Elise couldn’t sleep.She knew that there was no reason to stay up and wait for Cal. He would be home when it suited him, as he always was, but her mind refused to turn off.
What was he doing? Was he safe? Did he regret what they’d done in the annex?
She shifted restlessly in her bed. Fisting a handful of her blankets, she turned on her side and stared out at the sea of lights visible through her bedroom window — unlocked, just in case he decided to blow in sometime during the night.
Anxiety mingled with a dreadful, unfulfilled arousal.
Gods, but she loved the taste of him. Elise had always been a sexual being, but sex with Cal was different. Everything he did — every little sound, every shift of his muscles, every involuntary, stuttering breath — thrilled her to the core. He made her feel powerful and in control. There was nothing more intoxicating than guiding him through his first sexual experiences.
The ache between her legs hadn’t diminished even after the explosion. It persisted as she helped her mother clean up the living room and gave a faceless Patrol officer her statement. It didn’t let up even after she got home and took a cleansing shower.
It was a good sort of ache, of course, but Elise couldn’t shake the concern that she overwhelmed Cal. They’d fought and then he had what she was astonished to learn was his first orgasm. Neither were followed up with a talk or a check-in to make sure he was all right.
Is that why he left?
Elise rolled over again. Her eyes stung. Instead of staring at her closet and wall of framed articles, she forced herself to try and sleep.
But the worries came at her from all sides, robbing her of rest.
She pictured Cal out there, dematerialized and enmeshed in fog as he drifted over the water. Was he angry at her? Did he feel guilt or shame for what he’d done? She knew he still struggled with much of what Loft’s acolytes tried to indoctrinate him with. Did he think they’d done something wrong?
Whatever it was that bothered him, she was certain they could work through it. The problem was that he had to be there to do that.
Elise curled her legs closer to her chest, a bloom of hurt taking root in her heart. She hated the idea that he might be out there confused and hurt and alone. She hated being without him. For all that he’d never slept in her bed, she felt it was cold and barren without him.
Part of loving Cal was understanding that he did not just belong to her. No matter what her possessiveness said, he was a force of nature. He was wild. He could not be held in one place any more than he could stay in his physical form indefinitely. He had to roam because it was his nature. He had to do his vigil because it was his duty.
She understood this. As a weather witch with an unbridled awe for the wildness of the world, she even respected it.
But the part of her that was a woman in love had to come to terms with the fact that he would not always be home at night. He would never sleep beside her, nor would he take her out to dinner and a show.
She didn’t begrudge him those things. Cal was who he was. Elise wouldn’t want him any other way. Part of loving someone was trusting them to come back to you — even when they were the physical embodiment of something as ephemeral as fog. If she wanted a boring, five-in-the-evening-to-eight-in-the-morning kind of guy, she could have one.
Cal spoke to her soul. She didn’t and never would want anyone like she wanted him. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t worry.
It was an exhausting night. First, the nerves that came with introducing Cal to her parents. Then their fight. Then the rush of going down on him for the first time. Then the explosion. Elise felt like she’d lived a year of her life in less than eight hours.
Sleep pulled her down, though her worries fought it every step of the way.
* * *
FROM THE DESK OF ELISE SASINI, AN EXCERPT FROM THE MANUSCRIPT THE SHROUDED CITY:
I’ve loved before. My first boyfriend was Jeremy Ackerman, a wolf shifter, in the fifth grade. I loved him.
I dated Dan, a fellow journalism student, for three years. I loved him, too. I’ve loved strangers on the m-lev and I’ve loved men who never loved me back.
I’ve loved before, but I’ve never loved like I love Cal.
Maybe it’s something base and fundamental in our magic that draws us together. Maybe it’s just chemistry. Maybe it’s whatever unseen hand that people like to believe guides these things. I don’t know.
All I know is that Cal is wild, and beautiful, and strange, and sometimes hard to get along with. He is broken and he is proud and he is carrying scars I can’t even see. Every day I look at him and I see a deep, dark pool of secrets desperately trying to get out — and I see a man who wants to be held and yet does not have the words necessary to say so.
I see my whole future in a single, mercurial being, and if the gods truly exist, then only they can appreciate the scope of my devotion to him.
* * *
The feeling of cool air on her arms and face roused her from a fitful dose, but it was the feeling of chilly hands that really woke her.