He drew an awkward breath. “Hailey, I would like to show you my observatory. This winter… If you’d like. I’m afraid it would have to be very dark for you to see…”
She watched him, smiling in awe as it dawned on her—he was asking her out, and he was nervous. “I’d like that,” she said quickly.
“And in December… The university hosts a Christmas ball. May I escort you?”
“I’d be honored,” she said, though this was the first she’d heard of such an event and would have to find a dress and shoes and learn to walk in heels and figure out how to dance non-Irish and find Giselle a date, because there was no way she was doing this alone...
Hailey sighed.
“Go and rest,” Asher told her, kissing her cheek.
Fin was playing his guitar when Hailey knocked on his door to retrieve her things.
“Enter!” he shouted. As she poked into his room, he strummed softly.
“I love that song,” she said, standing in his doorway.
“I know.”
“How do you know that?”
“I know everything about you,” he said, setting his guitar aside.
“Enlighten me.”
“I know that roses are your favorite flowers—”
“Typical,” she said with a flick of her hand.
“And that your favorite color is green—”
“Obvious,” she yawned.
“And that you cry more out of your right eye than your left—”
“You noticed that?”
Fin nodded. “Seen you cry a lot—I know that you’re afraid of Asher, but you won’t tell him.”
Hailey ducked her head.
“Listen,” he said, leaning forward, “Asher’s powerful. He can protect you from harm, from bad people, from other Envoys… But,” he said emphatically, counting his points on his fingers, “he can’t laugh.” Searching Hailey’s eyes, he extended another digit. “He can’t love. He can’t have children. And he won’t tolerate your dancing.”
Hailey furrowed her brow.
“It’s the drumming,” he explained. “It’s like fingernails on a chalkboard to an Envoy.”
Staring at the floor, Hailey chewed her lip. She didn’t owe Fin an explanation. He wasn’t even interested in her, so why did he even care? This was just his big-brother-look-after-Hailey thing, and she was sick of it.
“I put your stuff in your room already,” he told her when she didn’t respond. “You’re not really building a ghost trap for your term project, are you?” he asked, adjusting to a much more agreeable tone.
“Yes,” Hailey said sounding way more excited than she wanted, and he closed his eyes, tossing his head back.
“Hailey—” He sighed loudly. “You’re gonna piss them off, and they’re going to come after you again.”
Chapter thirty
The Trap
