Page 184 of A Winding Wave of Magic
His pupils doubled in size.
“Fuck the rules,” he growled, then slipped a hand around my nape and pulled me to him with a groan.
Need pulsed between us, harsh and unforgiving. It wasn’t a kiss so much as a theft, both of us taking what our bodies seemed to crave at all times. Mates or not, Caomhán was right. We really were just animals, with instincts that superseded logic.
And then, just as quickly, Jonathan ended the kiss and put three feet of space between us. Both of us sucked in harsh breaths and wiped our swollen mouths, as guilty and desperate as teenagers.
“You really need to learn when people are teasing you,” I said as if the intensity of the moment wasn’t still lingering in the air. “And for the record, I couldn’t care less if you were fifty or five hundred. Especially when you can kiss like that.”
The green in his eyes darkened substantially. “Don’t toy with me, Cassandra. That would be very dangerous for us both.”
I couldn’t say I cared.
Jonathan ran a hand through his hair as he drained his tea and pushed it toward me for more from the pot. “I chose this record because my mother used to play it for me when I was a child,” he said as I poured more hot water. “It’s one of the few memories of her I still have, sitting by the fireplace. She’d put a record on her phonograph and dance with guests of the inn. Sometimes she would take a lone traveler up to her room. Sometimes not.”
I blinked, unsure how to respond. He’d never shared anything like this before with me, and I didn’t want to scare him off, even though I was already full of questions.
“She was a siren,” I said, remembering the exchange with Aoife.
He nodded, cheeks pinked. “From a long line. My grandfather was a Venetian nobleman, a famous lover who seduced my grandmother, the seeress who owned the inn tucked into the mountains north of Venice.”
Something rang familiar about that story, but I couldn’t quite place it. Then my eyes shot open. “Your grandfather wasCasanova?”
I was rewarded with an eye roll. “By all accounts, he was far less impressive than his memoirs indicate.”
“Well, maybe we’re not mates, then. Maybe it’s just your superior genetics that makes me forgive you even when you breadcrumb me to death.”
Jonathan grunted but shook his head. “Believe me, Iwishit were as simple as that.”
I turned. “What does it mean, exactly? Being my mate?”
He rubbed his forehead, which was heavily creased at this point, then looked up with that pained expression I was genuinely starting to hate. “It means you’ll never truly be rid of me, Cass, nor I you. It means we share a unique bond that is, yes, responsible for things like being able to See each other’s gifts or share our thoughts, but ultimately has nothing to do with how either of us consciously feels about one another. It means we’ve lost our choice.”
“But…you leave,” I said. “You’ve left before. For months at a time. In the spring. And then when you left me—left me here.” Odd. I could barely get that out. My voice quavered when I said it out loud, and the sudden tears pricking the back of my eyes felt as fresh as when he had left me at this cottage the first time.
“The more time we spend together, the stronger the bond grows,” Jonathan said. “We’d only just met when I left you in February, and even then, I nearly flew back to Boston at least once a week. These last six weeks…” He shook his head.“They’ve been fucking torture.”
I drummed my fingers on the counter, considering. “Why would it be worse for you than for me? I’m not saying the last six weeks were pleasant for me either—stop smiling, I can admit that you’re hot, and I thought about you a lot—but I wasn’t dying or anything.”
Jonathan’s face fell. “It’s because you’re not manifested. It will get worse. I’m so?—”
“If you apologize one more time for something you can’t control, I’m going to throw my tea in your face.” I huffed anddecided to put the matter aside for the moment. “All right. What about your father? Did you find him while we were apart?” Just asking about the shadowed man gave me chills colder than any ocean. Almost as if I was calling him here.
Jonathan gave a heavy, defeated sigh. “I tracked him to Eastern Europe. He doesn’t leave much behind, but I know his scent better than most.”
He sniffed as if to demonstrate, and I wondered if, as a manifested shifter, he could smell my emotions as acutely as my cousins. I wasn’t sure what I thought of that.
“He passed through Albania first,” he said. “Croatia. Some of the other Balkans. I talked it through with Robbie last night, and we both agree, it doesn’t make sense, what he’s doing. Going to libraries, then visiting some of the old hypogea in the region. In and out of the ground like a gopher. I thought he was looking for someone, but…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “I don’t know what he’s doing, haunting these old graves.”
“Preparing for his own demise, let’s hope,” I remarked. “Maybe he’ll visit the mounds here. They’ll give him a taste of his own medicine.” I shuddered at the memory of last night.
Jonathan’s hand lifted like he wanted to pull me close at the thought. Then it dropped, and he went on.
“Whatever it was, I lost him after he crossed into the northern Alps, but I don’t think he found what he was looking for.” He looked meaningfully across the counter. “He has no idea about Sibyl yet, Cass. Your mother is just fine.”
It wasn’t what I really wanted to know, but good to know, I supposed.
There was a knock at the door, and Caitlin entered, rubbing her forehead. The look on her face when she caught us so close made us both spring back like guilty teenagers.
