brought his head up. It was his phone. Out on her kitchen table in his jacket. “And our work night is just beginning. That’s me. Will you excuse me?”
“Sure.”
As he got out of bed, he stretched and felt his spine crack back into place. Crossing over to the door, he opened things, strode out to his leather jacket and palmed his phone.
“Hello?” he said. “Yes. Okay, sure. Yup. Ah . . . give me twenty minutes? Okay, thanks. Bye.”
Ending the call, he stared at the Samsung for a moment. Then he pivoted around. Helania was in the doorway to her bedroom, her spectacularly naked body such a sight, he lost his train of thought.
“You don’t have to explain yourself,” she said gently. “You have a life to get back to, and I am not asking for an accounting—”
“It’s about my father.”
She frowned. “Is there anything I can do?”
“I just have to go deal with some unpleasantness, but I’ve known it was coming. One way or the other, it’s all going to be okay.”
Walking over to his female, he took her face in his hands and let his eyes roam around her features, his mind memorizing each one of them sure as if he were never going to be with her again.
“When can I see you?” he whispered.
Helania’s smile was so beautiful, he felt like his heart expanded to fill his entire body.
“Whenever you want.” She lifted up onto her tiptoes and kissed his mouth. “I’m just here.”
“Well, my friends Craeg and Paradise asked me to a late First Meal tonight. Would you like to join us?”
“Really?” The shy happiness that came over her made her glow. “I would love to.”
“It’s a date. I’ll text you the where and when ASAP.”
“Okay. I’ll meet you wherever.”
Boone pulled her into his chest and just held her against his naked body. The contact was instantly electric, but he couldn’t give in to temptaion. He was liable to not resurface until the dawn.
Days and days from now.
And given where he was headed, he had to be good right now so he wasn’t late. Besides, if the Scribe Virgin so provided, this would be far from the last time he had a chance to be with Helania.
“I can’t wait to see you again,” he said as he put his chin on the top of her head. “And I’ll be counting down the eight minutes until I do.”
As she laughed, he felt the reverberation in his own flesh.
“Good deal,” she said as she looked up at him. “I’ll be doing the same.”
As Boone rematerialized on the front stoop of his house, he was distracted by the slideshow of Helania that was playing on the backs of his eyelids. And what do you know, he especially liked the image of her as the bedroom light had come on when they’d first been making love, her body arched as she rode him, her hands capturing her hair and holding it up, her breasts spectacular as they swayed to the undulations of her hips—
Wait, what he was doing?
Oh, right. The door. He was trying to open the front door to the house, but the thing wasn’t budging.
Frowning, he looked around—just to make sure he had the right mansion. Yup. Those were his bedroom windows.
He tried the brass latch again with his hand and then made an attempt with his mind—but obviously things were copper, so he was unable to will the lock to release. As a last resort, he put his shoulder into the heavy panels—which was stupid because it wasn’t a case of the door being jammed. All he got was a sore spot.
Backing up into the snowy yard, he checked out all the windows. The daylight shutters had risen and he could see all the familiar things he’d grown up with through the panes of old-fashioned glass. Then he glanced over the grounds. Nothing particularly out of place. No tire tracks that were fresh. No strange scents.
So it wasn’t as if Marquist had packed up his crap, moved out, and locked things behind himself.
Refocusing, Boone was not about to use the knocker on his own goddamn house.
Looking around again, he marched over to the hedges that anchored the front flower beds. Behind one of them, there was a garden hose that was wound about a heavy metal holder. The hose was not attached to the spigot because of the cold, and the whole setup probably should have been put away for the winter. But hey, it was his