Page 16 of Aberrant Monsters
“Come closer,” he ordered.
Not likely. I stepped away from him. “I’m fine.”
“You’d rather freeze than be close to me?”
How to explain to him that the hours after sunset needed to be mine. Free from his touch, free from his body encroaching on mine. How to explain that his proximity made the new hunger within me sharper and brighter. “I said I’m fine.”
He didn’t respond but his ire was a palpable force, and not for the first time, I wondered what he’d do once he was free of me. Of the cage of my body and the limitations our bond set. Would he go on a bloody rampage? Would he hurt me?
I flicked a glance his way, taking in the fluid way he moved, the pantherine, predatory purpose.
A chilly finger of dread slipped up my spine.
Was I doing the right thing in letting him go?
But the alternative didn’t bear thinking about.
I took a left on Cauldron Avenue onto Poison Ivy Lane. The streets in this part of the city had been renamed a decade ago when the Order of Yaga had bought the district.
The Order was made up of mystics, witches, and warlocks, descendants of Yaga and her acolytes. It was a powerful force in the city with fingers in many pies.
I stopped outside the address scrawled on the scrap of paper in my pocket. I didn’t have to check it. I’d memorized that fucker.
My uncle would be pissed I’d gone through his stuff, but I was done waiting for him to find a solution.
“Are you going to stare at the door all night?” Telarion asked. “Don’t tell me you’re having second thoughts.”
“No. We do this.” I strode up the path and knocked on the door.
Telarion moved closer, his chest almost touching my back. I tensed, holding my breath as he leaned in so his lips were inches from the delicate shell of my ear. “Why do you reek of fear and indecision?”
Fuck. “Your sense of smell is off.”
The tip of his nose touched the spot below my ear. “No. It isn’t. You’re afraid.”
I tilted my head away from his. “Stop that.”
“Tell me what you fear, and I’ll eat it.”
My stomach fluttered. Butterflies? No, moths. Urgh.
I banged on the door harder than necessary, as if the sting of wood against my knuckles would wipe away the tingle in my lower belly that Telarion evoked. Fear, longing, need, terror—they mingled to create a heady cocktail with a twist of fucking lime.
Yummy.
“What are you thinking, tiny human? Whatever it is, it’s delicious…”
Oh boy. I hammered on the door again. “Answer me, dammit!”
The door swung open, and a slender, graying woman stared at me for long seconds. “Amy?”
My pulse hammered. “No. Amy was my mother’s name. Amy Vera.”
Her eyes grew dark and wary. “In that case, I suppose you better come in.”
She stood back to admit us, her gaze skimming over Telarion and glazing over before sharpening again as it settled on me.
He was doing that thing he did, where he manipulated a mind so it didn’t see him as a threat. A kind oflook away and don’t ask questionstrick. It worked on individuals but not groups, which was why he hadn’t been able to employ the trick on the train.
