing stare speared her in place, enough heat within it to make the lap rug irrelevant. Her skin flushed, her body going uncomfortably warm. How did he do that? One glance in her direction and she went stupid for him. It was embarrassing.
“Cat, I need to—”
She leaned forward, held her breath.
“That is, we—”
His stare burned a hole straight through her.
Then just like that, he blinked. Cleared his throat. And dropped his gaze to the pages in his hand. “Yes, well I suppose we should get back to it.”
A mental sigh deflated the growing excitement. She scrubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands. Wished she could scrub her mind as easily. “I suppose we should.”
Silence resumed as they retreated to neutral corners. She settled deeper into the cushions, wrapping the rug tight about her shoulders. Tried erasing the pulse-pounding memory of his kiss from her mind. Stripping away the image of that fathomless bronze gaze.
“Here. Now this looks interesting.” His tone overly brisk and businesslike as he slid into the chair behind his desk. Scanned the page greedily.
“Yn-mea esh a gwagvesh. A-dhiwask polth. Dreheveth hath omdhiskwedhea.”
She recognized the words. She’d stumbled over them earlier, her mind frantically scrambling for a hold upon their slick black sounds. But they remained infuriatingly elusive. Not even her Other abilities granting her a window into the harsh vowels and rasping consonants.
But now on Aidan’s tongue, their meaning seemed all too clear.
“Skeua hesh flamsk gwruth dea.”
“Aidan, don’t. Please.”
He lifted his head, his gaze turned inward upon some image only he could see. He bore a quiet intensity, eyes alive with an inner fire turning the dark brown orbs gold as suns. But this wasn’t the stare he’d given her moments earlier. Instead it was as if the man within had been shunted aside by another. A creature of razor-edged cruelty. A being who fought tooth and claw to emerge.
“Drot peuth a galloea esh a dewik lya.”
