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He rubs my back in circles, obviously content. “You called me ‘Sam’.”
Yup. He noticed.
“You said I could,” I remind him. “Remember?”
“I do. But you chose not to when we were mating even though… you see, Malphas’s mate gave him a name of her own. ‘Mal’. I thought that, perhaps, you could do the same. Thank you, my mate. It pleases me to be your ‘Sam’.”
He means it, too. Such a little thing to make him happy that, despite how frustrated I am that my house ended up being a target for the Westfield robber after all, I promise myself that he’ll be ‘Sam’ from now on.
I can sense his emotions through our growing bond. So, it seems, can he when it comes to mine.
Pulling back so that he can look down at me, he says, “You are upset that someone entered our quarters while we were in Sombra. They took something that was yours.”
His face screws up, concentrating. Releasing one hand from around me, he shows off a curved piece of metal. It looks like real silver, not iron, and it’s more of a ‘C’ shape than a ‘U’, but it’s undoubtedly a facsimile of a horseshoe.
“For you,” Sam says, holding it out to me.
Oh, yeah. It’s much heavier than the cheap knock-off I bought with Johanna at some tourist thing we went to a couple of summers ago with the twins.
My mate made it for me. I already love it.
Only—
“How did you do that?” I marvel.
“Simple. Thanks to our bond, I could sense what you had lost. I had no use of my magic while I was a phantom, but the ashbalm flower did more that strengthen our bond. I feel… I feelwholeagain, Hope. I’m myself again, and I owe it all to you, my wondrous mate.”
Because I went into the shadows and gathered the ashbalm flower to repair our bond instead of break it…
It was one thing for him to tell me that he’s a mage. Duke Haures made it clear that Sammael was a magic user like Loki was, but I guess I just thought of it as him being able to create portals, not conjure steel almost-horseshoes from thin air.
“That… that’s amazing, Sam. What else can you do?”
“I can attempt to make my mate smile.”
And then, before I can ask how he plans on doing that with my mess of a house surrounding us, Sam does exactly that when he uses my essence to pluck out the melody of my favorite song. In his deep, rasp of a tone, he begins to hum Whiskey Rose’s hit, “Heart Barely Used”.
It’s a break-up song, but I don’t tell Sam that. The fact that he’s humming it for me means it’s the most beautiful love song that’s ever existed, no matter the lyrics.
He starts to dance, swaying with me. As we move, he switches from his solid form to his inky black shadowy shape. My fingers reach about an inch past the surface, tingling as I find the solid outline hidden amongst his shadows.
It feelsamazing.
Sam lowers his mouth to my ear. Pausing in his humming, he murmurs, “And I can do this.”
It’s like the earth shifted beneath my feet. A gentle earthquake that made me feel like I was moving though I didn’t actuallygoanywhere—and I think that until he puts a little space between our bodies and I notice that we’re not on the first floor any longer.
Instead, my wily mate has moved us to my—our—bedroom.
One glance up at him and I don’t need to be tapped into him to know what’s on his mind. And as much as I agree, I remember what we left down there.
I scramble out of his reach before I let my hormones take over for my common sense. “Wait. The door. Downstairs… it was open.”
It’s a wonder the cops haven’t been by yet. A door left open… did any of my neighbors notice? How long were we even gone? To me, it’s still the same day I woke up with Sammael, then drove all the way to Jericho—and, at some point, I’m going to have to figure out how to get my car back to Westfield—but how does time work across realms?
I don’t know, but before I can ask him, Sam grins. He waves his hand, eyes becoming a darker shade of purple before he says, “It’s shut. Locked, too. I’ve warded your entire house. Not even Duke Haures himself will be able to interrupt us now.”
Well… in that case. I fall back into his arms.
