Page 24 of To Hell and Back
Of course, his friend had already guessed what he was planning to do.
“That’s okay. He doesn’t need to make me anything. I could use a glass of wine or something, instead.” She tried to put on a brave face, but when Seneca smiled, her lower lip trembled. “I did turn twenty-one today…again.”
“Right! Happy Birthday! How about we have some champagne instead?” Arson sounded cheerful, but his gaze was serious as he sent Killian a slight nod.
Good. They would guard his mate until he returned.
“I’ll get it,” Gunner offered as he popped to his feet and hurried toward the bar. “We’ve got some of the good stuff stocked up here.”
“Make sure you eat more,” Killian said gently as he stroked his hand over Seneca’s pale hair. He desperately wanted to touch her, needed that connection after hearing what she had been through over the past year.
But it wasn’t enough.
When she tilted her head back to look up at him, he wanted to groan. As much as he tried, he simply couldn’t resist leaning down. He wanted to brush his lips against hers and taste the sweetness of her kiss. However, he didn’t want their first intimate act to be witnessed by so many people.
That should be a sacred moment only the two of them would share.
He also wasn’t sure he would be able to stop if he did that. Instead, he settled for pressing his lips against her forehead, needing to show her affection without asking for anything in return.
“I will be right back, mate.”
“We. We will be right back,” Anika corrected in a low voice devoid of all emotion.
“What? Where are you—?”
Before Seneca could finish what she was saying, Killian, Anika, and Dario disappeared, leaving an eerie silence in their wake.
Chapter Eight
Seneca sat therefeeling shocked that her new mate and his friends had left, while the others in the room didn’t seem to care. They just kept eating as if nothing had happened. She couldn’t help feeling like Killian had just abandoned her, though he probably had a good reason for leaving.
Recounting the last year of her life hadn’t been easy for her. It was even more difficult than it had been when she’d told Shadow everything earlier. Despite Killian being her mate, most of the people in the room were virtually strangers. Telling them the sordid details of what had happened to her was embarrassing since it was like putting her weaknesses on full display.
It was also pretty painful.
Being reborn might have wiped the slate clean for her, but the mental anguish of the events she had lived through was still with her like invisible scars. As she recounted the events that had occurred, she had tried to detach herself from the sorrow of the past. She hadn’t wanted to go into too much detail, but she’d felt an overwhelming need to be open and honest with Killian.
An omission wasn’t an outright lie, but it wasn’t the full truth either. Perhaps it was the influence of the mating bond that had made her want to spill her guts to him. That compulsion had made her blurt out far more than she had initially been prepared to tell them.
Retelling her story made parts of her previous life flash in front of her eyes. It was a bizarre feeling, the two timelines colliding and intertwining in her head until she had a hard time deciphering what was real. Memories surged through her mind, vivid and haunting, each one a fragment saturated in agony and despair. In contrast, her new reality was brighter and filled with hope, but that made it harder to believe.
It almost felt like she was still stuck in a strange dream. The boundaries between past and present blurred, leaving her feeling confused as she tried to separate the two. But it was a dream she was willing to indulge in, especially since it had brought Killian to her.
Amidst the chaos of being reborn, she had found her mate.
Out of everything that had happened over the past few days, meeting Killian had to be the most unexpected. Despite the undeniable connection she felt with him, a part of her still didn’t fully believe that he was really hers. She knew she had to trust his declaration, though. He wasn’t just any supernatural being. As a reaper, he was immensely powerful and perceptive. That meant there was no way he would claim someone as his mate if he wasn’t sure it was true.
“Don’t worry. I’m sure they will be back soon. Just eat. You’ve barely touched your food.” Celine scooped some of the creamy pasta with giant pieces of lobster onto her plate. “Try this. It’s really good.”
Still unwilling to let it go, Seneca turned toward Arson. “Do you know where they went?”
“If I had to guess, I would say your badass mate went to kill the witch who murdered you,” Arson said bluntly.
“Bro, you could have eased her into that a little,” Gunner chided as he carried over an enormous magnum bottle of champagne and stemless crystal flutes. With expertise, he opened the bottle and filled the glasses before handing them out. “Here, have some champagne.”
“But…but…he can’t just kill her,” she sputtered.
“Sure he can,” Arson countered cheerfully raising his glass in salute. “And after what you told us, she definitely deserves it.”
