“Deal.” The heaviness of his expression lifted, and he drifted back to rest against the side of the massive bath. I followed, but instead of moving to sit right by him, like I might have when we first entered, I dropped back on the opposite side.
Xander looked amused. “They’re going to come looking for us soon,” he said. “This was a nice little interlude. I have a feeling life is going to get very hectic for the next few days.”
I nodded. “I’m thinking the same thing. I can feel this … energy almost, running along my skin. Something big is about to happen. It’s like being in the ocean just before the huge storms. I can feel the electricity in the air. I always know when the storm is coming.”
Xander nodded. “It’s one of the things I love the most about Hawaii, when the storm clouds roll across the sky. We don’t have clouds here. Our water is from beneath the land.”
“I’d miss never seeing a storm again,” I told him. “So maybe living under the water isn’t quite everything I want in life.”
Xander chuckled. “Sometimes the water isn’t greener on the other side. Earth has a lot of wonders that Daelighters dream of experiencing, but very few of us make it through the transporter. The ones that do, most of them return home.”
From what I’d seen, it seemed like there were tons of Daelighters moving between the two worlds, but in reality it was probably only a small percentage of their total numbers.
“Can anyone cross to Earth?” I asked, wondering if there were rules about it.
Xander shook his head as he leaned back further, his long arms resting across the top of the bath on either side of him. “No, you need to receive permission from your overlord. There are long wait lists, some longer than others depending if you want to go for a vacation or to live. We closely monitor all Daelighters on Earth, which is something your government insisted on. There’s also a limit to the numbers of us allowed to cross. Lots of rules and red tape involved.”
It made sense. If an alien race was trying to set up shop in my world, I’d want to know what they were up to as well. “I’m still surprised that my government is so compliant with you all crossing to Earth,” I said honestly. “The stone must be something seriously important to the human race.”
“It is,” he said. “Before the stone, you were heading for a cataclysmic event. Nature was set to wipe you out.”
Before the true horror of that could sink in, there was a loud knock on the bedroom door. Xander’s head fell back and he groaned. “For a moment there, reality was far away,” he murmured.
It didn’t sound like he was talking to me, so I didn’t reply. I stood, sending a silent goodbye to the water as it trailed down me. Xander’s head snapped forward again, his eyes locked on me. The blue darkened—a sign I already recognized.
“No time, Romeo,” I teased him, taking my time as I walked up the steps and out of the bath. I didn’t feel one ounce of unease at being naked in front of him like this, which was really unexpected. Maybe it was the simple fact that I didn’t have to try and impress him. We’d already established the rules of this relationship, and now we were just enjoying it.
As I reached for a neatly folded towel in a set of dark gray shelves near the entrance to the tiled bathroom, hands landed on my hips. I hadn’t even heard him move, but I sure as hell felt him when he spun me around, his lips capturing mine.
I forgot everything in that moment. I’d always thought it was a cliché when chicks in books and movies said that, but Xander literally had the ability to wipe everything from my mind. I became nothing more than reaction and need.
I’d had sex more times in the past few hours than I had in the past year, and yet I wanted him again. A loud noise echoed at the edge of my brain, but I managed to ignore it.
“Xander, are you in there?”
The shout had him pulling back, and as he did I managed to regain some clarity.
He turned away slightly. “Hang on, we’ll be right out. Avalon was sleeping.”
I snorted, pressing my face into his right bicep. I hadn’t slept for a second, and now I was going to have to pretend to be well rested. I was well satisfied though, which was close enough.
“You have five minutes,” the male voice at the door said, before footsteps echoed away.
“Come on, we’d better get dressed,” Xander said, reaching for the towel and wrapping it around me. He must have used his power as well, because by the time I rubbed it across my body and hair, I was dry.
Xander’s hand landed firmly on my ass, just short of a slap. I narrowed my eyes on him playfully and he laughed. “Put some damn clothes on,” he finally muttered. “Or they will have to break the door down.”
With a shake of my head, I hurried across to the clothes Star had gathered for me. The underwear fit, which was almost unbelievable. How the hell had Star guessed my sizes? I was going to call that Daelighter magic. The rest fit as well: a simple white shirt, tan cotton shorts, and Converse in the exact right size.
“Where do all of these clothes come from?” I asked Xander when we were both dressed.
He shrugged. “Star has always dressed us. She loves it. Lexen said she makes some of the clothing herself.”
That would be a very useful skill indeed.
I started running my fingers through my long hair, silky and untangled from whatever Xander did to remove the water. That and the natural magic of my Royale hair. “Do you use toothbrushes here?” I asked.
“Yep, there’s a spare in the top drawer,” he said, pointing toward the bathroom.
