Page 43 of A Touch Of Death

I turn my head to face him and say, "You all did an amazing job. The room is beautiful."

He gives me a smile that has my heart somersaulting under my rib cage, and I force myself to look away. I turn and walk to the middle of the room, taking in the effort they've all put into making the space mine. My chest warms, knowing they've done all they can to make me feel at home.

"Go inspect the closet before we dive into the research," Zayn says, walking behind me and coaxing me along toward the door that I know hides the closet. I laugh at Zayn's gentle nudging in attempt to move me faster, but I do as I'm told.

When I open the closet door and get a first glance at the inside, my mouth drops open in shock. I know for certain that I did not have that many clothes before being shot and falling unconscious. I also know I didn't have that many pairs of heels and boots. Every railing is filled with clothes: shirts, dresses, jackets, you name it.

My head swivels towards Zayn and I know my eyes are as wide as the damn moon. He throws his hands up in a placating gesture and quickly says, "I'm not to blame for most of that. Spencer and I are only to blame for what you already knew you had. The rest... well, that was Ezra coping with you being unconscious and unresponsive for almost a week."

My eyebrows scrunch in confusion. There are so many things I want to question about that sentence, but I blurt the first questions that come to me. "Ezra's coping mechanism is to shop for clothes? And did he have to buy so much? He must have bought at least three stores worth of clothes."

I walk further into the room, brushing my hand over the beautiful dresses that line one wall, and move on to the shirts ranging in all kinds of colours and materials. As I'm moving towards the large dresser, Zayn answers. "He was rather distraught when you wouldn't wake up after the second day, so Spencer gave him a task to focus on while you recovered. He might have gone a little overboard, but he wanted to do something even if it seemed trivial."

Despite the amount of clothing in this room, that little bit of information has my heart melting into a puddle. He couldn't do anything while I recovered, so he bought me clothes to make up for it. I'd laugh if it wasn't strangely adorable. I can absolutely forgive the obnoxious amount of clothing in this room for the reasoning behind it.

I look into the dresser and find silk nightgowns aplenty. The first drawer is filled to the brim with various pastel coloured gowns, with the second and third overfilled with black, white, dark purples and reds gowns, with the odd deep teal colour thrown in there. The drawers beneath those are full of comfy looking pyjamas, baggy sleep shirts, and other night wear.

Blinking rapidly, I move to a different section of the room and find a stunning collection of lavish dressing gowns that I never would have worn before I was taken. Looking at them now and feeling the silk glide through my fingers has me thinking these items of clothing will no doubt be my favourite.

When I open a drawer that contains nothing but underwear, I promptly slam it shut with flaming cheeks. "I see he was very thorough in his shopping."

Zayn outright laughs, and my embarrassment almost flees with the sound of his smooth chuckles. "He bought you everything you'd ever need. We all told him he was going overboard, but he wouldn’t hear any of it. At least you won't be short of any sort of clothing anytime soon."

I snort and mutter, "You could say that again."

Shaking my head at the absurdity of my new closet, I turn and walk out of the room, Zayn backing away from the door to let me pass. Before I take a seat on the bed, Nix's head pops up over the banister to the stairs. As soon as his eyes meet mine, a grin forms on his face. "Mind some extra company?"

I roll my eyes with a smile and tell him, "You're more than welcome to join. We're only reading through books to figure out what could have caused my extra abilities."

He cringes, though he tries to hide it. I can't help the laugh that escapes me, and I tell him, "Or you could just hang out in here with us. You can have the TV while Zayn and I tackle the books."

Nix sends me a bigger grin and walks further into my room. He drops to the bed, brushing a hand over mine as he walks by me. Not knowing where the remote is, I tell him to find them himself while I pick up the first book and climb onto the bed, sitting cross-legged next to a sprawled out Nix. Zayn picks up a book and settles into the rocking chair.

A couple of pages into the book I'm reading - onNaturalsand mostly about things I already knew - Spencer joins us in my room. He doesn't make a big deal of it, just picks up a book, magics in a dark grey bean bag with a flick of his wrist and a spark of yellow, and settles in to read with us.

The room is quiet save for the action movie Nix has put on. At some point during our reading session, Nix moved and is now acting as my cushion, his stomach supporting my back while the rest of his body curves around mine. I don't know when he moved, or how we got into this position, but we both seem to be comfortable, and I like it too much to move.

It's twenty minutes later, and no answers found when Ezra comes upstairs holding two bowls of spaghetti and meatballs. " It's all dished and ready to go, but, as you can see, I only possess two hands. You shits can get your own food."

I muffle my snickering with my hand when Nix curses and Spencer calls Ezra a giant ass, and catch the smirk Ezra wears before handing me my bowl. He steals Zayn's seat while the three leave the room.

"What are you guys doing up here?" Ezra asks, tucking into his food after asking the question.

I nudge the pile of books with my foot, drawing his attention to them. "We're researching. Zayn mentioned having books onNaturals thathe thought might help us figure out why I’m different, so we're looking through them. Nix is watching some action movie on Netflix because it seems like he's allergic to reading."

Ezra snorts and almost chokes on the mouthful of food he's just taken. "Yeah, research isn't Nix's strongest suit."

I shrug. "It doesn't bother me. He's keeping the rest of us company while we search, and I like having the company. I've gone too long without normal, you know? Just having you guys nearby means a lot to me."

Ezra goes quiet, and it's only a few mouthfuls of food later that I realise he's stopped eating entirely and is watching me. "What? Is there sauce on my face?"

He shakes his head and blinks, diverting his eyes to his bowl. "Uh, no. You're fine."

Not a minute later, the others join us. Zayn takes up position at the end of the bed since his seat’s been stolen, but we all settle quickly. For the next hour, we all lounge around watching the remainder of the movie while eating good food.

As soon as the movie ends, Zayn says, "Alright, shall we continue our search for answers?"

I nod quickly, bending over Nix to place my bowl on top of his on the nightstand before dropping back into my seat. I snatch up the book I'd been working through before dinner and say, "Sure. Let's get reading."

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