Velvet

I ran out of words, so I hopped on the coffee table and pushed off, landing on the middle of the bookshelf and propelling away from the brothers as quickly as possible. That much gorgeous was not good for a girl.

After a few seconds, I found our previous study station and let myself down onto the couch. I contemplated taking the harness off, then decided against it. I might need another fast escape.

As I sat down, the clasps and knots bit into my legs uncomfortably. I sighed and stood, mulling over what to do. Finally, I jumped into the air, pushed the button to lower me just a bit, and hovered parallel to the coffee table where my papers were spread out.

After struggling through homework for a few minutes, I slowly became aware that all the hairs on my arm were standing on end. I looked up from my textbook and saw a familiar pair of aviator goggles peeking just over the edge of the coffee table. The boy that went with them was perfectly still.

“Are you breathing, Lucian?” I asked, half afraid and half concerned.

I heard a deep intake of breath from somewhere below the surface of the table.

“Now I am.”

I peered at him curiously. “Why weren’t you breathing?”

He peered right back. “I forgot.”

“You forgot?”

“Yeah.”

All righty. “Why are you hiding underneath the table?”

He blinked. “Why are you on top of the table?”

Smart-ass. Cute little munchkin smart-ass.

“Good question. Why don’t you come out so I can see you and we can talk some more? The couch is probably a lot more comfortable than the floor.”

I swiveled the harness so my body faced the couch, but kept my gaze locked on his face. Lucian was an unknown entity. And I doubted he had Adrian’s control, or Mariana’s and Dominic’s maturity—or at least, their natural reservation. There was a good possibility he viewed me as a snack.

He blinked again and slowly slithered out from underneath the table to crawl onto the couch. He turned around and sat limply, peering at me with his head tilted to one side, wavy brown hair sticking out in all directions.

“Isn’t that more comfortable?” I asked with what I hoped was a friendly smile.

He seemed to consider. “Yes.”

“Now what’s all this about not having to breathe?”

He did a funny one-shoulder shrug. “Didn’t need this so much back then.”

It took me a second before I realized “this” meant “body.”

“Where were you before?” I asked, trying to sound casual. I knew the answer, but I wanted to hear it from Lucian. Just because Mariana and Dominic believed all this stuff about demons and hell didn’t mean he did.

He stared at me from behind his big goggles, his eyes too dark behind the tinted glass to see what color they were. He replied without blinking, without breathing, without moving a single muscle but his lips.

“Where my father lives.”

I shivered. It seemed like a crazy question, but I had to ask it. “Did you like it there? At home?”

He tilted his head slightly farther to the side and held his hands in front of his face as if they were alien. “I didn’t … I don’t remember … these…” His expression turned frustrated. “Everything gets in the way.” He let his hands drop limply at his sides.

“But, you can do lots of great things with those,” I said, wondering why I was trying to convince him that having a body and being a quasi-human were great things. “I mean, you can pick up stuff and you can hug people and you can play.”

He seemed to perk up. “I like to play.”

I smiled encouragingly. “You do?”

The boy grinned. “Adrian plays card games with me.” And then he frowned. “Nobody else does.”

“Do you like Adrian?”

He nodded. “Adrian doesn’t tell Mariana when I’m in his truck or when I do things people aren’t supposed to do, like hang upside down. And he tells me stories when I go to sleep. I like to sleep. I like dreams.” He paused and tilted his head again in consideration. “I like to be awake, too.” He smiled. “I like blood.”

We’d been doing great up until that last part.

“Why is your heart fast again?” Lucian said in that half-dead monotone of his.

“Because I’m happy to be talking with you,” I said, only sort of lying.

“Your heart goes fast when you’re happy?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Sometimes. Sometimes it goes fast because of other things.” And before he could ask what other things, I asked a question of my own. “Why do you wear those goggles all the time?”

He blinked at me through the semitinted lenses before answering. “Light hurts.”

“Really? Why?”

“I never used them before,” he said, tapping the glass slowly with his finger, indicating his eyes.

Oh.

“Are you Adrian’s girlfriend?”

I was a little shocked by the abrupt turn of topic and could only come up with, “I, um—yes?”

He frowned. “What’s a girlfriend?”

Temple West's books