Scooping up my phone from the bedside table, I rounded on her, offended she’d think I’d let her do such a thing. “I wouldn’t have let you kick Sage. And you didn’t kick him either! You still have free will under thesway. You proved it to both of us by slapping the shit out of me!” I pointed the phone at my face, which didn’t have a lick of evidence left on it because of mymother’s unnatural healing. Nevertheless, I’d taken her beating, and it had hurtbrieflyat the time.
Sage flopped down on the ground beside the bed and rested his head on his paws, expelling a weary huff at our rage-a-thon, as if to say, here we go again. I squatted down to ruffle his ears, and he perked up a little.
Nelle crouched down on the other side of the wraith-wolf, petting beneath his chin, petulantly stealing his attention. She gave Sage a pouty face as slapped my hand away from him, so she could stroke his ears flat. “No one, not even thisdumbass, would ever make me kick you, puppy.”
I rolled my eyes and turned back to my phone. My fingers flew over the screen as I sent a quick message to Penn.
Me: When the hells is the poison oak antidote arriving from House Simonis?
Gods, it had better be arriving soon. I wasn’t sure I’d survive her fury when the poison oak hit full force.
Flicking my gaze to Nelle fussing over Sage, my mind wandered back to thesway. “What did theswayfeel like?” I asked, straightening to my full height.
“Awful,” she snipped back, rising and falling back into her trademark attitude pose. A hand on her hip, popping a shoulder out, with that fuckingduhface directed at me.
Gods, she just couldn’t help herself. She refused to give an inch to me every single time. She’d been happy, content, and peaceful under thesway. I had too. I liked the harmony flowing between us.
My phone pinged.
Penn: It should be here within the hour. I’m at the airfield awaiting its arrival.
Thank fuck. But also—fuck. This wasn’t going to help with things right now.
Nelle dropped her pose to itch furiously at the lesion bubbling with blisters running down her forearm, and finally, she noticed her naked flesh ravaged by festering rashes. Her eyes shot round as she flung her arms wide. Pale tresses danced when her head jerked back and forth as she glanced furtively at all the cruel lesions springing up in red streaks all over her skin. “The poison oak,” she breathed in horror. “THE POISON OAK!” she shrieked, jittering and flapping her hands in panic.“Ohmygodsohmygodsohmygods!”
I hitched a shoulder in mock commiseration because part of me remembered yesterday morning and how godsdamn hot and itchy it had been. “Residue, I guess, from when I spanked you and then we made out.”
“Hells, hells, hells!” She scratched at herself manically. “It hurts. It burns. It’s so fucking itchy!”
“Tell me about it,” I hissed, a little gleeful
She lunged at me, beating my chest with her tiny fists and slapping at my face. “DO SOMETHING!” she screeched. “NOW! FUCKING NOW! MAKE IT STOP!”
Her horror and agonized emotions erupted beneath my skin. The ear-shattering screeches of pain blew my calm state right out of my head. I jittered from foot to foot, fending off her blows before falling into panic-stricken motion, acting, not thinking.
Dropping my phone, I scooped her up into my arms while she itched and wriggled and cursed me out. Dashing through the threshold of the bathroom, I did the only thing that came to mind to get her into the pool as fast as possible.
I hurled her at the sunken bath.
She flew through the air, her limbs flailing and hair whipping behind her like the trail of a shooting star, as she shrieked in fright. “AAAHHHHHHHH!”
She fell like a heavy rock into the deep pool.
Fat splashes of water exploded everywhere, and choppy waves slapped up against the bath’s rim as she disappeared beneath the frothy water.
I slapped a hand across my mouth, realizing what I’d just done.
Oh, shit…
Nelle surfaced a few seconds later, coughing and spluttering out a mouthful of water, looking like a drowned rat with her hair plastered to her skull. Her mouth curled downward in misery. “Couldn’t you have just let me get in myself?” she said in a small voice.
“I panicked,” I replied honestly, giving her an apologetic grimace. Shucking off my boxer briefs, I crouched down and braced a hand on the stone floor, sliding one leg into the tub, then the other. The soles of my bare feet met the pebbled bottom of the bath, and standing, the warm water lapped up around my waist.
“Next time,” she replied, as I sank into the water to await the arrival of the antidote with her, “don’t panic. I’d rather not be hurled across a room like a cannonball, Crowther.”
Half an hour later, I left a trail of wet footprints across the carpet as I made my way back to the bathroom with the medical cooler Penn had delivered to my residence. Penn had said nothing about my attire, or lack of it, when I’d answered her knock on the door in just a towel hooked around my hips and water drizzling down my body, with the oaty scent of the soothing itch treatment wisping off my skin. I didn’t offer an explanation either, but I figured she knew where both of us were and why, judging by theway she’d clamped her teeth down on her bottom lip to stop the smile when she’d turned to leave.
When I re-entered the bathroom, Nelle was submerged up to her neck in the milky water, covertly scratching away at her hip. She glanced over, and her gaze slid eagerly over the medical cooler. “The antidote for poison oak, fresh from Lower House Simonis,” I said, popping the cooler on the vanity’s counter and opening the box up. Plucking the antidote out, I held the vial pinched between my fingers. The gummy liquid was the color of pomegranate.
