Page 28 of The Midwinter Mirror
He grins. “Actually, I was thinking about that blow job you offered me yesterday.”
My cheeks flame as I remember the moment. I was totally brazen. “I so did not.”
“Did so. I’ve been thinking about it ever since. And I can’t believe I turned you down.” He leans closer. “Ask me again, princess. Say you’ll go down on your knees for me. I won’t say no this time.”
An image fills my mind. Me, on my knees…My nipples peak and that place between my thighs tingles. My mouth goes dry, and I clear my throat. “Hah. In your dreams.”
“Every night.” His expression turns serious. “Are you regretting yesterday?”
I sniff and give him my best princess expression. “Hell no. It took my mind off this crap for at least five minutes.”
“Ten,” he says. “And I promise next time we’ll take it slow.”
Part of me wants that so much. The rest of me wants to run back to London. Back to my ordinary life away from magic and the monsters. “I don’t think there will be a next time,” I say. “Not for us. There’s too much between us.”
He looks at me and shrugs. “We’ll see. Let’s get the children back first.”
I take a deep breath and then the words spill out of me. “What if we don’t get them back?” I can feel my panic rising again. “What if we’re totally heading down the wrong track and they’ve been taken by people traffickers and—”
“Breathe, Holly. It will be okay.”
“We’re running out of time. I mean, if there is anything in these stories, then we only have a few more hours.”
“We’ll find them. We have to.” For the first time, I see a crack in his certainty. “I can’t let Tansy down again. Ihaveto find her.”
I can hear the fear in his voice. And that makes me feel…protective. I failed Zayne last time. I let him down in the worst possible way. I doubted him. I won’t let him down again. I’ll pretend to be strong. I slip my hand into his and squeeze. “You’ll find them.”
Though I don’t see how. I look ahead to where Josh is deep in conversation with the thing on his shoulder. I tug on Zayne’s arm and pull him closer. “What is that…thing?” I whisper.
Zayne snorts. “Don’t let Grimlet hear you call him a thing. He’ll get offended,” he shouts out. “Hey, Grim, can you come here a moment?”
The thing looks up, then flaps its wings and flies toward us, landing on Zayne’s shoulder and curling its tail around his neck. “You two haven’t been properly introduced,” Zayne says. “Grimlet, this is Holly. Holly, this is Grimlet.”
“But what is it?” I ask.
Ithisses.
“Heis a gargoyle,” Zayne says, then turns and whispers something.
It looks at me with narrowed eyes, then says, “Grimlet will forgive her.” He sniffs. “If only because she has been spelled to be stupid. It’s not her fault.”
I sort of feel I should be offended.
“Does stupid witch have chocolate?” Grimlet asks.
Actually, I do. I pull a truffle out of my pocket. Grimlet hops the short distance between me and Zayne, landing on my shoulder. I hold back the scream—I’m very proud of myself—then carefully hand him the chocolate. He unwraps it, gives me back the wrapper, and pushes it into his mouth. A smile of pure bliss crosses his little face. “He’s sort of cute,” I say.
A low growl rumbles from my shoulder, then he takes off, hitting me in the face with a wing and then a tail. “Ouch.”
Zayne laughs. “I think you offended him.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t actually know the proper etiquette for conversing with gargoyles.”
We’re coming up on Silvergate now, and my steps slow. I pull my hand free and pause at the edge of the clearing. I hate this place. It always feels like something or someone is watching me. I wrap my arms around my middle as Zayne walks across to Josh, and they talk together. Josh is wandering around the clearing, nose in the air, almost as though he’s sniffing. At one point, he turns to look at me, and I swear there’s a strange silver light in his eye, like a piece of starlight is trapped inside.
I don’t know what they hope to find here. There’s just snow and more snow, and…I can feel the panic rising again. I need to blow into a paper bag or something. Except I don’t have one. I concentrate on Zayne and Josh to pull myself out of my downward spiral.
They’ve stopped in one spot and are staring at…nothing I can see, just more snow. Zayne says something, then something else. I can’t hear the words. But it’s like he’s talking to the snow. Nothing happens, and he runs his hand through his hair. Josh tries. And guess what—still nothing happens. Josh says something to Zayne. His eyes widen and they both turn to look at me. What now?
