Page 69 of Hunt the Dusk
His question irritated me. “Because I want to meet that person.”
“Why?”
Because if there was good in him, real good, then I could justify my attraction. I could stop feeling like a freak for being drawn to him.
“Orina?” He lightly touched my cheek with his gloved hand. “Why?”
I pulled away. “I don’t know, okay?” The lie came easily.
He exhaled shakily. “He killed Agatha and many innocents. That won’t change.”
“I know, and that’s a guilt he’ll have to deal with once he has his humanity back.” I fixed a smile on my face. “And now I’m done talking about this. I need books.”
Hemlock pressed his lips together, and I sensed that he was battling with the desire to say more. Thankfully, he resisted the urge, stepping back to indicate the shelf behind him. “Take your pick. The whole aisle is modern-day literature from the most recent era.”
“Thank you.” I slipped past him and into the aisle lined with brightly colored spines.
He lingered as if wrestling with whether to rekindle our conversation. I grabbed a random book, flipped to the blurb, and pretended to read. He stood there a few seconds longer before retreating with a sigh.
Only then did I focus on reading the blurb. An angst-ridden romance about a woman wrestling with her feelings for a man she claimed to despise. For fucksake. I made to shove the book back on the shelf then decided against it. Heck, maybe I’d learn something.
Chapter 23
The magnificent Trellani brownstone grew closer as we coasted down the gravel drive. Would Ordell’s ex Bella greet us at the door, or would it be her husband Dash who answered to us this time?
The last time I’d been here, I’d put my foot in it by pointing out how obvious it was that the triplets were Ordell’s. Not my finest hour, but I’d been pissed at the way Dash spoke to Ordell. He’d been dismissive and irritated with him for coming to see his own children when he should have been encouraging the contact.
I didn’t remember much about my parents. The fire had taken all mementos that might help me hold on to them, but when I closed my eyes and thought of them, I felt safe. Always safe. They’d loved me, I was certain of that much because I felt it, and the way Ordell spoke about his triplets, the softness in his eyes, told me he loved them dearly.
This luncheon was a time for the children to be surrounded by the people that adored them, and it felt like an intrusion for me to be here.
I shifted in my seat, adjusting the box of cakes we’d brought on my lap. “I know they invited me, but I’m pretty sure they were being polite. I shouldn’t be here.”
Ordell killed the engine and twisted in his seat to face me. “You’re the chapter leader, the person who’ll watch over the triplets if something goes wrong with our plan to get them mageri protection. Trust me, they’ll want to know you.”
“And what if they don’t like me?” Why had I said that? I mean, what did it matter if they liked me or not, right? My job was to keep them safe, not be their favorite person, except…I wanted them to like me because…because they were Ordell’s children, and Ordell mattered to me. A lot.
His ocean blues warmed in that way reserved just for me, and the icy grip on my chest melted.
“How could they not like you, Orina? In fact, I’ll wager that by the end of the afternoon, they’ll have fallen in love with you.” His voice was hushed and intimate. My stomach warmed.
There was something more about him today. An earthy lure that made me want to get closer, to climb onto his lap and press my nose to the base of his throat and inhale him. Today, Ordell made me want to purr.
His gaze darted across my features. “What are you thinking?” he whispered.
“Things I shouldn’t be thinking.” I shrugged. I missed our closeness. I missed his touch. I missed the way he could fold me in a hug and make the world stop for a while. It was insane how I could miss all these things so much when I’d had them for such a brief time. The impact this male had on me…
Regret spawned a storm in his eyes. “It will get easier with practice.”
‘It.’ All the urges. All the desires. All the wanting. He’d bundled them all up into an ‘it.’ “How can you be so sure of that?”
He half smiled. “Well, it’s a full moon tonight, and all I can think about right now is throwing you into the back of this van and fucking you senseless, and yet here I am, calmly having a conversation with you about it.”
All the moisture from my mouth seemed to gravitate to my groin, and the urge to do something decidedly wicked flared inside me. Thank goodness I had a box of cakes to hold between us as a shield.
He pocketed his keys with a sigh. “We should head inside.”
The doors to the mansion opened as we were climbing the steps, and Dash greeted us with a smile that barely touched his eyes.
