Page 114 of Illusory

“Stop,” I rasped, my breath coming in labored as I yanked my hand back like I’d scorched it on an open flame. “Both of you.” I had no idea what they were doing but it was making my knees, and my resolve, go weak.

“Stop what, angel?” asked Dominic, his breath fluttering against the shell of my ear. “We haven’t even done anything yet.”

Yet?Did he sayyet?As in, something more was coming?

“No.” Nope. Not even entertaining that. “I need to get backto my homework,” I stated, pushing Dominic’s hand down from my waist and stepping forward so that he wasn’t pressed up against my back anymore. Unfortunately, that brought me almost chest to chest with Trace. I wasn’t sure which of the two positions was worse for that inferno heating me up from the neck down. All the way down.

“Can you please move?” I asked Trace, flustered beyond my wildest imagination.

“Don’t you want to get your snack first?” he asked, looking like he was the damn snack being offered. I suddenly felt starved, positively ravenous and it had nothing to do with food anymore.

And why was it so fucking hot in here?

“Of course, she does,” answered Dominic, and I could practically hear the smirk on his face even though I didn’t turn around to look at him. “Don’t you, angel?”

Were they messing with me? Were they trying to fuck with me on purpose? Fogging up my head and confusing my body for some kind of revenge game? Was this payback for breaking things off with them?

It had to be that. Nothing else made sense.

“We’re not messing with you,” said Trace, answering my thoughts. “I promise it’ll make sense if you just sit down and talk to us for a minute.”

How did he—? I looked down and noted his hand splayed against my hip. My skin had been vibrating so intensely that I hadn’t even felt him touch me again. Mostly because I already felt like I was being touchedeverywhereby both of them and all at once. I couldn’t seem to make heads or tails out of anything.

“Do you think you could do that for us, angel?”

I’d meant to shake my head, to scrounge up the proper words that would make this vampire menage come to an endbefore I spontaneously combusted on the spot, but that wasn’t what I did.

It wasn’t what I did at all.

“That’s my good girl,” purred Dominic as I nodded my head despite having meant to do something else entirely.

There was obviously something very, very wrong with me.

37. AN INDECENT PROPOSAL

Thick droplets of rain beat against the bay windows as the forecasted storm slowly rolled off the coast and began to make its way toward us. I was sitting at the head of the kitchen table, sandwiched between Trace and Dominic on either side of me and a plate of Isa’s chicken and potatoes in front of me. A plate that was making my mouth water.

Better my mouth than…other places.

As awkward as I felt with both Dominic and Trace staring me down like I was a Michelin star meal they’d been waiting weeks to eat, the prospect of finally putting food in my stomach seemed to break the spell I’d been in and turned all my focus and energy into getting a taste of Isa’s lemon pepper chicken instead of, well,them.

Note to self: use food to bury unwanted feelings.

Biting back a smile, I picked up the fork and knife and dug in.

The second the heavenly goodness hit my tongue, I knew I’d made the right decision coming downstairs, despite having had to go through the two of them to get here. It wassoworth it. The woman was a sorceress. There was no other way to explain her ability to do what she did with food.

I quickly cut another piece of the chicken and then scooped up some of the garlic potatoes before popping both into my mouth. Half a dozen different flavors vied for my attention, making me work doubly hard not to moan out loud or roll my eyes into the back of my head like I was having a religious experience.

Because that was literally the last thing they needed tosee. Not that I’d looked up and met either of their eyes. I was far too busy eating my feelings and avoiding eye contact with either of them to do that. But I could stillfeelthem and their heavy gazes weighing me down like a soaking wet blanket.

Despite my best intention to ignore them for as long as possible, it still only took a few more dragged-out moments of my knife scraping frantically against the plate and the internal sound of my chewing being played on a megaphone in my head before I cracked from the pressure and broke the silence first.

“Didn’t you have something you wanted to talk to me about?” I asked and then finally looked up to meet their gazes. “Or are you guys just going to watch me eat the whole time?”

Dominic cleared his throat and nodded to Trace. “Care to do the honors,Romeo?”

Oh no. For fuck’s sake. I immediately cringed, already mourning my delicious dinner that was surely going to get flung across the table as I anticipated Trace going ballistic on Dominic for using the nickname we all knew he despised, but the strangest thing happened instead. Nothing at all.

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