Page 241 of A Sanctuary from Shadow
Once, I did glance up from spinning Jet around like a whirly-gig, Sionna scampering between us in exuberant play, and I caught sight of him. Cissus had done an excellent job healing his wounds. Pete’s refreshed skin glowed in the firelight as he partook of spirits with Morus and Riordan. Maybe sensing my gaze, he peeked up from his frothing clay mug. And my word, I thought he’d smoldered at me before my summoning. That was nothing compared to how he looked at me now.
Shivering, I’d spun around and tossed Jet into the air. The scrawny Pixie squealed and flapped his wings to stay afloat. Panting, Sionna pranced beneath his tiny feet. Then, not one to be left out of the fun, she jumped up on her hind legs, her front paws landing on my belly. She wanted a dance with me just like everybody else.
I grinned down at her, waggling her floppy ears, and cooed, “He’s still watching me, isn’t he?”
She glanced aside to confirm, then smiled at me, stretching her back. I cuddled her head close. “You’re my favorite, Sionna.”
Her response was a good cheek licking. I wondered if she could taste my happiness.
Eventually, a massive group converged to jig along to the pipes, drums, and fiddles. Anyone who didn’t join the masses was forcibly drafted in. Including Pete, who Liatris dragged into the jubilant scrum, where he two-stepped with a wryness clearly meant to mask embarrassment. His cheeks flushed as he swayed like a redwood above a field of shrubs. I knew exactly howthatfelt.
To his credit, though, Pete stayed on the dance floor, and after a bit, his body loosened, and he swept one of the cutest little female faelets I’d ever seen up onto his shoulders. Shrieking in delight, she clapped her tiny violet hands together before burying them in Pete’s unruly fluff.
And on Pete’s shoulders is where the tiny ryan remained until Jet and his friends decided to go for a swim. Then she dropped from Pete like a pinecone and flitted off to join them, her silvery ringlets bouncing as she ran.
“You’ll be ridding your bum of those breeks before you soak them!” Liatris called to Jet, fluttering after him with hands on buxom hips. “Brine’s nay good for them, ken!”
After that, the music slowed, and the dance floor thinned, leaving a few left dancing—including Pete and me.
Across the distance, we smirked at each other. He like a wolf, bonfire light flickering over his tan expanse, and me like a vivacious coquette (I hoped), twisting a strand of my hair. Then Pete swaggered over to me, head bowed slightly aside. When he was close enough that I could trace his scars with my eyes, he took my hand and twirled me like a ballerina in a jewelry box until I burst with laughter.
My tipsiness evident now, I gleamed up at him. “From how you looked a minute ago, I didn’t think you liked dancing.”
“I don’t. Especially when it’s no more than hedonistic gyration.”
“Come on now, dude. I saw what your young adulthood was like on Earth. Hedonism comes second nature to you.”
“Mm.” What a deep, belly-fluttering sound that was. “Then I simply lack the grace for such free movement.” He was abigguy, after all. “Christ, I’ve struggled to keep up with the slowest, most structured dances. My cousin once tried to teach me the minuet. I hobbled her so that she couldn’t dance at her own wedding.”
“I’ve never hobbled anyone, but I get having two left feet. I usually avoid dancing in public.”
“In public, hm?” Pete’s grin slanted. “Does that mean youdodance in private?”
Whoo!I fought the urge to fan myself as heat flamed up my neck—and as Pete pulled me closer. “Yes.” I smiled like a doof in the framework of his arms. “All the time, actually. In front of my bedroom mirror, using my hairbrush as a microphone, so my droves of invisible fans can hear me sing along to my iBloom.”
“They have my sympathies.”
My amusement burbled again. Either that or a string of burps. Perhaps both. I’d had a good amount of some fruity, fizzy libation that night. I didn’t know what it was made of, but I’d made sure it wasn’t moonberries.
Who needed an aphrodisiac, anyway? Emboldened by the glory of the night, I palmed the smooth, warm, sinewy globe of Pete’s bare shoulder. Goddess, I wanted to bite into it.
“You know you wish you were a fly on the wall in my bedroom,” I teased.
Snap!went the tension between us, though I was baffled it could get any tighter. And those molasses cookie eyes—they hummed, saying Pete might prefer to be closer than the wall.
My breath shuddered as I watched the pulse accelerate in his neck. I nearly trailed my hand up to graze it. “So—about this affinity bond—”
Pete huffed, peering skyward.
“What’s so significant about it? Besides it making you my anchor—which you very obviously are, if you haven’t—”
“I saw it, Shorty. I kent I was grounding you through the summoning, though, aye, I doubted Myrrdin at first.”
My lips pursed. “I don’t know about that. I don’t think you doubted him so much as hoped he was wrong.”
He exhaled again.
“So, what is an affinity bond and why don’t you want one?”
