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“And you are. So how do you think Nigel knows about it?”
She screwed her face up miserably. “I don’t know. But he does.”
She pulled her purse into her lap, displacing the almost indignant-looking white rodent, who shoved at the purse, demanding his place back. Digging out her phone, Sybil showed me the scores of missed calls and unread messages from an unknown number.
“These all came in over the weekend.” I gritted my teeth and forced my understandably pissed-off serpent back down. I was angry enough myself. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t realize he was going to destroy your home.” She wrung her hands. “I’ll pay for any damages and a cleaner.”
This asshole was threatening to get her locked up unless she bore him a child, and she was worried about the state of my apartment? Was she fucking serious?
“I don’t care about the apartment. My serpent already—” I paused, realizing I was falling back into the trap of blaming my snake as if he was another person. “Ialready destroyed all my good furniture. This”—I gestured at the shared wall between our apartments—“is the cheapo crap I bought afterward. And even if it was nice stuff, that’s not what I’m worried about. You should have told me he was threatening you.”
“Why should I bother you with this? Why would I lay my troubles on you? You’ve got enough on your plate already with the curse. It’s not like we’re…” She pressed her lips together.
And here it was. The talk I’d been avoiding. Not just with her but with myself.
“Aren’t we?” To be honest, I didn’t know either.
Ssshe’s mine.
I envied my serpent for being so sure. I envied him for being so unafraid, despite the curse hanging over both our heads.
Ssshe ssslept in our nessst.
Sybil peered at me through her lashes. “You tell me. Are we?”
“I’ve spent my life trying to avoid exactly this. I never wanted to burden someone with my curse or pass it on to a child. But you seem to calm the curse.” I rubbed my forearm above the watch.
“But not break it.”
“No.”
I knew that all too well. And if I were logical, and smart, I’d stop talking to Sybil this instant so I couldn’t fall for her any more than I already had. I couldn’t torment myself with false hope that even now colored my vision of the future a rosy tint—a future with Sybil in it, and a family to call my own.
Should I keep going down this wonderful and exciting path I suddenly found myself walking?CouldI even stop? I’d denied myself this level of connection with anyone for so long that I’d remember this past weekend for the rest of my life. My serpent believed she was my mate, even though technically that was impossible since nagas only mated with other nagas.
How much harder would my serpent be to control if I took Sybil away from him? From us?
“How do you feel about it?” I asked her. “You know about my curse. Are you willing to risk what could happen if we got to know each other better?”
“I wouldn’t have told you about my secret if I didn’t think you were worth getting to know better.”
Well, that decided that. I smiled.
“I want to see you again next weekend. We’ll finish cleaning out your place. The weekend after that, I want to take you out on a real date.”
The corner of her lips lifted. “Yeah… We kind of skipped that, didn’t we.”
I reached over and hauled her onto my lap. “Doing things in order is highly overrated.”
Technically, because she’d already slept in our den, that made us mates. I didn’t care that she wasn’t a naga. She was mine. I owed it to her, to us, to give this an honest try.
I kissed her tenderly, hardly able to believe I’d finally found her after a lifetime of loneliness. Warm and gentle lips welcomed mine, so sweet and full of promise. When our lips parted, her eyes stayed closed, and she was smiling. She cuddled in my arms, utterly perfect.
Then her inky lashes fluttered open, and I was lost in the beautiful green of her eyes.
“That conversation wasn’t nearly as awkward as I thought it would be,” she mused softly.
