And the feeling was very much mutual. He could happily bury his face in the hollow of her neck and bathe in her scent forever, though the idea of trying to express this thought made all his words clot together in his throat.
We have to get over our awkwardness sometime, right?he thought desperately.We both want the same thing.
You should tell her that you would follow her scent from here to eternity,his pegasus piped up, seeming very insistent on this.Tell her that –
“You smell good too,” Ethan blurted out, before his pegasus could make yet another asinine suggestion.
But then… he had so little experience at this. Love had simply not been on his radar until now. Was it possible that Chloe might havelikedto have been told that he’d follow her scent into eternity?
“Oh, that’s sweet,” she laughed. “No one ever says that – but then, I guess usually I smell like disinfectant, and, if you’rereallylucky, dog lick. Or dog… other liquids. Or solids. Oh boy, I wish I’d stopped talking about two sentences ago.”
Ethan couldn’t help but laugh as Chloe buried her face in her hands.
Maybe we’re both as awkward as each other.
“Well. Be that as it may, I meant what I said.”
And he did. Chloe could smell like anything, but she’d still be his mate.
“Well, then,” Chloe replied, shooting him a quick smile when she raised her head. “I’ll take it.”
Finally, she shrugged off the jacket and held it out to him.
“Oh, just shove that in the bag,” he said offhandedly.
Her eyebrows rose. “This? This… Laura Piano?”
“Loro Piana,” he said automatically, then added, “I may go hiking whilewearinga suit jacket, but I draw the line at hiking whilecarrying arounda suit jacket.”
And I’m not sure whether I’ll be wearing it again,he silently added, as she shrugged and stuffed the jacket into the backpack.Do I ever want to go back to the office?
“Anyway,” Chloe said, breaking him out of his reverie, “I guess we should go locket hunting.”
“Yeah, good thinking.” He stood up and surveyed the area. The landslide-damaged landscape spread out before them.
Beside him, Chloe groaned. “This isn’t even like looking for a needle in a haystack. This is like looking for a needle in… well, a forty-year-old landslide site that has since grown over.”
Ignoring the way that his pegasus perked up at the mention of hay, Ethan did his best to keep up a positive attitude, even though he too was finding the idea overwhelming. Where would they even begin? The necklace was probably ten feet underground by now.
Their whole plan had relied on Curtis acting as some sort of spectral divining rod – but without him, they were flying blind.
“Well, let’s look around up here for a bit,” he said, trying to sound encouraging. “The pegasus has pretty good eyesight – it might spot something Eula couldn’t.”
Looking unconvinced, Chloe nodded.
Hesitating for a moment, Ethan wondered where to start, before eventually deciding to try for a grid search pattern, with Chloe beside him.
Together they walked slowly, heads down, hoping to spot a glimpse of silver.
It very quickly became an exercise in frustration – the understory was near-impenetrable in many places, and neither of them wanted to damage any plants or disturb the topsoil in this wild landscape.
About the only good thing that came out of it was the knowledge that Chloedidlook pretty cute with leaves stuck in her hair, but Ethan could’ve guessed that on his own anyway.
Even a search from the air in pegasus form proved pointless – the canopy was far too dense to spot anything. Maybe if the locket had been sitting on the surface he would’ve caught a glint, but that clearly wasn’t the case.
Coming back to earth and shifting back into human form, he tried to fight back the despair that was creeping up on him.
There had to be a way. Therehadto be. He hadn’t gotten through life to this point by giving up when things seemed impossible. There was always a solution.
