She felt stone beneath her hands.Light pressing in from one side.Darkness breathing from the other and a door.Lisa heard voices, and felt feather light touches against her skin making her shiver.
Then Rezer tore himself away like he’d been burned.He stood and staggered back, chest heaving, eyes wide and too bright, as if he’d been yanked out of somewhere he hadn’t meant to go.
“Rezer?”she whispered, lips still tingling as she rose to follow him.“What?—”
“That,” he said hoarsely, dragging a hand through his hair, “was a terrible decision.”
Her knees felt weak and she ignored the twisting in her gut at his words.“Strongly disagree.”
A strangled laugh escaped him, rough and unsteady.“You have no idea how badly I want to keep making it.”
Lisa put her hands on her hips and glared at him.The heat that he’d stirred in her began to chill as her ire rose.“Then why aren’t you?”
He met her eyes, something fierce and protective cutting through the desire.“Because whatever’s waking up inside me has now noticed you.”
The words chilled her more than the sudden absence of his body.“You think this ...thing ...is connected to me?”
“I think,” he said carefully, “that your light is bright, Sunshine.And whatever is calling me doesn’t like being ignored.”
She swallowed.“And kissing me makes it worse.”
“I think wanting you does,” he admitted.“And I don’t know what that means yet.For me or you.”
Silence stretched between them, charged, and unresolved.
He stepped back, forcing distance between them like it physically hurt to do so.“I should go.”
Lisa hated the desperation in her that wanted to reach out and grab him.She wanted to beg him not to leave her alone.“You’ll be back,” she said.It wasn’t a question.He’d started this whole mess and she’d be damned if she’d allow him to kiss her like that and then disappear.
His mouth curved, slow and unwilling.“Against my better judgment?Yes.”He continued to watch her, his stare heavy, and heated.“I realize that you’ve already had a mate, a Chosen.But he’s gone.That claim on you died with him.I don’t say that to be cruel, Lisa.You’ve pined long enough.I want this to be crystal clear to you.”
“What?”she asked, her heart in her throat as she forced herself to stay where she was.
“You said I’m not alone.I’m going to hold you to that.With those words, you laid some claim to me.Now,” he narrowed his eyes.“I’ll be back, not to visit or have tea.I’ll be back to claim you as mine.”
He crossed to the tall mirror that hung to the left of her door, magic already shimmering around the glass.He paused, one hand braced on the frame, and looked back at her.
“Try not to stab anyone,” he said.
She huffed softly, all the while her insides were doing a happy dance like a damn teenager with a crush.“No promises.”
He stepped through and was gone.
Lisa stood there long after the shimmer faded, fingers brushing her mouth, pulse still racing.“Holy crap,” she whispered as her heart pounded painfully in her chest.Lisa hadn’t felt that kind of pull towards anything since, she paused her thoughts and felt a pang of guilt.Not since her meeting her mate, her long-dead mate.Rezer wasn’t wrong.She was no longer bound, and though she’d always love the father of her children, she couldn’t stay buried in her past.He wouldn’t expect her to.He would however be annoyed that it was another dark elf she might be moving on with.
* * *
The forest feltdifferent during the day.Not safer, just louder.
Sunlight spilled through the canopy in broken patches, dust motes drifting like lazy sparks.The trees hummed the way the old elvish forests always did, but today it sounded ...watchful.Like they had opinions.
Cassie shoved a branch out of her face and exhaled hard.“If one more vine tries to trip me, I’m setting this entire forest on fire.”
Elora snorted behind her.“Please don’t, it might stop trying to trip us and escalate to homicide.”
Cassie stopped long enough to glare over her shoulder.Elora looked infuriatingly composed for someone who’d walked for hours, hair braided, eyes sharp, jaw set like she was going to war.Which, to be fair, she kind of was.
“You don’t even look tired,” Cassie muttered.
