The furie inhaled again, and the shade was pulled back, sucked down through her wide mouth. Her throat bulged as the last wisp of smoke snaked out, flailing before it too disappeared into the furie’s belly.

“Yeah,” I murmured, my fingers stilling in Josie’s hair. “That was…gross.”

She whirled toward me, but her gaze landed on Josie’s prone body. Immediately, she shifted back into her mortal form as she dropped down on the other side of her. She reached for Josie, but for some reason that was beyond me, I moved one hand to the back of Josie’s head and the other to her hip, guiding her into my lap. The look I sent the furie must’ve been read loud and clear, because she withdrew her hands.

Our stares held once more, and then she sighed, her shoulders shuddering, and dipped her chin to her chest. “They’ve found her.”

Chapter 7

I KNEW I was dreaming, because I was back home, sitting at the golden oak table in the old, country-style kitchen in my grandparents’ house, and I was wearing a grown-up version of the red cowgirl outfit that I’d loved dearly and had worn almost every day for several months before my granny took it away from me. The skirt was red with white ruffles, and the shirt had a red vest attached to it, also full of white ruffles that formed a “V” on each side. When I’d been four, this outfit had been cute—adorable even—but as a twenty-year-old, not so much.

Mom was sitting across from me, looking so very young and so very vulnerable as she stared into her teacup. My breath caught as she tilted her cup to the side.

Oh God, I remembered this morning. I would never forget this morning.

Closing my eyes tightly, I reopened them to find my mom staring at me. Her lips parted, and every muscle in my body strained to give flight, but I was rooted to my seat in that damn cowgirl dress, reliving the morning from sixteen years ago.

“You’re destined for something great, baby.” Her deep-brown eyes roamed over my face, unfocused. “You have to be. I keep telling myself that’s the reason why you’re here. There has to be a reason why my life ended when yours began. There has to be a point to all this.”

Like before, when I first heard those words, a very real pain sliced through my chest, cutting deep through tissues and organs. At four years old, I didn’t understand that those words meant I was unplanned and a mistake, but I had felt their meaning, and I had known in that moment that my mom hadn’t wanted me. I knew she loved me, but she hadn’t wanted me.

The kitchen blurred as the dream faded away before Granny entered. Even as I was pulled out of the dream, existing somewhere between asleep and awake, I remembered that Granny had overheard Mom, and it hadn’t been pretty. Mom had spent the rest of the day in her bedroom, and my grandparents had taken me out for ice cream.

Consciousness pressed against me as I dragged in a deep breath. It got hung up around the messy ball in the back of my throat, but there was a nagging suspicion that there was something more important that I needed to pay attention to, something other than what my mom had said so many years ago.

Nearby footsteps tickled my ears, and I forced my eyes open, blinking my surroundings into focus. The ceiling was unfamiliar. Satiny-white, with polished, exposed beams, it was a hell of a lot more fancy than the drop ceiling in my dorm. My gaze crawled past a huge ceiling fan to a flat screen the size of a small car mounted to the wall, and then to the large desk under it.

This was so not my dorm, and come to think of it, the bed in my dorm wasn’t this fluffy-cloud comfortable, and neither were the sheets or the blanket practically tucked up to my chin.

Holy crap.

My gaze darted to the left, to a door that was ajar. I caught sight of a massive bathroom. Heart thumping, I checked out the scenery to my right and my mouth dropped open.

Seth stood by a large window. The blinds were up and the curtains were pulled back. It was night out, but who cared about that? He was missing a shirt. Looking out the window, he had his back to me and all that golden skin was on display.

Muscles along his back and his shoulders rolled, flexed, and did a myriad of fascinating things as he dragged a white towel through his wet hair. When he lowered his arms, the ends of his blond hair brushed his shoulders. He turned around, and goodness, the nylon sweats he wore hung so low on his hips it was almost indecent.

That boy worked out—and then some.

On either side of his hips, there were these indentations that begged to be touched, but then there were his abs. Six-pack? Was it possible to have an eight-pack? I think he had one. Smooth skin stretched over tightly rolled muscles. I bet I could’ve done a week’s worth of laundry on his stomach. Probably would be a heck of a lot more fun way to wash clothes. The near-perfect, if not completely perfect, body came complete with actual pecs, and I’d never really seen a guy in real life with actual pecs. They were unreal, but totally—

“Do you want to touch?”

Eyes darting up to his face in surprise, I felt my body burn red-hot. “E-excuse me?”

His lips curved up and his bicep tensed as he tossed the towel across the room. He stood at the side of the bed, arms at his sides, completely comfortable with how much flesh he was showing off. Then again, I’d walk around naked if I were a dude and had a body like that, so…

“You were staring at me for so long, I was asking if you wanted to touch,” he repeated, and my face started flaming.

“I don’t want to touch. And I wasn’t staring.”

The half-grin spread. “You weren’t?”