“Never?” I reach blindly into the bag between us. “That’s practically criminal. Here.”
I hold out a red and yellow worm, doing my best to ignore how intimate it feels to offer food to him. His fingers brush mine as he takes it, and when he studies the candy with the same intensefocus he usually reserves for valuable artifacts, I have to bite back a grin.
“The texture is… interesting,” he observes, and his tongue flicks out briefly to taste the surface, before giving it a bite. “Hm. Sweet, but not unpleasantly so.”
The playlist shifts to something slower—a soft indie song I’d forgotten about. Its gentle melody fills the comfortable silence between us as miles of Texas countryside roll past. A bunch of longhorns graze in a distant field, their horns catching the light.
“Thank you,” Sundar says suddenly. “Not just for driving, but for… understanding the urgency. Most humans might have hesitated to spend a day alone with—” He stops himself, but I hear the unspoken words. With a monster.
“Hey.” I dare to glance at him, catching those golden eyes. “I trust you.”
The words hang between us, heavy with meaning. His tail coils tighter, and I feel the atmosphere in the car shift into something more charged.
“Perhaps you shouldn’t,” he says quietly. “After Friday—”
My hands tighten on the steering wheel. “Do you regret it?”
“No.” The word comes out like a growl, making heat pool in my core. “But I regret not discussing it properly. Not explaining…certain things about my nature. About what it means when a naga—”
A truck honks as it passes us, making me jump. I realize I’ve let the car drift again, too caught up in his words and the intensity crackling between us.
“What it means when a naga…?” I prompt, trying to keep my voice steady while correcting our course.
He shifts in his seat as he chooses his words. “When we… feel deeply for someone, it manifests physically. The need to coil, to protect, to…” His tail twitches. “To claim.”
Oh.
Well, that sure seems to imply something.
“Is that why you kept wrapping around me?” I ask. “When we…”
“Yes.” His voice has a rich, dangerous quality. “Though I tried to maintain control. To resist the urge to bind you completely, and…” He stops himself.
“What if…” I swallow hard, gathering my courage. “What if I didn’t want you to resist?”
His sharp intake of breath is oddly satisfying. Before he can respond, we pass a sign announcing our destination is only twenty miles ahead. The reminder of our actual purpose today brings me back to reality.
“Actually, if we talk about this much more, I probablywillcrash,” I say quickly, though my voice sounds breathless even to my own ears.
Sundar nods sagely. “Yes, perhaps it’d be better to have this discussion when we aren’t in mortal danger.”
“Hey, my driving isn’tthatbad.” We both share a smile, and it does feel good that we at least broached the topic. But now would be a good time to talk about literally anything else. “So,” I begin awkwardly. “Tell me more about Marcus Blackhorn. What exactly are we appraising here?”
Sundar takes a moment to collect himself, his tail doing that adorable coil-and-release thing again. “Marcus dedicated his life to proving that monster-human relationships weren’t just possible, but natural. He collected letters exchanged between monsters and humans, artifacts that symbolized their love…” He pauses, his voice softening. “Each story he documented challenged what we believed impossible.”
“That sounds amazing. And kind of romantic.”
“Indeed.” He pauses, then adds softly, “His work helped many of us believe that after the Great Unveiling, perhaps… perhaps we could find acceptance among humans. It helped knowing that there were already quite a few who already accepted us in the past.”
The vulnerability in his voice makes my chest ache. I want to reach over and take his hand, to tell him he never hasto hide anything from me. Instead, I say, “Well, I think Mrs. Brindlewood is living proof of that. The way she talks about her knight…”
“Yes.” Something warm enters his tone. “Though she can be overwhelming at times, her story gives hope to many. The choice she made—”
“Choice?”
“We who live for centuries can choose to align our life force with a mortal mate,” he says carefully. “To share not just our life, but our lifespan. Mrs. Brindlewood made the choice to remain ancient after her knight passed, which…” He pauses. “Well, it’s a valid decision, I suppose. She gets to watch her great, great—however many greats—grandchildren grow. Though I think I would make the opposite choice.”
The implications hit me like a wave. “You mean… you’d want to age like a human?”
