“So if you and I…”
She winked. “Yes, there’s a good chance you’d turn me into a devoted Doctor Who fangirl.”
Her fingers remained twined with mine as she led me past the monkey bars toward the trees. She gave me a sideways glance. “I’ll be here when you make up your mind. Or if you just need help getting to sleep tonight.”
With a mischievous smile, she jabbed her bokken into the ground and tugged me close, her arm circling my waist. Before I could react, she slipped her other hand behind my neck and kissed me.
She leaned into my body, and we both staggered a step before catching our balance. Her legs and hips pressed into mine, and her fingers twisted into the back of my shirt. She tasted faintly of mint, and any remaining conflict I was struggling with slipped away as her tongue darted between my lips. I kissed her harder, wrapping my arms around her body.
“Mm.” The soft moan of her mouth against mine made me pull her in even tighter. When she finally broke away, both of us were breathing hard. Her eyes were bright, and the way she looked at me was more sensual than any kiss.
She stepped away, pulling me after her through pine branches that jabbed my exposed skin but didn’t appear to bother her in the slightest. Without taking her eyes off of mine, she reached out to touch the trunk of the largest tree. Her fingers slipped between folds in the bark, disappearing in much the same way that I reached into my books, and I gasped.
“Can you feel it?” she whispered.
I nodded dumbly. The air brushed over every pine needle, making the hairs on my body rise in response. The tree’s roots dug deep into the ground. I curled my toes into my boots, feeling the immovable strength of the tree rising through my bones.
“Nidhi never could,” she said quietly. “I hoped, given what you said about sensing magic, that I might be able to share this with you.”
A squirrel jumped from the branches, and I laughed. “It tickles.”
“A little, yes.”
“This isn’t your tree.” I wasn’t sure how I knew. It simply felt off, like trying to sleep in an unfamiliar bed.
“I can rest in any tree, but you’re right. This isn’t the tree that houses what I am. After the vampires cut down my oak…” She shook her head, tugged me close, and kissed me again. “I took cuttings from my tree. When I went to your house, I grafted one to the oak tree behind your house. If you decide- If I return, that will become the tree that houses the rest of what I am.”
Her brown eyes watched me, reading my face. I still didn’t know what was fair or right. All I knew was as I stood there feeling Lena’s magic and her connection to the trees, thinking about her returning to Copper River with me, I felt happier than I had been in a long time.
“Isaac?”
“Yes?”
“Sweet dreams.” She grinned and slipped her hand free from mine, pressing herself against the tree. A part of me felt like I should turn away to give her privacy, but she had invited me to watch this. Her arm thrust deeper into the trunk. One leg followed. She turned sideways, squeezing into a tree barely wide enough to accommodate her.
She brought her fingers to her lips and blew me a kiss. I read both mischief and lust in her eyes, and then, seconds later, I was alone.
Chapter 9
I spent most of the night thinking about Lena, even in my dreams. I spent half of breakfast trying to put those thoughts into words.
Lena was uncharacteristically quiet as she ate. I got the sense she was deliberately giving me time. She split her attention between me and a Belgian waffle drowned in strawberry syrup and topped with what might best be described as the Mount Everest of whipped cream.
I usually approached food as a necessity, a refueling process to be completed as quickly as possible, but Lena turned each meal into a sensual experience. I watched the tip of her tongue capture a speck of whipped cream from her upper lip. She glanced up at me through her lashes and smiled.
I set down my fork and pushed away a half-eaten omelet. One way or another, I had to start this conversation now, before we headed into the Detroit nest. “I’ve been thinking of you as human.”
“Oh?” Confusion creased the skin between her eyebrows.
“I created Smudge out of a book,” I said. “The magic is no different than what I used to create the potion and gun I used at the archive. He’s bound by the rules of his character. But he’s alive.”
“How do you know?” she asked, her tone neutral.
“Nothing in his book said anything about liking SpongeBob or chocolate-covered ladybugs dipped in cinnamon. He came from a stereotypical pseudomedieval setting. Nothing in that setting made him hate Journey songs.”
Lena snorted. “Journey? You’re kidding.”
“Why do you think I was so quick to change the station when we were driving down 127 yesterday? He melted one of the speakers in my truck the first time he heard ‘Faithfully.’”
“You created him. You could have shaped his likes and dislikes.”
“Oh, no. I can’t stand SpongeBob.”
“What about Journey?”
“We’re getting off topic.” I finished the last of my coffee and waved away the waiter who started to offer me a refill. “It’s easy to remember what Smudge is. No other spider cooks his own horseflies. But you look human. You’re strong, you can manipulate wood, but I’ve seen other humans do equally impressive magic.”
I traced the grain of the false wood tabletop, remembering the sensation of Lena’s magic flowing through my body, connecting us to one another through the pine tree. “I’ve been trying to treat you like a human woman, and by that standard… no one should ever be forced or coerced into taking a lover.”
She frowned. “Are you suggesting a woman who isn’t human is fair game?”
“That’s not what I meant.” I groaned and leaned back in the booth. The hardest part was trying to separate logic from desire. Whatever I said or did, how could I ever know my attraction to Lena hadn’t swayed my choice? “Showing up on an acquaintance’s doorstep and asking him to become your lover… your mate… isn’t normal. Not for humans.”
“Normal?” she repeated. “Yesterday you fed me cake from Wonderland so we could ride your spider into a magical basement and fight a vampire.”
“True enough. Look, my parents dated for four and a half years before my mother proposed. Humans choose at the end of that courtship period. For a human, picking a mate you hardly know is madness. But you’re not human. Last night at the pine tree, feeling your magic-feeling you — helped me to finally understand that. And this is how you choose.”
“Pine trees have never been my favorite. The smell lingers in my hair for days.” Lena munched a piece of bacon. “So what are you saying, Isaac?”
I had rehearsed this bit time and again last night, but my mouth was dry. I lifted my coffee mug, remembered it was empty, and sighed. “I need to stop treating you as human and start taking you for what you are.”
“Oh, so you want to take me, do you?” Her tone was playful, but her expression was as serious as I’d ever seen.
I knew what I wanted. The hardest part was accepting that it was okay to want it. “If you’re sure.”
She dug a twenty out of her wallet and slapped it onto the table. I barely managed to grab my jacket before she was hauling me away from our table and out the door. When we reached the car, she caught my shoulder, spun me around, and kissed me. Her hand slid around my waist, holding me so tightly I couldn’t have broken free if I’d wanted to.
Not that I wanted to. Last night when we kissed, I had been torn. I realized now that Lena had been holding back as well. This time, I could feel her joy, much as I had sensed the magic of her tree before. I lost myself in that kiss, in the pleasure she took and the pleasure she gave in return.
I felt like a kid finding magic for the first time. It was the same excitement, the same joy in her touch. In her.